Chapter 488: Durian's mansion (12) - VS Luke

"SCREEEE!"

The entire stable building got blown into pieces when one of the monsters there suddenly flaped his massive wings and used a destructive skill - from the sound that the beast made once could only expect it to be a griffin.

"..."

"!!!"

"ANRY"

There was no need for any additional pause or a grand reveal of the creature.

The jet-black griffin with silver beak and talons was already right by the healer who did not react in time - giving the beast an opportunity to strike a devastating slash upon the young man's body - ripping right through Luke's clothes and flesh alike going as far as to cut through a few ribs and cutting into the spine itself - making the healer step forward and almost push into the blond prince.

"SCREEE!"

The black griffin screech sounded somewhat mockingly as he spread his massive wings to keep his large body up and deliver another strike with his front legs.

"...who asked you to interfere, you oversized chicken...?"

"Sc-ree...?"

*WHAM*

*crack*

*CRUSH*

Luke glared back at the jet-black griffin and scoffed before jumping up and doing a spin, leaving the trail of blood in his wake - causing the griffin to let out a short shocked screech before the young man's fist smashed into the base of his beak, get crushed - the fist that is - but even that crushed fist continued the punch which in turn slammed the beast right into the ground, causing a cloud of dust and loosened feathers to erupt, blocking whatever little light Mary and Roan get to work with...

...not to mention leaving them both petrified...

"...sc...ree..."

"ANRY!"

Picking up on the pitiful, bearly audible screech of her griffin Mary gasped and threw herself past Roan to reach her tamed monster.

"Oh, no...! Anry...! Mend!"

"...screee...!"

The brown-haired girl also passed by the indifferent Luke with no trouble at all as the healer did not even try to stop her, and instantly kneeled over her wounded griffin - activating the only healing spell that did not rely on the holy attribute magic that wasn't also in the skillset of the undead monsters - but the effect was only a giant screech that didn't even sound like a screech of pain, which as Mary knew from experience - wasn't a good sign as mend skill was known for being even more painful than the wounds that it was used to heal.

"Wh-what did you do to him?!"

Seeing absolutely no change in her griffins status, the brown-haired girl gritted her teeth and growled at the nonchalant healer glowing with white light.

"What? Mend doesn't work? It might be because I healed your chicken a bit while punching him - I also left a few souvenirs inside of his head."

Luke shrugged his shoulders while his bones reconnected and the horrible wound on his back left by the griffin's talons sealed up without leaving even the faintest scar - he also raised his messed-up hand, showing the gruesome sight of basically something akin to a meat mace with the shattered bones sticking out of it like some eerie whitish nails.

"What?! That doesn't make sense! Why doesn't my mend works - it should pull all the foreign bodies out!"

Mary trembled in fury glaring at the back of the healer who sighed up and shook his head in disappointment.

"You don't understand how to mend skill works, miss - it is a skill that forcefully restores the target to their best recent condition by using the mana of that same target."

Luke explained patiently, while the bones in his hand regrew in barely a single heartbeat and got enveloped in the muscles, sinew, and finally the fresh new skin.

"I used the heal+ skill to heal him over the normal limit of his HP setting up a standard that the system calculated as his new peak condition, even with a good few bone splinters tickling his brain and nerves - rendering your mend useless."

He explained with an indifferent shrug before turning back to the blond prince who, as it turns out, had managed to somehow equip himself with a massive golden sword that was honestly straight up bigger than himself.

"You...! How could you be so cruel?! What did Anry ever...?!"

"On the day you arrived, your chicken attacked a weaker slave and Mia saved them but received suffered a wound that would leave her right arm paralyzed if I wasn't there."

Mary cried out in anger but Luke didn't particularly care about her japing and casually revealed his reasoning.

"Once I'm done repaying our dear highness, I will turn your chicken back to normal, so sit tight or else your only choice would be to kill him to end his suffering - because I can assure you that no one else in this world will be able to save it."

The amount of composure that the healer had could only be praiseworthy - he had a furious tamer behind his back while the golden prince was preparing for a strike - although Roan was doing so hesitantly, wavy clearly unwilling to attack a fellow human.

"Oh, and before you get some odd idea - since the state he is currently in is set as the new default one, even if you remove the bone shards manually and use your mend skill - they will simply return to their current position. So seriously. Just stay back if you wish for your tamed monster to ever recover."

...honestly - for someone posing as a dismissive mocking type, Luke put a lot of effort into making sure that Mary will not engage in combat...

'Sorry for the delay, your highness... now how should I make you repent for messing up with my frie..."

*CHOP*

"...dghh...!"

Luke faced the blond prince just in time to see the shining golden blade falling down on him like a guillotine - digging into his body through his collarbone on the left side of his neck and burrowing itself all the way to his pelvis, splitting his torso up like a block of wood on a chopping block - causing the young man's eyes to widen in shock as he coughed up some blood that got sucked in by the ripped lung.

"My prince!"

The brown-haired heroine gasped as if Roan was the one getting attacked.

"S-since the pieces of bones can mess up the healing of the griffin - how about the sword...?"

Roan gulped down his saliva and tried to calm down his trembling shoulders and make his voice not betray how scared he was by his own actions - whether he succeeded in either did not matter as in the end, he followed up his own plan after taking the risk into the consideration.

"Swear to heal Anry and leave me alone too, and I will remove my sword - otherwise...!"

"...ghuh...!"

The blond prince clenched his fists on the handle of the overwhelming golden sword and slightly rotated the blade - causing the separation of the healer's torso to widen enough for some of the intestines to start being pushed outside by the force of the gravity - and making Luke cough more blood.

"Swear it...!"

Roan called out a bit louder - though the gruesome sight that he had himself inflicted on another human being was making his pitch slightly higher than normal.

"...I... I swear..."

Luke's body trembled and the healer whispered as the bloody foam welled up in the corners of his mouth as he locked eyes with the blond prince.

"...phew..."

"MY PRINCE! NO! GET AWAY FROM HIM!"

Roan breathed out and was took a step back in order to lift the sword back up without causing more damage to the healer who seemingly admitted the defeat - but got startled by Mary's panicked scream that he never expected

"...I swear... You are so dumb..."

Luke finished his sentence and his body got completely encased with the white light.

"...!"

In the next second, the blond prince realized that his sword was suddenly free as the left side of the healer's body simply disintegrated into white particles and a brand new one regrew in its place, pushing the golden blade to the side with no problem.

"Now - let's get to teaching you how to treat my friends!"

*WHAM*

"GHUUUAAAAGHH!"

*SLAM*

Luke wiped the blood off his face and without even taking a proper stance delivered a ridiculous uppercut on Roan's chin - which turned out to be powerful enough to send the prince flying, making him drop the golden sword.

"Now... since I'm such a generous person, let's just say that it was a punishment for the first half... for the first year"

Luke nodded to himself, checking up on his own wrecked fists as it was already healing.

"Aren't I great? Now, for the other seven..."

"I would be grateful if you stopped on that first one - my master arrived here with him, it would be bad if only she returned."

"HUH?!"

As the healer took a step towards the twitching prince sprawled on the ground thirty feet away, when out of nowhere a silver-haired gentleman appeared right behind him, locking him into a headlock while speaking in a polite tone.