When aran finally opened his eyes, he was lying on a bed. Bright sunlight was coming from the window and it was almost afternoon. Since he had immediately used a first aid, high-ranked healing potion before losing consciousness, some of his wounds had gotten healed faster than Elissa's.
He was happy to know his luck was still on his side. Without worrying about anything else, he looked at his hand and the ring was still there. He immediately took out another bottle of healing potion from his ring and drank it. After that, as he slowly turned his head he saw Arrax sitting on the right side of his bed.
" Haahh " After a deep breath he asked,
" How long has it been? "
Arrax let out a smile looking at aran still being casual after almost dying. But for aran, it had become a usual thing.
" Three days! " Arrax replied.
" Well, it was faster than I expected. Thank you for saving me! "
After realising that he is out of danger, as he slowly turned left he saw Elissa, who was lying on the bed next to his. She was still unconscious. Although her bleeding had stopped, some of her wounds still hasn't healed.
Aran took out another healing potion from his ring and gave it to arrax and told him to pour it into Elissa's mouth. Arrax took the potion and jumped to Elissa's bed, and did as aran said.
" So? Did you get what I asked for? " Aran asked, but it made arrax a little furious.
" What? With all the things that happened, that's what you are worried about? "
Arrax wasn't happy about what happened. Although they hadn't gotten close enough to care about each other, he was angry about aran putting his life on the line for some stupid stone.
" With all the things that happened, I at least need something, to think that it was all worth it. So, did you get it or not? "
" Yeah, yeah, I got it! Here, take this. Let me see what big help is this tiny stone! " Arrax said as he gave the stone to aran with his tiny hands.
The pure primordial stone was a crimson diamond-shaped stone. It wasn't a stone that contained dense mana energy like the spirit stones, but it had a unique power to instantly absorb a tremendous amount of mana, directly from nature.
As aran took the baseball-sized stone, he put that into his ring. And said,
" I will be taking a little more rest. Wake me up immediately if she wakes up! " Aran said and Arrax tilted his head.
Although aran knew that most of his wounds will heal in less than three or four hours due to the high-ranked potion's effect, which was specially made by the professor, he had to wait a little longer for his damaged mana points to heal. So he again close his eyes and went back to his sleep.
****
After a few hours when aran woke up again, it was already dark outside and Elissa was still unconscious but she looked better than how she looked in the morning.
Since using a lot of healing potions and pills regularly could get his body permanently damaged, he chose not to use another healing potion on her.
After waking up, aran slowly got off of his bed and tried to stretch his body a little but it seemed like it still takes two or three days for him properly recover.
As aran sat down on his bed and tried to summon mana, he could easily summon the heavenly mana, but when he tried to summon the demonic mana his whole body started aching.
After a while, the old manager visited that room with two bowls of soup for them. Although the old man had thought about waking them up, when he entered the room, he saw aran was already awake.
After giving a bowl to aran, when the old man tried to wake Elissa, Aran stopped him and took out a high-ranked food potion from his rings and gave it to him.
" Her wounds are still severe, she needs some more rest. So, don't wake her up. Pour this into her mouth, she will be alright !"
Aran said as he drank the soup. Without any questions, the old man did what aran said.
The old man had used all the food potions he had, on them while they were sleeping. He didn't have any food pills or potions left. That was why he wanted to wake them up.
Although aran thought the old man might question what happened, he just poured the food potions into Elissa's mouth and left after telling aran to take a rest. It seemed he had guessed something, but Aran didn't give a lot of thought to that.
Since Elissa hadn't woken up, aran also drank her bowl of soup too.
After the manager left, aran slowly got up and took the living storage ring from Elissa's finger and started to walk out of the inn.
" Do you really want to walk around with that wounds?"
When arrax who was still sitting on his bed asked this,
" I'm fine! " Aran replied and he just continued to walk and Arrax followed him.
They got out of the inn and Aran walked towards the empty spot, close to the inn which he had already chosen. The spot was a little away from the Inn and it was completely dark.
After getting there, Aran summoned the book and learned a formation and he slowly started drawing the formation on the floor.
The formation was very large and very difficult, so it took him nearly half an hour to completely draw it using the stored demonic mana in his ring.
After that, he threw the primordial stone to the centre of the formation to activate the mana letters. As he activated the letters, the stone started to shine red as it began to float ten feet high. With that, the surroundings lightened up red.
Since it was only a mid-ranked formation, Aran knew, he doesn't need any other stones to activate it. After that, he took out all fourteen cultivators from both of the living storage rings into the formation. When the bandits got out of their rings, they were still alive but their injuries hadn't fully healed because they had nothing but mana inside the ring to heal their wounds.
When they got out, they were terrified at first thinking that the enemies might be waiting to ambush them but when they got out, all they could see was a familiar stone shining red, floating on top of their heads and a teenage boy standing close to them with a cat. The bandits were relieved to know that they are not going to die. But their feeling only lasted until they tried to move.
When the bandits tried to move, they couldn't even move their fingers. It made them terrified again. They wanted to scream for help but they couldn't do that either. They were not only in their worst shape but also completely restrained.
Aran was planning on using a dark art formation to absorb the bandits' life force to increase his demonic cultivation. That was the reason why he stopped Elissa from killing them.
When aran first planned that, he thought, he might feel guilty. He thought he might not be able to go through that process, since it will end up killing the bandits. But now that he had almost died fighting the bandits and he couldn't think of any reason why he shouldn't kill them, there was guilt in his heart. Instead, he was thrilled to know that he will get one step close after this. Because deep down, aran wasn't that good of a person.
After making sure that everything is in its place, one last time aran activated the formation. As the formation got activated, the restraints of the bandits' bodies stopped but before they could even think about moving, their life force started to get sucked out of their souls.
As the bandits' life force was leaving their souls, they started to scream and beg for their life but aran simply ignored them. It didn't last more than thirty seconds. Since aran had chosen a place with the right amount of distance away from the inn and there weren't any houses close by, no one heard their scream.
Even when the bandits were screaming for mercy, there wasn't even a single drop of guilt on Aran's face. Looking at that Arrax realised, aran wasn't the nice teenager he knew until then. He started to see a unique potential in aran, which he didn't see until then. It was then, arrax realised, Aran can get dirtier for power, than anyone he had ever seen in his life.
After completely losing the life force, the bodies of the bandits had shrunken as if their blood had been sucked out of their bodies. As aran deactivated the formation, the floating stone fell to the floor. After taking the dead bodies back into the rings and collecting the stone, aran slowly walked towards the inn.
***
On the next day in the morning, when aran was having his breakfast in his bed, Elissa slowly opened her eyes. As she turned her head, she saw aran in a bed next to hers. It was arrax who first noticed her and he showed it to aran. Looking at her, aran greeted her good morning but Elissa remained silent. She might have been wondering how she was alive.
After finishing his breakfast, he left his room, to inform the old man because he knew, the old man really care about her, although he didn't know why. He had guessed that he might think of her as his granddaughter or something. Aran didn't ask Elissa about it because he simply didn't care.
He informed the news to old man because he thought he might be happy to hear it. When the old man heard that, he immediately took a bowl of soup and went to see Elissa.
When the old man saw Elissa woken up, he was overflowing with joy. He sat close to her and started to feed her the soup with a spoon.
After a while, Elissa slowly got up from her bed and after stretching a little, she got out of the inn. Aran was sitting at a table on the porch with arrax. He was drinking coffee.
Elissa slowly walked towards him and sat down at the table facing him. Aran immediately poured a cup for Elissa and passed it to her.
As Elissa started to take the sips of the coffee, she started to wonder what to say, because despite aran telling her not to act on her feelings, she had risked both of their lives. Although she could have argued that he could have just let her die there and it was not his business, it seemed rude to say that. So she started by thanking him.
" Thank you! "
" For what? "
" For saving me. Although I don't know how you did that. "
"It's fine! " Aran replied.
" So, what happened? "
" What do you mean, what happened? "
" I was surrounded by almost twenty bandits and there was no way of escaping. How did you survive? How did I survive? "
" I don't know, I also got fainted and when I got up, I was here! The old man said that some stranger carried us here! "
" What? That doesn't make any sense. "
" Yeah. I thought so too. But who cares. Im just happy that I'm alive." Aran said as he got up.
" We are leaving tomorrow. The bandits might look for us if we stayed here for long. I don't want this to end like your last time " Aran continued. But before he could leave, Elissa asked
" What about the bandits and their storage rings we collected? "
" We will give the bandits to the guild and seel the rings! Is that okay for you? "
" Yeah! " Elissa said.
After hearing that, aran left for his room. After a while, Elissa also went back to take some rest. When she asked the old man about the one who saved them, he also said the same thing aran said and she decided to let it go without thinking a lot.
On the next day, both of them got prepared and they got their horses back, from the old man. As they were about to leave, the old man asked Elissa to stay for a little while but Elissa refused and said that she will regularly visit after that. The old man was happy with that.
After saying goodbye to the old man, they both left from there and started their return journey. Since the cult will be busy with preparations, expecting a battle, aran knew that they won't look for them in the town. So he was sure that it won't end up like the last time.