The Ascension of the Celestial Priest

28; The Aftermath.

Lukas took a deep breath. The battle just now was too dangerous, from the use of his Sigil, to their knight dangerously pulling the attention of the Rat King and finally to the ultimate use of their most powerful far-reaching spells, everything has been done on point and without hesitation. And for once he was glad he was surrounded by people who actually understand and listen.

The stench was now rising to unheavenly levels, the smell grating inside their noses but at the moment no one cared. All of them were heavily breathing, their minds strained and tired but their hearts grateful for surviving the calamity. They couldn't believe they passed through the ordeal. If it wasn't for the priest they once looked down upon, they probably would have already been a meal for the dirty rats and the thought of them being chewed under their elongated teeth and their dark beady eyes raised goose bumps all over their skins.

"Look what I found." Rexsi said. In one of his hands he had a small dark stone, barely his hand's breadth gleaming in a dark luster while his other hand held what could only be a severed rat's head, its dark blood trailing from behind and across the gruesome havoc they had created.

He threw the head directly in front of them which elicited a response from almost everyone.

"God Rexsi..." Lukas complained.

"Why did you bring such a thing here? We can barely breathe." Mira shot a tired glare at him. Rexsi was just about to settle into his classic smirk before his face twitched when he remembered that the c*****e he had just witnessed was wrought by the hands of the young demoness, so it was probably for the best he didn't provoke her.

"I found the rat's king body deader than dead." He opened his hands, "But in its carcass, I also found an inner core which kind of resonated with me. This meant that the rat king possessed a silver of the shadow element, explaining why it was hard to lock on into it."

The rest of them nodded while Renesme had a strange expression... "Then this could mean its fate was meant to end." She mused.

"What do mean?" Mira asked.

"Right before you cast your spells, Lukas had sent a powerful flare, meant to daze the beasts into a stupor." She said. Lukas was taken aback when he heard his name. "But it was also at that moment that his Light pierced the beast's elemental shadow rendering it asunder. Your Purgatory spell would have never been able to harm it as much it did if it had its element as its defense."

It dawned on everyone as they all stared at Lukas in wonder. A little embarrassed, Lukas brushed off the attention. "It was all of our efforts that allowed us to survive at all."

"Geoff" Mira suddenly whispered under the dimly lit hall. Their Knight Geoff was barely walking, staggering as he let his huge shield down together his sword. He leaned beside the wall with deep breaths and muted gasps as Mira walked up to him, her beautiful face lined with deep worry.

Seeing Geoff in such conditions, Lukas immediately knelled beside him as he tried to see the extent of his injuries.

"Will he be okay?" Mira asked. Ever since she was little, Geoff had been her childhood friend for as long as she could remember. Even after she had awakened her gift of elemental Fire and Geoff was found lacking; where she was sent to The Tabernacle of Flames Sect to be trained while Geoff was sent to the Martial Sect, it wasn't enough to separate them as they jointly took their Adventurer's Qualifying exam together. She as a Fire Mage and him as her knight formed a perfect team as they regarded each other close than ever. So seeing Geoff with such injuries bothered her more than she could ever admit.

"Don't worry, with me here, I can at least him recover some strength." Lukas said. It was him who had proposed for Geoff to risk his life by taunting the Rat King. Although it was all for the purpose of pining down the beast so it wouldn't escape, the amount of danger he had faced at that precise time surpassed his very strength.

All this while Geoff had wore his helmet and the moment when Mira helped him take off Lukas froze. With short wavy hair, striking silver eyes and a kind but courageous smile, Lukas felt his body stagger in response and it seemed like hours passed before Geoff got visibly uncomfortable as he spoke. "Are my wounds worse they appear?"

Lukas snapped out of his reverie while being little regretful he had stared at him so intensely. "No your wounds are not that serious. I can do something about them once I have recovered a little more mana."

He quickly collected himself before he took note of everything around him and spoke "Rexsi circle the nearby tunnels and keep a watch out”

Rexsi looked up in surprise. "We should be safe right…The rat king and all his underlings are all dead."

Renesme glanced at Lukas deeply before she answered "we might seem safe but we are at our most vulnerable. Nearly all of our strength and support have been drained and in case there happens to be another creature in here then we might really be done for"

Mira paled while Lukas gave her a comforting smile. Looking around them again he immediately changed his thoughts. "Renesme go keep watch on our surroundings while Rexsi collects all these bodies together under one pile for a complete purge after Mira recovers some of her mana." then he added "Don't forget to take the rat king's head. It's a good proof that this mission was no longer simple as we had been told. We can demand for more p*****t the moment we return."

They all unanimously agreed while Rexsi's face blanched in turn. He was just about to refute when he looked around and immediately understood Lukas's arrangements. He was the only one that could deal with all the dead beasts something which the rest of the girls would definitely not do. Grumbling with a heavy sigh he pulled himself together and then started stockpiling all of the burnt rats, the foul odor suffocating him, making his eyes water as he helplessly pushed through trying to finish as fast as humanly possible.

Lukas heaved in appreciation before he turned to the nearby Mira after seeing Renesme gracefully walking away to keep watch.

"Don't worry and start meditating so you can collect some mana. Leave him to me."

Mira looked at Lukas and then at Geoff, who nodded towards her before she detached herself from his side, crossed her legs and then took a deep breath absorbing the ambient mana from the surrounding space. At the same time Luka collected himself, gathering enough focus and mana to prepare for the complicated spell he was yet about to cast. The kind of spell he had spent countless days to master.