Chapter 0039

Amber, Senna, Bailey and the strange new addition to their group, Jean, fought against the Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf. They were attacking the flank of the massive silver wolf. The black hair mercenaries were orphans who earned a living begging on the streets and later killing animals in the forest for food and money. What skills they learned were crude and unsophisticated.

 

Unlike Emery, despite her hatred for the stingy red haired caravan leader, they didn’t have a mid grade skill. They attack the Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf with their strongest attack, barely scratching it through its thick fur.

 

When the Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf attacked Ellen, the group adjusted and did their best to cut through hide tougher than steel.

 

All of a sudden the attacks meant to provide cover fire from the rearguard changed its target. Instead of attacking the enemies, the target of the spell was one of their own.

 

The four broke formation to escape the dangerous friendly fire with Senna and Bailey to one side, Amber and Jean to the other.

 

The crazy girl continued her attacks on the mercenary group.

 

“Amber!” The sharp eyed Bailey realized Tempest was focusing her attacks in Amber’s direction. Furthermore, Tempest attacks weren't weakening but getting stronger instead.

 

“Hasn’t she emptied out her mana yet?”

 

“Her mana pool seems endless!”

 

“We have to get to them.” Bailey yelled after parring a lunge from the Iron Clawed Wolf.

 

“There are too many wolves in the way.” Senna retorted hopelessly. She wanted to rush over to her companion’s side. The wolves swarmed to them when the psychotic red mage lost her sanity and attempted to kill her allies instead of the Iron Clawed Wolves.

 

“That crazy idiot. When this is over, I’m going to teach her a lesson she’d take with her to her next life.”

 

“Less talk, more fighting.”

 

Amber and Jean heard their dialogue over the din. Amber fought tirelessly against an Iron Clawed Wolf while Jean protected her back.

 

Their fighting styles were completely different, awkward and unsynchronized. Amber was used to having Senna and Bailey fighting alongside her while Jean was used to fighting alone.

 

Still the duo managed under the ferocious onslaught of the Iron Clawed Wolf pack. They not only have to pay attention to the wolves, they also have to avoid the spells sent their way by a powerful red mage with an almost unlimited mana supply.

 

Any help is appreciated.

 

3 other mercenaries came to their aid. Amber sent them a grateful smile before focusing her attention towards the relentless attacks of the Iron Claw Wolves.

 

Unexpectedly, one of the mercenaries changes the angle of her attack.

 

Instead of slicing the Iron Clawed Wolf, the target of the attack was Jean.

 

Amber immediately moved to block the dagger strike with her own body. She covered Jean’s vital parts as she braced herself.

 

The deadly strike didn’t come. When Jean and Amber got into a defensive position, the would-be assassin’s head was cut off.

 

The girl in brown wasn’t the only victim of the barrage. Wiminia was hurt as well.

 

Tilda and Wilminia has long since ceased casing spells and have taken up arms to physically fight the Iron Clawed Wolves. They knew their attacks will not hurt the Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf so they joined the rest of the mercenaries in attacking the rest of the pack.

 

The duo is good at physical combat.

 

There is a saying, “A caster that can fight has no talent as a caster.” The common saying is inherently untrue, however it is perpetuated at the lower level due to the practice of the guilds. In the Magus Alliance and come to think of it the Ethereal Depths as well, the cultivators who have high affinity or soul force are immediately snapped up to be trained leaving the less talented individuals to essentially fend for themselves.

 

Since being a cultivator requires a lot of resources, learning fighting skills is a must. Therefore those will with less talent trains in physical combat so they can earn resources to grow later on. When a cultivator trains their body, they see immediate improvement although it becomes harder to improve the body whereas when one trains the soul or the heart, it takes a while for the cultivators to see any result, but when they do, the results are much better than training the body.

 

The Heavenly Mountains trains the body, so at the lower level they have more cultivators than the other three domains. Also, training the body in the Heavenly Mountains requires the cultivators to have spiritual veins. Body cultivators in the other three domains literally train the body. No special requirement needed. Hence, the body cultivators in the 3 domains are much weaker than the Heavenly Mountains. A cultivator in the 3 domains will only train their body if they have no other recourse. Therefore, body cultivators are look down upon.

 

At higher levels, mages and soul practitioners can fight and cast at the same time. These girls are unskilled mercenaries seeking a chance to enter a sect. There is little chance for them to see the higher level cultivators fight.

 

Everything was going well for the group, until a certain caster went crazy and rain down spells like she wanted to reduce this part of the forest to ashes.

 

Those who stayed did their best to avoid the spells the best that they could. When they notice all the attacks were directed at a certain area, they immediately move away. When they notice the crazy woman was mumbling to herself about betrayers and targeting the girl in brown, they avoid the target.

 

They knew better than to run away.

 

The dead was proof staying and fighting was a better idea.

 

Although most of the spells Tempest cast was directed at the little girl in brown, a few of the spells headed towards Wilminia.

 

Tempest had subconsciously held a grudge against the blond for sicking her pet dog on the her during this travels. It is the responsibility of the owners if their dog bites someone and Tempest’s ears nearly got talked off!

 

Normally, Tempest will let bygones be bygones. Tempest isn’t in control of her consciousness right now.

 

All the grudges she held in her past life are unleashed here. It seems that all the grudges she held in this life she also unleashed here.

 

So the poor Wiminia had to bear some of Tempest’s anger.

 

She was doing quite well too.

 

Wiminia was used to Tilda causing trouble for her. There was a time when Tilda pissed off a sleeping Dragon Turtle. Dragon Turtles are slow moving sea turtles with a serpentine head resembling a dragon. Dragon Turtles spends most of their time in the sea eating fish. When they do come ashore, they spend most of their time bathing in the sun. Humans have gotten used to these docile sea creatures. Despite having a dragon in their names, Dragon Turtles don’t have the arrogance inborn in most dragon breeds and at times the Dragon Turtles can be persuaded to ferry the humans around.

 

Tilda… provoked the Dragon Turtles that they chase the duo for three days before they ran into the Silver Wind Eagles. Tilda … provoked the Silver Wind Eagles. Queue another round of chasing and then it became the Fire Marsh Pythons. Then it was the Three Eyed Toad and then a swarm of Giant Sting Wasp. Their elders finally deem it necessary to help them.

 

The elders in the family had to intervene or else there will be a horde of beast heading their way. In no way did the elders of the two families want their home destroyed by two troubles making girls.

 

Having a friend like Tilda is worse than … well Wiminia can’t think of anything worse. Xing Zhi Hui might say having a friend like Tilda is like having Aria Se Jivock around. They do nothing but cause trouble!

 

So several Wind Blade sent her way by a deranged Tempest is nothing. The Giant Sting Wasp was harder to avoid than Tempest’s spell. Wiminia just avoid it with her movement technique and continued on with fighting the Iron Clawed Wolves.

 

Wiminia did forget one thing. It was gossiped about before. Certain elements move on their own to Tempest’s benefit.

 

Ventus adored their little Tempest. After waiting for years, their little daughter was in the world where they can interact with her without repercussion. How can Ventus allow an uppity thing like Wiminia to toy with their precious child.

 

When Wiminia was avoiding one of the Wind Blade, Ventus moved one of the rocks directly under Wiminia’s feet.

 

“Be careful!”

 

The warning came too late.

 

Wiminia had already stepped on the rock she thought wasn’t there. Wiminia lost her balance and fell.

 

Tilda saw her friend's predicament so rushed over to help.

 

The Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf decided to change his strategy the same time Wiminia fell.

 

Attacking the leaders of the mercenary group isn’t going very well for him. He’s losing his wolves faster than he is killing the mercenaries. Therefore, he decided to do what he should have done in the first place, go after the weaklings first then pull back if they can’t overwhelm the stronger members of the group.

 

Running down and exhausting the weaklings among the herd is how wolves hunt.

 

And one prey just fell down.

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Tilda’s heart stopped beating when she saw the Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf lunge towards the fallen Wiminia.

 

“No!”

 

Tilda ran towards her childhood friend as everyone else rushed away from the level 3 magical beast.

 

“I can make it in time.” Tilda knew she can save Wiminia by using one of her trump cards, which she unhesitatingly did so.

 

Teleportation Charm is a level 6 charm that allows the caster to teleport to a location specified by the caster. A level 1 to level 5 Teleportation Charm randomly teleports the caster, with the range getting wider as the level of the charm increase. A level 6 Teleportation Charm allows the caster to specify where to teleport to.

 

For big clans such as the Se clan that Aria Se Jivock came from a level 6 Teleportation Charm is given to all descendant but for these poor mercenaries even if they spent all their life savings, they might not be able to afford one.

 

Tilda immediately teleported in front of Wiminia just as the Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf attacked.

 

Without any other recourse, Tilda used her sword arm to block the attack. The Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf is a level three magical beast focusing on physical strength. A bite and a quick shake later, Tilda’s arm was ripped off her shoulders.

 

Pain can cloud the mind until it is the primary focus or it can sharpen the mind.

 

Tilda immediately grabbed Wiminia with her good arm and rolled away from the Alpha Iron Clawed Wolf. She used Flash Step to boost her movement technique and ran out of range of the silver wolf.