Unsealing Emptiness

The giant head rolled over to the ground and stopped right next to the duo’s faces, staring stupefied at the gigantic eyes that had not yet realized it was dead.

The Panther’s body twitched on the spot for a few moments before it also fell down lifelessly.

Both Raven and Blaze had their mouths agape as they stared unbelievingly at the sight before them. Last time they checked, wasn’t Ozul just as powerful as a Rank-9? How could he then kill a Rank-9 Beast so easily!?

Behind the now dead Beast, Ozul calmly walked towards them without even sparing a glance at it.

He noticed their stunned expressions, but that was also good. If they saw hope and what they might be able to achieve in the future after the helplessness, then all of this would only bring about more benefits to them.

Ozul noticed how both of them had broken a few bones and could barely squirm in their position much less stand up and follow him back. Raven had blood dripping from the corner of her lips while it looked like Blaze was barely even conscious.

.....

He sighed and told them that they could use the healing potions while he sat a little distance away from them, gazing at the still open eyes of the beheaded Blood Panther.

The duo didn’t waste any time and brought out their healing potions and immediately gulped them down in an instant. Even keeping their eyes open was becoming difficult now.

The healing potion took effect immediately. Their complexion immediately started to improve at a visible rate. Blaze stopped groaning and Raven stopped bleeding. Although just taking a single potion helped them a lot, they still needed time for complete recovery.

While they waited there on the ground, Ozul suddenly asked without looking at the duo, “Look at this dead body. Why did it die?”

Blaze and Raven realized what was going on and started to think out an answer. After a while, Raven replied a little unsure, “Weakness...?”

However, Ozul shook his head sideways and spoke, “It isn’t necessarily dead just because it was weaker than me.”

The duo kept thinking for a correct answer, but they couldn’t think of anything in their current state.

After a while when Ozul noticed that they had given up, he sighed and answered it himself, “It is dead because not only was it weaker than me, but also arrogant.”

The duo fell into deep thoughts when Ozul continued, “Weakness doesn’t necessarily mean that you will die when your enemy is stronger than you. If this Beast had just decided to stay at its place without causing a ruckus, I am sure he would have been alive for days to come.”

That was it. If only the Panther knew its limits, it wouldn’t have dared to be so arrogant and run rampant everywhere, attracting the attention of those it couldn’t handle.

The pungent smell of blood permeated the air, but Raven and Blaze were lost in their thoughts.

Obviously, Ozul was trying to teach them a lesson from this. So they couldn’t just wave off his words.

“Being afraid, hiding, and running away is better than overestimating your achievements and dying. If you are afraid, you can improve yourself and still make a comeback. But when you are dead, there are probably no second chances.”

Ozul’s words rang in their heads, making them understand what he was trying to tell them all this time.

They weren’t any better off than the Panther, maybe even worse. Because although the Beast didn’t know about Ozul’s strength, they did know the Beast’s even before they started fighting.

Still, they proceeded on with it without any complaint and dived into the battle as if they really had any chance of winning.

It was more of a wake-up call for them than training. A wake-up call that not everything could be solved by being fearless.

Raven realized that they had taken a beating just because Ozul wanted them to understand their limits and could not help but smile wryly in pain. He could have very well just told them so, and it might have been enough.

However, Ozul always took extreme measures, and she couldn’t really call out on him since his methods did indeed work in the end.

Moving her sight to the right, she noticed that Blaze was still in deep thoughts, not yet understanding his intentions.

‘Yeah... any normal method wouldn’t have worked,’ Raven shook her head with a sigh. If even this much wasn’t able to make Blaze understand, she knew that a normal pep talk would have just flown above his head.

After that, her gaze darted towards Ozul’s figure who had now closed his eyes and had Jinx sleeping on his lap. Her eyes couldn’t help but show a tint of worry as she quickly concealed it before Ozul realized.

Whenever she looked at Ozul resting with closed eyes, she would remember the time when he used to look at the night sky with melancholic eyes that very silently would scream to tell that he was tired.

In her eyes, Ozul had so much to think about from a very young age. Although those shoulders still looked as if they could hold the world on them, Raven didn’t think that anyone realized how much of a burden it is for him.

One of the reasons she had stopped feeling jealous of Jinx was because whenever she was around him, Raven felt as if Ozul’s mood had improved slightly. And if that was the case, then the cat very well deserved his care.

Meanwhile, she could only try to get stronger and help lessen Ozul’s burden in the future.

Raven sighed before she tried to get up, but a hiss of pain escaped her mouth as she wavered.

“Sit back down. Recover first,” Ozul spoke when he noticed that she was trying to stand up in such a condition.

It hadn’t even been a minute after taking the potion, their bodies still pained as if they had been ground between two large boulders.

Raven complied and didn’t try to stand up anymore before taking out another potion from her Spatial Ring. She was about to gulp it down as well, but Ozul stopped her,

“Wait.”

Raven stopped and Blaze also looked curiously when Ozul stood up and approached her.

He stretched his hand towards the potion indicating for Raven to hand it to him which she immediately complied with.

Ozul took the purple potion in his hand and observed it from up close. Although he had previously examined them as well when he had first found out about them, he thought about giving it another try.

He remembered the old father of Luthien had reddened eyes and a few more disturbances in his body all because he had been absorbing the whiff of smokes released by his arm.

Then there was that Mikol who even fell unconscious in a near-death state after over exerting himself. He also had reddened eyes. Ozul had a feeling that it was also related to his limbs.

Since this potion was also made by a tiny portion of that smoke, Ozul wanted to see if he could find the reason why or what changes did his essence make in humans after absorbing it.

He opened the lid of the glass bottle and dropped just a tiny bit of it on his finger and closed his eyes to see if he could feel anything.

However, before he could even examine that drop, it suddenly lost its purple color and turned white instead!

Ozul realized that it was because whatever tiny part of his essence was used in making the potion had simply been absorbed back into his body. Of course, that little essence didn’t make any difference since it was only a small part of the never-ending smoke released by his severed arm.

On the other hand, Raven and Blaze were just confused and stunned seeing the purple healing potion suddenly losing its color.

Since the potion would just lose its properties after coming into contact with his body, Ozul decided to see if he could get anything just from examining the glass bottle.

Alas, he didn’t find anything that could give him deeper insights into his body.

However, there was still one thing that he could try before giving up. He handed the purple potion back to Raven and said, “Use it.”

That would have been fine if he hadn’t also taken another step closer and pressed his hand on Raven’s chest!

Blaze hurriedly looked away acting as if he hadn’t seen anything while Raven’s face began to heat up. She felt her whole world spinning before Ozul said in a seemingly uncaring voice,

“Drink the potion.”

When Raven looked at his face, she noticed how he had his eyes closed and was concentrating on her body instead. Realizing that she had just misunderstood, she hurriedly gulped down the potion to hide her embarrassment.

Meanwhile, Ozul was too lost in his thoughts to realize the situation around him. Things would have been much different if he was instead focusing on the whirlwind of emotions coming from his front.

Blaze even started whistling as he looked at the sky as if it had suddenly become the most interesting thing in the entire world.

Raven mustered up all of her courage to stay standing and not move a muscle while Ozul did whatever he was doing.

As for Ozul, he observed the path that the healing potion took after entering Raven’s body, and he was genuinely surprised by what he found!