Chapter 50: Bubble Terror
Alex observed as the sword glowed in Bull's hands. Blondy was shocked. "Is the treasure accepting a master?" He said in excitement.
Alex shook his head as his heart was beating rapidly. He could clearly sense a terrifying murderous intent from not just the blade, but the skeleton as well! He quietly re-entered the shrubs and blended in, using his Energy Affinity to observe the scene.
The sword turned blue and then, from the tip small bubbles of energy that were visible to the eye emitted out. The bubbles quickly targetted the five who had pulled the sword out and touched their bodies.
Within instants of touching the five people, the bubbles popped. The five, who had momentarily been overcome with fear, saw that the bubbles simply popped on contact like the children's toys on earth and relaxed.
However, within seconds their eyes bulged as the water within their bodies burst in an explosion. Four of the five immediately exploded to dead into a bloody mist, including Blondy and Burly. The only one remaining alive was Bull, but half of his body had disappeared, and he collapsed onto the ground. The sword, which was in his hand suddenly floated in the air and then returned to the hole in the ground.
Alex had been terrified by the scene. He was sure that he had sensed that the skeleton had come alive for a moment and then the sword had returned to the ground. Bull, who had collapsed on the ground was grasping at the soil in desperation.
Alex was surprised by Bull's tenacity. Those bubbles were absolutely terrifying, Alex had clearly seen that the popping of the bubbles on contact had triggered a chain reaction in the blood in the body of the five and they exploded. Bull only survived because of his strong body and his base attribute being the Life Attribute that gave him remarkable tenacity.
However, Bull soon breathed his last and passed away. He had been burning his remaining life force to desperately remain alive and on his death, his body disintegrated completely into dust and disappeared as well.
Those bubbles... Alex was shocked at the terrifying nature of those bubbles. He hadn't seen energy behave in this manner before. He decided to retreat, because he knew he was no match for this skeleton and the sword. He would not return here without finding out what those words marked on the tree's trunk said and if he really couldn't figure anything out, he would just inform the Adventure House and have them deal with it.
Alex decided to retreat back to the main path, but he saw that near the remains of the five, a few single use cards had scattered on the ground. Alex quietly walked into the clearing with fear, but saw that that the sword and the skeleton did not react, collected the cards and quickly left.
Most of the cards were basic emergency cards, like the ones he had purchased, but he found one card that he felt would be useful. Rank 2 Life Attribute Tracking Card.
"Rank 2 card, it would be very taxing to activate this card as a card initiate, but it might be useful for the investigation mission I took up." Alex nodded and made his way back.
Once he returned to the rat site, he ignored them and returned to the main path and moved forward. He soon found the next two mission sites and completed the quota of hunting. He had chosen these missions primarily because there was a herb that could be found in the vicinity of these sites called a Ginseng root. The Ginseng root, on consumption would help in increasing Alex's physical strength.
However, Alex was only left disappointed as his scouring of the areas around those two sites did not lead to any traces of ginseng roots and Alex guessed that the area must have already been scavenged for any that might exist.
Now Alex finally decided to make his way to the place where he had to perform the final mission and potentially the most difficult mission. He identified the location on the map where the group of Negima corporation had supposedly disappeared.
Negima Corporation was a gigantic corporation on Earth that had formed an influence in the Highland Shelter. They were major players for resources and major searches of treasures in this shelter's vicinity and competitors to the Adventure House, Family Alliance and other organizations.
The details of the mission stated that the Negima Corporation had discovered the hints of a very unique special item and sent a team of twenty people, all Card Apprentices, to investigate and grab the special item. However, since the expedition, no news had been found at all. Eventually, Negima Corporation decided to assign a task in the Adventure House to have their disappearance investigated.
When Alex picked the mission to investigate their disappearance, the Adventure House official tried to dissuade him as he was just a newly arrived Card Initiate. Alex had replied that he was just taking the mission as he was heading down that area to explore.
Alex had picked these three missions along the long path towards the south east. He now had to enter a mountain range by circling around and going deeper south. This was the place where the people from Negima were suspected to have disappeared.
Alex continued his journey towards the location. It would take him at least three days of constant travelling without interruptions to reach the mountain range in question, without any obstacles. Alex decided to farm fragments along the way and search for treasures of the dark attribute.
This time, he had discovered a few things, but no special items that he could use, so far. As such, he began often straying along the path to explore and find anything interesting or unique to explore. During this time, he employed his rank one cards of Energy Affinity and Light Aura to increase their proficiency as much as possible.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone