Chapter 73: To the Hunt
Unedited*
Three Months Later.
Lucius drank the last drop of Silver Marrow Elixir and set the glass bottle on the table in front of him.
"Are you going to make more?" Clara asked, picking up the glass bottle to wash it.
Lucius shook his head. "This is the last sip of that I’ll ever take. If I keep taking it, I’ll reach a point of no return."
Clara frowned. "Well, it’s a powerful drug... It’s unfortunate that you have to take it to numb your inner self."
"And it doesn’t have the same effect as it used to," Lucius replied, putting on the jacket that was hanging nearby. "It lasts shorter and shorter each time. So it’s time to go out and find another way."
"Another drug?"
"No, no more drugs. We’re going to look for Manna Marks." He pulled out a document and showed it to Clara. "We’re going on a trip."
"Huh? Did they give you permission to go in there?"
"Professor Jake took care of it." Lucius smiled.
Clara immediately got excited. She ran to wash the jar and then came back, wiping her hands.
"When are we leaving?" she asked.
"Right now. The beasts I’m looking for only come out at night. So we’ll have to get there by sunset," Lucius replied.
"Great!" Without another word, she ran off to get ready in her room.
Lucius left his office and walked through the workshop down to the first floor. Things had changed quite a bit around here.
They didn’t have any new workers, but they did have certain partnerships with companies to sell and resell magical materials and tools to them.
Thanks to that, the workshop was doing better. Old Garen looked healthier, and Old Kevin was overjoyed every day.
When they saw him come downstairs after a whole month without setting foot on the first floor, Garen and Kevin ran up to him.
"Young Master," they greeted him.
"I’ll be away for a few days. I hope you can manage things well. Work with Joao and Professor Jake to make sure everything goes smoothly."
"We certainly will," Kevin replied immediately.
Garen, on the other hand, frowned. "Go out right now? Those Fake Rankers are still out there, and I heard the Asturias family’s been having trouble lately. I don’t know if it’s safe."
Lucius stepped forward and patted him on the shoulder. "I’ll be fine. I can’t hide forever, you know? And the only way to get stronger is to go hunting. This world doesn’t reward those who stay stuck in one place."
Garen nodded. "If that’s your decision, then go ahead."
Clara came down shortly afterward, and the two said their goodbyes and left. The workshop now had several personal cars, so Lucius took one of them and drove it himself.
Due to the presence of Fake Rankers in the city and other problems that had occurred over the past three months, the city was practically under lockdown.
However, neither the Fake Rankers were able to find their target, nor was the city able to track down those Fake Rankers.
Tracking down those guys was easier said than done.
And no one still knew what those guys’ objective was.
But calm had returned to the city.
--
Lucius and Clara drove out of Nueva Asturias, heading north.
After driving from morning until night, they arrived in the vicinity of the Great Northern Forest, one of the largest private forests in the country.
It had its own parking lot on the outskirts of a small town where Lucius parked the car, and then they entered using the pass Jake had gotten for them.
Seeing the imposing Great Northern Forest spread out before them, Clara swallowed hard.
"What beasts do you want to hunt this time? I don’t even know what your two main spells are yet, now that I think about it," she said.
Lucius didn’t think twice. "My first two spells are dangerous for me, though powerful. Thanks to them and my skill, I was able to take down that gorilla with a single blow, but that seriously damaged me internally, and it took me a long time to recover. That’s why I can’t rely on them too much."
"Hm?" Clara frowned and looked at him. "Did you use both spells and your ability when you killed that gorilla? You can’t see it in the video," she said, opening The Wall before going to Lucius’s profile to check...
Lucius laughed. "My ability is special. So don’t bother looking—you won’t see anything."
She was immediately curious. "Why? What does your ability do?"
However, Lucius shook his head. It was better to keep that a secret for now.
"But this time I’m here to try to advance to Rank E, and for that I’ll need to look for mana marks of the support type," he said.
Although the support-type spells weren’t very useful on their own, I couldn’t even use them individually anyway. I absolutely had to activate their symbiosis if I wanted to use magic, so those support spells under the effects of symbiosis would surely create an amazing effect.
Besides, if I combined a support spell with one of my current attack spells, I might achieve an effect even more spectacular than [Meteor Impact].
Especially... if I can get them at Rank E.
"All right. If they’re support-type, my ice will be a big help in hunting them down."
"I know. So let’s start heading in. The first one I’ll need is a Quicksilver Medusa. But just in case, I’m also looking for an Echo-Locating Cricket and a Void Magnet Cockroach."
Clara nodded. "The Medusa will be tricky."
"Not if we find her mist." Lucius laughed.
"If we get caught in her mist, we’ll be in trouble," Clara reminded him.
"There’s always a way, Clara. When dealing with low-ranking beasts, anything low-ranking comes in handy," he said, pulling out a glass vial containing more of the drug—only this time, it was in powder form.
"Didn’t you say you weren’t going to use any more?"
Lucius stared at her. "Do I look like a junkie to you?" he asked, rolling his eyes.
"Well... you’ve been using a mind-altering drug for a long time. I guess so."
Lucius’s mouth fell open in surprise; he hadn’t expected her to think of him that way...
"Tsk." He felt annoyed. "I don’t take drugs just for fun. The Elixir is useful—this is only to counteract the Medusa," he said grumpily.
"Oh." Clara’s voice sounded as if she’d discovered something amazing. "Really? I never thought a drug could do that."
"That’s why I told you there’s always a way," he replied. "The Medusa’s mist is like a drug made of metal particles. And this is a drug made with metal particles. It’ll be easy to pinpoint that thing’s location within its own field."
Although Clara was a little surprised, somehow it no longer surprised her that Lucius knew so much.
If anything, she was surprised that he hadn’t explained that to her while they were hunting the beast in question.
"Though it looks like that will have to wait," Lucius said suddenly as he walked along and then stopped. "We have company."
Clara nodded. She immediately knew what to do.
She took a deep breath through her mouth, filling her lungs with air before blowing forcefully in all directions.
[Frost Breath has been activated]
A powerful blast of freezing air shot from her mouth in all directions and began to travel a considerable distance.
Before long, she found her opponent, though it wasn’t entirely necessary.
A huge snake emerged from behind one of the trees and lunged at them.
It was over 7 meters long and up to 45 centimeters wide. Its mouth could open more than a meter and a half, which would allow it to swallow a small human with ease.
Lucius pulled Clara back. "Freeze my insides. I’ll handle this," he said.
Immediately, [Mana Crystallization] enveloped him, and his body was surrounded by powerful energy as he activated [Meteor Impact].
He didn’t use it at full power because he didn’t want to cause internal injuries to himself or harm Clara. However, to fight an E-Rank like this, it was enough.
The snake lunged toward him, singling him out as its target, and contrary to his expectations, Lucius also ran toward it.
He ducked just before being swallowed by the snake’s enormous mouth and landed a solid blow on its jaw.
Even though Lucius was skinny, the snake felt as if it had been struck by a massive mountain. Its head spun—both literally and figuratively.
However, it managed to recover before Lucius could land a second blow and jerked its body to wrap its tail around Lucius... As soon as it felt contact with something, the snake tightened its grip.
It wanted to rip him apart.
BOOM!
Suddenly, the snake’s head was pinned to the ground, and confusion reigned in its mind. Its tail had just wrapped around... a tree?
Lucius had, in fact, managed to break free without too much trouble; by positioning himself above it, he was able to strike it precisely at key points.
However, the beast still put up a fight... but not for long.
Blood covered Lucius’s hand as the snake’s head was completely destroyed under his blows a few seconds later.
He jumped and landed next to Clara, who deactivated her ability.
"That thing has a lot of mana," Lucius said, rubbing his hand. Those blows had been painful.
"That’s why it’s a Great Forest. Its beasts are naturally stronger."
"And more numerous, too." Lucius sighed and looked behind and in front of him.
They had more visitors.
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