Small Enlightenment, Warning

Somewhere to the south of Stone Mountain Range. The date has already changed since Kirou started working on his quest and he's now quite a good distance away from Elderwood Forest, where he originally started.

Kirou was currently locked in combat with a few earth-attributed monsters that took the form of bulls. There were over twenty and with each charge, Kirou was forced to dodge wide as each bull had elongated horns on top of their heads. With that being the case, Kirou could no longer go it alone without the threat of him making a mistake growing, so he summoned out a few shadow clones, along with Tank to help him out. Unlike Mistaken Fox who could make use of monster medallions in place of actual weapons, Kirou himself wasn't able to make use of this trick so the system didn't stop him from taking out said medallion to summon out Tank.

With each combatant now responsible for five bulls each, the somewhat intimidating herd lost its ferocity by quite a bit, allowing Kirou to continue with his practice with peace of mind. If anyone else was present, they would be looking at this fight with their jaws on the floor. The reason for this stems from the fact that this herd of earth-attributed bulls was at level 26 on average. Just the fact that Kirou was able to take on such a herd with only his wires for more than a few charges was enough to shock the average player. Even the elite set would look at Kirou with solemn expressions if they were to see this fight.

To make matters worse, half of the herd he was facing was elite monsters. Kirou's actions of provoking and combating such a herd, all while maintaining a casual attitude in the face of monsters that were clearly stronger than him are not things that just anyone, elite or not, could pull off while simultaneously making it look like just another day to him. As for Kirou himself, besides the somewhat intimidating pressure he felt at the beginning when taking on the herd with just his wires, Kirou was now completely focused on the usage of his wires, almost forgetting that he was taking on five monsters at level 26 at the same time.

In his mind, Kirou was simulating the different ways in which his wires should be utilized given the type of opponents he currently faced. As if on instinct, Kirou's body moved on its own, sliding out of the way of one of the bull's latest charge. While doing this, Kirou had made a slashing motion with his hand, prompting the wires to form a blade-like shape which then slashed at the legs of the bull charging past him. As unlikely as it seemed, not only did the wires in their blade-like shape not snap on contact with the charging bull, they managed to leave a large slash mark on the body of this bull, which resulted in a bright red damage figure floating above its head.

<Fatal>

[-7520]

<Bleed>

[-1020]

[-1020]

[-1020]

[-1020]

[-1020]

With just that one attack, Kirou had managed to remove over 15% of the target's health. Not only that, with his attacking landing on that bull, but Kirou had also obtained a bit of enlightenment as he stared at the downed bull now struggling to get to its feet.

Monster: Stone Mount Stampeding Bull

Monster Level: 26

Health: 38,380/51,000

Attack: 170

Defense: 200

Skills: Wild Charge, Stampede (group), Horn Drill, Stomp, Rampage

After seeing Kirou's attack, the other bulls showed a rare trace of uncertainty and hesitation in their actions. This changed, however, when two bulls in the group roared at the others, prompting them to regain their spirits as they stared at Kirou with glowing red eyes. As for the man himself, he was currently looking at his hand with a strange expression on his face. The previous feelings that he experienced during that attack were still there and he was doing his best to quickly process them, but this action was quickly cut short as the four bulls started charging at him in a wild fashion.

Kirou had a smile on his face as he stared at the four bulls wildly charging at him. He completely disregarded the fifth as it was still struggling to get to its feet at the moment and would not be able to join the others. His previous attack had reminded Kirou of something he had previously learned and now he was planning to test it out.

Just as the bulls got close enough, Kirou immediately put his plan into motion as he thought to himself, 'It has been a while but I believe I should reinforce my wires with my energy while I execute this maneuver. With there being four targets, I don't think the wires will handle it otherwise.'

Following Kirou's thoughts, just as the four bulls were about to impale Kirou with their horns, his body vanished from their sight and reappeared a few meters behind them with both hands tightened into fists and glowing with a blue light as he pulled back. Naturally, the four bulls were completely unaware of Kirou's actions but the fifth bull from earlier watched with a horror-stricken expression as the next few events played out.

*******

Roughly half an hour later, the entire battlefield had been restored to its peaceful state. All twenty bulls have died and Kirou was now sitting on the floor in a meditative state, going over the details of the combat he had just experienced. Specifically, Kirou was now thinking about his recent moment of enlightenment that he had obtained mid-fight.

At the time when Kirou made his attack, no thought process went into it. Instead, that was purely his body moving on instinct, which resulted in him creating a blade formed solely by wires which cut into the bull that had charged past him. While it didn't seem like anything special since he could do so quite easily outside of combat, the fact that he was able to create such a construct during the fight without thinking about it is exceptional enough.

As for what said injured bull witnessed that turned its face horror-stricken, Kirou chuckled as he spoke under his breath, "I can't believe I never thought to combine my wire techniques with Shadow Teleportation. Who knew it would turn out to be such an effective tool?"

As for those wondering, what the injured bull witnessed was Kirou pulling something similar to a reverse decapitation. Naturally, Kirou's swift movement was due to <Shadow Teleportation>. What Kirou did with this technique, however, was that while he was on the reverse side where time was flowing slowly, he released his threads in a manner that made it look like an arc of threads appearing just above the heads of all four charging bulls. From the injured bull's perspective, however, it looked like a bunch of wires came out of the charging bulls' shadows and floated just above each bull's head.

Following this action, when Kirou reappeared and pulled back with his glowing fists, the wires above the bulls' heads came down hard, dragging the four heads to the floor in one swift motion. It happened so quickly that neither the injured bull, Kirou, nor the four charging bulls could have predicted what happened next. Due to their speed and the sudden fall of their heads, the charging bulls flipped over. Unfortunately for them, however, was that since Kirou had reinforced his wires with his mp, the part of the heads secured by the wires never joined the rest of their bodies in this flip, resulting in a grotesque scene that followed.

Both Kirou and the injured bull watched as four bodies flipped over, followed by the sound of bone breaking as all four bodies came to a stop. Maybe it's due to the system interfering at the last minute or maybe it was due to the bulls weren't moving fast enough, when Kirou got a closer look at the four bulls, he noticed that not only were they still alive, their heads were still connected to the flipped over bodies, though barely.

Even Kirou looked on at this and kinda felt bad that the system didn't allow them to die from just that single attack. It wasn't as if they weren't injured enough already. Kirou watched as all four bulls constantly lost health due to a bleed effect and could only shake his head at this. If he waited, the bulls would die on their own in just a minute but even Kirou found that to be distasteful so he went over and finished them off himself. As for the injured bull from before, it lost its will to fight and just sat where it was, staring at the grotesque scene before it with horror in its eyes. After taking care of the four suffering bulls and seeing this, Kirou just shook his head as he went over to the injured bull and finished it off as well.

Having sorted out his fight, Kirou quickly joined his clones and Tank in taking care of theirs, only needing fifteen minutes to finish off the rest and collecting his spoils. Looking at his quest window, Kirou could only form a wry smile on his face as he saw the update.

Bind your targets: 79/100

Hunt your targets and defeat them as follows:

Dismemberment- 45/100

Decapitation- 51/100

Splitting in Two- 30/100

Freestyle- 4/300

*Defeat Weapon Master Bladesmith's Clone: 0/1

It seems that the system had counted the four unfortunate bulls as his very first kills under the 'Freestyle' requirement.

Having remembered all of this, Kirou shook his head free of all unnecessary thoughts as he tried to focus on his experiences during those times. Kirou also made sure to focus on how he was able to pull off that stunt with the four bulls. Though he planned how the attack would go off, he never foresaw how his actions would result in such a scene, nor did he expect it to have gone off without any of the issues he had predicted would happen.

This went on for a few minutes before Kirou received a message from the system. Curious, Kirou decided to take a look as he wasn't expecting to receive one so randomly.

[System: You have received a message from the player 'Summer Shade'.]

Raising an eyebrow, Kirou decided to open the message, only to realize that it was a video. With a shrug, Kirou started the video and watched silently as the contents of the meeting that the gnome thief was in played out. Roughly ten minutes later, the video finally came to a stop, prompting Kirou to look towards the sky while scratching his chin.

As Kirou did this, he couldn't help speaking under his breath, "Not even two weeks and already this kid has given me some damning evidence on that branch. I'm not sure whether I should be amazed at that little thief or disappointed in the top brass of this branch. Tsk tsk tsk."

While Kirou was busy questioning what goes on within the minds of those in charge of Sanming's Assassin Branch, Kirou received a telepathic call from Reya. Kirou sat there in contemplation for a moment before answering the call.

[Player Reya: Hello, Mr. Wolf. Did I catch you at a bad time?]

Kirou just stared at the blue sky as he responded, "Not really, Ms. Elf. I've just got my hands on some information and wondering how I should utilize it. Nevermind that, is something the matter?"

Completely ignorant about the information that has to do with her and Navi, Reya spoke up from her end, [I was just calling to get your opinion on the lizardmen we met last night.]

"Oh? What about them?" asked Kirou in a curious voice.

[Player Reya: Since you gave us the go-ahead, Sister Navi and I decided to lead a small group of players to their village to test out that affinity thing you shared with us. Unfortunately, it seems that their village is well hidden and is surrounded by quite a few defenses. For now, we've decided to give up and turn back. Would it be alright with you if our team could join you on your trip later on?]

Kirou adopted a contemplative expression for a moment before he responded, "I don't mind bringing others with me on my trip, but I'd rather it be just people you trust to have your back. You never know what can happen these days."

As if picking up on something, Reya's voice came from the other end, [Did something happen, Mr. Wolf? Something that Sister Navi and I should look out for?]

Kirou nodded at the fact that she picked up on such a hint before speaking, "It's not something we can discuss over a telepathic call. After I finish my quest, I'll make a trip to SC Pier City or invite you two out to discuss my findings. Pass on my message to Navi as well. For now, I suggest you two watch your backs and ignore everything else, otherwise, you'll find yourselves in trouble."

[Player Reya: Understood, Mr. Wolf.] Following her words, Reya terminated the telepathic call, leaving Kirou to his own thoughts while staring at the blue sky. It was close to sunset within the game at the moment so Kirou could see the bits of orange mixing with the natural blue sky.

As Kirou stared at the sky, he got to his feet as he spoke underneath his breath, "I've already given you two a warning. However this turns out, it's on you to deal with until you actually ask for my help. Until then, do your best, Navi and Reya."

Having said that, Kirou turned in a random direction and started walking. As he walked, Kirou's body sank into the shadows of the various cliffs and rockfaces above him, completely disappearing from the area.