Chapter 194: Learning the Truth

Tyler only watched the fortress and everything around it vanish for a moment as he immediately teleported back to the castle in an instant. He had let his anger get the best of him and had consumed all his mana with the last few skills he used.

Warp creation was the highest level skill in his Spatial skill series and as such, consumed an absurd amount of mana. In the end, he had forced himself to use it twice despite his current state, and thus he was beginning to feel the side effects as his vision went white the moment he and Liz appeared in the main hall of the castle with the last of his strength.

He felt a wave of exhaustion wash over him and immediately lost consciousness but his fall was caught by Zelda who had instinctively sensed their arrival and moved to greet him. Her shadowy figure rushing towards him was the last thing he saw before he passed out.

'Yes... That's it. Just a little more. It won't be long now.'

Like a fading thought in the distance, Tyler awoke from his slumber with a staggering headache and a growling stomach as he felt like he had heard something in his dreams but could not remember what it was for the life of him. His eyelids felt heavy but he still forced them open as he saw a word-class Beauty above him saying something but his ears were ringing and thus could not hear her.

His eyes darted around the room he was in and notice it was just his office. It seems he was currently lying on Rain's lap as she spoke to him but he still couldn't hear her. As his eyes moved, he soon noticed someone entering the room and Tyler turned his head to take a proper look. 

Two figures had walked in one after their other as they approached him with a relieved look on one of their faces as the other was wearing a mask. One of these figures was Albert who seemed to have almost fully recovered from his previous injuries although he hadn't sustained many injuries and had just exhausted himself completely so it wasn't something a low-grade potion couldn't fix.

The other figure to enter the room was Zomatsu who was dressed in his usual outfit with his mask on. They seemed to have been waiting outside for Tyler to wake up and had entered when they heard Rain's voice.

Noticing Tyler couldn't hear their greetings, Albert quickly brought out a potion from his storage ring and offered it for Tyler to drink. As they both knelt before him and waited.

This was a rare mana recovery potion as they knew Tyler was suffering from mana deprivation after using so many skills and spells in rapid successions. Even someone with an absurd amount of mana reserves like him would surely suffer from this if they were that reckless with their abilities.

Tyler could understand Albert's intentions even with the headache that currently plagued him so he promptly drank the potion and relaxed for a moment. As he felt his mana being restored, his hearing slowly returning back to him and he could finally hear Rain's worried tone as she asked how he was feeling. He replied in the affirmative but Tyler thought he may have gone too far this time.

However, as he felt his mana recovering slowly from the effects of the mid-grade mana potion, he also felt something familiar happening within him as he could feel that his already massive mana reserves had increased yet again just like the last time in the forest. 

He hadn't understood what had happened back then but from what he knew now, he guessed that his innate ability, Potential Break, maybe the cause of this as it was probably still passively affecting his body without permission. However, this didn't feel like a good thing because his mana body was currently still damaged.

He could feel the mana struggling to fit in his mana body and the sheer amount of energy in there was threatening to choke him. For now, he would need to constantly use a spell every so often so as to avoid an overload.

However, his physical body wasn't in the best shape to handle this with the whole negative corruption and all. Still, it was best not to worry anyone about that especially since he had found out a way to fix it thanks to the Dark Garuda. In the end, giving that guys soul to that monster had turned out to be a great thing.

"How long was I out?"

He spoke to Albert who was kneeling before him next to Zomatsu and Albert answered frankly.

"Twenty-four hours my Lord."

"Is that so? You both don't have to keep kneeling there you know. Just have a seat. Anyway, how's everyone else doing?"

"We were able to avoid the worst-case scenario thanks to you, Lord. Our casualties are fewer than what I had witnessed but we had still lost a third of our current fighting force in the castle not including the trolls in Darkin."

"I see... And how's Liz and Erin. They seem to have taken the most damage, I couldn't fix anything even with my healing spell."

At his words, Rain who was clinging tightly to him had immediately lost her enthusiasm and her mood dropped drastically which told Tyler all he needed to know.

"I'm afraid both the Lady Liz and Erin are not in the best of shape but lady Liz and Lady Rain's conditions are something that could be easily fixed by Erin. However, she currently hasn't woken up since the battle as her life force is extremely low."

"I see... From what I sensed earlier her source seemed increasingly weak and so different that I almost didn't recognize her with Magic sense alone. I didn't ask earlier because it didn't seem like it would affect me but right now it has so I'll ask once, what happened to her?"

Albert didn't hesitate for even a second as he seemed to have made up his mind for a while now and immediately opened his mouth and spoke without holding anything back. The truth of the matter was simple and he narrated the story to both Tyler, Z, and Rain who listened attentively.

Tyler was aware of the fact that Erin was a Nymph, but to be more specific, she was a Naiad or in simpler terms, a water Nymph that dwelled in the Azabed region, or at least that was how it used to be. To be frank, even Albert wasn't aware of her actual age but based on the lake she had been born in, it was safe to say she had been born at least more than 800 years ago.

Perhaps she had existed even during the time of the demon king. He met her as a boy and befriended her not just because he felt she was lonely all by herself but it was also a way for him to get away from the life path that had been scripted by his family.

However, Naiads were rare and the few that existed were hard to find. They were powerful beings that could live forever as long as they were connected to any life source which meant they did not necessarily need their original source to survive.

Because of this, it seems one of the Great Five families had wanted her for something and had destroyed her lake in an attempt to capture her. It would seem that those two that had sneaked into the castles must've been from that original family. This meant the Brimstone family were the ones responsible for this as Tyler had confirmed their involvement in this attack which meant Mammon did not move completely on his own.

Still, their attack hadn't succeeded in Erin's capture as she was rescued by Albert who then performed a soul-binding ritual that connected their souls and made him her temporary source because, without any part of her original source, she would be unable to make a new natural connection.

In essence, they became somewhat of a married couple since he was a kid because they needed to regularly be near one another every so often. While Tyler found that weird. It was still mighty impressive for a kid like that to be so willing to make such a sacrifice in order to save someone's life.

Converting his age in human terms he would be around 12 or 13 and Tyler couldn't remember what he was doing around that age but he surely wasn't m going around sacrificing his future for people. 

Indeed, what he had done was a sacrifice as it rapidly drained his own life force and hinders his growth. He was a Tier 5 Magic swordsman but his strength even after all this time was still lacking. This was because he could not reach his potential when supplying energy for two living beings.

Due to the soul-binding effect on his mana, he had been unable to learn any high-tiered spells and even high ranking skills as his mana would instantly run dry if he did that. In order to become as strong as he was now he had solely relied on just Secret Techniques.

His determination had allowed him to master more than 10 when even more powerful demon lords couldn't master one. However, for some reason unknown to him, their souls that were bound to each other had been severed and since then, Erin's life force had been too weak for her to regain consciousness.

"Why do you think the connection was broken?"

"I'm not exactly sure sire. At first, I thought those two had attacked her soul directly and she broke the connection to protect me but that is impossible as it requires the permission of both parties to break such a bind."

"I see." Tyler contemplated the issue. It would be incredibly bad if he allowed Erin to die as not only was she a valuable member of his little faction but she was also their only healer. He needed to figure out a way to get her to regain her life force but it didn't seem like a soul-binding ritual would be possible in her current state.

Plus, he couldn't use Potential Break on something like her lifeforce so the only way to save her right now was to find her a new source. However, without any amount of water from her previous lake, she could not make a new natural connection.

"If I may sire."

Tyler raised his head and saw Z standing there almost as though he had the solution.

"What's up. Do you have an answer to this?"

"Well not exactly. From what Sir Albert just explained I can infer that the connection between them broke because the two that attacked her most likely had a sealed portion of water from her lake and in the presence of that, her lifeforce would have no choice but to be retired to its original source."

"I see... that makes sense."

"However, I've had the entirety of the main hall searched but it seems like it may have been destroyed during their death."

Tyler frowned, if that was the case, didn't that mean he had been the one who destroyed it. Realizing this, Z tried to explain himself properly as Rain glared at him but Tyler just waved him off. There was no need to sugar coat it, his anger hadn't let him give those two the chance to speak as the Dark Garuda had promptly dispatched of them. 

'Wait.'

A thought suddenly flashed in his head as he thought of that monster. At some point during the battle, it had handed something over to him before it charged in to kill one of Mammon's generals. 

Tyler then reached into the air and pulled out a small bottle that contain extremely clear liquid. "Is this it?"

There was no mistaking it, this bottle contained dense amounts of nature's essence so Tyler had originally thought it was some kind of potion although he hadn't put much thought into why the Dark Garuda had given it to him at the time.

However, looking at Albert's reaction, there was no doubt this was part of Erin's source and if the Dark Garuda was just another mindless summon, it would've surely destroyed it alongside those two. That monster must've realized what it was after a single glance at Erin while Tyler had failed to make such an observation.

What a frightening creature. This just meant he had much to learn.

"So... What do we do with this?"