Chapter 738: The Remaining Days (1)
The remaining two days inside Nalim passed in a way that, compared to everything that had happened before, almost felt strangely ordinary.
Liam kept his word.
After deciding that Charlotte would be the one to determine how they handled the rest of the assessment, he made no attempt to return east, search for another major threat, hunt down another abnormal demon, or force himself into any unnecessary confrontation.
The Berserker was dead, his personal goal had been accomplished, and the price he had paid for it had been more than enough to make him understand that pushing further would not be ambition anymore. It would be stupidity.
So instead of turning the last stretch of the assessment into another battlefield, Liam remained within the hidden cave inside the rocky outcrop with Charlotte and allowed the final two days to become exactly what she wanted them to be.
Charlotte, unsurprisingly, took full advantage of that.
She made herself far too comfortable inside the hollow chamber, treating the rough stone shelter as though it were some private retreat prepared specifically for her rather than a cramped survival base hidden inside a hostile realm.
She spent most of her time eating, resting, stretching lazily near the fire pit, and making constant remarks about how this was the best decision Liam had made since entering Nalim.
Whenever he looked at her with that flat, unimpressed expression, she only smiled wider and reminded him that he was the one who had handed her decision-making authority. To Charlotte, that meant she had every right to enjoy herself.
And she did.
She enjoyed every last moment she could manage.
She teased Liam while he prepared food, teased him while he checked the entrance, teased him while he maintained the fire, teased him while he inspected the outcrop from the outside, and teased him even when he was simply sitting still and recovering.
She acted as though making him react was a personal mission, and although Liam made his boundaries clear again and again, Charlotte never seemed discouraged. If anything, his constant refusal only entertained her more.
She would lean too close, say something shameless, watch him shut her down with a calm look or a short sentence, then laugh to herself as though that alone had satisfied her.
Despite that, Liam noticed she never pushed past the lines he actually drew.
Charlotte liked teasing him. She liked testing his patience. She enjoyed making him uncomfortable in small ways. But whenever Liamโs tone shifted from indifferent to firm, she stopped. She complained dramatically, called him boring, accused him of wasting opportunities, and insisted that he would someday regret refusing her charm, but she stopped.
That much told Liam something important about her. Charlotte was shameless, but she was not careless. Not completely.
During the night after he woke, Liam spent nearly the entire stretch from midnight to dawn seated in stillness near the colder wall of the chamber. Charlotte had already fallen asleep at some point, or at least pretended to, while the fire burned low in the center of the cave. Liam remained awake, eyes closed, breathing slow and controlled as he focused on restoring as much Myst as possible before daybreak.
His body still ached badly, and even though the healing potion had done enough to pull him back from a dangerous state, it had not truly restored him. Several injuries still lingered beneath the surface. His ribs were still tender, his back still carried a deep bruised strain, and his left arm felt unpleasantly raw whenever he drew Myst through it too heavily.
Even so, recovery had to come first.
The Myst instability within Nalim remained a problem, especially in this zone, but compared to the eastern forest, the outcrop was manageable.
The flow of Myst in the chamber was uneven but not violently distorted, and with enough patience, Liam could draw in small amounts without upsetting his core. It was painfully slow work. Every breath required focus. Every small intake of Myst had to be filtered through his body carefully before being guided into his core. If he rushed, the unstable energy would only create more strain and leave him worse off than before.
So Liam did not rush.
He sat there through the deepest part of the night, unmoving, while Charlotte slept and the fire sank into embers. By the time the first faint suggestion of morning began slipping through the crevice entrance, Liam had managed to restore enough of his reserves to feel functional again.
Not full. Not ideal. But decent.
Enough that his core no longer felt hollow and strained whenever he reached for Myst. Enough that he could cast Mend across smaller injuries without worrying about completely emptying himself. Enough that he could summon Smoke again and maintain the shadow wolfโs full form for more than a few minutes if the situation required it.
Once the sun had risen fully, Liam used Mend carefully on the smaller injuries that still bothered him most.
He did not attempt full-body Mend again. He had learned enough from the first attempt to know how costly and inefficient it was in his current state.
Instead, he worked with precision. A faint green glow gathered over his ribs for several minutes as he stabilized the remaining cracks and reduced the sharpness of the pain there.
Then he moved to his left foot, his shoulder, and the deeper bruising along his back. None of it healed perfectly, but the difference was noticeable. His breathing became easier. His movements became less stiff. He could stand and walk without feeling as though every step demanded a negotiation with his own body.
Charlotte noticed immediately, of course.
She had been sitting near the fire, finishing the last of the deer meat from the previous night when she looked him over and gave a satisfied hum. She said he looked less like a corpse now, which she considered a great improvement. Liam ignored the comment, though he did agree internally that his body felt less pathetic than it had several hours earlier.
The real issue that morning, however, was food.
