"Hum hum… hum hum… hummm hum hum." Adrian is humming a song and circulating mana while holding Durandal for extra efficiency.
"This in not the time for you to be humming a song. We are being chased by an army here!" Cassie screamed out inside Adrian's head. She is the one who is propelling Adrian froward like a torpedo. Zig zagging to dodge projectiles shot by the swarm of lake imps.
"Keek.. keik… kek.." The sound of hundreds of lake imps chasing after Adrian.
The swarm is led by the Lake Imp King. Its size is as big as a hobgoblin, almost 2 meters tall. Its not difficult to differentiate them. There is only one of them had a massive difference in size then the rest of them after all. Also the blue crown is a huge give out.
"Hehehe… I'm just trying to make a choice. Either I exterminate all of them…." Adrian is actually thinking while humming a song?
"Of course, just kill of them! What's more to think about?" Cassie yelled out making Adrian's thoughts shake.
"As I was saying… I was planning to capture some to make some test. We don't know much about miasma. The others don't know much about miasma. If we have some data maybe we can prevent the nest from popping out. You know these things suddenly appear out of nowhere, right?" Adrian states his reasons.
"…." Cassie became silent after hearing the reason. Thinking back, the miasmas are new to her. If Adrian don't know much that means she is equivalent to knowing nothing.
"Sigh, fine… Think of a plan quickly. All this dodging made my mana depleting faster." Cassie sighs and give in.
"Yea… Give me a minute." Adrian begins to think seriously while he is constantly moving on his own with the help of Cassie.
"Got it… Hold on a little longer Cassie." Adrian immediately got an idea only after 10 seconds passed. He changes the 'Parallel thought' objective to assist him.
[Target 'Ice prison' deconstructed. Successful results.]
[Target 'Paralyze' deconstructed. Successful results.]
[Target 'Dark bind' deconstructed. Successful results.]
The holographic patterns begun to arrange itself. The patterns are taken based on the function of what Adrian wants. After 2 minutes of arranging and failures, Adrian let out a smile.
"Construct."
[Constructing….]
[New spell created successfully. Created spell is automatically saved in 'Memory palace']
[Please give a name.]
"Stop right now Cassie!" Adrian orders Cassie to suddenly stop, so she stops.
Adrian wants to face this head on with Durandal in his right hand. A bright blue magic circle starts to be constructed on his left hand. With all the mana that Adrian had regain in that time he cast the spell.
"Dark Niflheim"
As the magic circle glows brighter, the dark cavern becomes even darker.
"Kek… kcikk?" The Lake Imp King orders his army to stop.
The sudden change brings in chills of fear that made the demonic creatures shiver. Every single one of them felt like they are sent to the deepest depths of the abyss. Suddenly, dark tendrils emerge from the darkness striking them in the forehead. From the strike, they become paralyze and left a rhombus shaped mark.
"KEIKKK… KIRCKK!!!" Screams of pain are heard from army. Even its king is not spared. Being struck out of nowhere must had break their spirits after losing their vision.
*Snap*
A snap of a finger echoes inside the Lake Imps head. The mark on their forehead glows blue and every single one of the lose consciousness, as they are being in cased in a rhombohedron shaped ice prison.
The darkness surrounding them moves like goo, changing its shape in to spikes. The dark spike pierced their heart. Each one of the prisons had 2 dark spikes pierced half way through the ice.
"Urghh…" Adrian slumps down as he begins to feel some weight inside the depths of his soul and fainted.
[Warning. Low mana.]
"Dark magic? A fearsome large area spell…. This child…" Cassie looked at Adrian with worry and amazement as she keeps Adrian afloat. Durandal also disappears after Adrian blacked out.
Dark Niflheim is actually a form of dark magic. Adrian rarely dabbles in the Dark element because most of Dark magic involves curses. He did some research in the past and test them on some bugs. The results he gains is, all of them corrodes and turns to dust. That is why he mix it with Ice element to turn it into a restraining curse, hence the rhombus mark on the lake imp's forehead.
'Paralyze' is also made from Dark magic and Lightning magic but the effects is lacking when he use it on the Deathbring last time is because the majority of the magic patterns are from 'Shock' spell. If he puts more of the Dark magic patterns, it will defeat the purpose of a restraining spell.
"Hmm… Adrian will be out cold for a while… What should we do next? The nest is still there. Should I drag him and help him destroy the nest?" Cassie talking like she had someone to talk to.
[…]
"I take that as a 'Yes'." Cassie leisurely propels through the underwater cavern while dragging Adrian with her.
As the danger is gone and she had a little more than half of mana left, she maneuvers through the maze-like cavern. She doesn't need a 'Map', as she just need to follow where the strongest presence of lake imps besides the ones where they were gathered and imprison.
Half way on reaching the location of the nest…
[STOP!]
Aria suddenly sounded prompting Cassie to a halt.
"Oh? You finally say something… About time. I was actually ne…." Cassie was about to finish her sentences but she heard a grunt.
"Ughh… What happen? Where…?" Adrian rubs his between his brows as the pain of depleted mana brings him migraine.
"You are awake…? It's been only 8 minutes had passed after you blacked out. You should be out cold longer because you drain your mana." Cassie is surprise hearing Adrian's voice is heard.
"The answer is Mana Heart, 'Parallel thought' and Aria. Ughh…" Adrian summarizes Cassie's questions with simple answers.
[Selected: Durandal]
"Equipped."
With Durandal, Adrian begins to circulate mana to recover quickly. It should be about 20 minutes had passed after he had saved the last group. He needs to hurry before a wannabe 'hero' dive into the lake to save the real hero. Luckily, he already dispersed the Light trails and bury of a path so he buy can some time.
"Fuhh… Let's finish this quickly." Adrian exhales deeply after 20 minutes.
[Selected: Excalibur]
"Equipped"
Holding on to both Durandal and the shining Excalibur, Adrian propels towards the location of the nest to clean it up and purify it. While cleaning up, he also did some test to gather data on how nest behaves.
"This is interesting…" Adrian marvels on his discovery.
"What is it?" Cassie did not understand what Adrian is doing after he suddenly unsummons Excalibur.
"I lost control of my emotions for a second there but I regain clarity after I shake the thought off." Adrian made a breakthrough on the discovery of the way to counter miasma.
"So, the answer is 'strong will'…. Easier said than done." Adrian found the answer but frowns at the answer.
He then starts shooting magic at the miasmic affected area with various elements. He could not use Fire as he is underwater but that is fine.
"Hmm… only special elements, Light and Dark can purify the miasma. Interesting…. Okay! Enough testing." Adrian feels like he had gained a lot of information after the test.
[Selected: Excalibur]
"Equipped."
Up on the surface, it had been 30 minutes after the last group had been resurface. All of the missing people had come back but only one person had not resurface.
The atmosphere around the lake is filled with tension as an angry dwarf is releasing her mana pressure to the surrounding because she is being held back by Ralph and the mercenary who is responsible on guarding the lake on Adrian's order.
"Let me go Ralph… If you want to fight let's fight. Fight me!" Kathleen screams out in a furious tone.
"Woman… If you want to fight I will gladly accept, but letting you go to dive inside the lake, no way! Hold her steady boy. Don't give in. I ask the young master to reward you later." Ralph sticks out his tongue to Kathleen while struggling to hold he back. He asked the mercenary to put in more effort to it and promising a reward.
"What 'young master', Ralph? The boy had not come back. He could be dead down there. Why aren't you helping him?" Kathleen stares directly to Ralph's eyes.
"Equipped. Watch you tongue woman! How dare you say that! I took care of his since he was a baby. I know him much better than all of you including his parents." Ralph places his spirit weapon on Kathleen's neck. His eyes are red in anger, and his Convex Moon stage mana dispersing Kathleen mana pressure.
"You!!!" Kathleen is baffled by Ralph response.
Everyone's attention is on the two of them quarrelling. It escalates when Ralph draws his spirit weapon and his eyes showing he is willing to kill a friend. Gasps and cries are heard from the crowd. The mercenary who is helping Ralph felt lost at what to do.
"What are you guys doing? Why is it so crowded here? Ralph, are you slacking off?" A boyish voice can suddenly be heard. Everyone froze in place because the voice brings an ire tone.
"Apologies, young master. I fail to do what you order. I hesitate on using force." Ralph immediately unsummons his spirit weapon and rush towards Adrian, kneeling in front of him.
"Sigh… Go buy me some new clothes. This clothes feels slimy. Here take this and go quick. I handle here." Adrian tossed 2 gold coins to Ralph.
"As you wish young master." Ralph stands up, bows and dash with the winds.
"Ahem… This area is now sealed under the orders of the Count's heir. I give 20 seconds for all of you to scram or you will be considered as trespassing and sentence by the King. 1… 2…" Adrian made a sudden announcement and begin counting. He shows a golden insignia. It's the royal insignia that he got from Charles.
"!!!!" The crowd recognize the insignia and started to disperse in every direction. That is the royal insignia for god's sake. Who dares to defy the royal family? As for the questions they can asked later.
Following the hero's orders is the least they can do.