"Let me down!"Despite her injuries, a punctured lung that caused breathlessness, and almost drowning in her own blood, Lilith Porter was still behaving feistily.
"I will once we are out of their reach," I a.s.sured her.
"Your help is unnecessary," Lilith told me coldly. "Even without your a.s.sistance, I could have handled them myself."
That wasn"t what I saw, but whatever. Admittedly, her h.e.l.lfire Bear was immense and would have wiped the floor with those dudes if that shadowy a.s.sa.s.sin guy didn"t backstab her. Actually, what the h.e.l.l was she doing, allowing the shadowy a.s.sa.s.sin to sneak up on her like that? One of the tenets of being a summoner was to never let your guard down even after you completed casting your summoning spell, for that was when your opponent will work even harder to take you down when he realized he couldn"t defeat your Soul Beast.
Not that I was going to tell her that, but whatever.
Above, Corvus squawked to inform me that there was no longer any student or monster in the vicinity, and I mentally instructed Pegasus to stop. He did so, and I allowed Lilith to jump down. She staggered for a moment, and then sat down cross-legged at the base of a tree.
"Hmph…well, I suppose I should thank you for saving my life, at least."
Lilith seemed to want to say that I actually saved her from something else, but the experience was so traumatic and horrifying that she didn"t put that into words and instead settled for that choice of words. Arguably, she was about to lose something that might arguably be just important as her life, so it made sense.
"What are you, a tsundere?" I demanded. Lilith flushed and looked away.
"Hey, I at least have some manners, you know? You helped me, and I owe you. I"ll definitely repay this debt."
"No, you don"t have to. I chose to help you myself. You don"t owe me anything."
Knowing the clichés and iron-clad laws of web novels, light novels or manga, the repayment of debt often included something as ridiculous as romantic relations.h.i.+ps or marriage. I sure as h.e.l.l didn"t want anything to do with that.
Lilith regarded me, annoyed. "It"s not what you"re thinking…"
She then erupted into a coughing fit, blood flying from her mouth. Grimacing, she held her chest and tried desperately to stem the wound. With a sigh, she closed her eyes and straightened her posture. I watched as crimson mana began to shroud her body.
"Sorry…I"ll have to ask you for another request. I need you to watch over me…ensure n.o.body attacks me while I try to heal from this injury."
"Okay."
I recognized the healing spell that Lilith was attempting to cast as very rudimentary. h.e.l.l, it was the same basic healing spell that Dad knew. It wasn"t enough to make them a healer-type mage, and was often used to heal very light injuries such as slight burns, shallow cuts, sc.r.a.pes or bruises. It certainly wasn"t enough to heal severe injuries, not unless you did the same thing as Lilith and continuously cast the d.a.m.ned spell for two hours straight.
That was why she requested that I watched over her, to ensure she didn"t get a.s.saulted while focusing on recuperating from such a fatal wound. It seemed that she was determined not to lose her blood token and get kicked out of the Spiritual Road…yet.
Too bad I didn"t have any healing Constellation spirit. It sucked, but I couldn"t summon a healing Constellation spirit just because I imagined it. There were limits to my imagination, so I couldn"t just imagine an invincible Constellation spirit and expect it to be invincible when I summoned it. I was also bound to the rules I had established for my constellation theme, so there was no stupid shenanigans such as summoning a tiger and pretending it was Leo, or pretending Corvus was a dragon or drake or such nonsense.
The limits of my magic were also displayed by the fact that I couldn"t summon sentient or human-type spirits, which was why all my human constellations were summoned in weapon forms. That was something I could never summon, none of my Soul Beasts could ever be sentient or a human. That was a little sad, but that was how it worked.
Therefore healing magic was out.
This wasn"t to say that my system or the rules I had established forbade it completely. If there was a Constellation that had something to do with healing, such as Ophiuchus, for example, then I theoretically should be able to summon a healing spirit. However, I wasn"t a Mary Sue protagonist who could master all elements, otherwise I might as well be a G.o.d, and everyone would be following my example to become a Versatile Mage capable of casting multiple elements. Most mages focused on a specific element and specialize only in it, often locking themselves to a single attribute, such as fire or ice. Theoretically, people could specialize in multiple elements, but no one could claim to master every single element on earth. That was why elemental mages often didn"t know how to cast healing spells, and healing mages weren"t very adept at combat magic.
Furthermore, I had already done my very best to learn as many different types of elements as possible. h.e.l.l, I barely managed to learn the five different elements for my Celestial Guardians, and for my Constellation magic, I couldn"t even do any wind magic. I never bothered to learn spells from the wind element. Five elements were my limit, and I will be honest, my elemental spells were the most basic of basic. I could never learn the intermediate or advanced elemental spells, not unless I one day chose to focus and specialize on one of them. They were powerful, yeah, but that was only because I infused a lot of mana into the basic spells. Even the simplest of spells would possess the power of a nuke if you infuse it with several megatons of mana.
Healing was no different. It was a completely different type of magic from elemental magic, and I had already invested so much time and effort in learning the basic spells of the five elements in order to create my elemental type Constellation spirits to the point that I didn"t have the luxury or s.p.a.ce to branch out into healing magic and summoning healing spirits. It was like jumping into a new major in the middle of your university years, after you spent two years on your previous major learning computer science, only to suddenly decide that you want to switch to liberal arts after all. You were not going to convert all that previous knowledge of computer science into writing essays for liberal arts. You will have to learn everything, including theory and content and knowledge from scratch. Similarly, healing magic was a whole new branch of magic that was completely different from elemental magic, and diving into it after spending so much time learning elemental and summoning magic was just impractical. Only a Mary Sue would be capable of doing everything and mastering everything while graduating at the top of her cla.s.ses and becoming the number one mage or whatever while maintaining her super popularity and beautiful looks. I was not a Mary Sue.
In other words, I wouldn"t be able to summon a healing Constellation spirit, not unless I decided to spend another few years trying to learn a whole new branch of magic. I would much rather develop the magic I already learned and start on the path of advancing my basic elemental spells toward intermediate and advanced. Right now, the only element I had moved toward advanced was wood magic, which was how my Green Dragon techniques were so…complex. And also the reason why he ended up being my last Celestial Guardian that I summoned (barring Golden Kirin, but that"s a whole new subject altogether).
And just like that, two hours pa.s.sed. As expected, despite the agonizingly slow process, Lilith succeeded in healing her injury. Not fully, but at least she restored herself to the point where she was no longer debilitated by a punctured lung, and her life was certainly no longer in danger. While she did so, I observed her, and was amazed by how beautiful she was. Not that I cared, because as I said, physical appearances meant jack all. That didn"t mean I didn"t appreciate beauty, especially since I was a normal, healthy guy.
I just wasn"t immature enough to be swayed by it to the point I thought with nothing but the lower half of my body.
"Are you all right?" I asked her when she opened her eyes. She nodded. Sighing in relief, I watched as she stood up. When she swayed unsteadily, I stepped forward to help her, but she waved me away.
"I"m fine."
I wasn"t sure if it was her pride or mistrust, but I backed off obediently.
"Who were those guys? Why were they attacking you? I think they said something about Ji Xuan? About bringing you to meet him? What does he want to do with you?"
"…"
Lilith studied me for a moment, and then she sighed and shook her head.
"Don"t take it the wrong way. I"m grateful for your help, but please…don"t pry into my affairs."
In other words, her business had absolutely nothing to do with me, so I should stop asking. That was fine. I understood her need for privacy. Moreover, I was some random stranger. As kind as I seemed, and even though I had saved her, she couldn"t just trust me so easily. For all she knew, I could have my own sinister motives for helping her out.
Honestly, though, I didn"t want anything in return. So I just nodded.
"You look familiar, though." Lilith was studying me, her lips pursed and her pretty brow furrowed in puzzlement. "Where have I seen you before?"
"I a.s.sure you, this is the first time we"ve met. I"ve never seen you before. Perhaps you"ve mistaken me for someone else?"
"Maybe." Lilith didn"t look convinced. She took a deep breath and bowed her head slightly. "I"m Lilith Porter of Vermillion Academy. Thank you very much for helping me."
Did she say Vermillion Academy? Where did I hear that name before? I was pretty sure I just recently heard about Vermillion Academy not too long ago. It had nothing with me visiting them or interacting with their students, but something I heard second-hand. And I was pretty sure it had something to do with the Porter clan too. Right, was it my dad who told me something about Vermillion Academy? What did he say about it again?
I couldn"t remember. It probably wasn"t anything important.
"No, it"s nothing." I raised a hand and waved. "If you"re all right, then I"ll get going then. Be careful and take care of yourself."
"Wait!"
Lilith called out before I could depart the clearing. I turned back to her, raising an eyebrow quizzically.
"Could you at least tell me your name?" Lilith fidgeted a little, her face red. "I still owe you for saving me. Like I said, I promise to repay the debt."
"And like I said earlier, there is no need to. I chose to help you on my own. I didn"t do it so that you"ll owe me."
"Even so…" Lilith looked reluctant. "I would like to at least know the name of the person who helped me, if that is all right with you."
"Richard Huang, Jing Tian Academy." I lowered my head humbly. "Well, I"ll see you next time, Miss Lilith."
"R…Richard?!" Lilith stammered. In an instant, she reached out and grabbed my shoulder, preventing me from leaving. "Wait! Don"t tell me you are…?!"
"Miss, I don"t know what you"re thinking, but I"m pretty sure you"re mistaking me for someone else."
"No!" Lilith insisted adamantly, her eyes bright as she shook her head. "I"m sure you are Huang Shun Yin"s son!"
Then everything came back to me and I abruptly understood why the Porter clan and Vermillion Academy sounded so familiar to me.
My dad had just only recently told me about the years he spent in Vermillion High, working with the Porter clan!