Gianna had appeared next to Nial wearing a robe to cover her appearance. She didn't want too much attention to fall on her, after all.
Nial could understand that and he regretted not having worn a proper robe. Only the Tier-2 runic cape covered him a little bit.
"It was about time you came to my rescue!" Nial said jokingly. Gianna rolled her eyes in return before she grasped his wrist to guide him through the crowd.
While running, she released her mana to push the crowd aside, while ignoring the grumbling complaints from behind her.
The Guards were trying to reach Nial and the unknown robed woman, who had appeared out of nowhere.
However, before they could even reach them the two had disappeared.
"What are we going to do now?" One of the Guards asked, panting heavily before he skidded to a halt.
"No idea. I will just report that we lost the Dark Lord. Our superiors will decide what to do next," the leader of the small unit of Guards said before averting his focus to look at the crowd around them.
"There is nothing to look at," He spoke while gritting his teeth while his eyes turned into daggers. The Guard Leader seemed to be annoyed about losing Nial and everyone noticed that.
The crowd dispersed slowly, leaving the young mother and the young boy alone. The young mother was sitting on the ground, not believing what had just happened, while her little kid was running around restlessly.
He was overjoyed and nothing could hold him down as he issued noises of joy while moving vigorously in the arms of her mother.
When the little boy moved a crystal fell out of his pockets. Kilian, the little boy stopped laughing and he began to struggle as he was trying to get back the crystal that was his prized possession now.
"Kilian, what do you have there?" The young mother asked almost immediately but the little boy didn't want to answer. He kept trying to wiggle out of his mother's arms to get his crystal back.
Unfortunately, his mother was faster and she picked up the crystal. Her expression changed drastically and she paled in an instant upon noticing it.
"Superior grade…ability crystals…" She blurted out and broke down into a hysterical sob. Wiping her cheeks, she looked up high in the sky.
"Mark…you don't have to worry about me and your little boy anymore…you can finally rest," The young mother sniffled while speaking. She continued to cry, and Kilian started patting her mother's back.
"Mom…don't cri…you can hab the sparky…I gib it to you…don cri…" the little boy said in a weak voice. The poor kid was unable to understand what had just happened and how his entire family's fate had changed thanks to their encounter with Nial.
Meanwhile, Nial and Gianna left them behind and it didn't take them long to reach Miranda's mansion.
"Why did you give the little boy a Superior grade ability crystal?" Gianna asked almost immediately. She looked at Nial in doubt while questioning his intentions openly.
"No reason, I just felt like it," Nial said in all honesty before he smiled proudly and added, "...and it's not like I'm lacking money."
Gianna rolled her eyes but she didn't say anything. Miranda had informed her about Nial's arrival but she had not expected him to cause such a commotion.
Considering that he didn't know about the news revolving around him, it was not like Nial could understand what was going on.
He looked at Gianna in confusion but she didn't even think about letting him in the truth, not yet, at least.
"So you are rich now and you gained lots of popularity, not bad kiddo!" Gianna teased before she sat down on one of the chairs in the living room.
"You changed quite a bit after serving in the military," She added with a glint in her eyes. Her motions were different than usual and it almost looked like Gianna didn't intend to hide her true self.
"Who are you?" Nial could only ask, feeling weird when he perceived Gianna's mana. It was almost 100% identical to before and ordinary people wouldn't even be able to sense that something was off.
But Nial was not an ordinary person. He was someone, whose mana perception was exceptional. His range of perception was accurate and spot-on.
Gianna flinched when she heard his question. She could immediately tell that Nial had figured out what must have happened. Her lips shaped into a small, yet, seductive smile as her impression of Nial changed.
"You really changed a lot, otherwise, you wouldn't be able to sense the change in my mana, that's impressive!" Gianna clasped her hands together, acting as if she was applauding him for discovering her secret.
Nial ignored this reaction entirely and let out a sigh.
"Did you receive the recognition of a God?" He asked straightforwardly, only to shake his head when he saw the expression on Gianna's face.
"That's not it. You wouldn't be that confused if you would have received a message from a God. You are not an incarnation either, and your Innate ability is [Stealth], so I doubt that you awoke your Innate ability's memories either…" Nial mumbled as if he was talking to himself but Gianna could hear everything he said.
She squinted her eyes after a while before freezing in place when Nial spoke about awakened memories and her Innate ability [Stealth].
"How do you know about my Innate ability?! Miranda would have never told you about it. No…it cannot be the case, was it really Miranda? Nobody else knows about it…" Gianna seemed to panic the more time passed. She stared at Nial in shock only to realize that he was smiling like a true devil.
"Is your Innate ability really called 'Stealth'? I didn't know, I just guessed it from what I concluded with the information I had at hand. Miranda never told me anything, don't worry about that," Nial was quite calm considering that something about Gianna had changed.
Based on her earlier reaction, he could tell that she was mostly the same as before. Her behavior hadn't changed and from his expertise with Incarnations of Gods and his memories of Divine Existences, there didn't seem to be anything wrong with her either.
The only thing that had changed was the potency of her mana, which had increased drastically. Gianna's combat prowess was likely to have received a massive boost. Nial was pretty sure that he didn't have a chance against her as long as he didn't have to go all out.
He focused his [Mana Sense] on her and used some of his mana to find the reason for the changes in her behavior. The robe she was wearing made it difficult for Nail to detect anything, especially because it was a robe of concealment.
Nonetheless, it merely made things more difficult. It didn't mean that he was not able to detect anything, at all!
A few seconds of silence passed and Gianna started to feel uncomfortable. Nial's lifeless milky white eyes stared at her unfocused.
"You bound a Spiritual Weapon to your mana core…is that it? Did it start talking to you or what?" Nial asked jokingly when he finished investigating the dagger that seemed to have concealed itself to hide from Nial's range of perception. He perceived a few things but it was definitely not easy.
But looking at Gianna's reaction, Nial's expression froze. He could clearly visualize her in his mind and her expression was blank as if she couldn't understand how Nial was able to find out everything that was supposed to be her top secret.
"Wait, are you serious? Is your dagger really a Spiritual Weapon, a weapon with a soul? …That's…amazing!" Nial exclaimed, totally ignoring the changes in Gianna's mana. Master Crevian had told him about various types of weapons earlier. According to him, there were weapons that could be bound to the Soul, weapons that could be bound to one's Mana Core, sentient weapons, Spiritual weapons, Abyssal weapons, and much more.
According to Master Crevian's teaching, most of these weapons were extremely hard to create and even the Elves didn't have many master craftsmen, who were able to create such masterpieces. They were extremely rare and Master Crevian didn't think that it would be necessary to teach Nial about forging them in-depth.
It was basically impossible to find such weapons on Jundra and Master Crevian was certain that no one participating in the U21 Runicier tournament would be able to create one of the special types of weapons either. After all, most of them were comparable to Tier-2 weapons, at the very least and their most apparent unique feature was their function to grow with their master until the weapon's material would reach its limit.
That was also why Nial had joked around as he asked Gianna if she was hiding a spiritual weapon. After all, Spiritual weapons were literally weapons with a soul inside them. The weapon gained sentience and after centuries or even millennia of a condition called 'cultivated mind' the sentient weapon would create its own soul.
"Everything makes sense now," Nial nodded his head before he pushed forward. His dark energy shot through the ground and ropes of darkness shot out, tying down Gianna.
"What?! Why are you doing this to me??" Gianna shrieked, taken aback by the sudden attack from Nial. The young Original was still smiling but he had reached out behind her back as he emerged in front of her.
Gianna could free herself but it would take a while because Nial kept releasing dark energy to strengthen the ropes of darkness that were wrapped around Gianna's entire body.
Grasping the Spiritual weapon aka the dagger Gianna got her hands on not too long ago, Nial felt a repulsive response of the weapon to him almost immediately.
It was as if two magnets of the same pole were forcefully held together. Nial frowned for a moment before a bright smile emerged on his lips.
"This is really interesting. Your weapon is great. Does it talk to you as well? Did it reveal its past to you?" Nial asked numerous questions as he returned Gianna her weapon. He dissolved the ropes of darkness as well after he was done with the inspection and kept smiling.
"You really are a weirdo, do you know that?" Gianna asked, feeling like she should punch Nial's face with all her might.
She decided against this after seeing that Nial was just making sure that Gianna was not a threat to him and that he was simply too curious about everything revolving around special types of weapons.
Master Crevian's passion and his knowledge had changed his opinion of runic armaments once again.
Becoming an ordinary Runicier was something everyone could achieve after investing enough time, work and resources but the same couldn't be said about true master Runiciers. To become one, passion for the craft and talent were necessary.
Nial gained the passion for the craft from Master Crevian's teachings and all the challenges Meryl had thrown at him against his will.
Now he wanted to know more about runic armaments and all kinds of unique crafts that were related to runic constellations.
"Yeah, you are right, it's speaking to me, and it tells me that you are the most dangerous human it has ever seen!" Gianna suddenly announced, not allowing Nial to take a breath.
'Oh? Does it know Damian?' Nial thought in doubt, questioning the origin of the Spiritual weapon. He then shrugged his shoulders and smiled faintly when he proudly announced,
"Well I am the most dangerous human, that's correct."
**
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