I had heard that Agnis had returned from his educational outing. He rarely halfasses something if he is serious about it. Even if he went intending to have fun, I’m sure the students have realized how big the world truly is. It is impossible for Agnis to stay out of trouble so at least they got to witness something spectacular which no normal human would be able to experience normally.


    I visited him in his room after he had returned. The first thing that I noticed was that he was giving off a strange energy. He told me about the state of the dimensional fabric and how he was unable to mend it. He also told me about a strange phenomenon which he dubbed. The ‘+1 mystery’ and how he almost got dragged into the void. As I had expected he had some bizarre adventures while away.


    He then described the pyramid dungeon and its contents and its challenges. It sounded like no big deal until he arrived at the manifestation of his own nightmare. I saw his complexion change during his retelling of his story and it seemed like his body was slowly shutting down. I gave him a check-up and concluded that some of the curses he contracted were affecting him. I sent a shadow clone to grab my supplies because I needed some potions to stabilize him. He linked me up with his vision so I could have an easier time dispelling the curses.


    I want to say that you did something reckless again but given the circumstances I’d say that you got the best out of the situation.


    You think so? I feel terrible. Dying doesn’t even sound so bad at this point.


    Well, you brought 62 humans into a dungeon. Not only did all survive, none are severely wounded. To add on top of that a watered-down version of a goddess appeared and still no humans have died or gotten wounded. Moreover, you survived without losing a single life. I’m not unreasonable enough to say that you were reckless. I think you handled it the best you could possibly handle it.  I dispelled 53 curses and Agnis breathed a bit more easily.


    The problem with these curses is that not all have the intent on killing you.


    Does that matter?


    Well, what I’ve realized is that my shadowcat passive doesn’t block curses. It just allows for opportunities to dispel them before they become an issue. This can be stretched over a long time before they take effect but they will eventually get through. Now curses are similar to barriers and seals but they have one important difference and this difference makes it hard for you to dispel curses and relatively straight forward for me.


    Uhh, I think I have read it somewhere. It has to do with the intent of the curse, right?


    Correct. You can’t see intent. But shadowcats can feel the intent of the curse. The reason why the curses that want to kill you are quite ineffective because you subconsciously recognize their intent to kill you. These other ones however are unclear to you and that’s why my passive is less effective on those.


    Hmm so if I knew the intent of those your passive would be able to negate them easier?


    Correct, and stop talking, I can see that you’re straining yourself.


    Agnis seemed to play it cool but I could tell he was in agony. He was using frost magic to numb himself and slow down the progress of the curses I was dispelling. Most of these curses gave him various illnesses. One curse had decayed, or more specifically regressed the state of his immune system so I had to create a sterile bubble. Interestingly enough Agnis had encountered a more advanced sterile bubble and instructed me how to create it. Rot or decay element isn’t that far from time magic.


    Anything relating to time or space will have a hard matchup against Agnis just as anything light or dark related has a hard matchup against me. He got lucky that he got to fight this specific goddess. I told him to attempt to return the state of his immune system to what it was before he got hit by that immune system decay. While he was struggling to reverse the time on that I continued to nurse him to health and remove the thousands of curses he had contracted.


    <hr>


    Three days had passed. I sat down exhausted in the corner of the sterile room. Just like Agnis was in a constant battle against the illnesses and curses, so was I constantly in battle against a specific curse. It is named [Hablena’s curse] and this curse generates 100 random curses every 12 hours. Most are deadly so I can ignore these for a bit because they don’t affect Agnis for now, the ones that aren’t deadly needed to be addressed in a timely manner else they would affect Agnis.


    He had told me how bad the matchup was for the goddess but the majority of these curses confirmed that. They would become quite potent against living beings that had a lot of mana circulating through their systems but since we got out of Hourai, both Agnis and I have made it a habit to make or internal environment as mana free as possible. Agnis uses frost magic or pulls mana from the environment and briefly holds it in his body for the most part, while I use mana stored in my shadows. Agnis and I especially seem to be a terrible matchup for that goddess. It’s comforting to know that there are some deities that are relatively useless against us.


    Raishin and several students have tried to visit but I had denied them access. It would be a bad idea for them and for Agnis.


    I had a shadow clone take over my lectures. Another one was doing research on how to combat [Hablena’s curse] more effectively.


    It was the first tier 2 curse I have encountered. Even those deadly sin curses we had acquired during Boshi town were tier 3.


    It was almost 17:25, the moment when [Hablena’s curse] would generate 100 more curses. I prepared for the 100 new cursed but they never came.


    This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    You look exhausted, take a break. I managed to freeze time on that curse for a bit.


    Stop wasting your energy, I’m fine, it’s you who isn’t. I will rest after we’ve solved this problem.


    Agnis nodded and I dealt with the 100 new curses that flooded in.


    <hr>


    A week had passed since Agnis had started to slowly succumb to the multitude of curses placed upon him. I had successfully dispelled 3195 curses from him. The curses that would hinder his normal functions had mostly been eradicated. Just 33 left including [Hablena’s curse].


    I looked at Agnis who was fast asleep. He had continued to apologize for the state he was in. He doesn’t realize that I don’t get nearly as many chances to save his life as he had saved mine. This is just a part of returning the favor. I do realize that nine tailed spirit foxes have a lot to deal with but that doesn’t mean they need to take up absolutely everything. I do acknowledge that I have been lax in what a shadow cat is supposed to be doing but my task isn’t as straightforward as Agnis.


    How do I know where to distribute energy to? And where do I get that energy from if I have to. We have Raishin but what do I do in situations where Raishin is absent? I haven’t noticed any strange behavior of shadows either and my shadow isn’t talking to me. Do I have a similar state as Agnis where I can see the fabric or feel the fabric of the shadows and feel if something is off? I have no ideas that can be backed up with facts.


    A clone had made a breakthrough and I started to address [Hablena’s curse]. My clone had found a way to forcefully remove or change the intent of a curse. Removing the intent is an extremely bad idea. It is near impossible to create a curse without intent but it’s also near impossible to remove a curse that has no intent. I will remember this though. If I can curse a god and remove the intent it will be there to stay. I will have to shift the intent of this curse to become easy to deal with it or I can change it to become beneficial and turn it into a blessing.


    A blessing and a curse are similar. Blessings have beneficial intents while curses have detrimental intents. Changing intent should be impossible but my race might be able to pull this off. I could turn this harmful curse into something that extends 100 blessing to him every 12 hours. I will just be making my friend here the strongest creature ever known. That is if I succeed of course. It will more likely just turn into a low tier normal blessing. But there is a small chance that I can just alter its intent without touching the rest of the curse.


    Now I do have to keep it from changing its name. if the real goddess appears one day, she won’t be able to place [Hablena’s curse] on him since he already has it. This isn’t the type of curse that increases in intensity or duration whenever it gets reapplied. It’s the type that’s unique and can’t be reapplied unless it gets removed first. I tested my theory on more harmless curses. Any harmless curse that was unique would get their intent changed by me with attempting to keep the rest of the curse intact.


    I had turned many curses into harmless blessings. They did seem to default to a one-time use and then disappeared. This is also a good result but not my objective.


    Agnis woke up. Ugh, it feels like you’re using me as a guinea pig.


    Well, you provide the perfect environment for me to study and experiment with curses. This field is highly theoretical so it’s unlikely that anyone gets a lot of practice with this.


    Whatever. As long as you become better at dealing with curses I don’t care. Go for it. I would prefer to stay alive though.


    I will keep you alive don’t worry. What is the point of me telling you to be careful all those times and then finishing you off myself?


    Maybe you got enough of my pranks and me messing with you.


    Don’t worry I always get back to you without compromising your life.


    My head hurts, how is the progress coming along?


    I just need to shift the nature of [Hablena’s Curse] and then I’m done. You will still need to rest to get back to good health.


    Agnis coughed and drank some water. I feel so much better now compared to last week, thanks Greg.


    Pay it no mind. You seem to forget how many times you’ve saved my life and how many times I’ve been unable to return that favor.


    Agnis forced himself to sleep because he didn’t want to be awake to experience what I was up to. I kept studying and examining the remaining curses and got rid of the 100 curses [Hablena’s Curse] generated.


    I succeeded and failed the next day. [Hablena’s curse] had been lifted. That was the success. I failed in trying to flip it into a blessing that generated 100 blessings per 12 hours. It just turned into a relatively strong 1-time blessing. It seemed to have boosted his natural regeneration. I guess if a curse of a goddess of decay gets flipped it will become a blessing of regeneration. After this he seemed to rapidly recover from his illnesses and made a full recovery.


    He gave me 30 bottles of liquid shadow vodka as thanks. I felt it was safe to lift the sterile bubble 12 days after he had shown the first signs of being cursed. The strange energy he gave off had disappeared with the disappearance of [Hablena’s Curse].


    You look exhausted. Let me bring you to your room. I will even send a request for days off for you.


    Thanks


    He teleported me to my room and cleaned up a bit. My room had been unattended for almost 2 weeks. He also replaced the food in the fridge.  Now go sleep, if I see you walking around within the next 3 days, you will be the first person to hear my [Bossmusic: Liam’s Lullaby].


    I went to bed thinking that he must have picked up another strange skill that would probably be very niche but save our lives one day.