As time pashed, there was a huge searchlight illuminating the borders of the town.
"From what the I see, the there is mostly some weird creatures here in the outskirts of the forest, heading north and west the enemies are a lot stronger." Thomas held Animanium Blade with his right hand as he quietly moved through the forest, his eyes searching for any energy traces of beasts.
Suddenly, a shadow approached from a within a small pile of leaves. With Thomas' Energy Sensor skill, he saw that the shadow's was incredibly dense and concentrated making it way more subtle than the other creatures. Upon a closer look, Its mouth had two gigantic fangs and a body covered in green scales which reflected the light of the sun.
"It's A demon Beast." Thomas grew alert. Differently from humans demons were a species that could appear in many types, humanoid demons were generally more intelligent and had higher class in their own world.
Among all types of demons the association has listed, Demonic Beasts are some of the worst. As any other beast, they acted only based on their instincts and bloodlust. The power of the weakest demon was already on par with 1-star Adepts.
Thomas tried to recall the name of this demon beast. The color seemed a little off, but the only beast that came to his mind was the Dragon-scaled Lion.
"Dragon-scaled Lion? I heard its scales are pretty expensive. Good, he shall be my next prey." Thomas watched the as the Dragon-scaled Dragon noticed the young human figure and rushed at him with eyes filled with bloodlust.
* Roar *
As he stared at the Scaled Lion in the eye, he held up his blade. The monster made a weird sound as gray mist expanded from its claws, making a cloud of dust as the huge creature with the size of a family car vanished from its previous position.
What the beast did not expect was that Thomas was highly sensitive to energy since he just got his new skill. It carried a trace of the denes demonic energy with it as it charged towards Thomas, like a Heavy Truck about to run over his body.
Wooosh! Right when the Lion charged, Thomas circulated his Anima Energy together with the skill [Swift Feet] and quickly dodged to the side.
The Dragon-Scaled Lion didn't even have time to stop during its charge due to its immense weight.
"Now!" Seeing the opportunity, Thomas' eyes lit up as he rushed forward like a lightning streak, all the power on his body focused on his arm and unrelentlessly pierced forward with his blade!
The blade which was infused with Anima Energy moved very fast, piercing through the wind just before hitting the back of its neck!
* Crack *
Thomas felt the green scales beneath his blade he crack due to his attack, yet, a thin layer of demonic energy seemed to prevent his blade from advancing any further.
"Cut for me!" Seeing how more power Demonic Energy was, being able to resist his anima-infused blade from him, a glint of gray flashed in his eyes.
SSSHHSHSHSHSHHHH ..... Shawsh!
The head of the demonic beast was immediately detached from its body and flew up high before it landed at sixteen feet away. Fresh blood was spewing out of the area where it was cut from, and Thomas was completely dyed in blood. The body of the beast which laid on the ground twitched for a bit before it finally died.
"Huu, hiii" After finishing off the Lion, Thomas took some time to rest. He was scared of himself after witnessing the gory scene he did just caused.
"Right I still need to complete the procedures." When he got better, Thomas had stored the heart of the beast in a special compartment of his backpack and was about to remove the valuable parts of the body when he stopped.
It was a arrow flying swiftly towards him.
After two of relentlessly fighting monsters and beasts, Thomas who only had one life-and-death battle to pick up battle experience.
As they were mostly on par with ordinary 1-star Adepts, Thomas was able to dodge the attack with ease, he instinctively picked up a sharp piece of stone from the ground, infused some Anima Energy and tossed it towards the knife thrower in a quick counterattack.
Soon, a group of human figures walked out of the shadows. There was a total of 5 people, but Thomas couldn't see their faces since it was covered by the shadow of the trees. Even so he could see they were strong Adepts from the amount of Anima Energy that was seeping out from their bodies.
When the 5 saw Thomas and the Dragon-Scaled beast on the ground, they let loose happy smiles to each other, as if they had mutually agreed on something. Increasing their speeds, the 5 of them quickly reached and surrounded the young Thomas.
Thomas was already expecting the people that were following him would appear. A Dragon-scaled Lion was too valuable to these people let it pass.
[Anima Energy: 100/300]
"Might I ask what you're doing?" Thomas asked while looking at his energy bar on the corner of his vision. He had spent two thirds of his Anima Energy in the previous fights, his hand slid into the backpack and grabbed some ration before taking a bit of the corn-based protein bar.
While he could use potions from the system store and the passive Vitality Aura to heal himself, there was nothing there that was related to Anima Energy so the only way he hand to replenish it was through eating.
[Anima Energy: 150/300]
He could feel all the energy of the highly concentrated ration melt in his stomach, making a warm flow of energy circulate his body through the path designated by the Thirty-Seven Mystic Rotation.
[Anima Energy: 200/300]
One of the youths, a female dressed in red brandished her sword with an evil smile, "Are you asking us what we are doing? You should know very well ..."
"Hand over all the profs of the beasts you killed and leave the Dragon-scaled beast behind. We definitely don't want to embarrass you, but if you don't comply ... You shall know pain." A tall burly man played with his throwing knives as he sneered at him.
Thomas dropped the backpack at his feet gently with a smile, "Everything is in this backpack, if you have the skill, come and get it then."
Although all the 5 of them were Adepts, Thomas didn't feel a hint of fear. He was confident in his escape even if he couldn't beat them. "Come on then, let me see how you will make me feel pain."