A small black hole materialized in mid-air, with Evan's hand diving right into it as he tried to grab a healing potion.
Fortunately for him, Elecrus didn't charge right after him; perhaps it was fatigued after launching such a powerful attack with its limited magic power and needed some time to recover before continuing its pursuit.
Evan on the other hand, had downed about two healing potions before the pain finally lessened, however, it was still going to take a while before the injury began healing.
In fact, right now, it was already a miracle that his guts weren't spilling out considering the part of his body that the attack sliced through.
Even after the lightning on the blade had torn through his skin and cauterized the wound immediately, the fact that blood still leaked out in huge quantities was a testament to how serious the wound was!
While he had a health stat of 'C-' that allowed him to heal from wounds dozens of times faster than the average human, the power of the monster who injured him was nothing to scoff at, as such, the wound was taking time to heal even with the help of the healing potion.
His only saving grace was that this was the first major attack that had actually hit him as he had always teleported out of the range of other attacks with a similar level of power.
'At least the bleeding has stopped...'
Just as he thought that, a familiar notification suddenly appeared right in front of him.
[Level Up]
[Level Up]
'huh?'
Upon seeing the level-up notifications, he was initially confused, however, a casual glance in Eliza's direction allowed him to find out the reason for the sudden level-up.
'Leviron is dead!'
Due to the fact that Evan had contributed more than just a helping hand to the defeat of Leviron, it was only fitting that he get some experience upon the monster's demise.
It was just two levels, however, for Evan right now, it was literally a God send.
When a being levelled up, their body was strengthened to a new level, with the level of strengthening increasing the higher one went at the cost of higher experience required.
Except for special circumstances, every aspect of them received an upgrade, no matter how small it may seem.
And if their current amount of power was not optimal, some of it would be restored during the process of the upgrade.
Normally Evan was supposed to only receive a single level up, however, his hero title and system benefits were applied, allowing him to gain enough experience to jump two levels.
For Evan who was injured right now, a level up that increased his overall power and helped him recover even by a little bit, was one of the best things that could happen to him now.
'Thanks, Eliza.'
He internally thanked the girl as he got up from the ground and rose his sword just in time to meet Elecrus' aura-coated blade that came crashing down from above.
His mystic eyes flashed as he immediately began mimicking the movements of the blade wraith, right from the overhead slash, to the forward thrust and the sideways slash.
Evan's feet slid across the ground as he moved to dodge the attacks by a paper-thin margin, however, with his injuries, his movements were slower than normal and Elecrus' blade ended up cutting his skin lightly.
Elecrus realized its sequence of attacks would be replicated and instantly changed its movements, pulling its sword to the side before immediately swinging in a wide arc while moving forward at the same time.
Evan, however, blinked out of the way and appeared right behind Elecrus, before replicating the Blade wraith's actions and delivering a circular slash to its back.
His blade which was infused with flame magic, tore through Elecrus' armour once more and sliced its flesh.
The young hero then blinked away just in time for the blade wraith to turn around and deliver an upward slash.
Looking at its movements from above, Evan allowed gravity to bring his body back to the ground as he slashed downwards, his blade clashing with Elecrus' sword and releasing sparks of light as they slid against each other.
Elecrus twisted its body around as it delivered a slash towards Evan's right side, sadly this was within expectations as the young hero concentrated his aura on his side.
"Ngh."
The force of the blow was great, great enough to normally knock Evan off balance, even more so in his injured state.
However, the young hero was already off balance due to the fact that he was landing from the air.
So instead of knocking him off balance, it actually helped stabilize himself as his left foot landed on the floor not too far from his right, inadvertently placing him in the perfect stance to execute another attack.
He reversed his grip on his blade and infused it with his own aura as he stabbed toward the blade wraith on his right side.
Elecrus backstepped to avoid the slash, lunging forward immediately afterwards with its sword raised overhead as Evan switched his sword grip to block the incoming blade.
**CLANGG!!
As soon as their weapons clashed, the two pulled backwards simultaneously and attacked once more, with Elecrus swinging his sword downward and Evan swinging upwards to meet its blade.
Flames burst forth from Evan's sword at the same time Lightning was discharged from Elecrus' blade.
*BOOM!!
The two elements exploded upon contact, sending the two combatants flying, however, Evan pulled out his second spare blade mid-air and flipped his body, stabbing it into the ground to prevent himself from falling on the ground.
He looked up to catch the sight of Elecrus who performed a similar action with the handle of his crossbow, damaging the weapon as the blade wraith tossed it away and kicked off the ground, dashing towards Evan.
Evan spat out blood as he pulled out the spare sword and tossed it like a spear in Elecrus' direction, making the blade wraith raise its blade to block the slash.
In the short moment that the thrown weapon covered Elecrus' vision, Evan vanished from its sight.
The monster's red eyes darted around the room, its gaze locking on Eliza who was seated at one of the walls to rest after killing Leviron.
The fact that the girl who was fighting its brethren was not doing so anymore, was enough to give it an idea of how the fight ended up.
It dashed in Eliza's direction, intending on taking advantage of her obviously tired state for one of two things.
Either Evan would be forced to make an appearance or it would end up killing Eliza.
And just like it had expected, Evan indeed made an appearance, with a thin layer of white light surrounding his entire body and a golden aura enveloping his sword, making him look like a holy knight, however, his expression was far from holy.
"How dare you?!"
The young hero was no fool and had realized why Elecrus targeted the resting Eliza, rage bubbling up from the depths of his heart as he cancelled his original plans and blinked right In front of the monster with his blade coated in aura.
**SWISH! SWISHH!!
He swung it twice activating his aura slash skill from a range that Elecrus who was already charging forward, would be unable to dodge in time.
"The nerve? To actually dare go against my comrade when I'm still here."
As he spoke, he channelled magic power into his left arm and pulled it back while forming lightning on the hand.
He then tossed the lightning in his hand towards Elecrus, gracing it with a lightning spear right after it barely managed to block the aura slashed with its blade.
*GUHH!"
The monster grunted out as the lightning struck it right in the face, exploding right after and knocking it backwards.
"Just what do you think you are?"
Evan asked as he blinked towards the back of the falling blade wraith with his blade coated in a golden aura, stabbing towards the monster's armour and piercing right through it.
With no armour to protect it, his blade tore into the monster's flesh with relative ease.
'Hmm? I missed where the heart was supposed to be?'
He asked himself the question internally as he poured more aura into his sword, causing Elecrus to scream out in pain.
Infusing his gauntlet in lightning, he punched at the monster's defenceless back, shattering the rest of the armour and exposing its scorched back.
'The wounds I inflicted earlier are still there, so how did its armour get restored? Magic?
It sure as hell doesn't have a skill that restores its armour.'
While Evan was lost in his thoughts, Elecrus recovered its wits and discharged lightning from its body, forcing Evan to pull out his blade and take a few steps back.
Studying the blade wraith, Evan could see that it was now breathing heavily, showing that it was indeed exhausted due to the constant consumption of magic and aura.
'Pride, can you help me check if there's any other monster around? This thing's armour was restored by some weird means and I can't seem to figure it out.'
[Got it.]
Evan sent a mental message to Pride through their connection, turning his attention back to the exhausted blade wraith upon hearing the high demon's reply.
'Well, my state is not far off from its own.'