章 21: Roaming
After seeing such a horrifying thing happening before his eyes, Ark was frightened out of his wits. He felt relieved that he hadn't revealed himself a little earlier. The scary part of this attack wasn't that it was powerful since Ark had sent out much more powerful attacks. What was scary about it was the fact that Ark hadn't seen it coming at all, he didn't even feel the ripples in Mana. He also didn't see who sent out the attack, this scared him a lot as well. But even though he was frightened he wasn't stupid, he quickly decided to retreat from the lake for now. He felt like it would be wiser to hunt for prey somewhere else, and then he would come back here when he wanted to sleep and drink.
He didn't feel like it would be wise to fight over territory with this mysterious monster right now, since he didn't know how powerful it was, and since he wasn't confident he could win if he was taken by surprise. Having decided his next course of action Ark went on his way. The more he explored the forest, the more mysterious he felt it was. How could such a place exist? There were numerous plants and other vegetation that didn't even look real. And almost everything here was infused with different degrees of Mana. There was almost nothing here that was normal in the slightest. He also noticed how almost all of the plants and such were either poisonous or releasing a dangerous vibe, one that he couldn't describe at first.
But after a while, he noticed what this dangerous vibe was. It was the dark element. The dark element was one of the elements that were often associated with demons and evil monsters. This was because it was very rare for the more humane races to obtain it, and on the occasion they did, they almost always turned evil or went down dark paths, such as refining humans into Mana crystals. This wasn't always the case however, the assassins that had accompanied Annette were users of the dark elements, and they were honorable people, they would never betray their benefactor.
Another reason for the shunning of the people born with an affinity with the dark element was the holy church of Aries. The people from the holy church all had an affinity with the light element, and since dark were their opposite, they shunned them. The holy church had a lot of influence since many thought that they were the apostles of God, and since they looked down on the dark element, many others also started doing the same. This, however, didn't apply to everyone, since many didn't like the extreme beliefs of the church. These people thought that one of the reasons that the dark element users often turned towards dark paths was because of the treatment they received from society. Not many people would be able to stay completely sane after being tormented from the day they were born, just because of an affinity.
In some places, it was quite the opposite, however, where people saw the dark element as a blessing, as it was generally stronger than the four standard elements. In these places, the church didn't have any influence, and most of them were thus labeled as outlaws because of it.
If Ark knew any of this he would feel a lot of sympathy towards the people born with the dark element since his situation in his old world had been fairly similar, but just a lot less extreme. The thing with Ark's life in his old world was that it was quite miserable, but it wasn't just because every single person he met looked at him with disdain, sure, most of them did, but not everyone. He actually had a very good friend for a little while, it was around the time he had just started to put more effort into studies. He was around 13 years old at the time.
This friend that he had acquired was Ark's everything, they did everything together. His friend had been a boy that was in the same class as him. Since his friend also was a target of bullying they quickly connected to each other. This relationship of doing everything together went on for around 4 months until it all crumbled down. His friend had suddenly collapsed one day, at first the doctors thought he was fine and had just collapsed from exhaustion. But a little while later he collapsed once more, and this time they found out that he had gotten cancer.
They tried their absolute best to save him, but there was nothing they could do, it was already too late. It didn't take long for Ark's friend to pass away, his name was Anthony. After being scarred for life due to his only friend dying, Ark stopped trying to make friends. He really wanted a friend, he really wanted to have someone he could depend on, someone who could help him through tough times. But this friend of his haunted him, he thought that he would never get over it. Which he kind of didn't.
After arriving in this new world Ark had slowly started to put his past behind him, little by little. He would never forget his best friend, but he knew Anthony wouldn't be happy with him if he just lived his life alone. He had also realized that dwelling too much on the past would do him no good. He still had a hard time trusting humans, but now he felt like he could finally try and make friends. Well, at least after he had gotten stronger, and when he had the opportunity to. One of the things Anthony and Ark had vowed to do was to both get really successful and then get married. They had felt that they would be friends forever, and when they both had their own families, their kids could play with each other.
Ark hadn't forgotten about this promise, but he couldn't fulfill it since Anthony was not with him anymore, and he had never felt any feelings of love before, so he just thought that it was unimportant. Well, when he was a kid he did have a crush on a girl that went to the same school as them, but after Anthony's death, he quickly forgot about it all.
Anyways, after discovering that most of the forest had affinities towards darkness Ark felt a bit surprised since he didn't know there could be so many things that were usually normal that had affinities toward any of the element. But since he was new to this world he felt that it actually might be perfectly normal, so he just put it behind him. Walking around for a bit more he started to notice that the wildlife in this particular section of the forest was very scarce, the wildlife in the other sections was already quite scarce, to begin with, so there was practically no monsters or animals here.
The section he had entered also seemed to have a little fewer plants, but the plants he did spot had even more Mana and darkness density than the ones everywhere else. This made Ark a little more alert since he could figure out that there was something special about this sector. Even though he called it a sector there wasn't any actual sectors, they were just something that Ark had made up himself to make it easier to remember where some stuff was located. In case he needs to find something he had seen in one of the "sectors" someday in the future. Having said all that, Ark still decided to continue walking forward.
This was because he felt that whatever was here might benefit him, and if it didn't, then he could always escape, and label this sector as something he should avoid. In the places he had explored so far he had also found some other spots that would be worth inhabiting, at first he still intended to go back to the place he had found earlier by the lake, but after exploring more he didn't really see that much of a compelling reason to do so. One of the other places had been along the stream that was connected to the lake. By the stream he had found an ancient looking tree, this tree was very majestic and was actually hollow. Since it was hollow Ark felt that it would be a perfect spot to live in, the tree was also quite sturdy since it was infused with large amounts of Mana, this made it very resistant to magic attacks as well as physical attacks.
If Ark wanted to try and get some darkness affinity to try and strengthen his stealth the tree was also very great, this was because of the high density in darkness Mana in particular. This would make it so that he would be able to absorb the darkness particles at a higher rate, enhancing the speed he could gain an affinity at. Having thought it through Ark decided to further explore this particular sector of the forest.
After exploring for a little while he finally came to a stop, he had finally found something, something interesting. What he had found was a graveyard, but not just any graveyard, this one had a lot of monsters roaming about, even though they were all either skeletons, zombies or a monster called "Ghoul". The graveyard in itself wasn't that big as it was only about 500 meters square, but at the innermost part of it was an entrance. This entrance was made completely out of stone and it looked like it was leading downwards, into the ground.
Ark had no idea what this entrance was, but he had identified the skeletons and the other monsters already, and they were quite weak. The skeletons were levels between 10-13, the zombies were a little bit stronger, their levels being between 12-15, and the ghouls were the strongest, their levels ranging from 16-21. What you had to keep in mind however was that levels were not everything, skills were also really important, as well as a battle plan or a strategy. Ark would probably be able to kill most of the ghouls here as long as it was 1 vs 1, he could probably handle a few at a time but he would rather be on the safe side. What made Ark very excited about this place was the fact that he had finally found a place to train, where he could gain levels as well as combat experience. The monsters here all seemed to have pretty low intelligence as well so it would be pretty easy to escape if he really needed to.
Now having a place that he could train in regularly he decided to switch his base of operations, after all, that tree that was connected to the stream was actually located in one of the sectors that were bordering this one, so he would not need to travel far at all if he wanted to get here, which he would want pretty often. Thinking about it a little before he returned, Ark decided to use inspect on the "entrance" before leaving, he hadn't really thought about it before since he was busy observing the monsters.
[The Tomb Of Charun]
This dungeon was formed after the death of the great demon Charun, some of the monsters here were attracted to the deep demonic aura emitted, and are now the dungeons subjects.
Rank: D
Floors: 3
Boss: ???
State: Unexplored
Seeing this made Ark both excited and apprehensive, seeing that there were 3 floors to this place, Ark could figure out that the monsters would probably become stronger for each floor. And that the monsters on the surface were the weakest of them all. But even though he was a bit apprehensive, he realized this would be an even greater opportunity in gaining strength. If he got enough strength on each floor he would be able to challenge the next one, this would, in the end, give him a lot of strength and levels, which was exactly what Ark wanted right now. Having made up his plans for the close future Ark decided to go back the tree for now.
When he arrived back at the tree Ark found another animal that was drinking from the stream, this beast actually closely resembled a panther, but after inspecting it, Ark noticed how it was nothing special, it's level was pretty decent, but it didn't seem to have any magic at all or any other strong skills for that matter. Therefore Ark decided he would get his first meal in a while, having decided Ark quickly gathered his ice Mana and sent out a ferocious claw attack, even though he stood pretty far away, the attacks still arrived in an instant, beheading the panther. This made Ark realize how powerful he actually was, nothing in his level range was his real opponent at the moment.
Seeing this dead beast in front of him Ark decided to roast it a little bit before eating it, even though his taste buds had changed since becoming a wolf, he still preferred his meat a little cooked, even though he could eat it raw. Since he had evolved Ark also noticed that his appetite had grown exponentially. But it wasn't strange at all since he now had a lot more body mass that needed the energy to work correctly.
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