D.I.O

After the necromancer answered, he took a tooth the size of a short sword out of his inventory. It wasn't just a simple tooth; it had golden writing engraved all over it.

“Three! Two! One! Contract shall be executed for six hundred and sixty seconds! Bring death to all who seek to harm us!”

After initiating dark magic, the necromancer threw the tooth into the air. In mid-air, it divided into five shadows that took on five physical forms. These entities were called Spartoi. They wore gloves that seemed to be made of tyrannosaurus hide, and looked more like draconic beings than skeleton soldiers due to their long tails. Spartoi were often referred to as draconic soldiers.

“Wow! They look really strong.”

“I’ve invested a lot of time into them, and it also took me a while to contract them. One of my goals is to create a real Spartoi from a dragon’s tooth rather than from a tyrannosaurus’ tooth.”

Without even being ordered to, the draconic soldiers started patrolling around the premises and guarded the two members of the party. DIO’s system didn’t restrict monsters to just their designated locations. If a monster’s target showed an opening or weakness, then a monster would initiate an attack even if the target was outside of its normal boundary area. This was why it was necessary to take precautionary measures.

“So, how will you go about repairing that damaged head?”

“I placed a self-repair spell on the bone tyrannosaurus, so once it rests, like it’s doing now, it’ll slowly recover. Do you see those pieces of bone flying around over there?”

Several bone pieces were floating around the parts of the tyrannosaurus that were damaged. It seemed like the bones drew magic power from within the tyrannosaurus, and then they were deployed to the areas where mending or repair was needed. At that moment, several pieces of bone were moving around near the tyrannosaurus’ head.

“But it seems it doesn’t have enough bones, no?”

“Ah, that Soulless Zombie bastard used internal energy in its sword strike. If the bone tyrannosaurus gets hit by a physical attack, it can easily regather its bones and patch itself up. But a spirit power-based attack, like what the Soulless Zombie used, will scatter the magic power residing within the bones, causing them to lose their connection with the main body and scatter… huh?”

The necromancer suddenly stopped in the middle of his explanation. He realized something that didn't make sense; an incongruity. He turned towards Merlin.

“How did you know that it was missing some bone pieces?”

“Based on the shape and volume of the tyrannosaurus’ head, the number of bone pieces floating around is too little.”

“Normally, people aren’t able to spot that so clearly.”

The number of missing bones that had lost their magic power properties totaled around forty grams in weight. Considering that the entire tyrannosaurus’ head weighed in at around six hundred and fifty grams, forty grams shouldn’t have been markedly noticeable. Even though the bone tyrannosaurus’ insides could clearly be seen, it should have been virtually impossible to calculate the weight of the flying bones with just the naked eye. Would anyone be able to differentiate 610g of bones with 650g based on sight alone?

‘Is he utilizing some sort of recognition or perception spell?’

It didn’t seem like Merlin was carrying any sort of perception or recognition device. Since he had been swimming, all he was wearing was his swimming trunks. However, there was one thing that was peculiar about Merlin’s outfit…

“What’s up with that marble and egg?”

“Oh, this marble is a type of mana tank, to carry magic power. The egg is my pet.”

“A pet that’s still in the egg phase… I’m guessing it’s a bird, or something in the reptile family?”

“I won’t know until it hatches.”

The egg had grown to become the size of a basketball. Merlin had used his spirit to hang onto the egg while he sped across the sea, so he was unsure if the egg was okay internally. However, the aura and presence of the being within the egg was still consuming Merlin’s magic power at a normal rate, so it seemed that its condition was normal. If it kept up its pace, Merlin felt that the egg should be able to hatch in about a week.

“Oh, so you’re… a mage?”

“A, well, yes, as my ID states.”

Only then did the necromancer notice the scarlet red Spinel that was attached to the back of Merlin’s right hand. After discovering this, the necromancer nodded his head. Though he initially believed that Merlin had used some recognition or perception device to figure out the status of the tyrannosaurus, the necromancer now understood that Merlin had been able to recognize the tyrannosaurus’ bone discrepancy with just his eyes.

“Ah, I haven’t even introduced myself. As the nametag above my head says, my name is Scorpion. I’m 27, and I’m a necromancer.”

“I’m Merlin. This year, I just finished the university entrance exams, and I’m a magic user… huh?”

“What? What’s wrong… oh shoot.”

Sensing enemies approaching, Merlin and Scorpion soon fell quiet as they focused their attention on the area ahead of them. They were trying to sense how many enemies were trying to ambush them, but they soon realized it was a single monster.

Grr.

“Ah, damn it. It’s a demon.”

“A low-rank demon.”

“Yeah, but we don’t even have a priest, so this is going to be a headache.”

Merlin had stated that it was a low-rank demon thinking that the demon would be relatively easy to defeat. However, for Scorpion, the low-rank demon seemed to cause him great concern. This was fair, given that the demon-species were categorized as level five monsters. Even the weakest demons were level five, and as demons developed and rose in rank, they’d go up three levels all at once. In other words, the low rank demon in front of them would probably be a level right monster at the very least. If they were unlucky, the demon could be a level nine or even level ten monster.

“Hey Merlin, I’m level seven, what about you?”

“Level five.”

“Ah shit. I mean… your level is enough to do well in this area, but it doesn’t help much in this scenario. Hey Ohje, wake up, quick!”

Nod.

Ohje, who had been sitting cross-legged on the ground, nodded his head. Normally, a martial arts practitioner would not be able to understand what was happening around them while they were circulating and recovering their internal energy and qi. However, for users who had nearly perfected their techniques, the case was a bit different, as these users only required ten to twenty minutes to complete their circulation and recovery. During their time of circulation and recovery, these users would still be able to understand what was happening around them and forcefully pause their circulation and recovery process on demand. Stopping the circulation and recovery process in the middle inevitably damaged the user’s dantian, so martial art practitioners did not do it lightly. However, since the damage done to one’s dantian wasn’t irrecoverable, one would no doubt choose to pause the process in a life-or-death situation.

“Wait, Ohje. Just finish up what you were doing.”

“Eh? What are you talking about?”

“I’ll take care of it, just pull aggro for a moment! Gear One! Gear Four!”

Having used his gear system several times, Merlin realized that the gear system didn’t swap every piece of gear on one’s body; it provided whatever gear set the user chose when setting the gear slot. Of course, Merlin didn’t know this when he was first setting his gear slots, but once he got used to the system, he had been able to organize and refine what gear each of his gear slots would carry. Hence, he had made his Gear One, Gear Two, and Gear Three slots into mage attire, swimming attire, and a full battle set respectively. He had also organized specific weapons and items into gear slots, allowing him to quickly adapt to specific situations. Gear slots four and five were the Mithril bow and Decian longbow respectively. These gear slots were specifically used to ‘add’ a weapon onto a set attire. Since Merlin called out Gear one and four, he was now decked out in mage attire, carrying a Mithril bow.

Fling!

Whoosh!

An arrow flew out from Merlin’s Mithril bow, speeding through the air like a flash of light. It was headed squarely for the approaching demon’s head, but the demon swung its large arm and swatted the arrow away like a bug. Obviously, just by this action, anyone would have realized that this low-ranked demon wasn’t a pushover low-level monster. Perhaps if the demon was not paying attention, an attack of this power may have caused some damage. But now, Merlin could shoot a hundred, no, even a thousand arrows, and the demon would easily deflect them all.

“Scorpion! Attack!”

“Wait, what are you thinking… ah shit! Toto, bite that demon!”

Whoosh!

The bone tyrannosaurus, which had been laying with its tail wrapped around itself while resting and recuperating, quickly shot up and flung itself towards the demon. The low-ranked demon was about two-and-a-half meters tall. Based on size, the two entities, the demon couldn’t compare to the size of bone tyrannosaurus. However, in terms of combat power, the demon was heads-and-shoulders above the bone tyrannosaurus.

Kyak!

The demon’s appearance reminded Merlin of a monkey. However, unlike a normal monkey, the demon had a gray body, as if it was made of cement, and possessed extremely oversized arms. A grown man would probably not be able to wrap his arms all the way around one of the demon’s arms. To match its giant arms, the demon’s closed fists were massive too, each the size of a refrigerator.

Bam!

The low-rank demon’s fist connected with the bone tyrannosaurus, sending the tyrannosaurus flying off. It landed in the ground in a heap. The demon pounced towards the fallen bone tyrannosaurus. Two draconic soldiers suddenly jumped in wielding their bone swords. However, the demon easily flung them away too. They flew through the air as if thrown from a car crash. All this happened in just two seconds. The draconic soldiers were no match for the demon!

Bam!

Kyak!!!

Right at that moment, the demon screamed out and jumped ten meters back. Everything had happened so fast, and Scorpion had not registered what had happened. Looking at the demon confusedly, he soon saw a metallic arrow sticking out of its left eye.

‘When did he…’

Obviously, a front-end, telegraphed arrow attack wasn’t going to hurt the demon. But what if an arrow flew through the bone tyrannosaurus’ armpit region right when the demon punched and connected with the bone tyrannosaurus? And what if that arrow had been hidden right until it reached the demon’s eye? Though the demon possessed exceptional reaction speed and defensive capabilities, it would not be able to react against an attack that couldn’t be visually perceived until it reached its target.

“Even if you have exceptional defenses, you can’t do anything about an arrow sticking out of your eye.”

Kik!

Kyak!

As if it had heard and understood what Merlin said, the demon dropped low to the ground and released an overwhelming killing intent into the surrounding air. The killing intent that it emanated was so great that it could even affect users who were mentally protected by DIO’s system. However, Merlin had already experienced the painful and gut-wrenching killing intent that emanated from the Seadragon Temple’s Zygmunt, which could have easily ripped apart the water barrier that had been protecting Merlin at the time. Since Merlin had been through far worse, this level of killing intent was nothing for him.

“Scorpion! Run interference!”

“Ah, okay!”