(Rudeus POV)
We have been out monster hunting for about three days, and the situation has been getting somewhat better.
The large packs of various monsters does make it seem like a major threat has made them to migrate from their previous habitat.
On our hunt, we not only encountered a few other adventurer parties, we even found a handful of Snow Drakes roaming around due in the search of a cave.
Since there has been so many monsters roaming around outside the city, the adventurers were asked to just exterminate any monsters they may encounter and get their materials to check for any request having been posted on the billboard.
Handling the reward system the guild used to have may be turned chaotic now, but as the state of overhaul of monsters made things more risky for adventurers.
Encountering monsters that a different group was having a job to exterminate is inevitable, as we are obligated to exterminate any we encounter in the first place.
Just now, we were taking out some Snow Buffaloes that attacked us. With their high sense of territorial pride, they weren't welcoming about us intruding into their territory.
It was so much of an ease to take them out, I decided to give myself a little practice with my toxic sword.
With both hands on the hilt, I held it next to my hip for the incoming bovine creature.
Gauntlets and boots made from [Specter Force] helped me evade to the right once the creature came close enough to hit its neck.
With an uppercut, I managed to cut a part of its neck that had a vital blood vein. But this wasn't good enough. It would have been better if I decapitated it.
While this one started to bleed out, another Snow Buffalo prepared to go after me, cautious about my sword.
With Gravity Magic, I jumped and used some aerial maneuvering to slice the top of its neck while it corroded from the acid flowing out of it. This time, I managed to sever the entire head from the body.
Landing perfectly on my feet, the next three were heading towards me.
Charging my sword with another load of poison, I swung it at their direction and let the abscess liquid fly out like a power slash.
As the liquid made contact with their heads, it didn't melt them but rather clogged up their airways until they died from suffocation.
The rest of the herd realized that I was too much for them to handle and reluctantly decided to retreat. But I wasn't done just yet.
Going in a zigzag, I struck each monster individually while passing by them and maintaining my speed.
Only four of them were left now.
Taking out my shuriken, I threw them at their direction and navigated them with Wind Magic to chop off their heads.
One of them managed to avoid getting targeted and slipped through.
Holding my sword for an iaido, I concentrated [Specter Force] to get my arms and legs boosted while preparing to use Gravity Magic to make me dash forward as if falling down a cliff.
A purple streak of light came from my sword as I cut the monster with a diagonal slash with ease, cutting a great part of the top part of its body. With this, I managed to reach a speed enough to swing my sword to a level of a pseudo [Longsword of Silence].
Placing one foot forward, I stopped my dash by pushing my heel down.
Once I stopped, I exhaled the air I kept in. Moving like this without the help of Touki makes things harder, but my body still isn't ready to make in any intense movements like against Arumanfi.
My barrier armor isn't yet on the level to be a perfect substitute for Touki, but I have confidence that I could bring it to that point in the future.
In terms of swordsmanship, using these moves which I believe could be from the North God Style, it might just be beginner or perhaps intermediate.
I really gotta scold Paul for not teaching any of it back then. Now I have to go by what I have experienced against from other North God Style practitioners to see how well it suits me.
As the last monster has been defeated, I turned to my team to see them clapping their hands in applause.
"Why are you all applauding me? It's not like I killed them in record time." I said as I got closer to them.
"Come on now, we all know how much effort you put in to improve on your performance." Connor remarked.
"And it's not like we don't know how you could have just used some large spell to eliminate them all. This has been more efficient, right?" Anastasia added.
She got a point. The amount of mana I used was less than using an advanced class spell to try killing them in one go, but even that wouldn't promise killing all in the first try.
Using my sword on occasions like this is more of a training to get used to my Toxic Magic and the armored version of [Specter Force].
I want to keep myself ready should there come a time when I can't rely on the easy methods of fighting prowess I have.
"I have to say, though."
Soldat was admiring the carcasses I had left.
"To do all this without the help of Touki is a thing of its own. And you said that this is just the beginning of what this method could do. The era of swordsman is truly in danger because of you."
"You say it like it is a bad thing to improve something for the better."
He turned towards me, hands in his pockets.
"You are already getting targeted by nobles and people who are after your spot as a Great World Power. This could add even more trouble to your list, so I'm just saying that you should tone it down until you have reached your actual goal of your adventuring career."
I sighed out in frustration. It's not like he is trying to taunt me. There is a bit of truth in his words regarding my reputation.
Swordsmen see Magicians as weak and fragile little know-it-alls, and Magicians see swordsmen as muscle-headed brute with no brain cells.
As of now, Magicians are better when it comes to mass attacks, and swordsmen are better in one on one close combat due to the long chants nearly all the Magicians have to say to attack.
Chantless Magic can turn that all to the side of Magicians, making the swordsmen look inferior in both departments.
My teachings will get me the attention of many people who would want to make a connection with me, as well as enemies that disdain me for ruining their chances of making a better reputation.
"Although, you did make quite a mess with this method."
"... yeah."
Toxic Magic does leave a mark for when it has been used. The carcasses actually got damaged to the point that Fire Magic would've been less... messy.
Well, time to clean up. The mess I made of course, not a monster purge. That will come another time.
***
As we continued for any other monsters to exterminate on our way, we made quite a bountiful monster harvest for ourselves.
And as we can store all our looted goods in my pocket dimension, it is only a matter of our mental health keeping up.
For almost two weeks we were doing nothing but taking out monsters daily, but Soldat and the others actually preferred that as it has been too long since they wore themselves out like this.
With my detection ability, we avoided bumping into any other groups' extermination attempts since it would be offending to just barge in when they are trying to make themselves a living.
Since we had more than enough to get each of us a decent pay, we headed to the city to take a few days off from hunting.
On our way, I detected a familiar signal and decided to inform the others about it. As we headed towards them, wariness began coming from them before I called out to them.
"Please lower your weapons. We come in peace."
"… seriously?" Kaleb asked in annoyance.
"What? Can't take a joke?"
Kaleb, along with the others exasperatedly sighed in unison. Jeez. They act like a little humor isn't good to have from time to time.
As we approached [Counter Arrow] we saw that they had quite the good loot too.
"Seems like we aren't the only ones making some money here." Ingolt remarked.
"Things have been easier Rudeus's added power up." Timothy replied.
Besides Sara, Timothy and Mimir also got the ability of chantless Magic unlocked by me.
But, like with every other person I've done that with so far, they couldn't surpass intermediate class.
It seems to be a certain limit factor involved, but since it has been only a few months, nothing can be said yet.
"Say, now that some of you can use chantless Magic, which one of you is the strongest?" Kaleb asked.
Timothy scratched the back of his head while smiling wryly.
"Hard to say. At some moments, I might be rivaling Susanne."
Oh my, to say that so blatant. He must have gotten a bit more confident now that he doesn't need to say any incantation.
"It's a good thing you're here." Sara said while getting closer to me. "Do you still have some Treant wood I could use?"
"Already? You guys must've gone nuts like we did."
The Treant wood she just mentioned is a bit more mana conductive than normal wood. Hence, she has been adding some to her Sea Dragon arrow heads for easier mana input.
"Here, let me get some for you."
As I was about to open my pocket dimension, all our teammates were looking at us teasingly.
What I thought was just some assistance in work performance looked to them like a couple's assistance.
It's true, Sara and I did improve by a lot ever since our first meeting, but I don't know at what level we are right now.
I don't know about her, but I don't see any problem starting a relationship. Maybe I should ask her out on a date once get back? I hope it is also her first time going out with someone.
Oh, she is blushing. She must've realized what the others were thinking and now feels embarrassed.
As a good person- wait, no, that's not fitting… as someone who wouldn't like her to be upset at me for not protecting her, I should move things quick before she ends up becoming a tomato.
I opened my pocket dimension to search for more Treant wood that might be in there.
As I was searching, however, something else came into my detection. I looked at the direction it was coming from and closed my eyes.
"Something wrong, buddy?" Soldat teasingly asked.
"Someone's getting hunted by a monster." I said out loud, turning the mood upside down.
"Ah, must be an unfortunate situation." Kaleb replied. "Either those guys are exhausted or underestimated their target."
As I was to identify more details about the situation from afar, something odd struck me.
"It's… a single person running away from a single monster."
They all started to grimace. In their heads, they may be thinking that the person and their group got overwhelmed by a larger foe and got annihilated, but there is more.
"Something is terribly wrong. The monster is taking its time, not seriously attacking or anything. It's enjoying the fear coming from the person."
Something tells me that it could've killed the person with ease but is making them cling on to the last threads.
"Go ahead. If it's one of those mutations, then you'll probably be the only one capable of handling it."
I looked over to Soldat to see his face being serious about his approval.
Out of everyone, he understands the most just how limited my fighting capabilities are when used around too many people. It's good to have him understand that.
"I'll go check things out. If I don't send a signal, that means I'm in engaging in a fight."
Before hearing their confirmation, I manipulated applied my legs with [Specter Force] boots and lightened my body with Gravity Magic and manipulated the air with Wind Magic to have less resistance coming from it.
With this, I dashed in the direction the signals were coming from.
After less than a minute of running, I came close to see what was happening.
Some human-shaped monster was about to attack a toddler.
Forming a mana gauntlet, I held it behind me before I swung my fist forward and extended the mana arm to punch the creature against the right side of its head.
The attack made it fly away, and I had an opening to check on the kid.
As I stopped my enhanced running, I noticed that it was a young girl, no older than 5, with orange hair, wearing ragged clothing not suited for the cold weather.
"Are you okay?" I said as I approached her, readying a healing if necessary. It doesn't seem like she has any serious wounds besides the minor looking cuts, but she may be hiding some of them.
"KYAAAA."
Immense fear excused out of her as I carefully tried to approach. I think she may have wet herself too. As she is young, she must be totally terrified about her entire situation.
"It's okay, it's okay." I said in a low voice and holding my hands out, trying to calm her down a little.
Still frightened, she backed off from me until she hit her back against a tree.
Keeping a certain amount of distance towards her, I went down on one knee and held out one of my hands while showing her a friendly smile on my face.
After she looked at me for a few seconds, she finally started to calm down and reach out for my hand.
Once she placed it on my palm, I released my Healing Magic spell to heal any wounds she has on her.
Although momentarily startled, she didn't remove her hand from my palm. The cold made her shiver even though she was healed. On closer inspection of her clothes, she wouldn't survive long out here in the first place.
Just a rag to cover the most part of her body and no shoes. It also appears that she is highly malnourished. She probably lives in poverty.
Suddenly, the monster came over here at incredible speed.
This time I activated my Touki to evade the incoming attack, grabbing the kid into my arms.
The creature was surprisingly fast. Too fast for me to evade quick enough.
Luckily, my Touki withstood the bladed attack and I jumped off with the kid still in my arms.
Landing on feet, I got to see what the creature looked like.
To simplify it, it was a mantis with the build of a human.
Sickle hands like scythes, leaf green armor so tight that it could be its exoskeleton, faceted bulging eyes on each side of its head paired with mandibles and antenna. Feet with insect-like toes, and two insect wings on the backside of its hip.
This is already screaming abnormality. An insect monster in a tundra biome?
No time to think, though. The monster is going for another attack, lowering its body and readying its sickles.
Attempting to evade it, the speed of the insect was too fast for me to react quick enough.
Prioritizing the safety of the child first, I covered her with [Specter Force] while defending myself with Touki.
The mantis monster struck me and the child both with each sickle at the same time. No, it was more like it was fast enough to make it seem that way with two strikes with each sickle.
Luckily, the blades aren't strong enough to go through my defense, but it also tells me that running away from it won't work. I need to kill it.
This opportunity calls for my brand-new technique that has been copied from the knowledge I have acquired from my previous world.
Blasting us a bit further away after another strike from the mantis, I took off my robe and put it on the little girl so that the warmth function helps her regain some heat to her body. For this technique, I need as much flexibility as possible.
Landing back on the ground, I put the girl down and started to manipulate the mana in my body as precisely as I can.
Before I tried to go for it, the little girl grabbed my hand, scared of me leaving her behind.
I tried to give her a reassuring smile to show her that everything will be alright. It did its effect, and she soon let go of me.
I looked back at the mantis monster that had its antenna straightened up. The thing must've noticed me changing the atmosphere before me for a [Columunimbus].
With my preparations ready, I made my outside perception slower with my thought acceleration technique and ran right through the cloud with my fist ready to go for a punch.
As I did, the electricity coursed through my body and my movements started to fasten.
In the next moment, I managed to out speed the mantis monster and land a hit on its face.
///