Chapter 98: Similarities To Origin Energy

"Can you pull back your mana a little? It’s making it difficult for my Faith to work," she said.

"Okay," Alex replied as he started reducing the mana circulating through his body.

The hardened mana supporting his wounds gradually weakened, and at the same time, he accidentally lowered the output of Battle Instinct Spell. He had maintained the spell for so long that adjusting one had unintentionally affected the other.

The pain hit him all at once.

Every injury that Battle Instinct Spell had been suppressing made itself known in that single instant. Broken bones, torn flesh, and the punctured lung all screamed at him together.

Alex immediately pushed Battle Instinct Spell back to full strength, and the pain faded almost as quickly as it had appeared.

Cold sweat gathered at his temple. That brief moment was enough to remind him how valuable the spell really was. Without it, fighting while carrying injuries like these would have been nearly impossible. Even now, he doubted he could stay conscious if he had to endure the pain constantly.

Sophia and Charlotta continued healing him while Alex slowly released the hardened mana sealing his injuries. He couldn’t remove it all at once. Their healing wasn’t fast enough for that, and opening every wound at the same time would only cause him to lose too much blood before they could repair the damage.

The treatment took longer than Alex expected. With nothing else to occupy him, he began training the Battle Instinct Spell.

He could already feel that he wasn’t far from learning the Advanced Battle Instinct Spell.

His concentration had already reached a level he believed matched the advanced version. The real issue was that the spell boosted everything at once. Every sense, every thought, and every instinct were pushed into overdrive, even when some of them didn’t need to be.

The solution seemed straightforward. He needed to figure out which parts of his mind actually benefited from being enhanced and which parts could remain at normal levels. That would take experimentation, but it didn’t sound impossible.

As the healing continued, the little girl Charlotta suddenly began wiping tears from her eyes. Sophia wasn’t much better. She bit her lower lip while continuing to channel Faith, her expression growing heavier by the second.

Since Faith let them sense the condition of the body they were healing, both of them knew exactly how serious Alex’s injuries had been. Alex noticed their reactions, but Battle Instinct Spell kept his thoughts rational, and calm.

Instead of worrying about how they felt, he found himself thinking about Faith itself. Unlike Mana or Aura, Faith entered another Ascendant’s body without much resistance, making it similar to Origin Energy in a way.

There was another difference as well. Every Mage’s Mana was unique, just as every Warrior’s Aura was unique.

Alex had already confirmed that after asking his friends to show him their Mana and Aura. None of them had been able to freely use their energy inside another Mage or Warrior’s body, or boost another person with their energy.

So why could Faith work on other people? More importantly, Charlotta’s and Sophia’s Faith didn’t interfere with each other the way Aura or Mana would.

Alex wanted to know. From what he understood, Mana was the most versatile energy. It could reinforce the body like Aura and sustain stamina like Faith. Its only drawbacks were that it was incredibly difficult to control and extremely dangerous to manipulate.

Still, Alex continued observing the Faith flowing through his body as Sophia and Charlotta healed him. Who knew? Maybe what he learned now would one day help him discover how to heal himself with Mana. He wasn’t about to waste such a rare opportunity. Moreover, he was having fun learning.

Faith could still enter his body, but only because he had lowered the concentration of mana inside himself. If he compressed too much mana, Sophia’s Faith found it hard to enter his body, which explained why she had asked him to retract it.

Even more interestingly, the moment he consciously thought of resisting the incoming Faith, it suddenly became much harder for it to enter his body.

It was almost as though he had instinctively gained some kind of protection against it. How did that happen?

Why did Faith behave differently from Mana and Aura? What allowed it to enter another person’s body when the other two energies couldn’t, but Origin Energy could?

Alex couldn’t answer those questions yet, but he quietly stored the observations away for later.

The healing continued for quite a while. Together, Sophia and Charlotta repaired the hole in his lung and chest before mending the broken bones throughout his body.

They also healed most of the larger injuries, but the smaller cuts remained because they had nearly exhausted all of their Faith.

They had healed him repeatedly, waited for their Faith to recover, and then continued healing again. By the time they finished, both of them looked mentally drained, and Charlotta was barely hiding her exhaustion.

Alex slowly stood up and rolled his shoulders, testing how his body felt.

It was much better than before. He gradually lowered the output of Battle Instinct Spell, allowing the pain to return little by little.

It was still there, but it was no longer the blinding agony he had experienced earlier. Now it was simply an ache spread throughout his body, reminding him that he still wasn’t fully recovered.

Alex smiled and gently rubbed the little girl’s head.

"Thank you. The next time we stop somewhere safe, I’ll show you some magic," he said.

Charlotta’s tired face immediately brightened. She happily ran back to Ophelia, most likely to tell her mother that Alex had praised her and promised to show her magic.

Watching her excitement, Alex smiled faintly before reaching into his backpack and taking out the Gene Potential left behind by the Level 14 Doom Bull.

He held it out toward Sophia.

"This is for you," he said.

Sophia looked at it before quietly shaking her head. "You should give it to Miss Rae instead. She’s already a very good shot with her rifle, and if increasing her Constitution can heal her legs, she’ll be able to help everyone a lot more than I can."

Alex watched her for a moment, making sure she truly meant what she said. Seeing that she wasn’t refusing out of politeness, he nodded.

They had no way of knowing whether Constitution would heal Miss Rae’s legs, but it was worth trying. As for Faith, it clearly wasn’t capable of treating an old injury like that yet. They would probably have to reach much higher Levels before that became possible.

"Alright. And good job during the fight with the Doom Bull," Alex said.

"I didn’t fight." Sophia gave him a wry smile.

"You stayed behind at the right distance so you could heal anyone who got injured without putting yourself in danger. You didn’t panic, and you didn’t run away. That’s something worth acknowledging," Alex replied.

A genuine smile slowly appeared on Sophia’s face.

"Thank you," she said.

..

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