Deal with The Devil!

As it turned out, searching for the treasured spots that were selected at random was not easy.

Despite searching for an hour, he found nothing.

In the end, he decided to wait for midnight to arrive and then look for the spots where the Dew of Moonless night might condense.

"Grrr…"

Once he stopped running around aimlessly, Jinn felt the hunger from morning catch up to him.

He had not eaten anything since morning, so naturally he was hungry now.

'Fortunately, the first class of the battle-oriented course was shifted to wilderness survival.' Despite living two lives, Jinn had no idea how to survive in the wild before.

Through the class he learned a little of all the basics.

How to start a fire, gather food, and what to avoid. Within minutes, he located a small reserve of clean water not far away from him.

Skinning a rabbit he had just caught near the lake, drinking water, he lit up a small fire, enough to cook food but also not to attract the attention of dangerous creatures.

Cleaning the meat, he pierced it with a clean stick and started grilling it over the fire.

'I should conserve my energy and practice until the time arrives.' Pairing the meat with herbs and fruits, Jinn finally had his lunch.

Everything he needed was near the water reservoir. He just had to look for it. Had it not been for his class, Jinn would have missed some simple-looking grass that was excellent for removing fatigue from the body.

He could have consumed a poisonous berry, though the imp said such lowly poisons would not work on his perfect form.

After an hour, the fire had extinguished, and Jinn was now sitting in a meditative position.

With his eyes closed, he was guiding the dragon energy through his body to increase his reserves.

Ever since he found out about the method, Jinn had been doing this every day without stopping.

He timed his meditation perfectly so it won't affect his studies and also does not slow down his progress.

With each perfect cycle, the time within which he completed it started to reduce.

Yet even now, Jinn feels like he was nowhere near forming the clouds that the text talked about.

…

After completing two perfect cycles of energy throughout his body, Jinn felt exhausted.

This was a great achievement, knowing that he only managed a single cycle on the first day before feeling hungry.

Hunting another rabbit, Jinn recovered his body energy. By the time he was well rested, it was already night.

There was no moon in the sky, but Jinn could tell from the positions of the stars that midnight was only an hour away.

Jinn slowly stood up and glanced at the lying corpses of beasts nearby.

When he was immersed in the training, the beasts chose to attack him.

If it was a normal human, they would be unable to leave their meditative state since moving dragon energy through the pathways required total concentration.

Just like the first time he was distracted, Jinn felt his internal organs bleeding from his energy getting out of control.

Someone else might have died, but his healing factor kicked in and saved his life.

Even though Jinn was no masochist, he would be an idiot not to exploit this advantage he had.

Woosh!

'Why can't I find it?' After several minutes, Jinn did not find anything.

Strangely, even the beasts in the area were nowhere to be seen.

All he could see were trees and bushes in all directions. With only a few minutes to the destined hour, he did not have many options left.

When everything seemed to be hopeless, Jinn suddenly thought back to the power he used while fighting with the Ironhide Wolf.

He stopped walking in a random direction and closed his eyes.

Woosh!

Roar!

Right when Jinn stopped, a giant bull with a boat head jumped out of somewhere and attacked him from the back.

Just when it seemed like Jinn would turn into the beast's food, Jinn's body leaned to the side, dodging a pair of horns by a hair's breadth.

"I thought all the beasts had suddenly run off to one of the nearby designated spots where 'it' would appear… but it seems there are still some unfortunate ones left behind."

RoaRRR!

The beast did not understand what Jinn said and continued to attack in a frenzy. It swayed its head left and right, trying to hit Jinn, but all of its attacks were evaded by the boy.

Jinn suddenly caught one of the horns of the beasts and jumped into the air, twisting his body.

"Looking at the world in this state makes you look quite… pitiful." He let go of the horn and transformed his hands midair.

To Jinn, everything looked black and white; the tree, the terrain, the bushes—everything was a faint outline.

But the beast before him was a raging mass of red energy trapped within this outline.

Just like before, several red lines were extended from the beast in all directions.

Without bothering to look at these lines, Jinn landed on the beast's back and stabbed its head from behind.

"Heeee!!!" letting out a shrill cry of pain, the beast collapsed on the ground.

"These horns will be useful." With a swift push, he pulled out the spiral drill-like horn out of the bull's head.

His gaze suddenly looked over the horizon, where a swirl of bluish energy seemed to be drifting over from afar.

"Ah, I see. So that's how it is…" Jinn lowered his head and saw several red hues gathering in different spots around the forest.

With no time to waste, Jinn picked the closest spot and closed his first Devil skill. 'Using this skill was a right choice.'

While running, he started to think deeper about this skill. 'From what I understand. It is also a spiritualist ability, but somehow awakening my first core had boosted my physical abilities, so it is still not certain which category it belongs to.'

'What I know for sure is that it can help me track things that are invisible to normal eyes.'

The proof of this was now right before him.

Jinn had stopped on top of a tall tree. In front of him was a wide clearing where grasses had melted into water like fluid, so clear and magical.

The motes of blue energy he saw from the distance through the skill were now visible here even without it.

It was swirling all around as if it was celebrating something. Maybe performing a ritual or a dance.

'I found the spot, but it drained my reserves quite a bit.' After some calculation, Jinn assumed that he could only activate this skill for only a few minutes.

After a short while, his dragon energy had depleted by a quarter.

'First, I have to hide.' As he looked around, Jinn saw several beast eyes shining in the darkness.

Fortunately for him, none had noticed him.

And from what he saw earlier, many other beasts were coming in this direction.

Jinn activated the devil skill once more and took a quick look around just to be sure while hiding himself under the illusion of the [Dream of the Trickster].

'Just as it was mentioned in the books. Collecting the dew is never easy.' He could also see faint human figures rushing towards this spot from afar.

They seemed to be following the beasts to track this place.

"I could have done that as well." Realization finally struck Jinn; he recalled reading that the beasts were a great threat beside humans in collecting this dew.

"But why do these beasts need the dew?"

No one had told him this, not even the books. Humans needed the dew for awakening; what would the beast need it for?

Fortunately, there was someone beside him who was an expert on such topics.

"Master, consuming this dew, the bloodlines of these beasts become pure."

What?

The reason left Jinn shocked. He wondered if no one from the church knew about it.

Even if they did, they would keep quiet about it.

To the beasts, the purer bloodline was like a star verification for the humans. The higher the purity, the more chance they have to turn into demons.

***

"Leader, should we follow the beasts?" several meters away from Jinn, a group of four people were following a small horde of beasts without hiding their presence.

A young woman with green hair looked around with a scared expression on her face. She was holding a long staff in her hand, running behind two men in the back.

Leading in the front was a burly man, brimming with unrestrained energy. His body was riddled with wounds, and his eyes were brimming with excitement.

"There is no problem!" Even though he shouted with pure enthusiasm, no beast reacted to his voice and continued running in a single direction.

"You are new, so you don't know this, but our leader has the most experience in gathering Dew of the Moonless Night."

The one who spoke with unyielding admiration was a short young man with spiked hair and corny eyes.

The second man, who looked like an assassin, smirked under the cover of his cloak and added, "They even gave him a nickname."

"The Legendary Dew Stealer!"