Harrian and Gold were sitting up front, discussing profit and what he would sell the [merchant] when he returned. Meanwhile, Atogin and Cordelie were getting on fine, since they both had the [alchemist] job, Atogin was teaching Cordelie how to make better potions. Unlike most [Jobs] and [Non-Battle: Jobs], [merchant] and [alchemist] could be either, another reason why Atogins [Duel-job] skill was strong.

After they left the village, the group arrived about six hours later. It was in the middle of a crater, and a large one at that. Gold carefully arrived at the bottom and everyone got out. The local guards were there and asked them what they were doing there. Gold held out his [merchant license] and Enar gave the guard a scroll which he then opened and read through.

After reading it, the guards made way for the group and noticed that a lot of places were already taken, but Gold did find a place where he parked his Carriage and set up shop. The group looked around and saw many adventurers that were already there. They looked around the stores, Harrian hiding Rache in his tophat for protection.

Atogin went up to a blacksmith and asked him a question.

"Excuse me, sir, may I ask you a question?"

"Me price is 1,000 sals, and buy something from my stock," The blacksmith replied before coughing.

Atogin quickly got out some Sals and made a quick decision, he settled on two dozen throwing knives which came with two small leather bands where he could store them. The man said that they would cost 50,000 sals. Although hesitant at first, Atogin decided to trade him some of his metal feathers that were pure [Iron]. Atogin gave him twenty feathers, each one about ten centimetres long, so he dropped the price by 15,000 sals.

Atogin took the price and paid for them and the [blacksmith] told him. He pointed with his left thumb to a large asteroid looking thing.

"There are three kinds of [dungeons] and [labyrinths], the natural, the man-made with a [dungeon crystal], and the rarest, a monster swarm. All the beasts under some sort of beast create a limited [Dungeon] or [Labyrinth] if adventurers don't defeat the [Boss], a wave of monsters will go in a random direction, and since Koumides is so near, they have taken every opportunity," The blacksmith explained.

"I see, my gratitude to you, anything else?" Atogin rolled one single sals in his hand, before making it disappear.

"Yeah, for some reason, you can only go into one of those four holes, each one only accepting each person [Strongest stat], either [Strength], [Magic], [Stamina] or [Speed], if your balanced enough, you can go into anyone, so good luck." Atogin got another sack with a hefty amount of Sals and placed them in the blacksmiths' hands before everyone walked to their designated entrances.

Enar went into the [Stamina entrance], Nicko walked to the [Strength Entrance], and of course, Harrian and Atogin went to the [Magic and Speed Entrance]. Although they split up, Harrian was with Cordelie and Rache. They went to the entrance and Harrian showed a scroll of his own. The guards blocking the entrance made way, and someone guided them to the waiting area.

The duo sat down on the floor and began to talk. Gold already told Cordelie about Harrians uniqueness and capabilities, but Harrian was more interested in her. He asked for details about how Aelor and his group fell in the depths, any information that Gold didn't want to know.

Although hesitant at first, she began to speak a few words about the incident. Harrian began to get more of an understanding. She wasn't sure why she followed Aelor, but he used to have a sense of leadership. After a while, Cordelie began to tell the entire story.

After being kicked out of Kilvi, they headed towards the mountain ranges, separating Kilvi, and the country Ioterra, the home of the [Earth-bound]. They chose that pathway due to the [Tank] of the party, Titos the [half-giant] as his kind is vaguely common there. On their way there, Aelor was kicking stones and yelling.

"Stupid Harry! And Stupid Raine or whatever, they took my fame!" Aelor was yelling.

Ligo put his hand on Aelors shoulder and talked next to him saying "Don't worry Aelor, we'll have a better chance to get famous next time,"

"True, we just need to focus more on [Earth] and [Fire] than any other [affinity] and [evolve] towards them," Rosetta explained.

"BUT I DON'T WANT THAT!" Aelor began to complain like the spoiled child he was "I wanted to be the [Hero] of the humans, not [Hero] of the earthbound, and it's all thanks to that pink-haired [Mage]!" Aelor then punched boulder next to him, and then the worst happened.

The entire group looked up and saw that massive boulders were dropping towards them, Aelor had caused a rock slide all across the canyon they were walking on. The group began to run, but they couldn', but thanks to Titos, he caught a glimpse of a cave and punched the hole to make room for everyone.

The group got in safe and sound, Titos the only one to get an injury, which was some minor bruises on his fists. Cordelie saw this and healed him up immediately, and what happened made Aelor even angrier.

A [status board] appeared in front of Cordelie telling that her [Healing Magic] had become [Recovery Magic], which made her smile, but what was underneath made Aelor even madder.

[[Healing Magic] had reached level 10]

[[Healing Magic] has become [Recovery Magic]]

[You have gained [Healing Skill Tree]]

[Need [grimoire] to access [Healing Skill Tree]]

[You have unlocked the following Magic]

[[Body enhancement Magic] level 1]

Aelor noticed that Cordelie needed a [grimoire] and Harrian had one at the time when he defeated him. He yelled at Cordelie to make the [status board] disappear before going deeper into the cave.

The group soon followed behind, keeping a steady distance as Aelor was throwing [fireballs] at the slightest thing that may as well have the littlest amount of [Magic] in it. After using three [mana potions] and a couple of hundred [fireballs] later, Aelors tantrum was over. He lit a single fire and went further into the cave.

As he was kicking stones around, he came across one which didn't move. When his foot made contact, Aelor grasped at his foot in pain. After Rosetta took a closer inspection on the rock, she noticed that it looked like a door handle.

Aelor pushed Rosetta out of the way and began to turn the handle, and after he heard a click and pulled. There was a small passageway, the air that came out of it had a stench of rotten corpses and blood.

Everyone other than Aelor backed away by the stench, but soon after, the passage began to call for them.

"Come down… the true [Heroes party], come down…," A voice echoed from the passage.

Everyone other than Cordelie and Ligo liked the sound of it and began to join Aelor, going deeper into the passageway. After a while, the two of them also gave up struggling and followed out of curiosity.

Aelor picked up Cordelie and Ligo during a trip to Drendel, a hillside village suited to agriculture, the other place to go other than Kethral when people were ready to leave Newtown. There they trained and met up with the rest of the group, so of course, they were the closest together.

After a while, Cordelie and Ligo caught up with the rest of the group. They noticed that something was off. They had entered a room which looked eerie. A massive door was at the other end of the cave room. It was black, with a face leaking blood from its eyes and mouth.

On either side of the door, there were also two circles, each one showing a different face. Each one had a different object in its circle, a sword, a bundle of wheat, a wolf, and a skull. Although they were telling them that it was dangerous, Titos, Rosetta and Aelor were intrigued.

They walked around the door and the ominous voice began to give them new instructions.

"For those who will enter, may the five of you... offer your life essence as to payment." The voice uttered.

Consumed by wanting, Tito grabbed both of Cordelie and Ligo's hand and Rosetta cut both of their palms, making blood drip onto the floor before she did the same for the rest. After about a litre of blood overall was split between the five of them, the ground began to glow red, and so did the door. After a little more concentration, Ligo saw that the ground was made out of many and many small and detailed magic circles, and they were disappearing.

After the circles disappeared, the door automatically opened, revealing something even more horrifying. An entire room, with dimly lit torches that were purple, revealed what was on the four walls of the room. Faces of Men, Women and children with faces as the same on the door, blood gushing from their orifice.

Ligo and Cordelie came back together, whilst the other three began to look around. Somehow the group didn't notice that in the centre of the room had an altar. It had four pillars on each angle, at least a metre away from the table at the middle.

Suddenly, a shadowy figure emerged from the altar and the entire group looked at the figure. It was covered in black bandages and looked quite feminine, the figure was average height and it had wisps of grey hair. After a while, the figure then spoke.

"Thank you for finding me," The voice echoed throughout the room "You have gained my trust Aelor, Titos, Rosetta, Ligo and Cordelie, again thank you for finding me,"

"Um excuse me, but who are you?" Cordelie came a little closer towards the figure.

"Oh, of course, I am an [Ancient God], I am Iyashi, the [God of healing]," The woman said.

"But how do we know you're telling the truth,"

"I healed your [Half-giant] friend over there when he hurt his hands breaking into this cave," Iyashi pointed at Titos, who was now looking at his own hands. Everyone saw Cordelie heal his hands, so they all knew she was lying.

"You're right! And so is everyone's cut wounds!" Titos yelled. Although it wasn't true since Cordelie healed them as well when the door opened.

"Exactly! But may I ask you for a favour,"

"As the leader of this group, I Aelor will listen to you,"

"Very well, I would ask for that magical girl, so I could get out of here,"

"Sorry, but Cordelie is an essential part of our team, you can't have her,"

"But I think I can," Iyashi then waved her hand in the air and Aelor talked again.

"Of course you can have her! Isn't that the right team?" Everyone nodded other than Ligo and Cordelie.

"Great!" black tentacles came out of the altar and wrapped around her, pinning her to it. Iyashi then remembered something and began to talk again.

"Now for the rest of you, please put your hands on each pillar, and we'll begin my freeing!"

The group, like a bunch of mindless slaves, did as they told, each one of their hands being absorbed into the pillars each one up to their wrists. By then, the tentacles covered Cordelie head to toe, leaving only her eyes and nose visible with Iyashi looming over her.

She then began to mutter, and a white mist began to appear out of them, each with a different shade of white, with Ligo's being the whitest. Cordelie felt a mass amount of pain, with all of her skin, slowly being torn off her body, unable to scream.

But she could still hear and smell what was around her. Aelor screams muffled by flames, the tearing of clothes near Rosetta, the beastly growls of Titos, and finally, the stench of death coming from Ligo.

After she lost consciousness, something happened. A bright and white light appeared everywhere around Cordelie and she saw an image of some sort of white being, which threw her something which Cordelie caught.

When she woke up, everyone was gone, the faces of screaming people gone, the door was gone. All that was left was an altar with no pillars and the clothes and bandages from Cordelies past teammates and Iyashi.

"She used [Purify] on everything, and tried to use [Heal] on herself as she had no skin, just muscle, but it didn't work. But with some quick thinking, she rummaged through her old teammate's stuff and found some more bandages.

After a while of wrapping her body completely with bandages with grey and white. Cordelie put on some of Rosetta's torn clothes and shoes, Aelor's broadsword and sheath, and finally Ligo's robe as well as his hood.

When Harrian heard everything, some details began to fit together, and then he heard it.

"All right everyone! We will now begin the expedition, please follow me!" Yelled a man in the front.

Harrian got up and brushed some dust off before offering his hand to Cordelie. As they began to walk, Harrian asked one last question.

"When this is all over, may I buy you a drink?"

Cordelie chuckled and then replied with "I would love that."

With Harrian giggling back, there was now one thing that laid at the back of his mind. Whatever happened with the Iyashi, the supposed [God of Healing]. Although the thought disappeared soon after, Harrian now had the feeling that his adventures would only get harder from now on.

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