Heaven's Greatest Professor

Warden was quite irritated just imagining someone insulting May. They had to deal with so much trouble on top of the forsaken breathing down their necks.

"It's not their fault," she said after a while. "My healing power is dwindling the more time I spend within this space. Your food actually helps in recovering that, in that regard, just so you know. Anyway, they are scared, just like I am... So when I cannot heal them properly, some frustration gets the better of them."

Warden clasped her shoulder. Some people in the camp had used derogatory terms about her race. As if she didn't get enough trouble from elves, that she would have to listen to them too.

It takes a good man to understand their lapses in judgement, and an even greater person to forgive them for such lapses.

Unfortunately, it wasn't a problem he could simply solve by beating a bunch of people.

"Don't be too hard on yourself, you're doing great," he said, pinching her cheek. May was really cute, like a little sister. He wondered if he had any siblings...

"I know," she shook his palm away. "And don't treat me like I'm a child..."

"What, are you like other elves, who look young on the outside, but are an old granny inside?"

"You have to ruin the moment, huh?" she glared, though it had lost all its intensity. "You know, I should be the one in charge of you in the absence of Marcus."

"Really? I thought you're in charge even when Marcus was present. After all, you went above him to select me for your team."

May smiled.

"Hopefully, you don't have to regret your decision."

She stood up and left along with the full jar of cookies as Warden brought out scribing instruments. He stretched his limbs and spine and began working.

Hopefully, he would be done with everything by tomorrow.

***

It was also May who turned up in his tent after having her rest. She was probably going to ask him to cook something. Thankfully, he had already prepared some easy-to-make meals for them all after being halfway done with his runes.

"You didn't sleep at all, did you?" she said, her eyes darting at everything scattered around.

"Usually, I don't catch much sleep in unfamiliar places," he said. "Anyway, everything is prepared for the camp to work... I'm going to go out for a while."

"Where?" she asked, and then bit her lower lip, knowing the answer.

"Also, I need you to do something for me," Warden said and pointed her towards a makeshift casket. "Deliver that to Lady Cassandra..."

"What's in tha—" May stopped herself, again understanding dawning on her. "Why don't you deliver that yourself?"

May was evidently not comfortable with delivering a dead body to someone else. Her displeasure mirrored his own, which was why he prepared to leave so early.

"Just tell her, 'I leave it here,' she'll understand," leaving those words, he flew out of the camp, riding on his broom.

It was time to check on what kind of decision the forsaken had made, knowing a human was hunting them.

Warden flew above the thick canopies and came to the outskirts of the second layer gate. They certainly had increased the guards, making them actively patrol, circling the space. So they weren't all oblivious. They had retracted most of the batches they were scouting for humans.

Well, that would make little difference, anyway, so he didn't regret that part. Instead, he focused on observing them. He etched his mind with all their behaviour, their habits, who were patrolling at what time, what they were eating. Anything could provide an advantage over the forsaken.

After a couple of hours of silently observing them patiently, Warden rechecked his stealth and began planting his landmines for his scripts. It was impossible to plant them anywhere near the gate without getting detected. Thankfully, he had detected a good point near the gate for his plans to come to fruition.

Warden didn't antagonise them anymore today that much, only hunted a couple of teams he found on his way back. He actually came across a team lead by Tayl and Cassandra who were hunting down the forsaken. Together, they have managed to take down a team full of orcs, goblins and a troll on their own without much difficulty.

Well, they were after all the cream of the crops for what the empire had to offer. Warden would have been disappointed if they hadn't even managed that.

Young Lord Tayl Alebson didn't want to leave after just dealing with one team of forsaken, even if that team had over a dozen forsaken. His success only boosted his fierceness.

Thankfully, Lady Cassandra was there to etch reasons into the bull-headed noble's head. She had done well in the expedition, even though she left most of the charge of the battle in Tayl's hand.

Satisfied, Warden got back to the camp and completed his part of the formation.

It wasn't hard, only time-consuming work. The hard part would be the infusion of the blood of moonspawn into the formation to create a modified veil. The aura of a moonspawn didn't have the same effect on forsaken as it had on humans; however, it was still enough to disable them from their sight.

It took about four hours, and by the time the team had returned, none looked seriously injured or rattled.

Warden was imbuing the cursed blood, full of dark essence, into the formation for the finishing touch-up to the formation when May joined along with Lady Cassandra.

Their expression changed immediately when they saw what he was dealing with.

"Is that..." Lady Cassandra began,

"Dark essence?" May completed for her, her nose wrinkling into an unsightly expression. Just staying near such a source of dark power made her stomach churn and convulse in disgust.

"Not the real thing, but you got it right," Warden answered. The blood was actually an even more twisted form of dark essence, with some life and death essence embedded in it.

"Where did you find such a thing?" Lady Cassandra questioned, her expression incredulous. "And why are you dealing with it just fine?"

Warden wrinkled his brows. "To answer your first question... I was dropped near the region of Moonspawn, and with some great luck, managed to score one against them."

"You hunted a moonspawn?" May gasped. "You know they are the living embodiment of a dead god, right?"

"I didn't do it alone," Warden shrugged. "And the forsaken helped a lot."

"You haven't answered the second question," Cassandra said, her nose wrinkling as well. "Why are you fine with handling dark essence?"

"I'm not fine, though," Warden said with a shrug. "My pain tolerance is just a little high for it to affect me too much. Still, it is making me pretty weak."

Like, he was weakened by about 12%. Thankfully, both his Void and Radiance essence were great forces against the dark essence. Void could break the twisted essence down to its minuscule particles, while the light was purifying the foreign will of the dead god.

Still, it would take him a few hours to dispel all the foreign will. As for the pure dark essence?

It turned out, like Agnes, it did not have much effect on him, either. It was actually strengthening his Void Vanquishing Physique.

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Mass 5/5... Finally done...

Today's chapter coming up later tonight...