The creatures of the night kept pouring in like a flood. The cave was littered with corpses and blood.
Khaladrel poured more divine energy into his body, he grew stronger and faster. His sword turned into a burning blur.
Viona could no longer keep up with him but he had to agree she was much stronger than expected.
Mana flowed freely through her veins. He could tell she had a talent for controlling it. She was suitable to be a mage which was a rare talent few had.
Subconsciously as they fought she started to passively absorb the mana from the air. It didn't seem like she even realised what she was doing.
Her body grew slightly stronger than before, her breathing became more stable and Khaladrel witnessed something he had only ever seen a few times in his life.
She started to absorb mana without a mana technique. The only few humans to achieve this ended up being saints.
A realm only below Gods, it was a talent that only appeared once in a billion years. Khaladrel was really surprised.
However he made a decision to keep this woman under his grasp at all cost. She will be a great tool... friend for him.
Hours passed, Khaladrel had lost his sense of time but he suddenly found himself standing amidst a sea of corpses.
He looked around and saw no new clickers or wraiths coming in. He sucked in a huge breath then cancelled the barrier.
He could've stayed within it last night but it would've been useless. Sunlight can't enter deep into the cave meaning they couldn't wait them out.
Not to mention more would've been attacking the barrier at once, he doubted he would've been able to maintain it until sunrise in that case.
But with him and Viona killing them, they reduced the pressure on the barrier thus keeping everybody safe.
The people stopped praying. " We're alive, everybody is alive, thank goodness." Realising they were all safe they started crying tears of joy.
Even Viona couldn't hold back her tears, Khaladrel didn't understand anything so he just kept quiet and checked his divine energy.
It had reached 1600, a significant amount only earned in one night, he couldn't help but grin which made the children cry ruining the happy mood.
Viona approached him. " Thank you, thank you so much, you have no idea what this meant for us, to go through an entire night without losing a single life, truly thank you."
He shook his head, " I'm not the one you should be thanking." He couldn't let their gratitude go to waste, divine energy points were what mattered.
She nodded. " Still, thank you, for fighting so hard for us." Then she gathered everybody, a little of the last candle was left.
He lit it up for them then they started praying with tears and crying thanking his grace from keeping them safe.
They all saw the barrier that kept the monsters out. To their eyes that barrier was created by the statue of the God.
To be honest he could've created it around the cave entrance to completely keep them out but why would he do it.
He needed them to see those things up close, to see how close to their jaws they were.
He needed them to feel fear and grow desperate. He understood that humans become more grateful the more desperate the situation you saved them from was.
He watched then pray to him, he could feel their worship pour divine energy inside him and he grinned inside.
They were very close to being true worshippers, their belief in him was getting stronger and the amount of divine energy they can give with each prayer was growing.
After they were done praying it was time to clean the cave. They started dragging the corpses towards the cave entrance.
Ved was confused by what they were doing then Viona grabbed it, using her superior strength she threw it out.
Khaladrel stood Infront of the entrance just a step away from the sunlight. He saw the corpse of the clicker being burnt by the sun.
It atrophied in seconds and before long crumbled like sand leaving bones behind. He was surprised but saw them dragging more of them towards the cave entrance.
" Stop." They looked at him strangely. " Why are you throwing them out?" Viona looked at him like he was stupid.
" You told us to clean up." He shook his head. " Yeah but I didn't say throw them out, you're wasting so much meat."
She looked disgusted. " Sir Khali, perhaps you don't know this but clickers can't be eaten, their meat is poisonous."
He smiled forgetting how terrifying his smile is. Viona subconsciously took a step back. " Oh I see you don't know, it's not the meat that poisonous it's the blood.
There is a way to process the meat, it's quite delicious once prepared I've been told." They looked sceptical.
He knew they wouldn't easily believe him. " Follow me." He called the strongest men to follow him.
When he first woke up before their intrusion, he could swear he heard the sound of running water deep inside the caves.
They passed by the area he woke up on and he realised something he didn't before. There was a magic circle where he woke up.
He frowned but ignored it and led them further in. After going down for a dozen metres they saw a tiny lake inside the caves.
The lake was clear and beautiful, it glowed blue from some type of flower inside it. He looked down and didn't see what he was looking for.
They went up following the river, the caves seemed larger than he expected. They walked almost a kilometres before he found it.
A few hundred metres away from them there was a river bend with heavy currents. Around that bend was yellow grey clay.
This type of claw was known as iron sand clay. It had a ridiculously high melting point and once it dried up it could be as hard as iron.
He grinned, " Just what I'm looking for."