William was sad upon leaving the treasure trove of Greater Fire Shards behind, electing to return later when the time was right. It didn't matter how long he stayed anyway; the cave was so large that it would take decades to extract everything by himself.
I would rather not spend ten years mining, though. William thought as he tunneled through a pile of rubble. He layered Ice Magic on the surface of the tunnel, temporarily reinforcing the walls so it wouldn't collapse until after they had passed through.
Carl returned to his previous assignment of barricading their rear, the short rest enough for him to recover about half of his Mana Reserve. He still couldn't use many Mana Regeneration Pills since the impurities of the pill hadn't been expelled yet, though.
With William by his side, it didn't matter that he couldn't recover his Mana. If anything, Carl felt much safer than he normally would, even compared to being escorted by Nascent Soul bodyguards.
