Chapter 140: Solution

"Oh, brother!" Enthusiastically called out Ynos as he walked over towards us.

Sidus nodded in acknowledgment and silently lowered his head in my direction before he jumped to the night sky, his dark figure blending in with his surroundings as it became almost impossible to distinguish it.

Both me and Ynos watched Sidus leave for a few seconds before he walked by my side with a wide grin on his face, he then spoke excitedly while showing me the two dead fairies in his palms.

"Look brother, the harvest today was plentiful! I managed to catch two little worms sneaking about," He said.

A strange expression made its way to my face as I awkwardly glanced at the fairy corpses. Ever since that faithful encounter with that first fairy, Ynos' hatred had never disappeared. Quite the opposite, once he was able to effectively hunt the tiny creature, Ynos turned it into a long life goal to exterminate any fairy he came across, I wouldn't be surprised if one day he suddenly drove them to extinction.

Shaking my head, I asked, "Where do you even find them? None of us had ever encountered one yet somehow you got an entire miniature hill made of skulls inside," I was genuinely curious, none of us siblings had ever come across a fairy, only Ynos seemed to have a knack for finding them.

Scratching his head with his free arm, he thought for a second before replying, "I learned that It's easy if I follow the scent of the Earth,"

"The scent of the Earth?" I asked again still confused.

"Umm, I think Earth mana is a better explanation," He said to which I remained silent as I waited for him to continue.

He pointed at the dead fairies in his hand and explained, "These little pests have a distinctive smell...umm, an Earth mana smell?" He said. It was apparent that he was having difficulties explaining it himself, yet I could still vaguely guess what he meant.

The fairies should have a high affinity with Earth mana, and with Ynos' similarly high affinity, he is able to distinctively sense their presence. 'Hmm, perhaps this is the reason why he was targeted in the first place, and why none of us can find the fairies,' I inwardly thought before absent-mindedly nodding towards him.

"I see," Changing the subject, I motioned towards the corpses with my head and asked in curiosity, "So you are going to add those to your collection?"

With beaming eyes, Ynos nodded enthusiastically as he went on to demonstrate, "Yes, these ones should make a fine addition!" He sounded quite pleased with himself.

Before I could say anything, my scales tingled as I felt the Earth mana steer in our surroundings, right before my eyes a green plant rose from the ground at an accelerated rate as it extended itself towards Ynos's palm.

He calmly allowed the plant's vines to wrap around the corpses. I watched over the whole ordeal in curiosity, using my spirit vision, I was able to see the Earth elements move as they covered the dead bodies, sucking 'something' out of them.

As if on cue, the dead bodies began to dry up turning into mummies before even the skin disappeared, the veins, the blood, everything was sucked by the plant that seemed to grow even taller. Not long after the fairies were no more, and in his palms, Ynos held two tiny white skeletons.

A frown made its way to my face as I watched the whole scene unfold. Although I saw Ynos' trophy mountain of skulls, I never quite knew how he managed to deal with the bodies until today.

Right before my eyes, with the help of my spirit vision, everything was crystal clear. What sucked whatever remained in the fairy corpses was not the plant itself, but the mana elements. Once they appeared, the plant appeared, and once they finished 'feasting' on the corpses, the plant slowly shrank before it disappeared.

Meanwhile, the elements moved and made their way towards Ynos as they twirled around him before seeping beneath his yellow scales. 'Are those the 'tamed' elements inside his soul space?' I wondered.

"What was that?" I curiously asked as Ynos lovingly stroked the now shiny skulls.

"You mean what I just did now brother? That's easy, the pests come from the earth, and to the earth, they shall return, I simply hastened the process," He explained with a grin.

"Interesting," I was honestly still quite lacking when it came to the uses of Earth mana, hence why I came to Ynos for help in the first place. Since he was the one with the highest affinity for it, naturally he would serve as the best teacher for me to improve my control over it...or so I hoped.

"Do you need anything else brother?" He suddenly asked snapping me back to my senses.

I solemnly nodded before replying, "Yes, I need your help,"

"My help?" Hearing that, Ynos's eyes suddenly lit up as he puffed his chest and subconsciously raised his head higher, "Whatever it is that brother needs, you can definitely count on me!" He said reassuringly.

Seeing that, my mouth curled upwards as I explained, "Then, I'll be bothering you to teach me how to better control the Earth mana,"

As soon as I said that however, Ynos's expression suddenly turned strange as he scratched his head awkwardly while avoiding eye contact, sensing that something was wrong, I slowly asked.

"What's wrong?"

"About that, uh, I don't think I can be of much help brother," He said with a hint of embarrassment.

"Huh, why not?" Confused, I asked again.

"The thing is, I'm not sure how I do it myself," The last part came out as nothing but a whisper yet I was still able to hear it.

"Then how do you control your mana?"

With a shrug, he replied, "I'm not sure, I just feel it?"

"You just feel it?" I repeated.

"Yes, it feels like...like...I don't know..." Ynos struggled for a while but still couldn't formulate his thoughts into words and so was forced to give up.

This put me into a dilemma as I was now back in square one. 'I guess he does have a point, I mean if it was me, how would I teach someone to control water mana? From one point of view, I was also simply feeling it,' a long sigh escaped my mouth.

It was then that Ynos suddenly spoke up, "Ah! Since brother wants to train his Earth mana, why not hunt fairies!" He said.

"....Ah?"