"Over here!"

Dozens of elven troops began approaching the two, their faces covered in blood, and eyes stone cold.

"This is interesting," murmured Gray as a few elven troops began drawing their bows.

"Atta-"

*stab*

Gray threw a crimson red throwing knife at the elf who was about to give the attack order, confusing the other elves as to what had just happened.

The elf in question began spasming on the floor. Although the knife had punctured his throat, his death wasn't instant. Unable to scream for help all he could do was let the blood bubble out of his throat as he held onto it tightly.

"So they do bleed red," commented Gray, shattering the strange silence that had overcome the battlefield.

"Don't touch them, they're all mine," smiled Gray, before drawing out his long sword and rushing towards the group of elves.

"Attack," shouted another elf once he had realized that they were being attacked. The elven archers released a volley of arrows towards Tesse and Gray, while the other elves charged as well.

'A bit above the average meal, but still generally weak,' thought Gray as he sliced an elf's head off, dodging the falling arrows as if they were moving in slow motion.

Although his initial speed was something the elves could keep up with, his ability to change weapons on the fly became a dangerous variable when engaging in combat with him.

Soon the elven casualties began to take a steep rise as Gray increased in speed and strength. His『Might Drain』skill now temporarily gave him +10 additional points in agility, strength, and stamina, and +3 points in attack force.

"W-We can't fight this, he's at least silver rank" stuttered one of the elves as he watched his comrades get torn to shreds, by what now looked to be a black blur of death.

"R-Retreat! Get the mages, this isn't something we can hand-"

"As if I'd let you," smiled Gray as he stood over that elf's now headless body.

"Mages would be a bit... tricky," commented Gray casually as he drained the elf's blood, leaving it a pale shriveled up corpse.

"I'm done with my experiments. Apart from your increased speed, it doesn't seem as if there's anything particularly different about you," said Gray as he turned the long sword in his hand into a pistol, before shooting at the remaining troops.

"Crush their skulls, look for soulstones," ordered Gray as he turned the pistol back into a longsword before placing it into its scabbard.

'『Might Drain』is a really good skill when I'm facing multiple weak opponents, though I guess it wouldn't be much help if I was facing one overwhelming opponent,' thought Gray as he felt his gained stats slowly disappear.

"Master, they don't seem to have soulstones," shouted Tesse from where she was, a cracked open skull rested underneath her heel, and pink pieces of brain matter sprayed onto her face.

"I expected as much. The nobles didn't have them either. It would seem intelligent beings don't have such stones," replied Gray, more to himself than towards Tesse.

'As much as it saddens me to leave behind prey, I'm not sure how strong these mages they spoke of are. And if they were the ones responsible for this carnage-' thought Gray as he looked at the scorched earth around him.

'-then it would be best to avoid fighting an unknown number of them,'

"Search them for any valuables and we'll be on our way,"

"Yes master,"

After a few minutes Tesse came back, dried blood glued to the arms of her suit as if she had been picking through a pool of blood.

"I've found several keepsakes such as pictures and jewelry, as well as pouches filled with gold coins," reported Tesse, holding out the items for Gray to see.

"Throw away the pictures and store the rest in your inventory," replied Gray, his attention drawn to the black cub.

'I guess it's common for big cats to eat meat,' thought Gray as he watched the cub tear away at one of the fallen elves' shriveled up corpses.

"Let's head out before their reinforcements arrive here,"

As Gray and Tesse snuck through town -making sure to hide in the shadows of massive buildings, and behind large structures- they realized that the entire city had been overrun.

A few humans had been chained up and walked in a single file, accompanied by guards on every side as if they were prisoners.

Among them were the Hephaestus members, including their captain. Their faces looked clean, and not a spot of blood could be seen on their clothes.

'They had probably begged for mercy,' snorted Gray as he ran past them, his black suit making him look like a shadow as he bolted past several buildings in a few breaths.

"Stop," whispered Gray once they had reached the outskirts of the town.

Now all that lay in front of them was the forest. However blocking their path was a large company of elves, and at the very back was a black-haired elf wearing a long white robe.

"Hmm, this probably won't work but it's worth a try," whispered Gray as he formed a crimson red M107 Semi-Automatic Long Range Sniper Rifle and looked through its scope.

*Shtau*

"Just like I thought,' sighed Gray.

The mage had instinctively cast some sort of spell, causing multiple blue hexagrams to appear out of thin air, deflecting the bullet.

"Stay here and try sniping while I distract them. If I fall come in and drag me out," ordered Gray, before pulling the silver sword from Tesse's scabbard and holding it in one hand, while pulling the crimson red one in his and holding it in the other.

'Time to test out my upgrades,' smiled Gray, his eyes a red stream as he dashed towards the elven forces.

==============================================

[System Information]

『Shadowrunner』

A cat-like magical beast that is naturally found in magical forests.

They may consume flesh, however, prefer soulstones above all. Soulstones increase their potential allowing them to evolve into other forms later on in their development.

However, since many of the hunter demi-humans -such as orcs- hunt them for sport, their numbers have greatly reduced.

Futhermore, forming bonds with them is highly difficult, as such they are not widely viewed as familiar beasts.

Check Beastly records for more information.

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