{[ March 4, 102 A.A. ]}
The map that Athelei used proved to be as reliable as ever.
It had footnotes that depicted the next village that they were to visit was a small outpost for the rogue and unpredictable Adventurers.
It was a village built by Adventurers and for Adventurers, thus it was situated in a special place.
At the foot of a mountain range, between the flatlands and the forests, and on a wall-like land formation in the midst of wild beast nests.
That was where the tumultuous Adventurer village, Colsi was constructed and is thriving.
As such, after about half a week of travel, Athelei could hear the roars and wails of beasts echoing out all around the merchant caravan. Athelei unsheathed his first and only weapon and opened up a 'file' from Appraisal's memory bank.
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Mystical Stiletto Dagger
[ "Needle of Motionlessness" ]
Lethality: 8
Durability 23/25
- Possibly has special characteristics. (Nerve Disruption: Partial Paralysis)
- Dipped in poison. (Arc Cobra Venom: Respiratory Paralysis) (6/8)
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
The screen above was the result of Athelei compiling the different results of his different Analysis Skills. Its information was so much more complete than before.
"Beast attack!" A yell suddenly came from the back of the caravan of carriages, "Twelve Scaled Wolves!"
More yells came from all around and reported the amount and type of beasts attacking. Most were Scaled Wolves this time and from what Athelei was hearing, there should be around forty wolves.
Athelei excitedly got out of the carriage as the survivors did the same: All of them held weapons of their own for the sake of their own safeties. Their carriage was situated around the middle of the caravan while the Harmonic Knights were at the back and the merchants' hired hands travelled at the front.
Armed humans hurriedly appeared from within their carriages, causing the attacking wolves to howl. Athelei watched as the one-meter tall wolves stand up on two legs, boosting their height way higher than a meter to howl a battle cry.
AWOOOOO!
What smelled like an easy hunt was now much harder than they initially realised. And so, they would fight harder. They desired... sustenance.
Their howls were then followed by the caws of black-feathered birds that were circling the caravan overhead.
"Venomous Ravens! Reporting at least nine!" Another yell sounded out from the caravan.
The battle then quickly descended into a blood-boiling skirmish. Athelei's eyes flashed as he drew a Mystic Pattern in the air. The white light that trailed from his fingers swiftly shrunk and merged with his body, filling his little figure with energy.
But Athelei did not strike just yet. He was being protected by the adults for a reason he clearly understood. With the effects of Hunter, Athelei was about as strong as an athletic teenager despite his tender age. If he was in his fog-body, he could exert strength on the level of an adult instead due to the combination of a better-drawn Hunter pattern and his powerful consciousness.
The wolves and the ravens, on the other hand, were much stronger in physicality than the normal, unbuffed human. They operated on instinct, allowing them to make the most out of their raw strengths.
Humans had a mind that was prone to emotions, which could both impede or strengthen them depending on what kind of character they bore. Intelligence, just like many things, was not a characteristic filled with only pros. It had many cons as well, and it depended on the person how many pros of intelligence they were capable of tapping into.
This was Athelei's simple goal for the first battle he would truly participate in—figure out how one would exert the pros of intelligence while minimising its cons.
He wanted to carefully observe, running Judgement again, and again, and again. Lisa, who was protected by the Harmonic Knights was doing the same thing.
War truly was a wonderful place to grow... but only if you lived through it.
The survivors were the weakest link of the caravan and wounds began to appear as the battle progressed. They traded wound for wound using their grief and anger as fuel for their strength. It was a different fight when compared to the Harmonic Knights who were inching towards their area to provide reinforcements.
Athelei continued to watch, judging that fighting with reckless teammates would be a risk to his own plans. He was already receiving a lot from simply watching, however.
'I found it.' he inwardly grinned, 'Residues of a mortal's consciousness. It does exist as I expected it to.'
The consciousness that Athelei was pertaining to was the same grey fog that he used as a body whenever he fell into slumber. And, seemingly due to the fact that none of the beasts who died was a Nightwalker, and perhaps because their intelligence, in general, was weak, their consciousnesses were but little puffs of smoke.
It was nigh-invisible, like when Athelei spread his fog-body thin.
'I do wonder if the ability to sense such minute presences is granted by the wings that I had made for myself...' thought Athelei as he witnessed those small puffs of smoke instantly dissipate into nothingness. He hadn't been searching for it before, but with his eidetic memory, not many things were capable of hiding themselves from his senses.
Whenever he reanalysed his experience in the Exiled's raid, he knew he never noticed those residues despite being a witness to many human deaths. At least, his senses at that time could not perceive anything.
Now, it felt very clear to him. In fact, there was a rhythm with each slain wolf.
Death then dissipation.
Death then dissipation.
Death, then dissipation.
It was like a heartbeat. One that beat to the rhythm of death.
And then this rhythm was suddenly disrupted by a wave of bloodlust. A bloodlust that choked the air and caused the wolves and humans alike to stiffen for a moment.
FWOOOSH!
A black blur zoomed past a carcass of one of the Scaled Wolves and in the next second, the canine's body was gone.
Athelei blinked and realised something crucial, 'Those Venomous Raves are opportunists!'
And they were now divebombing anything that perished.
The battle continued to rage as Athelei assessed its development, learning, studying, and getting a feel for it all. He watched the survivors' exchange of injuries, the hired hands' systematic slaying, and the Harmonic Knights' forceful destruction of anything that stood in their way.
There were no losses on the human's side so far, with only the survivors earning a few dangerous wounds.
'So this is the difference between adults,' Athelei observed how each group fought and gained insights on the manner in which they did so.
He recalled what he had learned so far and identified the inexperienced movements of his fellow survivors.
The hired hands were simply fighting with all of their prior knowledge; this was a route they had passed through many times before. They knew how the wolves moved, and how to react. It looked so easy that Athelei was tempted to try the same. Perhaps once he had watched enough battles, he could mimic them even if only a bit.
As for the knights, with their mystical armour and weapons, they were simply too hardy to care about technique too much. They reflexively swung their blades to kill and stormed the small battlefield with their iron greaves. They were making use of their instincts, just like the wild beasts.
CAW!
As the wolves were dwindling in number, the ravens seemed to eye the injured humans. They already had beasts in their stomachs, so they fancied a bit of... dessert. Athelei squinted when he inferred such a situation.
His obsidian eyes scanned the battlefield for a wounded survivor and quickly spotted a man, limping to return to the carriages.
Heightened by his Hunter pattern, Athelei did his best to navigate through the open spaces on the battlefield. He found himself close to the wounded survivor... but not close enough for a melee strike.
FWOOSH!
Athelei heard the sound of whistling wind and knew what was about to happen. 'Predictable behaviour...' he thought to himself as he flung his dagger towards the raven's flight path.
Ssuk!
The mystical blade found itself deep inside the bird's flesh. It pierced through its brittle defence as two paralysis effects began to run their course.
Thud!
Instead of a swoop, all that the Venomous Raven experienced was a bone-shattering crash. The avian opportunist found itself dead upon impact, right beside the wounded survivor.
The man jumped in fright when he felt the bird's feathers caress his skin and ruffle his clothes. He swung his weapon at the bird but realised it was already dead. He then watched as the familiar figure of the young Orien run to the bird's carcass and pull out a threateningly pointed dagger.
He then watched as the little boy flung off the blood from his blade and sheathed it with the grace of a knight.
The man then stood there in a daze for a good few seconds as the battle quickly ended.
The Venomous Ravens had fled when they noticed one of their own had died while the few surviving Scaled Wolves had run away with their tails between their legs.
Athelei felt the weight of his dagger hanging on his belt as he noted to himself, 'The mystical effect, Nerve Disruption, seems to be instant. It is a splendid complement to the slow-acting Arc Cobra poison. The partial paralysis is a small drawback but shouldn't be too much of a problem for a practised fighter... I wonder what restricted the dagger's creator from making a complete paralysis effect instead?'
Athelei then swiftly shoved that thought into his mental shelves.
There was something more crucial right now, and that was the Venomous Raven's residual consciousness.
Athelei had come into contact with the dissipating consciousness even before he pulled out his dagger. He had then promptly consumed it.
How, exactly? Athelei was unsure, but he did have a few guesses.
The only problem was that absorbing a foreign consciousness did not seem to be something commonly practised by those with a fog-body. Athelei felt a contaminant grow rapidly inside him.
It was different from the chilly corruption of the Unknown Mystical Badge. That had been a looming and inevitable kind of growth.
This contamination was not subtle in the least.
It thrashed about in his mind, and Athelei could guess what would happen to a mortal consciousness if it experienced the same rampage:
'Their minds would fall apart as they lose themselves to the maws of insanity.' Athelei inwardly whispered as he gathered his consciousness and crushed the Venomous Raven's remaining sentience. He did it in the same way that he shattered that one Nightwalker a week and a half ago.
And after he did just that, he felt the refined consciousness assimilate with his being. The powdered fragments wafted over and became a part of a new whole.
'It seems like this is something only a select few should be able to play around with,' Athelei smiled, 'That's fun.'