In the middle of eating his freshly prepared breakfast, he suddenly heard a weird noise from outside the ship. Within that very moment, the entire ship shook, as though it had hit something.
'An Iceberg out here? Am I going to re-enact the titanic in this world? Wait, how can there be obstacles a hundred metres in the air?'
With this thought in mind, Daron picked up the rest of his sandwich and stuffed it in his mouth while making his way to the highest deck. On the way, he found Patrice, and her squad of ducklings, as well as that ostrich among their group, the official knight. As he reached the middle deck, he also found Doug, which now meant that everyone on the ship was now present with them.
As they made their way to the higher deck, the ship shook once more, this time, much more fiercely than before. Most of the people present, excluding Daron, the official knight, and the knights in training, all lost their balance.
Noticing the situation, Daron turned around and asked while waiting for everyone to get up.
"For now, you guys get up and prepare for battle, I am going up to check what it is."
With that, he dashed out, leaving everyone shocked for a moment, before they quickly stood up and also began walking upwards. However, before they could reach all the way up, Daron came running down.
"All you knights in training stay on the outside and protect the mage apprentices who will go on the inside. Any mage apprentice who finishes their mana will return back to the lower deck to recover their mana, but the knights in training will remain up there unless I say so."
"Rudolf, try and conserve your Internal energy, using it only sparingly for defence, until I give the signal. I will be right behind you."
Although Daron would not mind killing it on his own, he needed to not show his powers in front of anyone who could be possibly watching. After all, there was no age restriction on this journey, yet for some reason Patrice was sent along with children? Clearly, Bob had used this same method to travel a few years ago, but this time, only a single Rank 6 official knight was with the group, one that was clearly not experienced in combat.
Therefore, there was a 40% chance that someone, either an Advanced knight, or an Advanced Apprentice, possibly even an official mage watching over them in secret.
After saying that and standing behind Rudolf, Daron cleared his mind and began constructing the fireball spell. All the other mages did not know what Daron was doing, thinking he was simply calming himself down while walking before a battle, and began to do the same.
A soon as they appeared outside, they were greeted with a Rank 2 flying beast.
"A Rank 2 flying beast, could, in some cases, even be considered a Rank 3 beast, since they could easily dodge attacks!" Doug mumbled to himself.
"Alright, everyone begin casting your spells, and do not aim it at the beast, but around it, to prevent it from escaping!" Daron said before waiting.
However, instead of hearing spells being launched, he only heard nothing, looking back, he saw that all the mages were standing still, with their eyes closed, concentrating severely on their spells.
"Shit! I forgot they did not prepare their spells in advance."
Cursing in his mind, he whispered to Rudolf to stand his ground facing the Rank 2 beast that was the size of a bus, and was heading straight for the food it had found on the weird flying tree that was invading its territory.
Opening its gigantic mouth, the Rank 2 beast revealed rows of sharp teeth, as well as an intensely disgusting stench, while flying full speed towards the group.
Naturally, just an official knight was no match against a Rank 2 beast, and would likely be thrown away from the force, however, This was exactly what Daron wished to see.
Just like he predicted, Rudolf was thrown back, and at this moment, all the spells from the kids was launched. Patrice had launched a fireball, and so had all of the other 3 beginner mage apprentices. Doug, on the other hand, had launched a water ball, which worked similar to the Fireball in terms of construction, but did not cause splash damage or burn damage, instead, it worked by accelerating the water ball to high speeds, and considering the weight of the water, it was like being slapped by an Intermediate knight.
'Huh… They are pretty calm for their first-time facing beasts… something seems rather odd here.'
However, Daron did not waste time on that, and instead wielded the sword that he had gotten from the old man, and dived trait into the temporarily stopped beast.
The beast would naturally not reject free food diving into its mouth, and with the spells surrounding it as added insurance, it safely allowing Daron to enter its mouth, before closing it shut and trying to grind the food into nothingness using its teeth.
However, something unexpected happened, with the food continuing to dive in, and entering its throat, still alive!
However, before it could react, Daron launched his prepared fireball into the back to it's throat.
Doug, Patrice, and everyone who were looking in shock as Daron sacrificed himself, suddenly heard another explosion similar to some of their own fireballs. And soon enough, smoke began to bellow form the nostrils of the beast which resembled a sort of hideous flying lizard.
The beast fell onto the deck of the ship, and began rolling around, thrashing its head everywhere, trying to get rid of the food that was giving it indigestion.
However, before it could do much else, a sword pierced through its throat from the inside, before cutting a small hole inside, from where Daron's head peaked out, before he squeezed through.
Not wasting any time, Daron turned around at the flapping bast, carefully avoiding its wings, and tail, and placed his hand inside the slit he had cut though, before launching another fireball.
This time, due to the accuracy of the hit, and the fact that the angle was perpendicular to the throat instead of being at a shallow angle, the fireball ripped a hole through the other side of the neck.
Quickly retreating, Daron just waited, while panting. In just one moment, he had quickly used up most of his mana, and the only thing he had was Internal energy, which he was trying not to use.
However, he had actually done it! He had killed a Rank 2 magical beast, just like that!
However, thinking about it, something seemed wrong with this.