Life Hunter

Arima emerged in a dark place after his teleportation. The first thing he saw was a huge shadow right in front of him that looked like a monster's leg.

He slowly raised his head to look up. The appearance of the 'thing' in front of him became clearer and clearer in his head then he thought of something that perfectly matched the figure.

As he was looking up with his neck crooked, he stared at a pair of green eyes that were observing him from above. Arima forgot to react, not that he was scared, or surprised, he actually seemed to be in a daze.

"Mh? What's wrong? This is the first time a human has this kind of reaction in front of me," A strong voice resounded.

"No, just…" Arima lightly laughed, "It was unexpected."

"Unexpected?"

Arima nodded, "Yes. In my homeland, your kind is only recorded in books and are supposed to be extinct. I only ever saw creatures like you on paper. That's why it took me off guard."

"Extinct? Me?" The head of the figure moved and asked.

Strong hind legs on which he stands, small front claws, a long neck, and a threatening head with a mouth that could probably chew steel like it was nothing.

"'Tyrannosaurus Rex', it's the name given to you from where I come from."

"Tyrannosaurus Rex? What a strange name," The T-Rex snorted and shook his head.

"It's also abbreviated to T-Rex. In fact, the marking point of that name is that 'Rex' means 'King' in another language," Arima explained and smiled.

"Oh… forget what I said, I quite like the name actually. I'll take it if you don't mind," The dinosaur started laughing and his attitude made a 180° turn.

"Hey, stop blabbing already. Seriously, why did you need to lock yourself in there to find him?" Another voice echoed and the ground suddenly shook and a ray of light illuminated the area.

Arima turned around and witnessed the wall sliding as if it was a door. A land dragon was actually pushing a huge boulder blocking the entrance of this place which was, in reality, a very large cave.

The imposing land dragon put his head inside the cave and focused on Arima, "Let's go. The old geezer told you why you're here, right?"

"Oh, right," The T-Rex had almost forgotten about the main reason he called Arima. He stood up and left the cave.

Arima followed and raised a question: "By the way, how did you find me?"

"That old geezer doesn't have that much of fighting strength, but his ability to control magic is something out of this world. He can locate anyone on the continent without being detected at all," The land dragon said while pointing to the T-Rex with his chin.

"That's indeed impressive," Arima honestly praised. "Even I almost failed to notice."

"Huh?"

"What?"

The T-Rex froze on the spot and the dragon looked at Arima with an expression full of surprise.

The T-Rex was dumbfounded. "Seriously?" He muttered toward and Arima casually nodded.

"Before you started a telepathic link with me, I sensed your spirit scanning me. The only thing that surprised me was that you suddenly talked to me."

The dinosaur bitterly laughed since he wasn't used to having his scan being seen through but the dragon laughed cheerfully for some reason.

"See that, old geezer? A human beat you in your own domain that took you hundreds of years to master!"

"Shut up!" The T-Rex snapped and shouted.

Arima shrugged, "I just felt it, anyway. I don't think I would be able to do the same as he did."

This time, it was the dinosaur's turn to laugh and the dragon to fall silent. "That's true, totally true," He kept nodding exaggeratedly.

"Can you stop now, though? Your personalities are kinda 'heavy' and it annoys me," Arima scowled and the two beasts instantly closed their mouth. They were being obnoxiously loud in his opinion.

After a few minutes, they arrived at the top of a mountain and stopped at the edge of a massive crevasse.

"So that's the volcano you were talking about, huh?" Arima remarked after looking down the crevasse.

"Hm?" The dragon raised his voice, "What is a volcano?"

"That's how you call this type of natural formation," Arima shortly answered. He sat down and closed his eyes.

"[Index mundo] (World Index)," He chanted and inspected the entire mountain but he mainly concentrated on the underground.

"What are you doing?" The T-Rex was surprised by the sudden wave of spirit.

Arima opened his eyes and stood up, "A small assessment to clarify the magnitude of the volcano's threat."

"The results?"

"Bad. The magma chamber is too wide. We're lucky that one side of this mountain is nearing the sea, but…" Arima looked left and right, "If the lava comes out of this entire crevasse then this continent could end up at least half-destroyed."

The land dragon groaned, "Are you sure? I thought that it would only threaten our territory."

"Yeah, and what's scary is that the magma is unusually dense and hot… Or maybe it's just something that is different in this world," Arima mumbled the last part.

"It's plausible that huge quantities of inborn mana have been infused into that magma."

"Do you have a way to stop it?" The T-Rex anxiously asked.

Arima scratched his head, "We could try to reduce the pressure in the chamber or move the tectonic plates one way or another to avoid the eruption. We can't freeze the magma though. I think it will just build up the pressure and accelerate the eruption. Well, not that I know what would happen exactly. It's not like I ever tried to freeze a magma chamber."

The dragon and the dinosaur were already lost at what he was explaining, they couldn't understand what he was talking about.

"So… we can stop it, right?"

"Yeah…" Arima smiled to the dragon, "If we're lucky that is."

"…Lucky?" The two beasts looked at each other with a worried look.

"Anyway, let's try it. I think we have around five days before this thing explodes. We should be able to stop it in time," Arima stated and created a connection to another dimension. The three of them vanished from the place to reappear in another dimension.

"This is…a dimensional link! How can you do that so easily!? And alone!" The T-Rex shouted in shock. He seemed to have an even better understanding of dimension magic than Koden.

"Don't mind about that," Arima said and flew off to study the volcano from above and smirked.

"Anything we do to the volcano here won't affect the original one. So, we can experiment all we want. You'll have to assist me a bit."

*************************************

Back in the spirit city, at the moment Arima left, Night sighed, "As Arima said, it's simple."

"He always says that," Lanya retorted and Night coughed awkwardly.

"…You will just need to call that prince here by saying something like 'I want to talk with you about the engagement' or something. When he comes here, I'll just need to either brainwash him and order him to confess his crimes or use a weaker version of the 'Penance stare' to make him regret everything he did until today. Also, if he kills himself after that, I'm sure it would the best scenario."

The room fell into silence for the third time. Or maybe fourth?

Vinia raised her hand, "Sorry, but that's unlikely. That prince is always accompanied by his most trusted guard, a woman at the ninth level. We can't use your plan if we have to fight her. We would directly be compromised and the prince would be able to escape while being protected."

"It's fine," Night lazily said. "Although I'm not as good as him, Arima taught me how to create a dimensional link. I can hold it for around three hours."

"A dimensional link?" Vinia was confused.

"That's one of Arima's magic. He can create a parallel dimension and fight in it without damaging the surroundings," Lanya explained to her.

"It sounds… really handy," Vinia wore a strange expression. She wasn't sure how to react.

"Once I send the prince and her guard into the other dimension, I will just need to beat the latter and take care of the former afterward."

"But what if master can't beat her?"

"Well, in that case… let's say that Arima left me a pretty reliable assurance," Night uttered and glanced at Lilis. The goddess smiled and made a V sign with her hand.

"If you need my help, just say it."

"…Then it's decided. You can call the prince right away," Night told and yawned before closing his eyes again.

"Hum, what should I do? I feel like something really important has been decided really leisurely," Vinia said with a complex expression and sought some kind of answer from Lanya but she just shrugged and smiled to her.

"Fine… I will lure him in…" The fairy sighed before leaving the room.

************************************

Back at the beast territory, above the 'mountain', six hours after they began to search for a solution.

Arima and the land dragon were resting. They attempted all kinds of methods they could think of to stop the eruption. But each time, the volcano would either erupt instantly or the magma would start to rise faster. In conclusion, Arima had to destroy and recreate a dimensional link at least thirty times.

"Damn, we'll never be able to stop it if we continue like that," The huge dragon complained whilst snorting flames.

"Indeed… no matter what we try, we just aggravate things," The T-Rex also was tired because he was the one that kept the volcano in check each time Arima and the dragon changed something.

Arima grumbled, "To be honest with you, I'm starting to run out of ideas."

The three of them stopped talking and began to think over it on their own.

"…I have one very last solution," Arima abruptly declared.

The two beasts raised their heads and looked at him.

"I could simply destroy the volcano in its entirety, along with the magma. But I would need Night's help and it would destroy more than half of the beast territory."

"Then forget about it. I can't let you endanger our territory. We're trying to protect it right now after all." The dragon shook his head, "If something like that was a viable plan, I would've already tried it."

Arima shrugged then a thought struck him, "Wait, you two, do you have some Dravinite?"

"Dravinite?" The T-Rex was puzzled, "Well, yes, we have some. The beasts are the best to refine metals and minerals after all. But what would you do with that precious metal? We don't have much of it."

A silver flame ignited above Arima's hand and the corner of his lips curved upward as the light illuminated his face, "I'll try to expend and absorb the magma instead of destroying it. That metal will help me a lot for that, and I'll also be able to reforge Karma at the same time."