Chapter 51: Hidrance

[5th Circle - Will-O-Wisp] *BOM*

A huge fire explosion appears and burns everything on its path towards the bear bee nest that looks like a strange tall building. The flame is alive and keeps moving towards the nest.

The mystical flame is very hot and engulfed the nest along with each resident. After the nest has been burned for a while, the low sound wave is stopped and replaced with loud growling sound. *ROARR*

Because the majority of bear bees are out searching for food, there are only a few dozen bear bees inside the nest that come out and attack the preparator that burns their nest.

"Yosh.. Finally some real battle." said Gibbs enthusiastically and readying his axe.

"Everyone sticks together and covers each other's back. We need to kill the Queen bee before her army comes back." Command Sylvan while killing the incoming Bear Bees using his spear.

While fending off the bear bees, the nest is kept being burned and finally destroyed. From it appears the Queen Bee which is many times larger than ordinary bear bees. If the normal Bear Bees is around two meters height then this Queen is around five to six meters height.

Looking at the group of people in front of it, It becomes enraged and attacks them. During this time many small fireballs scattered in the air from Jacob [4th Circle - Vulcan Shots]. The scattered fireballs attack towards the Queen Bear Bee like it is being programmed.

But, the Queen also not a pushover and parry all of them using its legs and arms. As the [Vulcan Shots] being parried spark of fire gathered around the Queen.

Using this opportunity, Jacob manipulates the fire element and mana in the air and casts another spell [Fire Manipulation - Fire Cast] [3rd Circle - Fire Wyrm]. The fire spark turns into bigger fire and becomes a huge fire snake that attacks the Queen.

During this moment, the brown woman on the team also finished her chanting spell [4th Circle - Hurricane]. The huge magic circle appears above the Queen and creates a gust of wind. Then, it ignited the [Fire Wyrm] to become bigger and stronger.

The Queen is immediately trapped by the stronger [Fire Wyrm]. It try to destroy the [Fire Wyrm] but it could easily regenerate itself from the Jacob mana supply and [Hurricane] spell.

Using this opportunity, Sylvan approaches the Queen while ignoring the other Bear Bees [Windwalk]. The other bees also notice their Queen's predicament and try to help her. But, they are being held by Maru, Gibbs, and others.

Arriving in front of gigantic size Bear Bees, Sylvan flares up his mana and imbues it on his spear [Spear Art - Piercing Hawk]. A powerful attack with the embodiment of Hawk penetrated the Queen's body and ended its life.

Looking at their Queens dead, the other Bear Bees becomes disarray. Using this opportunity, the group immediately retreat and back from the battle.

Although the battle seems simple and fast, they also spend a lot of their mana to create an opportunity for this victory. Being inside the inner area of Dark Forest with exhausted mana is the same things as suicide act.

Therefore to avoid this situation, they immediately retreat and recover their mana. Soon, the battle sound will attract other high grade monsters. Fortunately, there are no other monsters inside the Bear Bee territory because of the Bear Bee's nature.

After finding a hiding area and camouflage with the surrounding, they immediately rest to recuperate their mana.

Recovering mana is not easy, sometimes even after one whole night high grade people with big mana pools couldn't even recover half of it. Moreover, they are also inside the miasma fog where the mana is more scarce than outside the forest.

They still could use mana potions that they brought but it is supposed to be used in case of emergency since they only have a limited amount of mana potions.

Meanwhile the Heart kingdom team recuperated themself, the other teams also got many kind of problems with various different grade five monsters. 

Some of them also have the power to jam the communication device like the Queen Bear Bee. But, most of them could be easily dealt with since all of the investigation teams consist of strong people from various kinds of race.

Humans may not be the weakest race in terms of combat but there are many other strong races in Firuman. All of them send at least a few people of fifth grade to do this mission. 

This kind of force is also one of the reasons why monsters never conquer the Civilian Society despite their superior strength. Furthermore, monsters inside the Dark Forest or other areas are not very harmonious one with each other.

For example like the Bear Bees. Their gluttony nature and its appetite will make them eat everything from the plant to other monsters indiscriminately. This way, the Bear Bees have a lower chance of getting some relation with other monsters.

On the other hand, monsters like Corrupted Mother Treant could easily cooperate with other monsters since its nature is giving a place towards other monsters.

While the investigation teams have their own difficulty, Angus keeps his academy life 'peacefully'. 

Inside the training room, under the smithing facility a booming sound along with quaking keeps being heard constantly despite the room is enchanted with various isolation runes. *BOOM* *BOOM* *BOOM*

Inside the training room, "Hahaha… Is that all you got, brat?" mocking Balrug towards his opponent.

Angus keeps his calm despite being provoked by Balrug continuously. Now, in his arm there are two different weapons. In his right hand is a one handed axe and in his left hand is a long poleaxe.

However, Angus could use both different lengths of weapon with maximum efficiency. If not because of the weight and mana restraining bracelet, he could already parry and even counter attack all the old dwarf attacks.

During this past month, Angus also gave some suggestions to increase his physical body further. The mana restraining exercise is really effective. It makes his body break his muscles more than training without it.

But, as an expert he feels that the training is too bori… *cough* crude. So, he also added some ideas and suggestions towards the old dwarf. One of the suggestions is by putting his body under the stress through sparring.

Although Angus has a manual battle system, the manual battle system is too dangerous to be used as training since one careless could lead him to his doom. 

Compared to it, the old dwarf will give some break if Angus is too overwhelmed or holding back his attack to not instantly kill him. 

This kind of training will temper his body in a safe way. Combined with his healing art technique, his physique will become stronger after the training.

Still after all these past months of training, his strength only increased by 2 points to become 14 and his dexterity only increased 1 point to become 13. This shows that his body already has a difficulty in increasing his physical strength.

After a few moments of parrying the old dwarf attack, Angus finally collapses on the ground exhausted.

"Haa.. Ha.. Let's take a break first." as Angus put off his mana restraining bracelet.

The moment he puts off, he feels his mana flare up and begins soothing his body under Angus control.

"No matter how many times I see it, I could never get used to it. To have this kind of enormous mana without forming a mana core is outrageous. Especially this technique you used to heal yourself."

Angus ignores the old dwarf comment and focus to tend his injuries using his [Rejuvenation Flame]. This kind of spartan practice may seem absurd but it also tempers his body more.

Not only in strength but also his flexibility and his battle instinct. Angus may still retain his absurd battle instinct. But, if he doesn't fight with different types of people, he feels like he will rust.

Beside the old dwarf is also very experienced and knows where to hit during the spar. This also made Angus choose him as his spar partner.

After Angus finished healing his wound, "Say kid, I hear you are getting exempted in your class tournament. I don't know why you want to hide your ridiculous strength. But, if you want to gain experience by fighting, they should be enough for you." asked Balrug curiously.

"It's just my personal reason, besides they are too weak to become my battle partner." as Angus put the weapon back in the rack.

"Too weak… Well, with your absurd strength and combat ability, I doubt even the fresh graduate could beat you now. But, you still need those… what is that called about… Ahh.. Points. Yes, I heard students need points to survive in this academy." [Balrug]

"Well, I don't really care about points and rank. Besides I could exchange them with money to not have trouble in my daily life every month." explained Angus

"Exchange?! Didn't it have an absurd rate of exchange?" said Balrug.

"Yeah.. But, I have some useless pocket money inside my storage anyway. So, it didn't really bother me." said Angus nonchalantly.

"Tch… what a spoiled rich kid. Say how many spare coins did you have right now?" Asked Balrug curiously.

"Hm.. If I am not wrong it is around twenty…twenty thousand gold coins. Why do you ask?" replied Angus

"Twenty thousand??!"