The bear in front of him was probably at least 5 meters tall, much taller than the average bear on Earth.
‚It seems like mana makes animals grow bigger and stronger. However, I don't know if this beast can also use magic, so I'd better be careful.'
There was no time to cast a spell, so Sylas tried to dodge the bear's attack by jumping to the right, out of the way.
The bear swiped at him anyway, ripping off a relatively large chunk of his pants and even lightly grazing his skin. But its momentum was too great, and it continued on, trying to come to a halt as Sylas tumbled across the ground.
He did his best to get to his feet as quickly as possible, eyeing the bear as it looked at him as if he were its food.
‚That could have been dangerous. I must pay more attention to my surroundings.'
The bear, on the other hand, realized that Sylas was extremely physically weak and continued to run towards him.
Realizing that the bear was attacking him for a second time, Sylas began to cast the only spell he knew. "Destructive Void Ball".
Sylas had found that saying the spell out loud helped him focus on it and allowed him to cast it with much greater speed. Against a bear that didn't understand human language anyway, saying it out loud was no problem.
As the bear continued to approach, Sylas began to run backwards as well, his front still facing the opponent in case he suddenly did something unexpected. At the same time, the runes began to form in the air and the spell took shape.
Running while casting would complicate the process, meaning the spell would take longer to cast, but it would also put more distance between Sylas and the bear.
A hint of fear began to form in the bear's eyes as he sensed a great deal of danger from the gray ball forming in front of Sylas. At the moment, there was only 2 meters between the two opponents, but Sylas' spell was finally finished.
Just as the bears were about to hit Sylas right in the chest, he finally threw the ball. It collided with the animal's right paw as it swung toward Sylas' chest, completely obliterating it. The entire right arm was now missing and the bear fell back quickly.
Sylas could tell that his opponent was now afraid of him, having seen the power of his attack. Had the spell hit him in the head or even the chest, he would have died. This was the power of the Void Element.
Sylas immediately prepared his second spell in case the bear decided to continue the fight. But contrary to his expectations, it decided to retreat. It knew it had attacked someone out of its league. This fight would cost it more than just an arm if it decided to continue.
‚Interesting,' Sylas thought. ‚It seems that the animals on this planet are much smarter and can even control their instincts better than those on Earth. Probably because of the influence of mana.'
After the bear was completely out of sight, Sylas had to sit down and collect himself for a moment. He had never been so close to death in his life, at least not counting the plane crash, or rather the truck crash. His heart was racing and he was breathing heavily.
After a full minute had passed, he finally stood up. In front of him there were still some felled trees that had been destroyed by his attack, and he decided to continue in that direction.
He walked for another hour without being disturbed by anyone or anything before something else happened.
Suddenly, he heard loud fighting noises coming from his right. For the moment, he couldn't see what was going on, so he decided to make a little detour so he wouldn't end up in that fight. But just after he had taken a few steps away from the sounds, he suddenly heard a scream.
"H-Help me. Help me. Somebody, please!"
The voice sounded like it came from a boy of about 14 years old, as it was relatively high-pitched. This caused Sylas to suddenly stop walking away and start walking towards the noise.
Not that he wanted to be a hero and save a little kid, no. But if he could save his life, then the child could lead him to the next town and he wouldn't have to waste so much time. The age of the child was the key factor in his decision, because it meant that the opponent couldn't be too strong. If a young boy could fight them for a relatively long time, then Sylas would probably be able to defeat them. The only risky thing was that he didn't know at what age people in this world started meditating. If they started at 6, then Sylas would probably be walking right into danger right now. But it was a risk he was willing to take.
He crept silently through the forest, ducking behind bushes and trees, until he reached the scene of the fight. The noise had gotten louder and louder, but for now he could only hear a few thumps and the boy's shrill voice.
Suddenly, a small clearing appeared in front of Sylas, revealing a very comical scene. A huge boar was chasing a small, distant boy who was running in circles. Due to his greater agility, the boy was able to dodge the stiff boar, who was already spinning stars above his head from dizziness.
‚Looks like this is going to be an easy fight. But you better hope my aim is good. Well, losing an arm or a leg is still better than falling prey to a boar.'
Sylas started the casting process again, forming a set of ten runes in the air before channeling mana into each of them. This time the whole process was even shorter than before, a little less than a second, since Sylas stood completely still and didn't have to concentrate on anything else.
When he was done, the boy was still running in relatively predictable circles. Sylas aimed directly at him and fired his gray, gaseous spell. It reached a speed of 100km/h before reaching the point where the boy had been standing a second ago. Fortunately, he had already moved on, and the boar now stood in his place.
The Destructive Void Orb hit his head, dissolving half of it before dissipating. Basically, it was left with only half of its brain, one eye, and half of its jaw. It was safe to assume that it had already died.
However, the fat man kept running in circles until he bumped into the corpse from behind, as if he had closed his eyes in fear.
He looked around, but didn't see Sylas, who was still hiding behind the tree. Suddenly, he knelt on the ground before shouting, "Thank you, great Magus, for saving my life. If you ever need my help, I will certainly repay this favor."
"Wahahaha, you're a funny guy!" Sylas decided to finally show himself and stepped out from behind the tree.
The boy looked at him warily, but finally decided to let his guard down. The person in front of him had saved his life after all. "Thank you for helping me. Even though you're not a great magus, my offer still stands."
"I might actually need your help. How about leading me to the next town right now? And what's your name?"
"Okay, just follow me." The boy said. "You can call me Fatty Ye, like everyone else in town. I don't have a last name because I'm an orphan."
‚A Chinese name? But it makes sense. Why should there only be Western or Chinese names in other worlds when even Earth has such a wide variety?' Although Sylas was a little surprised, he didn't show it.
Ye said that the rest of the journey would take at least 2 hours, so they left immediately after the boy tried to pack as much meat from the boar as possible.
After Sylas asked why, the boy became very talkative and told Sylas his entire life story.
As it turned out, he used to live in the slums of the city until he awakened his system a few months ago and found out that he had a mana core. This meant that he would be able to enter the city's academy and become a magus. The only problem was that it was very expensive to study there.
You needed a lot of resources for experiments and training, so most of the people who attended the school were rich. Since Fatty Ye didn't have any parents who could pay for his education, he went into the forest to hunt some smaller animals. However, for some reason, most of the animals around the city were missing. This meant that he had to travel 2 hours just to meet this huge boar, and he almost died. If he hadn't met Sylas, this would have been the end of his path to power.
‚It seems that there are no handouts in this world. If I want to become stronger, I will have to give it my all.'
"Say, Ye, do you think I can join the academy as well?"