The black sludge's aura had reached the level of a Cursed Item. While judging power by aura intensity alone was a fool's ga, it at least suggested he wasn't dealing with an overwhelmingly powerful artifact, like one of Papa Oliver's keys.
After gleaning so vague details from the flower sellers, Jenkins directed his blessed flas across the floor to et the encroaching ooze. The mont they made contact, the sludge recoiled instantly, showing no intention of fighting back.
"So it is afraid of fire."
Otherwise, it made no sense. It had cornered them all on the third floor, yet it remained confined to this one room, ignoring everyone else. Jenkins even began to suspect that the Gravedigger captain in front of him had started the blaze, likely after discovering the creature's weakness.
Knowing this made things much easier. As he had grown in power, Jenkins's control over his abilities had beco far more precise. While he couldn't yet manipulate the fire into fine threads to carve away at the ooze, he could certainly herd it into a corner without any trouble.
As he worked, he gestured for the flower sellers to move back. Then, Jenkins quietly turned and summoned the miner's lamp from his [chanical Light] ability, using it to bore a small hole through the door.
He had planned to use that opening to blast the entire door off its hinges, but a glance outside revealed the fire had intensified. He and the Gravedigger could probably make it out, but the teenage girls with them would never escape unscathed through the path Jenkins had taken.
"We'll have to make an exit through the wall and get down from here."
But that ant first dealing with the unidentifiable sludge.
While forcing the sludge into the far corner with his flas, Jenkins slowly approached the Gravedigger, who remained completely motionless. Activating his Eye of Reality, Jenkins scanned the man from head to toe and spotted a dark point of light near his waist.
"Can you speak?"
He asked again and, as expected, got no reply. Without warning, Jenkins shot his hand out, pressing it against the man's back. Flas stread from his sleeve, engulfing the Gravedigger entirely. The flower sellers shrieked behind him, but the man didn't burn. After a wisp of black smoke curled into the air, Jenkins commanded the fire to recede and rejoin the containnt of the ooze. At last, the frozen Gravedigger moved.
He collapsed to the floor, gasping. It took him a mont to get his bearings.
"I was careless," he panted. "A drop of the toxin splashed onto my clothes. By the ti I realized, it was about to touch my skin."
"So this sludge really is the toxin you were extracting?" Jenkins demanded. "What in the world did you do?"
"Since the rose toxin is strengthened by passing through an animal, I wondered if the process could be repeated. I used normal roses and tulips to transfer the extracted toxin three more tis. At first, it only increased its potency. But on the fourth transfer, when I injected it into a lab mouse... that black ooze poured out of the poor creature. This is it."
The Gravedigger captain explained with so embarrassnt. A muscle in Jenkins's jaw twitched; he was at a loss for words. The man was certainly imaginative and resourceful, not to ntion incredibly reckless. If Jenkins hadn't been here, even if they'd managed to contain the ooze with fire, a lot of people on this floor would have died.
"Get these girls out of here," Jenkins ordered. "I'll handle this thing. We can't use the hallway, so we're going out through here."
Captain Rogues understood imdiately. Just as his subordinate had done, he used a bone-fracturing charm to shatter a section of the wall. Then, to Jenkins's surprise, he pulled a rope from thin air. It was a Bestowal.
Jenkins hadn't encountered many people with Bestowals in the past year. He certainly hadn't expected a Gravedigger captain from the Church of Death and End to possess one.
This was for the best. As the captain began helping the girls down, Jenkins walked briskly toward the cornered ooze. It had nowhere left to run and was now touching the flas.
The fire and sludge began to consu one another, releasing a thick, black smoke with a stench so foul that even Jenkins found it hard to bear. He still had no idea what this thing truly was, but he knew it feared fire. All he had to do was keep it contained with his blessed flas until the reinforcents from the Church of Death and End arrived. He could leave the rest to them; he didn't need to destroy it himself.
Using the enchanted rope, the flower sellers descended one by one through the gap in the wall. Jenkins's flas tightened their cordon around the ooze. Everything was proceeding smoothly.
Just as Jenkins let out a sigh of relief, believing the crisis was over, the black sludge—which the flas had compressed into a tight sphere—suddenly exploded.
Droplets of black sludge sprayed everywhere. Behind Jenkins, the Gravedigger and the last three girls were still in the room.
"Look out!"
Without a second thought, he threw himself in front of the four of them. The Gravedigger was just as quick. As the unnatural explosion echoed, he threw up a hand, conjuring a transparent, coffin-like specter in the air.
The spectral coffin caught the bulk of the splattering ooze, and Jenkins's body blocked the rest. Still, a few droplets scattered across the room, squirming like black ants as they sought a way out.
For a split second, Jenkins thought he was done for. But the impact of the droplets only brought a searing pain. The sludge corroded large holes in his clothes and raised sickening blisters on his skin, but it wasn't lethal.
"Of course," he realized. "This body of mine isn't exactly mortal anymore."
Just as he had this thought, a gust of wind blew rain in from outside. As the drops landed on him, the pain from the blisters surprisingly began to subside, accelerating his body's natural healing.
This rain had been summoned by a divine art of the Lord of Blossoms, and it resonated powerfully with both Jenkins's own energy and the power of the World Tree. It was no surprise, then, that it had a healing and purifying effect on him.
He thrust a hand toward the doorway, and a gout of fla shot forth, lting what was left of the door. The inferno consuming the building roared into the room, its heat slowing the movent of the scattered droplets.
"Get out of here!" he yelled to the Gravedigger. "I can't let a single drop of this toxin escape."
He said to the Gravedigger behind him.
"What about you?"
The Gravedigger asked, staring at Jenkins standing amidst the inferno.
"Don't worry," Jenkins replied. "You think a little fire is going to kill ?"
"I ant the toxin," the Gravedigger clarified, his gaze fixed on the angry blisters covering Jenkins's skin. "Your body..."
He had also seen the blisters on Jenkins's body.
"It's fine. Just have soone collect so of this rainwater in the courtyard below. If I run into trouble, I'll jump down. The water will heal ."
Reassured, the Gravedigger captain wasted no more ti. He scooped up two of the girls in his arms and leaped from the third-floor opening to the courtyard below. The last girl, one of the older flower sellers, was just reaching for the rope when Jenkins suddenly yelled:
"Look out!"
Instead of dodging, the girl instinctively turned to see what was wrong. A glob of black filth shot through the air like a flung stone, heading straight for her face. She stood frozen, watching it approach.
Jenkins was already moving. He tackled the girl, and they hit the floor in a rolling heap. He'd kept her safe, but his back had taken the hit.
Up close, he recognized her. This was the girl who had first told him that they all knew Fini.
"Are you alright?"
She saw the pained look on his face and knew that taking a hit from that strange black ooze hadn't been without consequence.
"I'm fine."
"I'm fine," Jenkins said, getting to his feet and pulling the girl behind him. With her safe, he could stop holding back. The sharp pain lancing across his back only sharpened his focus. He commanded his blessed flas, combining them with the inferno pouring in through the doorway, and began forcing the scattered droplets of ooze back together.
Truthfully, this was one of the easier Cursed Items Jenkins had faced. But he knew the creature's true danger lay in its ability to grow more toxic with each host. This was far from its final form, so Jenkins didn't delude himself into thinking this victory ant he had grown overwhelmingly powerful.
Normal fire couldn't touch the sludge. Jenkins's purifying blessed flas could set it alight, but the process of burning it away was agonizingly slow, like a glacier carving through a mountain.
He had no intention of finishing it off himself. He simply controlled the flas, wrapping them around the glob of sludge and pushing it into the heart of the inferno.
Hearing the noise outside, he glanced down through the breach in the wall. The reinforcents from the Church of Death and End had arrived. While there were no demigods in the group, the sight of twenty Gravediggers was still an impressive and rare deploynt.
"I'll get you down first. Oh, I haven't asked your na yet."
He spoke to the girl huddled behind him. She was clutching her flower basket, her eyes wide as she stared at the inferno. It was hard to tell which terrified her more—the fire, or the remnants of sludge still twitching on the floor.
"My na is linda Priest, sir."
"Alright, linda," he said gently. "I'll get you down. Don't be afraid."
He hesitated for a mont before placing one arm behind her back and the other under her knees, lifting her carefully. Even though she was young, he was mindful of propriety and chose the most practical way to carry her.
"Hold on tight."
He said, then took two quick steps and leaped from the third-floor opening.
Down in the courtyard, everyone stared anxiously up at the breach in the wall. After Captain Rogues landed, he noticed the last girl hadn't followed and realized sothing had gone wrong. He was about to go back up when he caught a glimpse of Jenkins's coat flash past the opening as the young writer threw himself in front of the girl, shielding her.
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