They won the war. The jade palace had fallen, and was completely destroyed. The Enlightened there were all slaughtered, the buildings were destroyed, and the mortals were either enslaved or murdered as well.
Everyone who fought in this war received great respect and applause back home. They were the heroes of the first stronghold. Even the unpopular and hated, like Yuna, were celebrated.
The first stronghold only suffered two great losses and a few minor ones. The 8th and 9th strongest Enlightened had died, as did many of the weaker Enlightened supporting the different groups. The Enlightened, which had supported Yori and Noboru, were executed for cowardice immediately after arriving back at the first stronghold.
Due to the death of numbers 8 and 9, the 10th strongest Enlightened ranked up to 8th, and Noboru became the 9th strongest, while Kei became the new 10th. There was no rank 2 Enlightened to fill the gap, and so Yuna believed that these two were the most deserving by far.
The titles Yuna had bestowed upon them were "prodigy" for Noboru and "indestructible knight" for Kei.
All the gravely injured Enlightened, such as Yori, were immediately sent to the hospital upon their arrival in the first stronghold, but it took Hana a long time to heal all of them, meaning that many remained injured for a long time.
Her actions weren't spoken of again yet, and she was declared the third strongest Enlightened in the first stronghold due to her achieving a breakthrough to rank 4, making Rina and Ayumi number 4 and 5.
After absorbing the soul of the deathmonger, Noboru got extremely close to achieving his first breakthrough, but aside from him and Hana, no other Enlightened had received a major power-up or were very close to one.
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Noboru was watching over Yori's vitals as he was lying in his hospital bed. They were stable, yet Noboru had to make sure that Yori would survive this ordeal, which is why he stayed despite that.
He still had a lot to learn from him. Letting Yori die now would be very ill-advised.
It took Hana a while to finally arrive on the scene, because there were far more urgent cases, and she had to save them before she had time for Yori.
After hours of waiting in silence, Hana finally entered the room. She had a radiant and elegant smile plastered on her face, just like she always did. Her aura had changed entirely now that she increased her rank to 4. She emitted far more power than ever before.
Aside from that, there were no traces of her cannibalistic act left anymore. She was exactly like she was before any of this happened.
"Good afternoon, Noboru. Or should I call you prodigy from now on? Congratulations on becoming the 9th strongest here. What you did on the battlefield was truly remarkable, and I'm sure that your story will be told for a long time. Killing a rank 4 as a rank 1 is simply unheard of!"
Her voice was polite and elegant as she spoke to him, yet her attempts at making friends with him were a failure.
"Noboru is fine. Don't flatter me. You've achieved great things yourself too. I would appreciate you taking care of my master now, Hana."
His voice was polite and formal, yet also distant.
Hana kept her smile, yet she felt slightly uncomfortable inside because of his reaction. Nobody usually reacted to her so coldly aside from Yuna. Especially not an Enlightened weaker than herself.
"As you wish."
She got to work, and healed him quickly. His right foot grew back. At the same time, all the other injuries had disappeared in an instant.
"What's going on? Why am I here?"
Yori asked as he woke up, sitting up with a confused demeanor.
After Noboru and Hana explained everything to him, he started smiling, half flustered and half proud.
"Haha! I knew training you was a good idea, Noboru! You are truly worth your title!"
"Thank you, master."
Hana left the room with a soft chuckle, giving the two time to be alone.
"Thank you for saving me back there. You are truly resilient, aren't you, Noboru?"
"I'm not. Resilience is the ability to feel deeply and move forward without stopping no matter the situation, right?"
"Yes."
"Then I truly am not resilient."
Yori seemed confused as to why he would turn down such a compliment like that. He couldn't understand the meaning behind those words. He seemed to feel emotions just fine, and he always kept moving forward as well. So why wouldn't he consider himself resilient?
It was impossible for Yori to know that Noboru had declined the compliment because he couldn't have cared less. He felt no fear nor worry during the fight against the deathmonger.
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Instead of taking this day off, or going to Hana for her healing services, Yuna and Kei trained.
Yuna didn't care about her injuries, and didn't deem them serious enough to take a break for even just one day.
Their training was extremely difficult and demanding on their bodies. At least it was for Kei. He was sweating and trembling all over his body, panting as they finally took a small break from the training.
Yuna was completely fine, and didn't break a sweat as she spoke up, full of energy.
"You're this exhausted already? You have more in you. I'm sure of it."
Her voice was almost demanding, and ordered him to continue sparing with her.
"I do… just… give me… a moment… please."
He spoke between every pant, completely exhausted.
"Sure. But no longer than a minute."
"Yes… master."
She sat down, and gazed at the beautiful surroundings. The garden they always trained in was as beautiful as ever, and quite the perfect place to relax in during breaks.
"I'm ready again, master."
Kei spoke with determination, completely collected once again as he adopted a fighting stance. Less than a minute had passed, and he had recovered well already.
"Good. Come at me."
Yuna prepared for Kei's attack with a feeling of pride in her heart. He seemed so much stronger compared to when she first trained him. Not only that, but his determination and techniques have improved significantly as well. He pushed his body closer to its limit each time they trained than ever before.
She was sure that he could eventually become more of an equal to her than a disciple. She looked forward to it.
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At that time, in the wasteland once called Jade Palace, the ground and ceiling began to shake severely, and soon enough, huge tunnels appeared from the ceiling.
A humanoid fell out of one of these tunnels, followed by dozens of monsters. They gazed around, taking everything in with great joy. They seemed to love such severe destruction. The smell of corpses filled their nostrils, and the sight of these mangled corpses filled their eyes.
The humanoid smiled with great joy as their monster companions began to feast upon the corpses.
"Ah. So this is what all the commotion was about earlier. I wish I could have been there to watch this unfold. Oh well, I will have my fun soon enough, hehe."
Theirsmile only intensified as they realized how much fun they would have. Once their companions were done feasting, the group exited the place, marching towards the first stronghold excitedly.