13. Wild Earth bear

*swoosh*

A small gush of wind blew past Mariel as he made another breakthrough. He has already reached the second level spirit mage in the morning and the cultivation became slow so he chose to stop. He stretched and went for a dip in the rivers and shower in the waterfall. After freshing up he looked at the crystal.

"No one will know that I took it. Besides it's extremely helpful"

He then took the crystal and stored it in his ring. Mariel then put on a combat attire and left for the desert.

After running for about 10 minutes Mariel was confronted by a large snake. "Shadow cobra" the information about the creature was in the information site.

Jumping out of the way, Mariel dodged it's tail. (I'll use this opportunity to test my speed) he thought as he brought out his swiftblade and started running around the snake. "Let's see how sharp you are" he waved the sword and a purple trail if light followed as he cut the bottom part of the snake's tail. "Hiss" the snake hissed as it vanished.

"Huh... where did it go?"

{it's it's special ability that allows it to move in the shadows} Levi said.

Mariel activated his Phoenix eyes and immediately he saw that the snake was about to bite him from the side. He jumped back and sliced one of the teeth. "HASS" the snake hissed in pain as it tried to escape.

"oh no you don't....holy blast" he stretched his hand forward as a beam of light shot out from his hand and pierced a hole through the body.

{The snake was at D level, that's between 8th level apprentice mage and 3rd level spirit mage} Levi analysed the snake.

Mariel then walked to the corpse of the snake. For some reason Mariel wasn't afraid of monsters, he has always dreamed of becoming a mage.

Using his Phoenix eyes he found what he was looking for. "Haha...I found a Monster crystal. Turns out it's filled with Mana and the snake was probably about to breakthrough to the spirit stage" Mariel brought out a fist size glowing ball from the snake's forehead.

He then ran through the forest, towards the desert area. He ignored all the monsters he saw as he was in a mission. With his new speed of 15 metres per second, he ran until he reached the desert area.

There were very few trees with little hills here and there. All the trees in this area has no leaves, just naked stem.

"It really is like a desert" he said as he made his way to the location where the Earth bear was last seen.

When he arrived at the site, he didn't see any living thing but there was a cave nearby. He theorised that the bear was probably residing within the cave.

*ROAAARR*

He heard a loud roar from within the cave as a bear slightly bigger than a full grown human came out of the cave. The moment it spotted Mariel it leapt towards him with it's claws.

"Lightning barrier" he deduced that he wouldn't be able to use strength to block the attack so he cast his defense spell. A dime off lightning surrounded him. As the bear hit the barrier, a wave of electricity passed through it and the bear was stunned.

*arrrrr*. It let out a cry of pain. Mariel too the chance as the bear was vulnerable, he jumped high in the air and with a circular motion he used the sword to cut the head off of the bear. "That's too easy" he said as he went to check it for spirit cores.

{It wouldn't have any monster crystals, it's just a baby. And also, your mission isn't complete because the skin of this bear is too weak to be used for anything}

"Let's keep....."

*ROAAARR*

A loud roaring sound resounded. As Mariel turned he saw a large bear with rocks on some parts of it's body. The bear was 70 metres long and 30 metres wide. "It's so big" Mariel said as he readied himself to face the battle.