My mother returned a week later. With no lesson or training, I had a bit accustomed to my lazy lifestyle. My magic training was also not quite burdening as the principle was quite easy to understand. I was scolded by my mother and was dragged outside of the city to be left in the middle of the forest.
I sighed when I was told to return to the city by myself. I sighed and looked around. Since nobody was around, I decided to summon something from my inventory
"Summon!!"
I chose the Stallion. A 2 meters wide magic circle appeared on the ground. I heard a neighing sound and a white stallion with grayish mane and black eyes jumped out from it. The magic circle faded right after the stallion shook its mane.
"Ooh"
I leaked the sound of amazement. I walked slowly toward it. It wasn't hostile at me at all. I touched its nape and it rubbed its head on my chest.
"It's obedient and a good horse. Yosh, I'll name you... Sora."
It neighed and looked happy. I looked around.
"For now, let's find the pathway."
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Even I said I wanted to find a way home, I forgot one fundamental problem I had since, in my previous life, I have no sense of direction. When I found the pathway, I rode on Sora's back and took the left road I thought I had taken to come here.
On each branching path, I would use a coin flip to decide the direction until I finally arrived at a town. My storage ring almost full of the herb and raw materials I had gathered along the way. I hadn't done any potion crafting yet but I had leveled up several times thanks to the monsters I had killed along the way.
I sighed as I let Sora brought me along the pathway. As a horse, she had high stamina. She had been running for 3 hours now. But, she had no sign of getting tired or slowing down.
Riding without stirrup rein is quite challenging in its own way. I felt that I would be thrown from Sora's back anytime as we accelerate.
"I guess we'll arrive at the Capital soon"
I said as I looked at the clearing on my sight. I patted Sora's neck and we headed to the end of the pathway at full speed.
Upon arriving at the clearing, I saw an unexpected spectacle. It was a city with hordes of Goblins, Orcs, and Kobolds were attacking the wall.
There were lineups of knights who tried to block their path. I made up my mind to help them. But, just a moment before I could start casting my area of effect spell, an amazing view entered my sight.
Three lesser dragons flew above my head and they breathed flame toward the city beyond the wall. Three dragons and hordes of monsters against three battalions of knights. Even an idiot can guess the outcome. The knights will lose. I looked around if the mastermind was around.
Unable to see anyone stood out among the monsters, I turned my gaze at the dragons. They were aiming to fire another breath of fire. I looked at the burning town. Another batch of fire like before was enough to destroy the whole place.
"Yosh! Let's shot down those flying lizards first."
I said to myself.
Looking at the dragons I then pondered. How should I shoot it down?
Inside my storage ring is filled with herbs, loot, and potions. I don't have any spare weapons or projectiles. That means that I only have my magic to attack. The dragons were hovering in the sky.
I raised my hand. I recreated the image of my magic inside my head. Arcane Magic was one of the three types of magic. The other types are Attribute Magic and Rune Magic. Arcane Magic and Attribute Magic are categorized as attack magic. The difference between them is that arcane Magic used a magic circle instead of chant.
Attribute Magic had a lot of spell and varieties and it had low mana cost compared to arcane Magic and Rune Magic. It could be categorized as an all purpose magic. But the chant became longer as you used higher tier spell.
Rune Magic was a semi-passive spell. It used runes written using mana on a medium. It was cost-efficient, fast, and Perfect for creating traps, buffing equipment, creating barriers, or small scale attacks. The demerit of this magic was that it required a medium to write on such as paper, ground, cloth, leaves, etc.
Compared to them, Arcane magic was closer to combat magic. No, Arcane Magic was full-fledged attack magic.
Arcane Magic used a magic circle created by materializing the concept inside the head using magic. As long as the Caster could muster the concept behind a phenomenon, he could recreate it with this magic. The only demerit of this spell is the high rate of mana usage.
But, mana is not a problem for me. Beside my based mana pool free along with my level, my alchemist profession increased its growth by two times, plus the additional growth from my Arcanist profession.
I focused my magic. I created a magic lens in front of my left eye by creating light distortion.
I could see the dragons as if they were within my grasp. I lined up 6 layers of yellow-colored magic circles.
I took out a batch of herbs for curing blood loss and extracted the iron essence from it. Using additional material from the ground, I created metal-coated bullets.
"Time to get down here, flying lizard!!"
I shouted. I three the first bulletin into the magic circle closest to my body.
BWOOOOSH!!!!
It was sent flying through the layers of magic circles and flew straight at its target.
Launching the bullets using electromagnetic force, that was the concept within this magic. In other words, this magic was created based on modern weaponry, rail guns.
Splatt!!!
The dragon's head blew up soon after the bullet entered its eye. Ignoring the first Kill, I quickly changed my target. The second and third dragons are looking for me.
BWOOOOSH!! Splat!!!
The second dragon was shot down. I smirked when the last dragon glared at me. I opened it's mouth to breathe fire at me but I fired 3 consecutive attacks using my last bullets.
I snorted when the window came from the fallen dragons swept my small body.
"Well then, shall we start the cleaning?"
I said.
Sora carried me toward the clearing. The view of the disastrous battle entered my eyes along with the looks of half slaughtered knights.
I took two vials of mana potion and chugged them down into my throat. I concentrated my mana into my magic. Three layers of different colored magic circles appeared om the sky.
Lightning, Wind, and Water, the three of them widened and covered the sky. Just in split second, a raging storm descended to the army of monsters. They blasted the monsters like firing magical Gatling guns at them. I controlled the magic circles to completely eradicate the monsters without leaving any survivors.
I dispersed the storm when I felt a bit lightheaded. I looked at the battlefield. The monster corpses were shattered everywhere and the survived knights looked dumbfounded seeing such spectacle.
I rode Sora's back toward them. The knights prepared their stance to attack me but a heavily armored man stopped them.
"Thank you for saving us"
He bowed at me.
"It's alright, I'm just coincidentally passing by. I will be grateful if you can help me looting those guys later. I bet the materials must be quite a lot to be done by myself."
I said. The knights tilted their heads when they heard my childhood voice. I took off my hood.
"Wha-"
"A kid!!?"
The knights were quite shocked by my appearance. I just smiled back at them and patted my horse's head.
"For now, why don't we go inside and talk with the city mayor?"
The armored man said. I nodded and followed him to the tattered burning city.
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The people were over here and there. They tried their best on putting out the fire as well as helping those who are trapped inside the rubble.
"By the way boy, are you come here by yourself?"
The armored man asked.
"Hmm... Actually, I came to the forest with my mother but we got separated midway. That was before I came here and shot down those flying lizards."
I said honestly yet somewhat as vague as possible.
"Hee... Your mother is it? Where is she now?"
He asked me.
"I don't know. I was traveling alone with Sora since then."
I replied. I saw a priest passed by in a hurry. He had quite fatigued looks. The surroundings were quite hectic when I looked at it again.
"By the way, about the harvest over the loot, I will probably be taking only some of them. As for the rest, I will leave it for this city's sake."
I said.
"But, first we should meet with the mayor shouldn't we?"
I added. The armored man nodded and increased our pace. We headed to the largest building, or rather the former one.
"Sir Alan, good thing you're survived. I heard you managed to devastate those wicked monsters, congratulation."
A bearded man said. The armored man, Sir Alan, smiled wryly and scratched his cheek.
"Actually, regarding that, I got something to report."
He said. The bearded man looked at me.
"By the way, who is this kid?"
He asked Sir Alan.
"Etto, basically, this child is the one who single-handed had destroyed those monsters including three red dragons."
He explained. The bearded man looked at me with disbelieve.
"Again, you must be joking with me, hahahahahaha!!"
The bearded man laughed it off. Sir Alan tried his best to explain things to the bearded man over and over. I, who got bored, decided to roll the gachapon for today. It's a miss again though.
"Bozu, what's your name?"
The bearded man asked me.
"My name is Ren Concerto."
I said.
"I think I've heard that name somewhere but well, let's put that aside. You said you're traveling. Where are you heading to?"
He asked.
"The Capital!!"
I said honestly. The two of them were dumbfounded when they heard it. Sir Alan sighed and scratched his head. I titled my head as I looked at them.
"Actually boy...."
The bearded man said.
"This city is located at the border of this country."
He added.
Eh? Border? Doesn't that mean that I was ended up at the furthest point from the capital?
"And the capital you're heading is..."
He pointed at behind me.
"2 weeks away by carriage to that direction."
"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
At that time, I just realized. My sense of direction is completely astonishing in a negative way.
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"Here's today's batch, good work everyone."
I said as I handed the box filled with Mana Potion I made. Currently, I stayed inside the church for some time. I helped the priests in rebuilding the town by supplying the healers with mana potions and stamina recovery potions. I also made some medical compound tends the wounded using the herbs I had gathered within the forest.
In exchange for that, I hired some people from the town to take the materials from the monster corpses. So far, I had gathered 180 scrap weapons, 400 horns, 25 demon fangs, 4872 pieces of dragon scales, 6 dragon horns, 60 dragon fangs, 800 vials of dragon blood, and quite a lot of dragon meat.
I traded a few materials in exchange for some magic storage rings and sold some others for money. As for the meat, I gave two out of three dragons to the citizen for them to eat. And thanks to the effect of the medicinal treatment and dragon meat, the city was recovering very fast. Just in a week, the former city of rubles and coals returned into a busy city at the borderline of the kingdom.
"Say, if you're this strong, why don't you become an adventurer?"
A priest asked me as we ate together.
"Adventurer eh? I don't know if my mother will allow it."
I said.
"By the way, how high your level is?"
He asked me. Now he mentions it, I hadn't checked my level since I got my demon heart.
"Hmm... I haven't checked it for a while. Perhaps it hasn't changed much."
I said. I secretly used appraisal on myself.
###########################################################################
Ren Concerto Level 95 Alchemist Level 88 Arcanist Level 45
Titles: Genius Alchemist, Saint's Son, First Prince's childhood friend, Scientist, Prodigy, Miraculous Eyes possessor, Auction Hall's VVIP, 3rd Princess' fiancé, Baron of Maximilian, Dragon Slayer, Demon Tribe's Nightmare, Savior, Hero Candidate
Race: Human, Demonification Level 0, Dragonification Level 3
Seed: Acedia Level 38
##########################################################################
My jaw almost dropped when I saw my stats, especially the titles. Dragonslayer aside, the Hero Candidate was too surprising to appear. The Demon Tribe's Nightmare was rather assuring as this might make my position better as I would be feared by demonkind. The Demonification also didn't show any change but the dragonification appeared instead.
"Maybe you can have the head priest check it for you. The level identifier shouldn't be broken from the flames."
The priest suggested.
"I prefer not. I don't want to see the head priest have a heart attack when he sees my level. I mean, I just killed a dragon you know. I bet that the priest will faint if he knows that my level is still quite low."
I tried to avoid the topic. The priest frowned.
"Hmm... That's true enough."
He nodded as he thought about it.
"By the way, your relationship with Lisara-san is quite close isn't it?"
He grinned at me. Lisara was a girl 8 years older than me who worked for the adventurer guild. I often talk to her when I posted a commission for herb gathering for potion making or material selling.
"Well, we're just an acquaintance. Furthermore, I will be leaving soon."
I said.
"Eeeeh, already?"
The priest was surprised.
"This city is already can act on its own. And I now can hire some adventurers with the fund I had gathered so far as to an escort. Also, I can't let my fiancee waited for long."
I said.
"Eh? You got a fiancee?"
"I never tell you?"
"Not even once!!"
And thus, I started my preparation for my journey back to the Capital.
I departed from the city as soon as I bid farewell to everyone I knew in the city. I couldn't become a coach so I hired an adventurer to become one. Including the coaches of the carriages, there were 12 adventurers. They were quite famous ones at that. Southern Wolf and Gale Falcon are their party's name.
"But, Savior-sama, what business do you have at the Capital? You can stay in the city in luxury you know."
The coach said.
"Well, I can't let the people precious to me worried. I had written a letter to them but I can't let them wait for too long."
I replied as I gazed forward.
"Well, that's quite true. But, there was something I was curious about."
He said.
"Just how old are you?"
"I'm 10 years old two days ago. What of it?"
I said while tilting my head. The coach's jaw dropped.
"Well, my level grew fast because my main profession is Alchemist. Furthermore, I like to make potions and experiment on many things so the levels are growing rather fast."
"I see."
He sighed as he drove the carriage. The journey was rather smooth. The monster rarely appeared, the weather was good, and there was no bandit at all.
"But, this is quite strange that there's no bandit along the way."
I laid down.
"Well, the escorts are well known as the best bounty hunter after all. As if there's a bandit stupid enough to attack us."
He said.
"Well, that's true."
I smiled wryly.
"Oh, I can see the castle wall from here."
He said. I raised my head and looked forward.
"Finally, I'm home."
I muttered. I looked at the approaching gate in front of us.
"Mind if I see your identification paper?"
The guard said.
"Etto, this is our client, Mr. Ren."
The coach said to me.
"Ren?"
The guard looked at me carefully.
"Yahoo, guard-san. It has been a while."
I greeted him as if I just left for half a day.
"Wha- Re-Ren-sama!!"
The guard was stunned. He quickly opened the gate for us to enter. I told them the direction until we entered my mansion's yard.
"This is a noble's abode isn't it?"
The leader of Southern Wolf said.
"Yeah, my mother is a baron after all."
I said. Well, I lied about it though. I was the baron after all.
"Eh?"
Everyone looked at me in surprise.
"You're a noble?"
The Gale Falcon's Leader asked.
"Well, kind of. The king just gave this title to me as he wished."
I sighed.
"...."
None was able to respond to that. Suddenly the door of the mansion was opened widely and a woman was running toward me at high speed. Unable to dodge, she crashed toward me and hugged me tightly.
"Ren, it's you, right? Do you have any wounds? Are you hungry? It must be a tough journey right?"
She, my mother, asked me as she checked every corner of my body. The adventurers were lost of words seeing the scene.
"I'm alright, mother. By the way, these onii-sans had escorted me back here."
I said. My mother quickly stood up and bowed at them.
"Thank you for bringing my son home."
She said.
"By the way, why there are so many carriages?"
She asked as she looked at the carriages.
"Etto, Souvenir?"
I said as I tilted my head. I told the adventurers to help to move the materials into the storage and the meat to the kitchen. Natalia was shocked when she heard that the meat was actually dragon meat. It took me a long time to explain everything to my mother. And in the end, I was punished by being forbidden to touching my lab or training magic for 3 days.