The Gelu Drake's neck bone, laid wide open by the wound Kai had cut.
Piercing a Gelu Drake's hide barehanded was difficult, but a neck bone already half in tatters could be torn out well enough with a Strength stat of 22.
CRRRRUNCH—!!
A sound of bone breaking burst out, in the most literal sense. The Gelu Drake put up resistance.
But the Gelu Drake's strength was already drained to the last.
Having used even the Ice Breath, its final redoubt, the Gelu Drake's resistance was helpless in the extreme.
I kept putting in strength and tore the neck bone out.
Only when the spine connected to the neck bone came away with it did the Gelu Drake tip to the ground.
THUUD!
That heavy body was buried in the snow of the Snowy Mountain and a great tremor went up.
And almost at the same moment, translucent messages poured down before my eyes.
◆You have slain a Gelu Drake!
◆You have gained 8,180 combat experience!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
This meant the Gelu Drake's certain death.
"Hoo-ah...!!"
Only then could I let the tension out of my body.
When the tension released all at once, the strength drained out of my whole body.
Even having recovered my damaged body with the Regeneration [B-] ability, I had not a scrap of energy.
I sprawled flat on the Gelu Drake's corpse. And then I checked the messages that had surfaced.
But......
The experience was considerably extraordinary.
The experience from the monsters I had hunted up to now had never exceeded 200.
The Ice Troll's experience was 120.
The Dermexus's experience was 200.
The Alakron's and the Rex's were 100 and 80 respectively.
And yet the Gelu Drake was a full 8,180.
And that was the experience from hunting a single one.
From this alone I could tell at once that the Gelu Drake was a monster the me of now could absolutely never have hunted.
There was a reason it was called the Master of the Snowy Mountain.
This time I really had nearly died.
As I caught my breath, relief and joy mixed half and half, translucent messages of another kind surfaced before my eyes.
◆You have cleared the sudden quest [You're That Strong?! Follow Me to the Snowy Mountain!]!
◆You have gained 16,500 quest experience!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
With the sudden quest generated on encountering the Gelu Drake cleared as well, I was able to level up enormously.
It was more than I could check one by one, so I went straight to the "Player Information" panel.
=="Player Information"==
[NAME] = Adrian White Wolf
[LEVEL] = Level 21
[HP] = 26
[MP] = 0
[STATS] = Strength: 22 Agility: 8 Stamina: 15 Mana: 1
[EXP] = 22.8%
<Additional stats +8>
Over the past two weeks, sparing my sleep and hunting while fighting the cold, raising +5 levels had been the most I managed.
By which my level before hunting the Gelu Drake was 13.
And yet by subjugating a single Gelu Drake I was able to raise +8 levels.
By which my current level is 21.
And the sudden quest's reward was not simply experience either.
◆G-good heavens!!!!!!!!
Messages full of fuss.
They poured down before my eyes.
◆You did not flee but stood and fought and seized victory!!!
◆And against the Gelu Drake, called the Master of the Snowy Mountain, no less!!!
◆What ever shall we do!! What ever shall we do about this!!!
◆At an achievement past astonishing into appalling, we flail this way! We flail that way!
◆Our mouth falls open all on its own!!!
◆As your reward, the 'Title - <Master of the Snowy Mountain>' is granted!!!
'A title?'
The title <Master of the Snowy Mountain>, granted as the sudden quest's reward.
Before long, as though reading the question in my thoughts, translucent messages poured down before my eyes.
====
A [Title] is an honour granted to a [Player] who has achieved a great feat of a degree that is unachievable.
According to the degree of unachievability, the difficulty of obtaining a [Title] varies enormously, and some [Titles] possess effects that raise figures such as the Player's stats, attack power and defence.
The lower the obtaining difficulty, the lower the applied effect.
For instance, a title such as <No Wonder My Luck Was So Good Today>, granted to a [Player] who died by being struck by lightning in the field, is a simple honorary title with no particular ability.
A [Player] can obtain and possess several [Titles] at once, but may select only one for its effect to apply.
====
I thought I understood roughly what the mechanism was.
And in that sense, the title <Master of the Snowy Mountain> I had obtained this time.
==<Master of the Snowy Mountain>==
[Obtaining condition] - Subjugation of a Gelu Drake.
[Effect 1] - Strikes every monster inhabiting the Snowy Mountain with fear. A monster so frightened suffers a drop of -15% to its stats.
[Effect 2] - Raises all of the Player's stats by +5.
The title's effects were... tremendous.
In the case of [Effect 2] in particular, it was raising my stats by a combined 20.
In other words, a single title possessed an effect amounting to a full '20 levels.'
'That's completely broken, isn't it?'
It was a broken effect enough to draw those words out of me.
There was a reason the quest had made such a fuss.
Just as I was marvelling at the <Master of the Snowy Mountain> title's effect, it happened.
◆You have cleared the affinity quest [Don't Get the Wrong Idea, This Alliance Is a One-Time Thing]!
A translucent message surfaced abruptly before my eyes.
It said that Kai's affinity quest, which I had no intention whatsoever of completing, had been cleared.
◆Kai's affinity toward you rises greatly!
◆Kai's affinity toward you has entered the [Anger] state!
◆A person fallen into the [Anger] state holds negative feelings toward you.
◆That person regards all of your words and actions as objectionable.
◆But if you do nothing in particular, their feelings will gradually subside over time and reach the [Conflict] state.
◆You have gained 32,320 quest experience!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
◆Your level has risen!
It poured messages down all by itself, and more experience came in than from hunting the Gelu Drake.
'What is this all of a sudden?'
Just as the question surfaced, it happened.
"What on earth are you."
Kai approached me with a meaningful face and expression.
***
Kai's head was in considerable disarray.
Jumbled, tangled, a right cauldron of chaos.
The reason was unquestionably Adrian.
And because of an Adrian who had shown combat power enough to stand against a Gelu Drake, at that.
He was a different order of thing from the Adrian Kai knew.
Of course, from what he had shown in recent days, Kai knew Adrian had changed to a degree.
But that did not mean to a degree that could stand against a Gelu Drake.
The Gelu Drake is a monster given a ruling of 'subjugation impossible.'
A monster for which not trespassing on its territory was the only method of dealing with it.
It was the ruler of the north, against which even Kai could reckon no better than three in ten odds, and yet Adrian had capably tied the Gelu Drake's feet alone.
And barehanded, at that.
That...... is not a possible thing.
Of course, unlike knights who use long weapons such as swords, there are those called 'martial artists' who use the body itself as a weapon.
The combat power of martial artists is by no means inferior to a knight's.
They are people who have professionally studied and trained in killing as a foundation.
People who systematically research and develop and ceaselessly strive for how to kill life more efficiently.
At a glance Adrian's fighting style resembled such a martial artist's.
But martial artists likewise use 'Aura.'
The human body that martial artists use.
Because it was not suited as a weapon.
Which is why the Aura of martial artists developed with its focus on strengthening the body.
A body strengthened that way capably blocks an Aura sword, and at times shatters even an Aura sword.
The physical technique of a martial artist who has reached the stage of Master compares with an Ogre.
Therefore Adrian could not be called a martial artist.
Because Adrian cannot handle Aura.
Never mind Aura — his very talent for mana converges on 0.
This Kai could state flatly, because he had seen it clearly with his own two eyes.
In the fight with the Gelu Drake, Adrian used no power of Aura and no power of mana whatsoever.
That is, it meant Adrian had faced the Gelu Drake with a purely physical body.
And that was not all.
The real reason Kai was in disarray lay elsewhere.
'How did he block the Ice Breath...'
Adrian had blocked the Ice Breath single-handed.
That was a thing impossible even for Kai.
Kai was a man who had capably blocked the Snowy Mountain's avalanche.
But he had no confidence he could block an Ice Breath.
Even drawing the power of Aura he possessed to its extreme, it was impossible.
And yet Adrian had blocked the Ice Breath openly, without using any power of Aura at all.
"What on earth are you."
Just what is Adrian's true nature?
He was so utterly different from the Adrian Kai knew.
It was as though...... he had become a different person.
Adrian's order to pull the soldiers back, in particular.
Rather than making sacrifices of the soldiers, Adrian had volunteered to become the sacrifice himself.
CRACK!
What's more, he had thought the man had thrown Kai out as bait and fled, and that was not so either.
CRUNCH!
Even in a situation where lives were at stake, Adrian had not fled.
It was difficult to admit, but.
......They had fitted together, hand and foot.
Without speaking, each had caught precisely what the other wanted.
CRUNCH, CRACKLE!
Like partners who had entrusted each other with their backs for decades.
Facing the Gelu Drake together with Adrian, Kai had even felt an exultation he could not explain.
CRRRUNCH!
And so, perhaps...... he had come to acknowledge him a little.
CRACK!
Past the point that Adrian was no longer the Count's wastrel, he had come to acknowledge the person called Adrian himself, if only a very little—
CRACK! CRRRUNCH!
"......?"
Kai's head tilted of its own accord.
The thoughts whirling through him cut off dead.
CRRRUNCH!
That grotesque sound that had been coming for a while now.
When Kai slowly raised his gaze, for some reason Adrian was nowhere to be seen.
Adrian had unmistakably been right in front of him until a moment ago.
Surely he had not shot up into the sky?
Naturally, that was not it.
Then had he sunk into the ground?
Naturally, that too—
CRACK! CRRRUNCH!
......was more or less correct.
The grotesque sound that came again was coming from the Gelu Drake.
And every time the sound came, the Gelu Drake heaved.
It was not that the Gelu Drake was alive.
The Gelu Drake had met a certain death.
Which meant.
"Surely not......"
The wits went out of Kai's face and expression.
Just as a thought of surely-not, surely-not was churning wildly through his head.
Crunch.
From inside the Gelu Drake's body, 'that sound' came faintly but distinctly.
***
Kai, standing there blankly after calling out to me.
Kai had lowered his gaze slightly, with the expression of someone chewing something over.
It seemed he had something he wanted to say to me.
I didn't know what he meant to say, but whatever it was, I had no time to be listening to it.
The Gelu Drake's corpse was cooling fast.
From a heart that has completely lost its life force, no genetic factor whatsoever can be devoured.
I had already lost a considerable amount of time checking the quest rewards.
Delay any longer here and I might not be able to devour a single genetic factor.
After all it took to hunt this Gelu Drake, was I to throw it away?
So whatever Kai was blathering about, I paid it no mind.
I had no interest either.
Unfortunately my sword could not cut the Gelu Drake's hide.
Because with a plain sword holding no Aura I could not make so much as a scratch.
There was no help for it but to dig through the severed neck.
There was no way but to go into the Gelu Drake's body myself, find the heart and take it out.
CRACK, CRRRUNCH!
A size of a full ten metres.
Reaching the heart alone took a long while.
Still, as though proving it had not been dead long, the inside of the Gelu Drake's body was very warm.
I barely managed to dig through to the chest where the heart was.
After all the trouble, I was able to find the heart.
Fortunately.
'Still all right.'
The heart's life force had not gone out completely. Thanks to its having desperately protected the heart, its condition was very good too.
I brought the Gelu Drake's heart to my mouth without hesitation.
And then, crunch!
When I crushed the heart with my teeth.
◆Kai's affinity toward you plummets sharply!!
All at once Kai's affinity plunged into the abyss.
◆Kai's affinity toward you has entered the [Disgust] state!
◆A person fallen into the [Disgust] state dislikes and detests you!
◆The [Disgust] state does not go so far as active aggression toward you, and shows only a passive aversion to being near you.
Honestly, back and forth like this.
'Still, not the Hatred state?'
◆Well, isn't that fortunate!!!