Having his sword stuck in the maw of one of the four pavis lupus who dared to defy his superior human authority, he punched it in the face before walking back with his now free blade.
Having a mana-forged sword against weak monsters like these made his life so much easier, there was far less wear and tear than one would expect from a beast chomping down on iron- Not even an almost unnoticeable dent was found.
A bit away Seria watched in awe, as she once again saw Hariot fighting at a level a good bit higher than her own. Though, the impact of the whole process had lowered over time.
Two pavis lupus rushed towards him, probably trying to prevent Hariot from lowering their number advantage. A- Though sad- Reasonable strategy to expect from innate pack animals.
He pushed out a bolt of mana from he left hand as he readied his right for a swing, said bolt manifesting and then propelling itself at great speeds towards the righter pavis lupus.
Then he reoriented his sword to set up a stab, having used the previous form as a little falsehood to see if the pavis lupus had enough pattern recognition to see through a stance's intended attack.
It sadly did not, as it tried it's best to stop advancing out of the sudden shock of its friend's skull shattering in an instant.
Hariot was not happy with that, since then he actually had to put actual effort into stabbing through the stupid dog's neck instead of letting its own speed do all the work.
He shook his head and ran after it, luckily reaching it since at least some cowardly beasts knew that turning your back to a threat was stupid beyond belief.
He raised his sword up high, and slashed down on the pavis lupus' neck, causing quite the large wound- One which he tore his sword out of by putting his foot on the victim in the making, and hold it still for his own ease.
Though he would rather kill it now, it was probably wounded to a sufficient degree as to no longer run. He still had to save time so that he could go after the two pavis lupus left behind, so he chose to lean over a bit and cut off on of it's paws; Which was far less intensive work.
He turned to face the two other cowardly monsters, and reconsidered his life choices for a moment 'Is hunting small game really all I'm ever going to do with my life?'
But he quickly shrugged it off and readied his blade once more.
Seeing that, once again, his furry foes refused to come at him, he ran after them himself. It honestly confused him why the pavis lupus back in the promotion test fought till their last breath, while these refused to fight him after only seventy-ish percent had been killed.
He mentally ridiculed them while comparing them to the honourable Beyklir, rushing at him without fear in order to donate to him their precious gallbladders.
But at least they didn't run as he rushed to their location, having the deadly mentality of a cornered rat when it was well within their abilities to just run away.
Raising his sword's edge above his head for a sweeping swing reaching below his navel, he finally provoked some retaliation from the impish wild dogs.
A single extension of a clawed paw, mostly as a cautionary attack, one that he used to cut off said paw.
The Pavis Lupus that had the guts to do something to Hariot being an example, the other ran with all its might- Hariot gave up trying to kill it, he would not catch up to it either way, at least not without magical help.
Sadly he didn't have any kind of spell to go for, and making his own seemed like a large hurdle he didn't have time to cross. Reinventing the wheel wasn't really the best use of his mental faculties.
And using the left over magic bolt to kill it, getting rid any notions of a failsafe except using his legs to runaway- Was, in simple terms; A dumb idea.
From the seven pavis lupus, he had killed a total of six, which was twelve eyes he could gather and then sell for a somewhat good price.
He wasn't exactly sure what could be considered 'Fresh', but if it was under a day after it was harvested then there would be no problem making a pretty penny, maybe even a whole silver in one day- That wouldn't actually be that hard with the beyklirs if he had enough space.
Wiping off his sword on the clean fur of a pavis lupus corpse, Hariot decided to buy some kind of towl he could use to clean his sword instead of this make-shift method born out of being poor.
It wasn't like he couldn't clean it, just that it would make both the sheath and the sword reek of filth, and accelerate rust accumulation. Both prospects not in Hariot's white list.
It wasn't like it cost a lot, maybe twenty bronze for a really good quality one that could be used for about a year. Though it may seem like a lot, that's just two-hundred copper, a total of...
Hariot did some quick calculations '180 is 9 times twenty, subtracting that from 200 means that it's 20 plus 20 divided by nine, subtracting another 18 from that leaves two over which makes two ninths... 22 and 2/9 fresh eyes.'
-or just 23 if you feel that using fractions when talking in wholes is bad, unlike Hariot himself who felt that the fraction gave personality to the equation- More like it made him look smarter if he ever told anyone the answer, but that's just how the world works.
He gave his, habitual, periodic glance at Seria to make sure she wasn't standing behind him; Ready to kill him with the sword he had so kindly given her.
Though luckily such an occurrence had never come about before, he had heard a few tales of the most loyal subordinates stabbing their boss in the back, with his relationship with Seria; He was reasonable not to expect loyalty from her.
Though what confused him quite a bit was her fiddling "Anything on your mind?" He queried in a less authoritative tone than usual, better to build a better relationship when possible, even if he would return to his tyrannic ways if found to be more convenient.
Seria thought for a moment, which was pretty obviously her pondering if she should ask "How do I learn to use my sword like you?"
Hariot paused for a moment to disect these words to understand what she meant- Then he remembered that the weird way of saying words was not some sophisticated way to convey intention "You mean you want to know how to learn my sword style?"
"Uh... Y-Yes." She stuttered out, apperantly not certain if that was acceptable or not.
"Well, normally, no one would ever teach you their own unique sword style. But luckily for you, my 'Swordsmanship' is very basic at its core." He said matter of factly.
Seria seemed to wait for Hariot to continue "So are you going to teach me?.."
"No," He stated with absolute certainty "What I learned was solely about using the sword however you wished in order to have a better compatibity with masteries and skills when I gained my class."
Hariot saw Seria's face just saying 'Why does that matter?', and frowned mentally, steeling his passive smile as much as possible "This means that it's useless if you already have a mastery, and is not even half as good as a proper mastery."
"Are you sure?"
"Pretty sure, yes." Hariot stated, storing an eyeball at the same time.
"Huh."
On that note, Hariot found it best to end this conversation there, he wasn't that sure about what he said, he mostly didn't want to spend time teaching her swordsmanship born of mostly just practice
'It'll be better for her future if it's made through combat,' He thought to himself, while also being happy at the fact he didn't need to teach her this too 'What did that book say again? 'A swordsman's style should be an extension of themselves, and learning the style of another would be a crutch rather than a benefit'.'
-----
He looked at the coin he had gained; 124 copper, or; 4 copper and twelve bronze.
Since he had brought back 32 eyeballs, that meant he had 3 fresh eyeballs put into the all-consuming component-synthesizing machine.
Those three came from a pair of Pavis Lupus he had killed a bit less than two hours ago while he returned to the city- Sadly he had let Seria give it a go, she had failed miserably and even damaged one of the valuable eyes that was apparently 9 copper in physical form.
His mental eye shifted to a mental projection of Seria, and mentally spit on it, before turning back to the money he had made.
This was enough to take a quick break and start setting some things up for future ease; Especially finally putting in some effort to progress some masteries, it wasn't nice, not seeing progress.