As Juan and Maria continued to walk forward, they encountered more and more stray low-leveled monsters which they quickly sent to the afterlife.

Soon they arrived at an abandoned city, Juan sighed at the sight of this.

They entered the area and looked for a place to rest. There were many weird vines entwined on the surface of the houses and buildings.

Juan raised his hand signaling Maria to stop moving.

“Be careful, I think it’s a bit weird.” Juan frowned, his eyes constantly scanning around the area.

Mostly in a place like this, there would be many low-leveled horned monsters lurking around.

Maria quickly called back and unsummoned her monster mount,

She stopped and asked, "What's wrong, why did we stop?"

"Quiet, it’s too quiet here." Juan thought while putting up his guard.

Squeak squeak squeak!

They just stepped into the dilapidated street in front when a weird sound rang out, causing the tensed-up Maria to exclaim and look in the direction where the sound came from.

“It’s just a mouse.” Maria heaved a sigh of relief when he saw the dark creatures at the distance.

These mice were a bit big as the size of rabbits with one horn and their mouths were full of jagged teeth, which looked very disgusting.

The monsters' instinct told them that the two humans in front of them is dangerous so they didn't approach and minded their own business.

“There are so many skeletons…” Maria and Juan continued to move forward and at the next corner, Maria’s eyes widened as she looked at the scene ahead. On the street in front, there were bones everywhere. It seemed like some belonged to humans and some were horned beasts.

Juan checked the bones near him, they should belong to warriors as it's very hard and still look fresh even after a long time passed.

And on the bones, there seemed to be quite a few horned rats standing.

“Be careful, don’t attack them carelessly”

 

As soon as Juan spoke, Maria immediately attacked a horned rat that crawled past her feet!

Peng!

As Maria’s saber cut down, the huge rat was cut in half and blood splattered everywhere!

“Run!!!” Juan who saw this scene already knew it was too late. Maria was puzzled, didn’t she just kill a horned rat?

But when she turned to look ahead, she found that those massive horned rats seemed to lose their minds and were rushing towards them madly!

The whole street in front of them was completely black, it looked like a long thick black line and they were all are horned rats!

“Shit!” Juan was shocked to see this scene.

Juan roared and the steel sword in his hand flashed as some horned rats fell to the ground. But the horned rats were numerous and both of them had to hold them off while backing out slowly, looking for a way to escape this area.

"Damn it!"

The horned rats rushed to the front, then pounced towards Maria and Juan. They opened their mouths and you could clearly see the two rows of sharp teeth inside.

It looked very horrifying and disgusting at the same time.

Juan’s expression also became a bit nasty and he held nothing back.

With a wave of the steel sword in his hand, the sword light flashed from time to time and went back quickly.

The disgusting horned rats that rushed over were all cut into two in a short time.

“Leave quickly!!!” Juan waved his hands continuously at Maria while he was holding them off himself and let Maria go first.

These horned rats were very tricky and dangerous.

He just remembered seeing their information in the monster pedia and these darn things usually only eat warrior corpses. But when provoked, they will attract a swarm and take their revenge. Their claws and teeth would release some toxic fluids from their bodies. If accidentally touched, it would be troublesome!

When Juan defended at the back, Maria quickly ran to the front. After making turns and going around corners, none of those terrifying rats were chasing them anymore.

Maria then said sorry a lot of times and leaned her back against the wall behind him. While panting, she looked at him apologetically.

That rat crawled over her shoes just now and she found it really disgusting.

However, she didn’t expect that just killing just 1 horned rat would attract such a swarm of horned rats to take revenge. In that kind of situation, if you’re not careful, you will probably be swallowed up by the rats and become skeletons.

“Just be careful in the future,” Juan said helplessly.

He thought it would be great if he had a beautiful companion during the mission but she ended up sending him to hell's door and almost screwed him over.

“We should find a safe place to rest soon” Juan looked around at this time and said to Maria.

“It should be up ahead.” Maria quickly nodded and looked at her map. They just have to find somewhere safe to rest and they can continue their journey to the power ant's nest.

Soon they found a safe place,

Juan set up the camping tent then took out some simple food and ate.

After another half an hour, Maria finally got sleepy. She could no longer hold back her desire to sleep and went to her own tent to sleep first.

At this time, Juan felt something he stood up and walked in another direction a distance away from the camp.

"Come out!" Juan said loudly.

Right at this time, a cold aura shot towards him from another direction. It was extremely fast and aimed straight for Juan’s head!

Juan suddenly unsheathed his steel sword blocking the attack and his pupils immediately constricted when he felt the cold aura.

Dang!

Right at this time, a sound came out, and thankfully he reacted fast enough.

"Did Meg send you to kill me?" Juan spoke up indifferently.

Just as he finished his sentence, a tall figure walked out and he could finally see what the attacker looked like.

He was a bearded man and he used throwing daggers as his weapon which mostly assassins use.

“Oh? You already knew?” The tall man frowned and asked.

He had indeed been ordered to assassinate Juan and Maria by Meg when around five in the morning he started following them and followed them outside the gates.

After hearing that the noble would reward him greatly and his promise, he became greedy.

He did not expect Juan to find him first and stop the sneak attack.

Juan was also shocked, the assassin had concealed their presence for so long and he did not discover them at all! If he didn't notice the slight killing intent he might have stayed here forever and not come back.

“You are Fernando Lopez, frequently killing and plundering warriors outside the Daling City, am I right?” Juan glared at him and said indifferently.

“Oh? Seems like you recognize me?” The tall man and revealed a look of surprise.

“A man with the bounty of 500 gold coins on the wanted list.” Juan extended a finger out and said.

Fernando Lopez looked at Juan sinisterly and roared, “I'm honored that you know me, now should I kill you or you kill yourself?”

Juan shook his head and looked at him indifferently "The battle didn't start yet and you are already planting red flags"

...

The man was enraged and said "Fine, I will do it myself" (Thanos?)

Upon saying that, he charged towards Juan!

Juan’s expression remained unchanged as he wielded his steel sword. Right at this time, his own sword aura exploded out.

Juan was abnormally calm although this time it was a life and death situation. His sword aura was endless and felt extremely dangerous.

On the other hand, Fernando Lopez was already in front of him and was about to swing his dagger at Juan's neck.

Clang clang clang!

Sounds were produced by the collision of their weapons.

Fernando Lopez’s strength was too much as he was already a mid-level warrior, although his dagger only collided with Juan’s steel sword and did not harm his body, Juan felt immense pain in his arms.

Blood spurted from his arm.

Fernando Lopez sneered "You're dead, brat!"

At the same time, his other hand with a dagger slashed forward at Juan's shoulder.

Juan gritted his teeth as he deflected the first attack with his steel sword while dodging the second attack.

“Hehehe, you shouldn't have left the city and made it easier for me to kill you!” Fernando Lopez laughed sinisterly as he suddenly leaped into the air.

“Take this!”

“Assasin skill – Dagger rain!!!”

Juan was surprised when he heard that. A skill that could only be used by assassins. These skills required an extremely deep understanding of daggers before you can learn. The slightest error would cause the skill to fail.

But if the skill was unleashed successfully, the power of it would definitely be horrifying.

Fernando Lopez rapidly threw his throwing daggers mid-air shouting loudly,

Which looked like a rain of deadly daggers!!

"DIE DIE DIE DIE!!!"

At the same time, Juan thought hard about how to defeat him.

The daggers fell like rain towards Juan!

This attack was definitely horrifying as it was a large area of effect attack that blocked off all paths of retreat.

A large area-of-effect attack!

And the power from the skill was definitely one from a mid-leveled warrior!

But suddenly, Juan smirked as he held his steel sword above his head while rapidly closing in Fernando Lopez.

“Nice try, thank you for giving me a chance”

In the next instant, Juan gritted his teeth unleashing all his strength, and sword light flashed from time to time.

Clang clang clang!

Countless collisions occurred but Juan remained safe in the middle of the field staring at the vulnerable Fernando in front of him who run out of daggers.

"How is that possible!!"

Fernando roared out loud when he saw this scene with his own eyes and his expressions turned to fear. He couldn't believe that he would be defeated by a young low-leveled warrior with his strength.

He dug a grave for himself this time!

He knew that it was over because without a weapon his strength was useless in front of a good swordsman so he glared at Juan in front of him and decided that he would die together with him. He knew Juan was young and lacked battle experience so he tried to distract him by talking.

"Wait, kid let's talk it's all a misunderstanding?"

But Juan obviously saw through this and didn't let him continue. He exerted force with both legs and shot into him like a cannonball!

Fernando was visibly panicked and tried to run away stupidly exposing his back to the enemy.

Juan quickly arrived behind and pierced the back of his throat with his steel sword.

Blood spurted like a fountain!

...

Zheng!

Three seconds passed and Juan’s figure stopped and he had already sheathed his blood-stained sword.

Panting, he went to Fernando's corpse and took his finger so he can send it to the officials for confirmation and get his 500 gold bounty.

Still, he didn't get out unscathed, there were many slash marks on his shoulder and arms. He looked at his shaking hands due to the battle earlier but he still quickly cleaned up Fernando's corpse as it was near his base camp, the smell of blood might attract some horned beasts.

Back at the camp, Juan quickly got back here and found Maria who was still sound asleep.

He shook his head helplessly and sighed.

He scattered some scent-powder around the camp to hide their scent.

Walking to his tent, he cleaned up all the blood on his body and changed into clean clothes before lying on his bed. Then he slept with his steel sword beside him and thought about the battle earlier.

Reminding him that outside the city, he has to be wary of not just beasts but also his own kind.

Just as Juan was thinking of this he wandered off to dreamland.

 

- End of chapter 6 -