Gathering around a fireside were eight enforcers and one guy in a tattered hauberk. Zalanir’s armor was completely done for. He had checked his stats before and after taking the armor off of his virtual avatar as well as his real body, and the +4 to Endurance was gone.

  Fortunately, Hiina had mentioned that reinforcement from Yebin was coming, and she had asked them to bring a change of basic armor. She counted them as payout for his contribution in the scouting mission earlier, so it seemed like she wasn’t that bad, after all. He had initially thought that he was dragged into this against his will — and he did — but now that he could get not just a direct connection to the enforcer, but also monetary compensation out of this, the whole hunting-a-cult operation had become rather attractive.

  Zalanir had actually been left alone for a while before getting called here to tell about what happened in the cave. Hiina was the main narrator, but she asked him from time to time about the appearance of the cultists and especially the details of the summoning altar. The loss of the Gymer and the assassin, in contrast to his thought, didn’t affect the other enforcers or the captain that much. Except for that moment of care from Hiina to the assassin at the end, there wasn’t much expression going on among them. Their code of conduct, perhaps? Seemed like they were all business. But wasn’t that a bit cold-hearted?

  “Looks like they are getting better with the summoning practice if they can call up such a powerful birduomera. We have to track them down fast,” said an old man in a blue robe.

  “Let’s wait for the reinforcement, then we move out,” the captain said. “Everyone can leave now. Both of you stay here.”

  Why him? Zalanir didn’t expect to see the captain’s eyes on his spot. He had no idea what the leader of the enforcers could possibly want from him. He had already told them everything. This couldn’t be another reward for his contribution, could it?

  The way the man just kept on scratching his thick beard reminded Zalanir of the old man next to his apartment. Every morning, that gaffer just waited for his friends to come over to play some xiangqi games on the doorstep. He was a competent player for his retirement age, but the reason Zalanir thought of him now was the long, carefully trimmed gray beard. That old man just couldn’t stop stroking his beard for maybe more than five seconds, which was exactly what the captain was doing.

  “I want to applaud you personally for helping us out there. If it weren’t for you, we would lose the whole team and, even worse, be left in the dark about the true competency of their summoning ability.” The man held out his hands in front and nodded. “Let the issue with the cultists be ours. Can I ask what you are planning to do next?”

  “This is my first time venturing outside of Bodylovo, so I just want to take my chances exploring. Yebin would be my next destination. If I remember correctly, Rafnick had said that the city was about 10 days to the south. Not too far,” Zalanir shared his plan.

  He wanted to tag along with them into the city, but he was also fine going there alone. With the reinforcement, he doubted his involvement would make any difference compared to the trained enforcers coming from the city. He didn’t want to appear to them that he hoped to get on their good terms. Doing so would backfire hard and lose him any power in the negotiation or compensation department.

  “Oh, then why not come back with us? We will return to the city after catching Wagenner. You could join us as an enforcer. With you having killed several cultists already, I don’t think that would be an issue.”

  Zalanir maintained his deadpan expression. “Thank you for your consideration. I guess getting there with the residents would definitely be better. I will just be around this area trying to get some levels while you are dealing with the cultists then.”

  Even though Zalanir wanted to continue studying the summoning practice of the cultists, he had to consider that the prophet was a C-grade. He had no idea how strong the boss man of the cult was, but it should be safe to assume that he had no chance of winning against that enemy. He just barely defeated one of the cult’s associate leaders in the case of Eiselen, and that was with the fact that she was worn out rather significantly already. A 1-on-1 at full strength could probably be his loss. So, getting involved with the enforcers’ hunt wouldn’t be wise.

  “It might take us a couple more days to get it done. I see. You are close to the first evolution, so taking the chance to get it done is logical. This forest isn’t one of a high level … actually, there are two places that I used to hunt that are not far away where you could find some peak D-grades to kill.” The captain pointed to the northwest and the south. “One is a badger den. The other is the territory of some flower monsters. They are easier to miss with the eyes and prefer to ambush you, but you can take this. Those monsters love this scent, and they would come at you like some addicted fools.”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Zalanir received a fist-sized gold silk brocade bag. Only when hovering it right under his nose did he smell a faint sour, acidic aroma. Would this really work? The scent was too soft.

  As if noticing his doubt, the captain assured. “Don’t worry. These flowers are hundreds of times more sensitive than us. They can detect these several meters away. If I were you, I would worry less about the bag’s effectiveness, but more about how to fight those flowers. They are a nasty bunch with strong nature magic.”

  “Thank you for the whereabouts of these two areas. Can I ask which one is closer?”

  “The flower monster. You just need to follow the river until you see a small valley between the two cliffs. Those flowers grow there. The chance of finding a peak D-grade is rather high, I would say.”

  “Got it. Just in case, how would I contact you to check in if you are done with the cultists?”

  “We will find you. Both of these places are just a day away. Unless you go somewhere else, then maybe see you in Yebin? You can always come back here to check on us occasionally,” the captain said.

  Zalanir found that the captain kinda went out of the way a bit to help him, which was rather odd. He didn’t think his help was that big of a deal. Maybe they saw him as a colleague already? He didn’t really want to join the enforcers, but whatever. If they took too much time, then he would just farm until he was over-qualified for this forest and headed to the city first.

  Zalanir spent the next four days chilling inside the camp, continuing to sponge off the chef’s delicious stews. Not that he was hungry, but he made sure that he was there during the time before nightfall when the food was served. Missing that would make his mouth and belly go riot.

  Most of the time he spent feeding mana to the soul inside his mind. With the safety the camp provided, he could expend all the mana without holding back. After four full mana bars, he noticed that the green aura of the soul had become denser, and its moving speed faster. Finally, some progress. Zalanir then tried to enlarge the current cage a little bit, which proved to be more difficult than he had initially thought. No matter what he did, the cage just refused to budge.

  Seeing no result there, he shifted his attention to creating another cage, which he succeeded on the sixth try. The second one was just one-tenth the size of the initial one, though, so he erased it and tried again. However, he paused after the third attempt, since all the new cage was just the same size. Perhaps it was just that this was his current limit.

  Since the second cage was too small to house the now bigger toddler, Zalanir moved on to another experiment that just popped into his mind: moving the cage around. He could sense that the current cage was in the upper part of his mind, so what would happen if he pushed it down to the bottom? Could he even do that?

  Turned out he could, but with a twist. He couldn’t move it on his own, but with mana — similar to how he directed it to the soul — he could slam it onto the cage and thus slowly push it around. Each throw was an expenditure of mana, though, so he stopped right after confirming that his theory was legit. If anything, this discovery further signaled that he needed to invest in a lot of mana-related attributes. If this tiny soul had already cost him this much, then how could he hope to capture a giant ant or dragon soul, for instance? It would be impossible.

  Outside of his time with the soul, he also got two spars with the archer enforcer, which he was utterly on the receiving end of. On the first try, he got wrecked by the homing arrows. Energy Barrier wasn’t enough to stop all the incoming arrows, no matter if he formed it on his arm for better control or erected it in a large space in front of his body. The arrows just kept on finding small angles to sneak through or curve around. He ended the first spar without being able to even land a single attack.

  The situation was more positive during the second attempt when Zalanir employed a reckless and more aggressive approach. Instead of focusing on blocking and avoiding the arrows, he just guarded some of the nastier ones while rushing forward to close the distance and forcing the fight into a messy brawl. He had done this several times in the past when going up against a player whom he just couldn’t hit through with an aggressive baseline game or when he was on an off day. During these occasions, he just tried to put in more variety, with dropshots, moonballs, and even forehand slices — he detested this tool for being uncool — to make the match into a hell contest of who could hit fewer errors. That approach did net him some ugly wins, so it wasn’t like it wasn’t effective.

  The archer was clearly annoyed by this approach. Zalanir prioritized blocking these powerful explosive arrows while ignoring the normal ones in order to take a few close shots of earth and air Adaptability Bolt. He even succeeded in slamming a point-blank Sonic Lance after purposely taking an explosive arrow to his shoulder and staggering the man with a salvo of sound bolts, which knocked quite a bit of blood from the archer’s mouth. Given that he only channeled the attack for less than two seconds, the force and impact of the attack were more than what he could hope for. Though after that, the archer became aware of Zalanir’s bold approach and won the exchange by rapid-firing explosive arrows while retreating away as far as he could by using some smoke and explosion attacks.

  Given that Zalanir hadn’t used Wind Rush or Hurukele Whirlwind, and that they were fighting in an open area, Zalanir could see a scenario where he closed the distance and won by bursting down the archer, but likely the archer was also holding back himself. There was a clear gap in the finesse and in the matchup itself that Zalanir needed to learn how to overcome. Though unfortunately, the archer and most of the enforcers moved out the next day, so Zalanir was left alone with the chef until the afternoon when the reinforcement arrived.