I went in the direction of the beach like area casting 『Arcane Shield』 and 『Improve』 on the way, I could still feel the malign aura in the sky and that was the only thing that worried me. I had no idea if the Hydra was being powered up by someone watching from a distance, I was convinced by then that someone was actually behind this beast appearing in a place like this.
I ignored the weird palm trees with red leaves and the calming wind as I went in the direction of a fight.
“The aura up there is behind this...” I commented.
“Yes, and that is a problem for us, I can’t shake the feeling that this has to do with our mission” Mega answered.
“If this has to do with our mission, we need to learn how to track this dark aura and find its source, a powerful monster like the Hydra might appear somewhere like this again”.
“I don’t think whoever is behind this summoned a Hydra, that would take too much energy, but whatever is going on could have lured that beast here” hmm.
“Well, for now let’s see what we’re dealing with” I said just as I reached the sand.
I stopped and tried to sense the mana around me and feel the danger. Nothing happened for a moment and I stepped forward, my boot treading water. As soon as I stepped on water I felt the ground shaking, it started slowly and then it began getting stronger. I could feel the monster coming but I wasn’t prepared for something such as the Hydra that emerged from under the water.
“Holy mother of god! Mega, you forgot to mention the size of that thing!” I screamed.
“I didn’t have information about the creature’s size” you’ve got to be kidding me…
The Hydra was at least one hundred feet tall, I could count eight draconian like heads looking angrily at me. My surprise delayed my movements, so I almost took the first hit as one of the heads growled and shot a water jet in my direction. I jumped and the other heads followed. One by one, fire, water and then the pattern repeated, the beast was good at leaving me no room to counter-attack. I was constantly moving so I wouldn’t get annihilated by the creature.
I ran around the beach area and studied the heads that used determinate kind of attacks, the two central heads could only use fire and although I was mostly jumping around the sand, I didn’t want burned palm trees around me so I kept close to the beast. I used 『Aerial Slash』 in the direction of one of the heads just as a fireball came in my direction. I was just getting used to the creature’s patterns when suddenly the creature jumped and as soon as it hit the water and the ground, an earthquake erupted around me, water angrily splashing everywhere around the beach. My spell missed and the creature prepared three heads so I saw what was coming.
“Oh no you don’t. 『Whirlwind』!” I said just as the creature shot three giant balls of fire in my direction.
The tornado started small but picked up wind and went in the direction of the beast, the Hydra tried using fireballs and water jets but the tornado was strong and repelled its attacks. The winds engulfed the creature and I had a few moments to breathe before concentrating hard again, the tornado only bought me a few seconds and I knew it wasn’t strong enough to kill the creature, I would need to use the right combination of spells to do the trick.
What to do? What to do? I could use 『Firestorm』 like I originally planned but I needed to cut their heads first. I need to cut one of the heads first to see how long I can go before the beast regenerates...
I used 『Aerial Slash』 just as I canceled the tornado from 『Whirlwind』 and since the creature was still somewhat stunned and struggling to move, my spell was a direct hit. The spell cut two of its heads and I jumped to the left of where I was before casting 『Water Spiral』 to get the creature’s attention, the Hydra shot a fireball that collided with my water spell and was instantly canceled leaving my spell to do its job, just as I jumped again and controlled the water so it would intercept each of the creature’s attacks, the two heads started growing again.
Forty-seven seconds… How do I go about this? I need to stun the creature for long so I can cut all of its heads at once…
“Mega, I need a spell to stun the creature for a moment so I can cut all of its heads. Do we have a spell that can make the creature fall?” I asked while moving fast so the Hydra would have a hard time trying to kill me.
“『Earthquake』. Put more mana into the spell so you can make the Hydra fall”.
“All right, let’s do this”.
I canceled 『Water Spiral』 and jumped back before I jumped really high and used 『Earthquake』. In the next moment the ground shook and the water around the creature gave way for the earth below, the earth rose mixing with sand and knocked the Hydra forward while it violently shook the ground all around us. It was a good thing that I was in the air while it happened so I didn’t feel the impact.
I could feel the impact of the Hydra hitting the ground though. I took the opportunity while its heads were disoriented to use 『Aerial Slash』 multiple times in the direction of all heads. The spells made beautiful work of the creature, severing all of the heads in no time just as I prepared 『Firestorm』 to cook the monster. The fire that broke this time reminded me of a forest in flames, the creature’s body squirmed as the fire engulfed it and destroyed every living part of its body. After just a few seconds, the only thing that remained were the creature’s ashes and bones as I canceled the flames.
“Burn in hell Hydra” I said sighing and sitting next to the creatures bones.
“That’s not very nice” Mega commented.
“That creature is something that should always be killed”.
“I agree with that statement. This one sure gave you a work up”.
“Yeah, and it’s early. I need more coffee” I mentioned. I then felt the dark aura dissipate.
“Maybe this was an experiment? That aura dissipated conveniently after you killed the Hydra” he commented.
“Wait, can we use the map? 『Display Map』” I said.
I looked at the map and scanned the area around me. I couldn’t find anything wrong though. I wasn’t expecting the aura to appear on the map but I wanted to see if something was definitely off.
“It shouldn’t show on the map” Mega commented.
“One can hope”..
“Hold on, zoom on Yokana”.
I looked at the map to locate the place he mentioned, Yokana, the capital of Largos. The city was four days away from Oetto, it appeared to be somewhat smaller than Sunnara but I couldn’t find anything wrong on the map, doing as he asked, I zoomed in.
“Notice that forest outside of the city?”
I looked at the map again and there was a small forest just outside of the city that had the shape of a disc, I stared at it for a few moments but still, I couldn’t find anything out of place by looking at the map.
“This forest doesn’t make sense… Why do they have a forest so close to the city? Unless they can monitor that area, the forest is an ideal place for an enemy army to gather without suspicion” he mentioned, what was he talking about?
“Wait, what? You want to investigate? You think that forest has something to do with our mission?” I was at a loss here, was he really talking about the protection of a city?
“No, I was just… Never mind. For now I think we should get back to Sunnara and get on with our investigation” now you make it sound like we are cops… I miss the old life, but things in this world are very different from things on Earth, I guess magic does put a spin on things.
“All right, we do need to find a way to get to the source of this dark aura” I said just as some soldiers from Largos approached “but for now I need my coffee”.
A few minutes later they were singing me praises and the same soldier that took me here by carriage offered to take me back to Oetto since he would need to inform the guild that the quest was completed, that way I would be able to get my money before heading back to Sunnara.
The journey back to Oetto was silent, I was deep in thought,
mostly thinking that I needed to find a way to exercise better, the movements from my battle with the Hydra were all thanks to my spells and since I arrived in this world, I didn’t reserved much time to properly exercise and maintain a good routine like I had on Earth. I realized that my mana was monstrous but if I had to rely on my melee skills someday, I would be out of my element. One hour of melee training a day should suffice.
The clerk thanked me for killing the Hydra, after a few moments someone from the guild staff mentioned to me that they informed the rest of the guilds of the region that quest was completed and Yuna sent message that she needed to speak with me, so after the clerk retrieved my reward, I put it in the bank and teleported outside of the guild building in Sunnara.
Entering the building, Luke spotted me and waived. I then followed him to the guildmaster’s office. Yuna was eating some kind of noodle based food, she smiled when I entered the office and took my seat. She congratulated me and mentioned that the guild would be promoting me to the platinum rank after an exemplary and quick work with the Hydra, I just shrugged and thanked her. I thought of telling her about the situation with the dark aura but I had no one that I could trust at the moment, she seemed trustworthy enough and worried about the people but for now I would keep my findings to myself, after all, my work was just beginning.
CHAPTER III
A ROYAL ALLY
“You’ve improved these past few weeks” said Mega.
“Yeah, I needed to train hard” I responded panting.
On the ground were destroyed pieces of wood all around me. After I informed Mega that I needed melee training, he suggested that we could find an open field and he could help me, it was there that he demonstrated how he levitated objects so we set on a plan to improve my reflexes. I was to train without a shirt and blindfolded. No magic was allowed, in the first few days I was sore even after using healing spells after our sessions, but eventually I got a better hang of how to move and dodge the multiple pieces of wood that he threw my way at high speed.
With a couple of weeks my speed improved quite considerably and now we were training how to defend while also attacking, for that I focused mana on my hands to strengthen my punches to the point that I could shatter the wood if I landed a hit. I was still training blindfolded, and I trained like that everyday for a couple of hours.
Earlier in the month, after I had a chat with Yuna about the term ‘Warlock’, I learned that apparently the term wasn’t as common as the term ‘Wizard’ but I preferred the first one since in this world they were basically the same. A few days later the guild clerks of other cities started referring to me as “The Crimson Warlock” because of my blood red mantle and also the fact that I only used magic to defeat monsters; even after denying, I still thought that Yuna was the one responsible for the nickname.
The amount of money I had started pilling up since I kept teleporting from guild to guild and completing quests while trying to determine how to find the source of the malign aura to see if that indeed had to do with our mission. Mega suggested that we could create a spell to capture the energy of the dark aura, so we could then essentially create a magical compass that would guide me to the aura’s source.
The problem with creating a spell was that it took a really long time to understand how fundamental magic worked, I skipped all of that when I arrived in this world. Normally a magic student starts by learning the fundamentals so they could construct a mental image of the spell and how it worked before he or she could even use the spell. Since I was basically cheating by using the gifts that god gave me, I only needed to know what the spell did and its name and I would probably be able to use it on my first try. That didn’t worked for spell creation though, so I bought a bunch of parchments, ink and a feather, that way I could properly study.
My routine became that, two hours of melee training, four hours of spell crafting and one quest a day. It was kind of funny that the gold quests I completed were easier than studying spells or melee training. I wanted to complete more platinum quests but there weren’t any near the cities I’ve already visited and since whatever was going on with the artifacts was bound to happen somewhere around Heryan and Largos, I only explored the two nations in hopes of completing my mission.
“I don’t think what you’re doing is productive” Mega pulled me out of my thoughts as I was staring at one of the parchments trying to make the spell work, this spell was rapidly becoming the bane of my existence.
“I feel like the athlete that was caught in a doping test” I sighed “if this is how wizards and witches of this world study to learn and create spells, no wonder it’s hard to find people that mostly fight with magic”.
“I’m sure you’re thanking god right now for your beastly ability to use spells without studying them first”.
“And amen to that, I’m very thankful for being able to freely use spells” I sighed again “I might as well keep practicing, this should become second nature to me some day and apparently I do have the time to study” destroying the artifacts are proving to be difficult since we can’t even find them.
We tried looking for clues in various cities, visiting shops and watching out for suspicious activities involving magic but found nothing. In the regions we visited there were no signs of dark magic being used in cities, the forests around cities were equally fruitless in producing results so we kept an eye but weren’t hopeful that something was going to pan out.
“Well, for what’s worth… I think you’re doing fine, people tend to take years to master the ability of translating spells and understand how they work”.
“Thanks Mega. Now if I can make this work, we can finally make some progress and I’ll feel better about myself”.
“Geez, you are sad today… Normally you’re either serious, content or happy. Hey James! Let’s do something else if you’re not up for studying” I smiled at his comment.
Lately Mega and I started talking more and even though he was way more serious than I appeared to be, he also was showing a playful side that I hadn’t seen before and I hoped that it was because we were becoming good friends.
“Aye aye Mega, what do you want to do?”
“Let’s take a stroll through Sunnara” he suggested.
“Hmm, for that I’ll need to take a bath first” I summoned the map, it was still 9:18 AM and then I remembered something “wait, I think shops are closed today, are they not?” I asked.
“Why would they be closed?”.
“Wasn’t today supposed to be the royal wedding or something like that?”.
“Oh, yeah. I forgot about that, people will be at the noble plaza waiting for the wedding to finish, that way they will see the Prince and his wife. What a strange thing to do...” he commented.
“Well, it’s not everyday that the First Prince of a large nation gets married”.
“Duly noted” he said.
I gathered the parchments and stood from the shade of the tree I was resting on, looking around I marveled again at the nature all around me, it was inspiring. This world is beautiful… Teleporting back to my room at the inn I immediately went to take a shower and wondered what Mega and I could do for the rest of the day, I wasn’t in the mood to complete any quest unless they were critical and truth be told, I completed at least one quest per day for the last few weeks and even though my money was pilling up nicely, I needed to slow down and rest for a bit.
“I think we should explore another town or city, it’s clear that the wedding is the only thing happening here today, weddings are boring...” Mega informed me when I arrived at the bedroom.
“Wow Mega, come on, what do you have against marriages?” I chuckled.
“Nothing, but you’ve been working these past few weeks and there’s nothing to do… We haven’t found traces of the dark aura, there are no gold quests in any of the cities we visited because of you. There’s only boring stuff happening”.
“Ha! Well then, we can-” I felt it happen before I finished ta
lking “what were you saying?”.
“Work, finally!” he either sounded excited or sarcastic, I had trouble identifying which.
“It’s near here, perhaps in the capital, you don’t think...” I tried to feel where the aura was gathering.
“It’s totally at the church in the noble district” he said “well, I retract my earlier words, this is going to be one heck of a wedding” he commented as I was getting dressed. Yep, he was excited. I put my mantle and covered my head with the hood so noisy people wouldn’t bother me.
“Let’s go” I said before teleporting.
Chaos. That was the perfect word to describe the noble district. People gathered outside of the church, some were crying while others looked confused. Soldiers were posted near civilians while royal guards tried to enter the church’s outer grounds but were being repelled by some kind of magic. I knew there was a barrier there in place that protected the building and its grounds against transportation magic, but that wouldn’t repel people from entering on foot. To change that kind of magic someone would need time, so whoever was behind this targeted the wedding and bypassed the protective barrier set up by the royal mages. That took planning and cunning…
I could see a fallen royal knight at the church’s grounds, not moving… If they were dead or just passed out I wouldn’t know but the situation was bizarre, if they were dead that meant that whoever was inside the church could have the royal family surrounded or at a disadvantage.
I wasn’t in the mood to explain to soldiers and knights what I wanted to do or how I could help them but I needed to do my job, especially if the aura was connected to the artifacts I’ve been looking for. Perhaps this day would be the turning point of my mission.
I found someone I recognized from my vantage point on top of one of the mansions overlooking the church, I was trespassing but I needed to assess the situation accordingly. I wasn’t stupid enough to let people see me though, so I concealed myself with the use of 『Camouflage』 before teleporting up to the roof of the mansion. Yuna was in the crowd talking with a royal knight and I knew she would be the perfect person to help me.
The Crimson Warlock Page 7