TAP-TAP!
“Get him! Get that bastard!”
“Son of a bitch! Why's he so fast?!”
Rough breathing and curses from behind.
Theron casually turned his head to look at the ones chasing him.
Falcot and his companions were chasing Theron murderously.
‘They're keeping up nicely.’
Theron cunningly controlled his speed, keeping a razor-thin distance from them.
From their point of view, he always seemed about to be caught yet never was, so their anger could only boil up all the more.
WHOOSH!
And how long had he been running?
Running toward the outskirts, avoiding the mushy ground he stepped on now and then and the tree roots, Theron eventually found the place he had been looking for.
“Huff…… Huff…… Huff……!”
Theron stopped in place, his shoulders heaving.
A place with a slope so steep it felt like a cliff, and thickets growing densely below.
Stopping at its very edge, Theron turned around to look at Falcot and his group.
“You…… you son of a bi…… haah…… haah…….”
“Fucking finally, we've got you…… haah!”
They were breathing so roughly their faces looked ready to burst.
Falcot forcibly steadied his breathing and said to Theron.
“Done running? You rat of a punk.”
He raised his knife, threatening Theron.
“If you cooperate quietly even now, I'll spare your life. Ah, though one of your arms is getting broken, of course.”
The ones gathered around Falcot were the ones Theron had given a harsh beating last time.
Even so, there was one reason they had been able to band together again.
‘……Is it because of those guys?’
Several vicious guys, Falcot among them, had latched on.
Because they were displeased with the recent atmosphere in the Section 5 training camp, which revolved around Theron.
‘Over something that petty…….’
Kids were kids.
Theron casually looked at the slope behind him.
It was a place full of branches and thickets, and the slope was steeper than one would expect.
At that, Theron sneered at Falcot.
“Stop spouting bullshit and come at me if you're going to.”
At the same time, Theron raised his dagger close to his body and said with sharp eyes.
“But come in ready to die.”
At Theron's words, some of them flinched and stepped back before they knew it.
Theron was small in build, but the presence emanating from his body was no ordinary thing.
But…….
“Who do you think you're peddling snake oil to, you bastard?!”
To Falcot, it only seemed to act as a stimulant.
Falcot shouted loudly, as if worked up, and charged at Theron.
Having rushed in like a wild boar, Falcot looked at Theron with half-crazed eyes and shouted.
“Die, you bastard!”
SHHK!
Theron lightly knocked aside the dagger thrusting straight at his belly.
With weapons involved, the situation actually favored Theron.
Because it let him ignore the difference in weight class between them.
SLICE!
“GAAH!”
Theron's dagger cut Falcot's left forearm, spraying red blood across the ground.
Falcot screamed and stepped back with a startled expression.
Because, though only for an instant, he had not been able to see Theron swing his knife.
“What are you doing? Not coming at me?”
Falcot alone was not enough.
To create a pretext…… all of them had to come at him.
Was that not why he had deliberately cut the arm and not the leg?
If anything, this small injury would become the trigger for them to charge in murderously as well.
As proof.
“What are you doing, you bastards?! You want to break the alliance?! Kill him! I said kill him! If we all go at once, we can just kill him!”
Falcot screamed as if struggling desperately.
At those words, the ones who had hesitated bit their lips hard, then.
“AAAAAAH!”
“Die!”
They charged at Theron at the same time.
But how clumsy they looked.
‘……I could kill them all in thirty seconds.’
Their openings were so plainly visible that he faltered before he knew it.
But soon, Theron casually dodged the knife of the one in the lead and took a big step backward.
SLIP!
“AAAAAAARGH!”
In that moment, Theron's body slid down the slope and fell.
Since the slope was so steep and overgrown with thickets, Theron vanished from sight in an instant.
Moreover, it was dark, which made its depth even harder to judge.
At that, those above said with bewildered expressions.
“Wh, what?”
“That bastard…… fell down there!”
Falcot's group rushed over in a crowd and stood at the edge of the slope.
Below, the slope, overgrown with thickets and shrouded in darkness, seemed to go on endlessly.
“……I can't see him.”
“Fuck…… Isn't he dead?”
At one of them muttering, Falcot frowned.
“Shut up, you bastards!”
Having shouted, Falcot looked down in silence.
But no matter how much time passed, Theron, who had fallen down the slope, was nowhere to be seen.
One of the guys who had formed the alliance with Falcot scratched his head roughly.
“Ah…… damn it. Then what happens with the test?”
After all, the reason they had tried to catch Theron was to get Moltir Flowers, was it not?
Far from making him gather them, they had not even been able to take the flowers Theron had.
Moreover, if word got out that trainees had fought and killed each other inside the Shadow Forest, the test site…….
“……Listen up. We chased him and lost him. Theron just died while running away. Theron fell off a cliff or whatever…… don't spout that kind of bullshit. We just lost him, that's all. Got it?”
As long as the people here kept their mouths shut, the secret would never leak out.
“The bastards who room with Theron didn't see us fight Theron anyway, so we just deny it.”
At Falcot's words, some of them exchanged uneasy glances.
At that, Falcot gripped the hilt of his knife tightly and said to them.
“If anyone so much as opens their mouth to an instructor, I'll twist your neck while you sleep. Got it?”
“G, got it.”
“Understood.”
“Everyone keeps it secret. We take it to the grave.”
Everyone held their breath and nodded.
Then they quickly headed back the way they had come.
With Theron dead, they had to find another way to gather Moltir Flowers.
And after they had left.
RUSTLE.
Below the slope, something stirred among the thickets.
Theron got up.
Scratches and abrasions all over his body.
Blood was running down from his shoulder.
But Theron simply wiped away the blood without expression and looked up.
“……Bastards. Suspicious as hell.”
Staying still while pierced by a branch had been a bit of an ordeal.
But with this, he had completely diverted their attention.
Probably to the instructors as well…….
‘I'll be reported dead.’
However, that did not mean he intended to leave the training camp like this.
There were still far too many things he had to obtain here.
Staging this ridiculous act had only been to buy time to get the Blood Jade Fruit.
“Hoo.”
Theron caught his breath for a moment.
Then, searching through his old memories, Theron looked in one direction.
‘I need to hurry.’
Because if he did not return in time, the test would be over.
He had to obtain the Blood Jade Fruit and pass the test at the same time.
Then, having organized his thoughts, Theron.
WHOOSH!
Threw himself swiftly into another darkness connected to the Shadow Forest.
***
“Missing?”
“……Yes.”
At Berton's words, spoken with a frown, Bengle lowered his head.
It was very rare for him, the Chief Instructor of Hell Island, to take an interest in a particular trainee.
And yet that trainee had gone missing at the site of the first test.
No, in effect, he could be considered dead.
But Berton asked with a calm expression.
“From whom did you hear this?”
“The trainees who share his room told me. They said trainees including Falcot attacked them.”
“Including? You mean they attacked as a group?”
“Twelve trainees, including Falcot, I am told.”
“…….”
Berton fell silent.
In that case…….
“Is that not killing him rather than him going missing?”
Cases like this happened occasionally.
The space of a test.
The Shadow Forest in particular was a perfect place for fights to break out between trainees who had had conflicts.
Berton narrowed his eyes.
‘He is not a brat who would fall…… to a mere pig like that…….’
Whether it was twelve or twenty.
He had the feeling that a brat with eyes like that would not have been taken down so stupidly.
But Bengle shook his head.
“I do not know whether it is true or not…… but they say they lost him during the chase.”
“I had better confirm this myself. Bring those brats here right now.”
“But…… three days have already passed. Whether he was killed or went missing…… it is highly likely he is already dead.”
“……Did I not say I would confirm it myself?”
“U, understood!”
Bengle hurriedly turned and ran to where the trainees were.
Because he knew that if he said even one more word here, his head could roll.
And in the office Bengle had left.
Left alone, Berton recalled Theron's figure once again.
“……That cannot be.”
This feeling that he was missing something…… was it merely an illusion?
Soon, Berton put on a cold expression as he watched the trainees entering his office.
***
In the past, on the day of the unfortunate accident.
Theron had been completely reborn.
The intense vitality and heat he had felt at the moment of death.
The memory of when he had first seen the Blood Jade Fruit still remained vivid.
“It was definitely…… this way.”
A crevice in the valley that ran south from the Shadow Forest.
Theron walked step by step, searching through memories from long, long ago.
Three days had already passed.
‘Two days left…….’
There was not much time.
But Theron did not grow impatient and slowly examined the inside of the valley.
Before long, the day darkened, and the cries of beasts could be heard all around.
For Theron as he was now, there was nothing that was not dangerous.
Whenever their presence drew near, he hid behind rocks and lay flat, avoiding danger as much as possible.
And how much time had passed?
“Found it.”
Theron muttered, looking at a small cave visible inside the tall-grown thicket.
When he had found it before, there had not seemed to be any thicket like this.
‘That was 2~3 years later…… so things might be a little different.’
Theron brushed the thicket aside with his hands and went into the small cave in the valley crevice.
WHOOSH!
There was no wind blowing, but the moment he entered the cave, a chill wrapped around his entire body.
And as he went further in, at some point, a sweltering heat began to be felt.
The very same feeling he had felt before.
As the heat touched his body, it felt as though his past memories were being vividly reenacted before his eyes.
“……Ah.”
His dark vision gradually brightened, and the cave walls were tinged reddish.
Along with the heat haze rising from the cracks between the stones, Theron's gaze fixed on one spot.
A crevice where the heat of the earth and mana intersected.
The thing that held that intense mana and vitality was once again before his eyes.
“……Found it.”
A single fruit resembling a vermilion crystal was shining mysteriously in a hollow in the rock wall.
Pulsing like a living heart, it drew in the mana deep underground and exhaled it as heat.
‘Before…….’
He had simply chewed and swallowed it recklessly, just to survive.
Because of that, he had not properly absorbed even 10% of the Blood Jade Fruit's power.
‘Yet…….’
The energy and abilities of the Blood Jade Fruit were so tremendous that even that alone had completely changed Theron's life.
But now.
“This time will be different.”
If he could absorb everything the Blood Jade Fruit held…….
Theron reached out, plucked the Blood Jade Fruit without hesitation, and sat down.
The Dark Tempelst Mana Cultivation Method should be able to contain all of this limitless power.
And…….
CRUNCH!
Theron swallowed the Blood Jade Fruit without hesitation and began to operate the mana cultivation method.
Tab 10