When Atlas opened his eyes again, he was looking up at a white ceiling. It didn’t take him long to realise he was in his own room, a quick glance to his right told him that. The window on the far side of his bed was open, the curtain was moving in and out with the help of the wind.
Everything was quite loud. Even though he was staying on the upper sides of the huge building in which the academy was located, he could hear the sounds coming from outside the window.
There was an incredibly suffocating, heavy and painful feeling in his body. This pain was coming from his abdomen.
When he lifted the quilt, he managed to see that he was naked and his abdomen was wrapped with bandages.
He tried to move his body and then said "Aghk!" painfully. He was really in a state where he needed to rest. Still, he wondered if the wound was close; if not, he was convinced that the inside of his body might be in a bad condition.
With that pain, he leaned his head back on the pillow and then began to look at the new system windows opening before his eyes. Still... things were a little different this time:
[I have to say, you worried me quite a bit.]
Atlas looked up in disbelief, and then saw that a different system window had opened right in front of him.
Nyx’s name was written on the window.
"Umm...I’m sorry?" muttered Atlas.
[I was really worried. Not just me, most of us were.]
"Thanks...but how is this a little different from the way we talked about it before? I can’t get used to it," replied Atlas.
[Ah! I told you earlier that you’ve obtained something that even gods and goddesses can barely obtain. It’s something that many of us have, so we know how to use it better than you do. What I’m using now is the message section, before I used to talk to you using the notification catalogue.]
Atlas smiled a little after these words and then said, "So... Whatever makes you feel better, my lady, I apologise for making you worry about me. And forgive me for showing you my bad side."
[Your bad side? Just to let you know, darling, the elf you rescued earlier and the three vampire girls you just rescued came to you constantly while you slept. Every day, at least two hours. We liked them so much, all four of them got a blessing].
After Nyx’s message, Atlas smiled and then said playfully, "I pity the people who prayed in temples for decades. Was it that easy to earn a blessing?"
[Haha...Maybe we only like honest people. After all, if we gave only those who wanted power what they wanted, we would have started the apocalypse with our own hands.]
"Haha, the apocalypse, huh?" Atlas suddenly said, and with that, the door of the room opened.
The person who entered was Abraham himself. A look of relief came over Professor Abraham’s face as he saw Atlas awake.
"You have been a great fool, young man," Professor Abraham said. Soon he walked over to Atlas and gently took the young man by the hand.
"Still, you don’t know how proud I am of you for being so foolish," he added.
Atlas smiled and then replied, "It’s good to be well, Professor, though I can’t tell you how much pain I’m feeling in my abdomen."
"I can honestly say you’re lucky. If I had arrived a minute later, you would have died because there was no one there to de-ice you. First aid saved your life, and the rest was solved by the doctor at our clinic. Haha...you have no idea how many potions Frank made for you," Abraham said. The brightness of the smile on the old man’s face was full of hope.
"What about Kris? What happened to him?" Atlas suddenly asked.
Professor Abraham, with a sudden seriousness, replied, "He was questioned. We were able to get every bit of information on every cult section in the Blackmarket, every slave dealing centre, every harmful substance dealing centre," Professor Abraham replied with sudden seriousness.
"Excellent," Atlas muttered.
"Then we wrote a letter from Kris’s hand and magic trace to let the cult know he hadn’t been captured, so I don’t think they’ll try to escape until we make a raid," Abraham said.
Atlas stared at the ceiling for a few seconds and then muttered, "I don’t think they’ll fall for that. I’m sure they’ve been hanging around the academy."
Then he turned his head towards the window and asked, "Did I give you the names of those who should be questioned?"
When Abraham shook his head no, he could do nothing but say, "Silly me!"
"Please get out a pen and paper. I will give you the names of everyone I have and everyone who is in the academy."
"We think we got all the names from Kris, but I don’t think it would hurt to make sure," Abraham muttered as he pulled a notebook and pen out of his magic bag.
Atlas counted nearly a hundred names for almost fifteen minutes. After that, Abraham got up from his seat and said, "Okay, there are some people we missed, we’ll take care of it right away."
With his words, Atlas was left alone in his room. Abraham immediately left the room to fulfil his professorial duty and put everything on the right track.
Atlas closed his eyes and prepared to fall asleep again. However, at that very moment, he opened his eyes as if a question was stuck in his mind and managed to utter the following words:
"Lady Nyx. Do you know how many days I slept?"
It didn’t take long for an answer to come to his question:
[Exactly two weeks. Today is the 15th day.]
Atlas, who could not hide his surprise at this answer, managed to fully understand how worn out his body was.
Still, he needed to rest. So he closed his eyes and comforted himself to sleep. At that moment, the door of his room rang:
"Thud---Thud---Thud---Thud!"
"Come in!" said Atlas, and with that, the door opened.