Chương 12: First Kill

Leo didn't go to the forest immediately. He didn't have any money to prepare any good equipment or anything, but he could use the time to make sure that he perfected the use of his spell. For the rest of the day, he used the spell again and again until Daphne came back. Once she came back, he stopped and got some rest. During the night, instead of practicing, he chose to get some rest because he would need a lot of energy the next day.

The next day, he left along with Daphne. Unlike before, his satchel wasn't all torn up. Instead, he got a new satchel, because he would need to carry the herbs carefully. The satchel had three different categories, one for each herb. It was very ambitious, but he needed to do it. The only other thing he had was his knife. The knife was the only purchase he had ever made with his savings that wasn't food. He had bought it a year ago, and this would be the first time he would use it properly.

Daphne split up from Leo to look for work, while he went straight to Trevor. He wanted to confirm that Trevor would give him the money.

Trevor saw him coming. He smiled.

"Are you leaving today?" He asked Leo. The satchel hanging on Leo's shoulder was a dead give away.

Leo nodded. "Yes. I wanted to make sure our deal was still on."

Trevor brought out his hand.

"Let's shake on it. I won't go back at all."

Leo shook his hand. He then turned around to set out for the forest. Behind him, Trevor shouted a piece of advice.

"Aim for their eyes. They go down if you can reach their brains."

While Leo appreciated the advice, he hoped he wouldn't need it. He walked toward Valkyr's Forest. While walking toward the forest, he steadied his breath. This would be the biggest job he had ever done in his life, and the most dangerous as well. So he was naturally incredibly nervous about it.

"Obviously, nothing could go wrong," He muttered to himself, chuckling at his jinx while he was on his way.

He reached the outskirts of the forest and decided that he should use the body-strengthening magic immediately. While practicing the previous day, he found out that his body could only hold the spell for two hours. After that, he would need an hour to recover and use the spell again. This was because his body didn't have enough

He felt the surge of power in his body. With this new strength, his confidence got bolstered and he went into the forest.

For the first thirty minutes, he was just walking into the forest. He was walking slightly faster than usual and had gotten deeper into the forest than before. So he was surprised that he hadn't encountered a single animal yet. He hadn't even seen a normal hare. What he saw made him realize why.

In front of him was a magical herb. It was an orange-colored plant that had embers dripping out of its leaves. The herb was a similar height to the Glimmer root, but it was a lot brighter. The embers didn't seem to burn the grass beneath it, so he hoped it wouldn't burn through his satchel.

He immediately took out his knife. The reason was that he knew the herb had a beast that had claimed it as its own. That could be the only reason that no other animal could be seen in the area. His senses got a lot sharper as the adrenaline in his body clicked in.

He looked around for a predator. The only animal powerful enough to claim an entire area would either be a predator or a magical beast. But magical beasts only cared about herbs that were in the Inner Valkyr's Forest. He was currently in the Outer Forest.

The previous time, he was in the outskirts, which was barely considered a part of the forest. The only reason he even encountered a wolf was probably that it was just exploring the area and chanced on his scent. But this was the Outer Forest where dangerous animals were a lot more common. Only Apprentice Aura Knights and above were strong enough to explore the area.

He quickly found his opponent. It was sleeping in the shade of a tree with the herb in its eyesight. It was a tiger. It probably hadn't eaten the herb enough because it was hoping that it would mature even more. The longer herbs grew, the more potent their effects became.

Animals that ate magical herbs had a chance to evolve into Magical Beasts. Their bloodline also played a part, but magical herbs makes the chance higher. He saw that tiger sleeping and knew that his best shot was a sneak attack.

He didn't approach the herb since didn't want to walk towards it while facing the tiger. If it woke up, he would be dead meat. Instead, he went around the herb from the side. He wanted to surprise it, but in case the surprise attack failed, he would be maintaining the high ground.

He slowly crept towards the tiger, grabbing his knife tightly. As he got closer, he moved slower. He wanted to limit the sound he made as much as possible. The minute he got 6 feet close, he knew he couldn't move without alerting the tiger.

He took a deep breath, preparing his body. After taking a second to calm himself, he leaped towards the tiger. He swung the knife into the head of the tiger with as much strength as he could muster. The knife wasn't sharpened properly, but it still dug into the skull of the tiger. He heard a soft whimper from the tiger, but the tiger couldn't fight back. It immediately died on the spot.

He was breathing heavily. The adrenaline in his body had peaked. He stood up straight and looked at his victim. After looking at its limp body, he looked back at the herb. His mouth curved into a smile.

"One down."

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Chương 13: Battle

After killing the tiger, Leo walked toward his prize - the orange-colored herb. When he picked it up, he found that his earlier suspicions were correct. The herb didn't burn his hand at all. When he placed it in his leather satchel, the satchel was completely okay.

At this point, he had been using the spell for a total of 45 minutes. He only had a little more than an hour before the spell would wear off. The options he had were to either finish killing two more animals, get the herbs, and then run out of the forest, or get himself to a safe place before the spell wore out and wait out the cooldown time.

He decided that waiting out the cooldown time was a better idea. But he still wanted to scout the area while walking toward his hiding spot. He paid full attention to the surroundings while walking toward the lake. The hiding spot he chose was the cave behind the waterfall since it could fit him comfortably.

While he was walking, he saw something interesting. In the distance, a herb gave a small shine before fading. He had already found another potential herb so he decided to go closer and take a better look.

He walked slowly toward the flickering light. The shine shone again making him more curious. He peeked through the trees to look at the source of the light. Behind the tree was a plant that was periodically emitting light. The source of the light was a low-hanging fruit that was dangling off the plant. In front of the fruit, a snake was coiled up in the grass.

The snake was bigger than the average snake. It was twice as long as him. The body was also as thick as Leo's. The snake would be towering over his under-nourished body and crush him. At this point, it had noticed him peering behind the tower. It hissed loudly and stood up.

The previously coiled snake slowly unraveled its body, revealing its true size. It was 5 meters tall and dwarfed him. It was a few yards away so he walked from behind the trees to face it. While he was doing this, he was calculating how he could escape with the fruit.

He hadn't really used any of his stamina to kill the sleeping tiger. So for this battle, he was full of stamina. He grabbed his knife and pointed it toward the snake. It hissed at him when he showed his aggressiveness.

He immediately ran around the snake, hoping that it would take more time to move because of its lack of limbs. He was wrong. The snake moved lightning-fast and almost caught up to him.

He saw the snake coming too close to him and jumped up, kicking against one of the branches to jump over the snake. He landed behind it just as it bit the spot where he had jumped out. The snake only found wood in its mouth. It closed its jaw and a piece of the wood from the tree got torn off like it was bread. The snake opened its mouth and the crushed piece of wood dropped out.

As he saw this, he understood that the scale of the battle was different than what he envisioned it could be. He immediately ran toward the fruit that was behind him and away from the snake. The snake was away from the fruit since he had lured it toward him.

This was the perfect time to steal the fruit. He had planned this out because his main purpose was only to steal the fruit. Trying to kill the monster wouldn't bring him any profit. He wasn't going to be able to carry their bodies back to sell them anyways. It was also too dangerous.

However, he had miscalculated the speed of the snake. He was able to grab the fruit off the plant, but by the time he had thrown it into his satchel and taken a few steps, the snake had lunged forward toward him. He dodged the bite by rolling away. The satchel got away from him when this happened. The snake smacked its tail against him.

He took the blow and felt a crushing pain in his stomach. During this time, the snake coiled itself around him and squeezed him. The squeezing of his chest snapped him back away from the pain. He immediately used both of his arms to stop the snake from biting him.

The tree was a very good example of what the snake bites could mean. His right hand still had the knife. He then switched to stopping the head with only his left hand and stabbed the knife deeply into the scales of the snake's neck.

The snake stopped trying to bite Leo. It started squeezing him with even more power. It was trying to kill him before he could kill it. He realized that it became a battle of speed. To make the wound bigger, he grabbed the knife with his right hand and dragged it up. The knife sliced the head of the snake and tore its brains. The snake stopped squeezing him and fell down, dead. He immediately got himself out of the snake's lock hold.

After grabbing his satchel the minute he got free, he was planning to leave immediately. But when he grabbed his knife from the head of the snake, he saw a shiny stone right next to the butchered head of his victim. He grabbed it. It was an interesting stone that was a little shiny.

He just threw it into the satchel and into the same pocket as the fruit. He then quickly started walking towards the lake. It would be a 30-minute walk according to his estimates. He could run, but he wanted to conserve all of his energy.

The battle took a huge chunk of his stamina, and he had spent 45 minutes there. Now, Leo only had 30 minutes of the spell. During this time, he would have to get to the lake and swim toward the waterfall. And the biggest problem was that he would have to face the crocodile.

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