Daggers and potions

Acario was looking at Sheyken and just did not feel right.

'His not fazed by us. Even his posture is mocking Haarica and the outfit he is wearing is fit for an assassin, but watching him fight that spider monster tells me otherwise. If I had both my hands I would not let Haarica get close to him. I would take the lead instead.....'

Acario could not finish his thoughts. While he was in his thoughts and still watching Sheyken, when Haarica was close enough to pick up the dagger, Sheyken had thrown a red-looking potion in the air that made both Acario's and Haarica's eyes go wide.

"A fourth circle healing potion!"

Haarica said out loud. His eyes were now glued onto the potion. He knew how much Acario needed any healing potion they could get their hands on so he could at least not die of blood loss or infection. They had used up all the potions they had during their battle with a beast from hell.

Acario calmed his mind after the initial shock of seeing a fourth circle healing potion being thrown up in the air towards his direction by a kid from a faraway village that had no business having such a high-value potion. Both Acario and Haarica now could not wait to see what was in Sheyken's storage item. If he could throw such a valuable item like that, they thought he must have many.

When Acarios eyes went back to Sheyken, he was shocked again. He thought he threw the potion so to distract them and run away but to his surprise, Sheyken was headed straight for him.

He took a look at Haarica and saw that all the fingers except for the thump of the hand he had reached out to grab the dagger with had been chopped off. The dagger was now lodged in his neck. As soon as he saw him, Acario now thought they were dealing with a Finis assassin in training. With a fit of rage after seeing his childhood friend with a dagger in his neck, he let out all of the mana he had left after the battle with the Vatagreos together with the one he had been gathering since then and turned it into a flame spit spell.

The spell launched from his hand like a flame thrower hitting Sheyken head-on. He wanted to finish him with a single blow. In his experience, without a defensive spell, even he would die from the flames.

His eyes almost popped out when his spell ran out and Sheyken burst out of the flames not harmed and was now at arm's length to him.

"Bless...."

He could not finish the word he spoke out. The feeling of having his head chopped off together with the shock and embarrassment of being killed by a kid made his soul leave his body as soon as it could.

"So mages of this would do not have to chant a spell?"

Sheyken asked himself but finished the question when he was facing Haarica's direction. He was holding his other dagger in his left hand. He only now thought it was abnormally long for a dagger as someone else would call it a short sword.

Haarica was struggling to breathe. He was on the ground looking at where Sheyken was and had hopped Acario would not let him die without killing the kid assassin that played them for a fool. After seeing Sheyken decapitate his friend like it was nothing, he now thought of all the rumors of how they would describe the kids from Finisrepo. Always praising them in all the nations even though they came from such a faraway place and were not that civilized.

What made him hate them more was how his father would always say he wished he was a fraction as talented as the least competent Finis. That is why when he had rumors of some ruins close to Finisrepo and that his academy had a scouting mission on its mission board, with no one wanting to take such a long mission he jumped at the chance and convinced Acario to come with him. After they told their parents about the rumors of the ruins, their parents promised them they would reward them greatly if they found anything pertaining to the ruins and would invest more into them so they could advance quicker as mages.

Looking at Sheyken coming closer and closer to him, He could not take the shame anymore and took out the dagger lodged in his neck. Blood sprayed out and he quickly died with his eyes still opened and looking at Sheyken. When Sheyken was finally close, he took his dagger that was still firmly gripped by Haarica, stood up and for the first time looked at a dead person in disgust.

"Don't you know only I am allowed to have Plot Armor!"

He said out loud as if to not only tell Haarica's dead body but also the world. Thinking back to when he threw the portion in Acario's direction and succeeding in distracting them. He did not know how good Arloch's potions were since he had no base standard to grade them on, but after he heard Haarica say 'Fourth circle' he was now eager to find out about them. When Haarica had been distracted by the potion, Sheyken had no choice but to turn to his not-so-old bad habit.

He moved his defensive field to Plot Armor and used one of its properties 'Push' together with 'Maneuver' to lift it off the ground and push it towards Haarica. He was not yet adept at using these skills at such a distance which put a toll on him. The dagger did not have that much force as it moved through the air but Haarica was distracted enough for it to go through his fingers and into his neck as he was still looking at the potion in awe. Plot Armor being as sharp as he was only needed just a little force to cut through flesh and bone.

As Sheyken looked at Haarica he did not know how to feel.

"So you have no qualms of killing a kid when you yourself are still a child. Looks like I will need to blacken my heart in order to survive in this world. I am sorry kid, but if it comes to my life, if you try to kill me you better come prepared to die. No matter how old you are."

Sheyken let out a long sigh, then put Plot Armor into Ruby, and since he had previously battled a beast in the area and now had killed two children after talking to them for a while, he wanted to get out of the area as soon as possible. He absorbed Harrica's body into Ruby, planning to look for loot on his body and hopefully find a map when he is out of the forest. Ningal had told him she did not have one and she was not on friendly terms with most of the villagers she thought had one.

He then turned back to where Acario's body should be but could not see it. He immediately tensed up as his intuition was telling him something was behind looking at him. He immediately understood that no matter what he did in this situation he was going to die.

'Shit.... why am I panicking? Being in Arloch's or any of the 5 and my master was more intimidating than this. If whatever ate Acario without me even feeling its presence and is now behind me, if it wanted to kill me it would have already. Funny how I have been coming up with this conclusion every time I'm in danger.'

Sheyken did not move. He waited a couple of seconds before what was behind him slowly showed itself. Coming into view from his right side, he swallowed every single saliva that was in his mouth making it dry as it was no longer producing any saliva.

The beast looked like a huge centipede, with every leg it had consisting of large scythes. Its head looked like it was rotting away but had clear mucus around it and had visible teeth that looked like those of a shark. It was brownish in color and its body resembled that of human skin with black hair, it was around 1.8 meters wide and had 7 eyes. It looked to be 7 meters in length. It was something Sheyken did not want to keep in his mind.

It came closer to him with all 7 eyes looking at his. He heard a sniffing sound that he did not know where it came from since he could not see its nose. It circled him while he continued to hear the sniffing sound until it was in front of him again, looking at him in his eyes. It opened its shark-like teeth and let out a 'chirp' sound. It was a bird sound that Sheyken was not expecting. It sounded like a sound a little bird would make.

After rewriting what a cute sound should sound like in Sheyken's brain, the beast disappeared almost like it blended with the surroundings. After noticing that he had stopped breathing, he quickly let out a long breath.

After not moving for some seconds, he then started to dash out of the area like lightning.

'I guess this is why Ningal was emphasizing that I should not stay in an area I was in a battle in for too long. That thing was the stuff of nightmares. Why do I run to such things and why did it eat Acario but let me go?

Sheyken took out Plot Armor, looked at him, and then kissed the flat side of his blade with a grand smile on his face.