Changes after the contract[1]
[Ace POV],
Looking at the darkening sky, I knew it was getting closer to nighttime, which meant our hunt was coming to an end. It would be more accurate to say that the night had already arrived. It was a beautiful day outside.
'It really is a new world,' I thought as I looked up at the two huge moons hung up in the sky, ready to rain their radiance on the people. This was my first sighting of the moon in the new world. I didn't see one when I was in Adara camp because it was just getting close to nighttime then, and I also wasn't waiting to see one.
After taking in the scene, I turned to Anna, who had just finished filling another bottle with blood and was heading my way with the others. Mia was fast asleep in Anna's arms. After all, she is a child and must be exhausted.
Aside from that, I was also exhausted from hunting most of the day. At least, it was not without gains.
As I was thinking about this, I called up the primordial chronicle in my head to check on the status of my job quest.
.....
[Kill Unranked Monsters using Magic: [42/100]],
[Kill Rank 1 Monster using magic: [0/50]],
[Kill Rank 1 Monster with the aid of Alchemy: [0/30]],
[Kill Rank 1 Monster with a single hit with the aid of Alchemy: [0/1]],
....
Looking at the number of unranked kills I had today, I knew it would have been higher if I had any magic spells or attacks when the hunt began.
Since killing a monster with my twin flame-coated blade could not be counted as killing a monster with magic, I could only discard the blades and store them in my storage ring while improvising in the battle to finally get a kill with magic. I had to give up some kills to get it.
According to what I've seen, when the primordial chronicle mentioned killing monsters with magic, it meant pure magic, which I'm not very good at. Emma must be a magical genius to be able to manipulate magic like that and form and use various attacks and spells to kill monsters when she only recently came into contact with magic and mana.
As these thoughts raced through my mind, I took the wooden bottle handed to me by Anna and placed it in my storage ring while taking another look around.
Although there were visible signs of the battle all around, not even the corpse Anna had just drawn blood from was visible. That's because they were already exchanged for coins in the store.
Even though I did the same, the gains were not very significant. It was exactly as I predicted: the monsters in the dungeon were more rewarding than those outside, whether in coins or primordial records.
[Total Coins: 3 Gold Coins: 54 Silver Coins; 36 Bronze Coins],
Even after killing a reasonable number of monsters, I still didn't have enough primordial records for a level-up. Though I didn't get a notification that I had enough primordial records to level up, I knew I wasn't far off. Just a dozen more monsters to kill and I should have enough.
As I was thinking about this, I called out my status in my head, took a quick glance at it, and discovered a new change in it.
.....
[Status],
[Name: Ace Blaze [Yet to evolve]],
[Age: 17],
[Race: Human [Homo sapiens]],
[Level: 25[+]],
[Job: [Alchemist lord[23.25%]],
[Store],
[Title: None],
....
The first part of the requirement, killing unranked monsters, was, as expected, the easiest. The difficulty only increased from the second requirement. But there's nothing I can do about it except take it slowly, despite not having much time.
As I was thinking of this, I looked around at the others who had finished whatever they were doing and turned back to Anna, saying;
"Look for a place for us to stay for the night and complete your contract," I said, to which she replied with a nod.
I asked Anna a question after seeing the crow back turn slightly in the sky as it went to scout.
"Are the materials for initiating the contract with your summon completed?" I inquired.
"This should be sufficient. It's just the small cores I have on hand that are causing me concern ", she replied.
The cores she mentioned were the ones we were able to obtain from the special zombies we encountered on the road. Fortunately, there was no other instance of the mutated zombie with abilities similar to the one we fought that ate the awakening fruits. Emma was also with us, which made group fights much easier.
"Forget about the cores; if you don't have enough, I'll give you some, but why do you need so much blood?" I questioned as it was a question that piqued my interest.
Of course, my team and I were not in an open area during this conversation to avoid becoming targets for monsters.
When Anna heard my question, she responded, by saying;
"Thank you, and it's because of the success rate," she explained.
"There's a success rate?"
"Yes, that is why I have enough blood and crystal cores in case the success rate is low, as materials will be wasted. This is also why I said that the materials harvested from stronger monsters will be better but with the strength of our team, since the only monsters that could really threaten us are rank 1 monsters, and from what I've heard, I don't think we're ready for that, so I had to settle for the lower level one and hope the success rate isn't too low ", she explained.
As she stated, the only thing that could truly threaten our team is rank 1 monsters, and this claim is not unfounded given that everyone on the team, including myself, is at level 25.
As we are still outside, no one has time to check their notifications.
As I pondered about this and spoke with Anna, who was sharing vision with her crow, a report arrived, as Anna had found some suitable locations.
Without saying much, I told her to pick any one of them since I was tired, as was the team, and wasting time choosing a place was something I was too exhausted to do in this state, and I also believe Anna's decision should not be bad.
When Anna heard what I said, she nodded and led the way as we all blurred from our location.
....
We arrived at our destination after some time spent going under Anna's direction. A single-story structure. The reason this location was chosen was that there are few houses in the community this building is in, so there was a lot of space, which meant that even if there were zombies in the community, they would be fewer than the ones outside, and we'd be less likely to face the situation we faced when we encountered multiple zombies just after waking up outside the building.
Since the door to the building was closed, I had to destroy the doorknob to enter, and when everyone else entered, we checked the entire building for zombies before closing the door when we didn't find any or anything that spelled danger at first sight.
After that, we chose a random room to stay in, and just like before, everyone was together. I told Anna to wake Mia up as I brought food cans from my storage ring for everyone to eat after deciding on the master bedroom.
There were some rest stops along the way where we ate, but they were all exhausted from the fighting. So, before anything else happened, everyone ate, and when Mia finished eating, Anna put her back to sleep on the master bed.
I'm exhausted.
"Ace, I want to start the contract," Anna said, as the exhaustion I had felt before vanished. I was very interested in this contract thing, and I could tell from the expressions of the others in the room that they were as well.
"OK, continue," I said, and she nodded as she approached the center of the room.
Seeing this, I took whatever materials she had given me during the day and moved to the far end of the room to make room for her. When the others saw this, they did the same.
Anna took a wooden bottle from the ground where I had dropped it and opened the cap after a while of breathing in and out. At first, I had my doubts that she would drink it, after all, it is a new world, and I wouldn't be surprised if a vampire appeared tomorrow, given that there must be a reason why we have 'Race' in our status.
As I thought about these things, I watched as Anna carefully poured the blood from the bottle onto the floor and began to draw a circle on the floor with strange symbols drawn in and out of it. I initially thought the circle was random, but I later recognized what Anna was doing from the basic alchemy knowledge in my head.
It was a magic array.
There wasn't much of a distinction between magic arrays and formations.
There were a lot of details in the array Anna was constructing, but based on what I knew from basic alchemy, the things drawn here were too advanced for the current me. I could only tell it was a magic array.
I finally understood why Anna needed blood and crystal cores because, in magic arrays and formations, a catalyst is required for both of them.
As Anna was constructing the Array on the floor while chanting something in an unknown language, the mana in the air began to react.
At this point, the magic array on the floor began to emit light.
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