Tempest [13]

Fanzer Leblanc sat on the branch of a large tree flicking through his various cards, humming softly to himself. His purple eyes glimmered under the soft glow of the consistent moonlight. His face scrunched up as he split his cards into various sections.

He sighed, laughing, "Damn, getting stuck in a Red Gate was the worst thing that could happen to me today. I was already running out of cards, but now…."

Fanzer picked up his 64th card, where Legacy was held, and summoned the weapon into his hand. As soon as his hand touched the dagger, he felt like his hand would fall off with how heavy it was. He hadn't noticed it before due to instantly pulling it into his card.

"Holy hell, could Mom really carry this so nonchalantly?!" He cursed, running mana through his arm to properly hold the obtusely heavy object.

As purple mana softly flowed off his arm, now thick enough to see even with an untrained eye, Fanzer noticed something intriguing. His own mana was flowing towards the heavy dagger and being absorbed into it.

Although Fanzer silently noted that such a situation couldn't have been good for his health, he was mesmerized by the item.

His mana got sucked deeper and deeper, the Thief looked intently at the blade. He could see something, something small, and invisible. He wasn't sure if the drained mana was causing him to see things or not, but within the blade, he could barely see two golden orbs looking back at him.

He looked closer, squinting. He swore he could see something, although he wasn't quite sure what it was.

However, he had to stop his curiosity in its tracks before Legacy could such his mana pool dry, Fanzer stabbed Legacy into the bark of the tree, looking at the dagger with a complicated gaze.

"Damn, I definitely messed this one up. This was the weapon Mom had for sure, but…."

He could hear her words flashing through his mind.

'This dagger is a truly amazing thing, and one day, it'll finally be in the hands of the person who it belongs to. I know it sounds strange, but you should help them. They'll probably need the help too! If you do, maybe you'll have a beautiful guardian angel of a wife, kiddo!'

"I was so caught up in finally finding this weapon that I couldn't even remember the most important thing about it. Hmm… what to do… what to do…." Fanzer tapped at his chin dramatically, until he just sighed and picked up another card.

"Card 2: Burger and Fries Kit," Just as it seemed, his card disappeared and a fresh, homecooked burger and fries appeared before him, certain to attract nearby monsters with its alluring smells. "Well, there's no point in worrying on an empty stomach, I'm sure Mom would agree on that."

-----

Jin-Woo Sung sat outside the small wooden building, looking up at the moon. His expression was dark, darker than usual. All around were his summons, just as they were before, standing guard reliably.

He could've gone to sleep, like Ichigo did, but something about her words stuck with him.

Sung put his hands behind his head, letting out a soft sigh.

He chuckled somberly, "I can't believe I let that bother me. I know I've been in a lot of close shaves, but… I'm alive. My heart is still beating in my chest, I get scared, I get happy, that sort of thing. If that's not being alive, what is?"

Silence overcame him, but although he didn't vocalize his thoughts, he continued to think about Ichigo's words.

From what she was insinuating, Jin-Woo either wasn't human, or he wasn't alive. But based on her statement a little earlier, she noted that Jin-Woo always had Undead Mana, even before his Dual Awakening.

Even though he couldn't quite understand what people meant when they referred to his "eerie" mana, he was never able to do several things that everyone with mana should've been able to, like enhancing his body. He always chalked it up to being weak, but after learning of Undead Mana, he understood.

Zombies and skeletons weren't necessarily special monsters to run into, but they weren't typically in E-Ranked and D-Ranked dungeons. Whenever Jin-Woo thought back to them, he didn't remember the undead monsters doing anything too… powerful.

They were supposedly C-Ranked monsters based on the mana crystals that they dropped, but their speed, intelligence, and power were nothing higher than the average D-Rank. And that was all because of Undead Mana, and specifically because they couldn't enhance their bodies like other monsters naturally would.

Knowing that was based on their connection to Undead Mana made Jin-Woo question his own connection with it, and with the evidence presented to him, he found it hard to refute.

Jin-Woo jumped up from his spot with an exasperated sigh. He slowly peaked into the small shack, and he observed Ichigo for a moment before being sure that she was asleep. With that confirmation, he gently closed the door and hopped up on his toes before rocketing off, taking Igris and half his soldiers with him.

"I'll do some Hunting, since I can already tell I'm falling behind in power. If Ichigo couldn't beat Lycaon, there's no way in hell I'll be able to, at least, not right now," He grinned, following his senses to avoid the strongest energy source, which was Lycaon, and go to a smaller one.

Jin-Woo was quick to arrive at a small clearing by a cave side, and as soon as he arrived, pitch-black wolves with individual horns slowly skulked out, approaching him with the fierce eyes of predators.

Leading the pack was a two-horned black wolf with electricity shooting through its eyes at random intervals. Jin-Woo could tell that it was the leader of the pack, but before he could even summon his weapons, Igris and his knights stepped forward.

He left all his wolves at the base, since their senses would be much higher, allowing them to warn Ichigo if the boss was approaching, so he had an entirely two-legged army.

"Well, I see you're all eager, good. Destroy them all," Jin-Woo ordered, a golden trail of ruthlessness shining from his eyes.

His knights charged in unison, their footsteps daring to shake the island all at once. A happy sigh escaped Jin-Woo's lips as he watched his army follow his orders, with Igris leading the pack. The blood-red knight stood taller than the other knights, empowered by Siegfried's soul.

Igris's sword shot up high into the sky, pointing straight up towards the moon, the stars' light bouncing off the powerful knight's sword for an instant before it came shooting down at a speed faster than Jin-Woo could follow. Underneath Igris's power, the solid ground rippled, blooming into an impending tidal wave of earth. The sheer force alone shattered the once solid footing, leaving nothing left for the enemies to salvage.

A few wolves lost their footing, tumbling, and falling, but most of them were quick to move forward, leaping into the air. The summoned knights focused on their airborne enemies, taking several of them out with unclean, forced swipes.

Igris took a step back, blocking the leader's two horns with his sword. He was pushed back by the blow, but not by much. Burying his armored feet into the ground, he flung the wolf high into the sky, as if it wasn't a threat in the slightest.

However, despite Igris's victory in his struggle, the other Summons weren't experiencing the same thing.

As the knights fought a one-on-one battle with the wolves, Jin-Woo's MP dropped lower and lower, a telltale sign of the losing battles his soldiers were facing. Every time they were destroyed, they came back at the cost of Jin-Woo's mana, and he wasn't sure how long he'd be able to maintain it.

He was about to step in, but his soldiers noticed him advancing and began working much harder, as if the simple reminder of his presence was enough to invigorate them. The soldiers started working together, attacking the wolves' eyes and legs before taking them out in a few heavy blows.

With their boss launched away, Jin-Woo was almost entirely sure that the battle was won, until a worryingly loud howl flooded Jin-Woo's ears, accompanied by a triple-horned pitch-black wolf, standing at least two time the size of the "normal" horned wolves.

"Ah… so then… was the smaller one the Vice-Leader or something?" Jin-Woo questioned, shrugging to himself. "I guess it won't matter either way. I won't step in unless I need to, so try and beat this monster all on your own!"

Jin-Woo's words seemed to encourage the soldiers more, because they let out a roar of exhilaration and starting to attack the boss, but….

With a single swipe, the monster cleared out several summons all at once, a whirlwind kicking up just from the power of a simple swing. And, unfortunately for Jin-Woo, the boss didn't stop with a single swipe.

As his summons were pummeled, Jin-Woo's MP couldn't keep up with the speed of the destruction, and slowly but surely, the number of his troops started fading, not being entirely destroyed but returning to the nearby shadows.

Jin-Woo peaked up into the air, seeing the two-horned wolf falling from the sky. Before Igris could attack it, electrical energy surged out of its horns, gathering at the very edge of its power, before it fired the energy off, which Igris desperately tried to avoid.

He barely dodged it, the sparks of the electrical ball slowly gnawing at Jin-Woo's MP. As soon as he dodged it, his sword almost immediately after tore directly through the spell.

Igris leapt back, glancing back at Jin-Woo. He seemed to be asking for some sort of permission to begin with all his skills, new and old alike.

The two-horned wolf and the boss stood next to one another; two powerful presences that only seemed stronger together rather than apart.

Jin-Woo nodded, smirking.

With his master's permission, Igris let loose.

The boss slammed its paw towards Igris, but it was shocked to be stopped in its tracks, its size and strength being contested by the blood-red knight. Before Igris could push back, the boss looked down on him, an intimidating aura exuding from it.

No—intimidating was putting it simply, this was seeming deeper, more primal than that.

It was a dark, repressive force, making the very air heavier as it soaked into everything. It became hard to breath, hard to stand up, and hard to fight back. It was more than simple intimidating, it was bloodlust, pure and inarguable.

Even though he was several feet away, Jin-Woo shivered as the Bloodlust nicked at his confidence. Even if he was a Hunter, he was only an E-Rank, so he'd never experienced such thick and terrifying bloodlust. Monsters he'd normally fought were certainly not saints, but they didn't have the animosity that this monster had.

It was scary, a genuine, primal sort of fear, like the fear of the dark. The Bloodlust made Jin-Woo want to retreat, but he firmly stood his ground, even if he was ready to summon his weapons and fight at any second.

However, Igris didn't falter one bit. He stood the intense bloodlust without even taking a step from his spot.

Jin-Woo noticed Igris's determination swallowing nervously. He wondered what would happen if that determination was so powerfully flipped on him. The E-Rank Hunter shook his head, pushing away the fear and drilling his attention back on the fight.

Absentmindedly, he realized Advanced Observation allowed him to see skills that were being activated. Noting the skill as shockingly useful, he turned his attention back to the fight at hand.

The two-horned wolf tried shooting off another lightning bolt, but Igris didn't even care to dodge it, taking the bolt to the chest, the electricity doing odd things to the knight's limbs.

Despite that, Igris's sword began glowing with power.

Igris cut directly through the boss's foreleg, blood spurting from the wound, but he didn't stop there. In an arc, as his sword emitted a bright light, he cut directly through the boss's head, not even patient enough to see what other tricks it may've had in mind.

Not forgetting about his other enemy, he pulled the two-horned wolf towards him telekinetically, taking that one's head clean off its shoulders as well. Both heads spun through the air before Igris stabbed his sword into the ground and grabbed them both, laying them at Jin-Woo's feet, kneeling to his master.

Jin-Woo couldn't hold back his nervous laughter, thinking, "If I would've actually fought him, was there any sort of chance in me winning…? God, I'll have to get stronger soon to maintain this relationship."

The summons who'd been destroyed rose once more to search the mini-boss's corpse for drops. Sung didn't expect anything, so he was a bit surprised when a knight handed him two Runestone. He instantly Observed them, curiosity rising within him.

His eyes widened upon reading the second, larger Runestone's description.

After learning just what it was, he crushed the smaller crystal, feeling the shift change within him.

[System is now adapting to the new skill, "Advanced Observation."]

["Advanced Observation" has now been integrated into the passive form of the System.]

[Observation now holds more information upon active usage.]

Now, he crushed the larger Runestone, feeling a different kind of energy fill him.

[System is now adapting to the new skill, "Pandora's Blessing."]

[Upon leveling up, the Player will now obtain Five Status Points instead of Three.]

Pandora's Blessing was incredible, allowing Jin-Woo to grow at an even faster rate than he had been. He couldn't figure out why such a valuable skill was with such random bosses, but it motivated him to check out more of the Island's minibosses.

Although no other important items dropped—and that's insinuating that Jin-Woo even desired more after Advanced Observation and Pandora's Blessing—and Jin-Woo's level didn't change at all, he wasn't bothered in the slightest. For a necromancer such as himself, there was one thing he wanted more than levels and items here, Summons.

"Arise," Jin-Woo ordered, gaining several of the horned wolves into his soldiers. Even the two-horned wolf came back to serve Jin-Woo, but unfortunately, an annoying notification appeared as he looked over the boss's body. He didn't get it, so he tried again, only to fail a second time.

On the third try, Jin-Woo brought the soul back, but it couldn't properly form, so he fused the soul into the only two-horned wolf there was there.

[Three-Horned Wolf's soul will be infused with Two-Horned Wolf.]

[Two-Horned Wolf has been given the new skill, "Bloodlust."]

[Two-Horned Wolf has been raised to the grade of, "Elite."]

[The information of summon will be accordingly changed.]

As if sensing that he found it obtuse and annoying to call the Two-Horned Wolf a… Two-Horned Wolf, the System gave Jin-Woo the choice to name the summon.

He was quick to decide on Tempest, based on the Lightning that the wolf had released twice in his fight against Igris. It was simplistic, but it stuck with Jin-Woo enough to not bother him. Tempest didn't seem to mind the name either, its tail wagging softly.

[Tempest | Lv. 13]

[Grade: Elite]

Taking his eyes away from the various screens of his Dual Awakening, Jin-Woo looked at Tempest, who was just his enemy mere moments earlier.

The wolf was large, about 2 meters tall, with fur as dark as the night and two curved horns sprouting from its head. Its head titled down a little bit, its yellow eyes meeting Jin-Woo's. The only change from its original body was greyed fur beginning to form a thin mane.

Jin-Woo could help must note that the wolf was certainly taller than himself, just like Igris has grown to be. Shrugging the observation off, Jin-Woo was quick to use Soul Mimicry. An unexpected notification appeared.

[Newest Summon, Tempest, will be automatically added to the second Mimicry slot.]

[What skill would you like to mimic?]

1. Sprint – Momentarily increase your speed by 30%.

2. Lightning – Shoot a bolt of lightning from your fingertips.

3. Bloodlust – Unleash the might of your bloodlust, stunning and lowering enemy stats by 20%.

Jin-Woo softly hummed at the changes to the System. Now the annoying problem of trying to understand skills based on their names alone was completely avoidable, all because of Advanced Observation.

"This doesn't feel very advanced to me," Jin-Woo sighed, feeling like the descriptions of the stats were still too vague for his liking, however, he still chose a skill even with his small complaints. He checked over the skill and nodded to himself, satisfied with his choice.

Jin-Woo stretched and yawned, thinking, "I didn't gain any levels yet, but the experience gain in this place is a completely different level. I can sense more locations like this strewn around on the island. As long as I don't run into the boss or aggravate a leviathan, I should be able to slowly increase by level over the next few days!"

Jin-Woo snickered to himself, the worry of Ichigo's earlier statements fading away. He couldn't say he knew anything about Undead Mana, but the pride and satisfaction in his chest reassured him of his vitality. He was alive, and he didn't plan on forgetting it anytime soon.