Wolf of the Blood Moon: A Blood Magic

Scarlet

I sigh.

At least there doesn’t seem to be any antagonistic comments towards me. Most of them seem to be positive, even if some are a little antagonistic towards the spirit’s choice in Guardians or mention my obvious lack of experience and apparent habit of scowling.

“I don’t scowl that much, do I?” I mutter.

“You’re scowling right now,” a certain tanuki’s voice echoes in my mind before he appears in the air car and lands on my lap.

No idea what you’re talking about.

Out of boredom more than any form of interest, I continue reading through the comments for a little bit until we arrive at our destination. But most of the comments appear to be around the topic of my appearance, whether it’s because of my young age where quite a few are trying to guess how old I am, or my apparent good looks. Which I’ve never really put much thought into, since most people don’t bother looking past the fact that I’m an orphan.

And quite a few comments about my ears, unfortunately. A couple about why I have wolf ears but no tail, which I’m going to promptly ignore.

Surprisingly, there’re only a few about my glowing red eyes. Most of which think they’re rather cool.

There were a couple though that mentioned that my eyes were scary and that that effect was only enhanced by my scowl.

As soon as the air car pulls over in front of a large building spanning only about half the size of Allen’s, which was already about fifty floors, I close out of the video and its comments before putting my phone in my pocket and getting out of the vehicle. And the first thing I see is the man standing next to the entrance tapping his foot in his obvious impatience. The man is actually about the same age as me in appearance, with silver hair and blue eyes. He’s wearing a fancy suit similar but also slightly worse than Cipher’s, with it being a magi-tech suit with a silver core on the center of the chest.

“Try sensing for his mana,” Tar suddenly suggests, making me raise my eyebrows before I give a mental shrug, close my eyes, and focus on my senses. And after a few seconds, I begin to feel something emanating from him. “That’s his mana. It’s one of the ways a Guardian judges the strength of another Guardian. Or at least, for magic focused Guardians.”

He pauses for a second as I open my eyes to find the man’s own eyes having locked onto me.

“It’s not always accurate, since physical focused Guardians might not have as much mana as they do physical stats. Or they might also just have a skill that helps hide their mana.”

Makes sense.

That aside, the man – who I feel like I vaguely recognize but can’t place his name – only briefly glances at my ears before focusing on my face and giving me a nod. “You’re finally here.” He then turns around and says, “Let’s go.”

Guess we’re not introducing ourselves.

“His mana is quite a bit stronger than your own, but also far, far weaker than that Cipher guy. I’d place his level at around the bottom of Class II.”

Oh, okay. Guess he probably considers this some sort of babysitting job then. Looking after the newbie as he works on clearing out the Fracture.

I follow after him into the building, entering past the shield and into the entrance hall to find quite the number of high level demons inside.

|Demon Spawn – Subspecies: Imp – Level 31|

|Demon Spawn – Subspecies: Imp – Level 30|

|Demon Spawn – Subspecies: Imp – Level 31|

|Demon Huntsmen – Level 51|

|Demon Huntsmen – Level 56|

Holy shit. And at the back of the room, near the stairs, I can even see a couple of demon knights.

|Demon Knight – Level 61|

|Demon Knight – Level 67|

“Stay back here and watch,” the man says, his eyes flashing with a bright silver glow, “maybe you can learn from this. After the floor is cleared, go to the higher floors for opponents at your level.”

I nod in acceptance with that before watching as the man slowly steps into the floor, bolts of silver lightning beginning to build around his body, just dancing across his skin in a brilliant display. And the sight of this finally makes me remember where I recognize him from. He was in one of those posters I saw hanging up across the Silver Works headquarters.

Sylver was his title, he should be the same age as me, and I believe he uses some sort of strange silver lightning that has the effect of being able to move even without a conductor? Or something like that at least.

It does feel odd to be taking orders from someone who’s the same age as me. Even if he did become a Guardian about four years ago. At least, assuming the fliers are accurate.

The man continues stepping forward before raising one hand and directing all of the lightning dancing across his body towards that hand, where it then bursts out from his palm and envelopes dozens of demons at once. And after just a few seconds, I can tell the demons are already beginning to die from the lightning. Even the two knights.

An idea comes to me, and I use my Blood Boil skill on several of the demons, giving me a slight headache from using it so many times. And while it doesn’t really do much to them, what with the level difference between us, I do notice a couple tiny boils appearing around their already badly burnt skin before popping.

Sylver glances at me for a second before focusing on the demons again while taking a single step forward, sending another surge of lighting through the air, frying every last demon on the floor, including the ones I used blood boil on. And just as I’d hoped, the ones I used the skill on do end up giving me EXP. Albeit with a major reduction.

{Level 61 Demon Knight assist. Bonus EXP is awarded for killing a creature fifty levels or more above you. An extreme EXP penalty has been extracted for barely assisting in the kill}

{Level 61 Demon Knight assist. Bonus EXP is awarded for killing a creature fifty levels or more above you. An extreme EXP penalty has been extracted for barely assisting in the kill}

{Level 51 Demon Huntsmen assist. Bonus EXP is awarded for killing a creature ten levels or more above you. An extreme EXP penalty has been extracted for barely assisting in the kill}

{Level 56 Demon Huntsmen assist. Bonus EXP is awarded for killing a creature ten levels or more above you. An extreme EXP penalty has been extracted for barely assisting in the kill}

{Level 30 Demon Knight assist. Bonus EXP is awarded for killing a creature ten levels or more above you. An extreme EXP penalty has been extracted for barely assisting in the kill}

{Level 31 Demon Knight assist. Bonus EXP is awarded for killing a creature ten levels or more above you. An extreme EXP penalty has been extracted for barely assisting in the kill}

{Level 31 Demon Knight assist. Bonus EXP is awarded for killing a creature ten levels or more above you. An extreme EXP penalty has been extracted for barely assisting in the kill}

{Congrats, you have leveled up to level 11. Two Free Points have been awarded to you and your stats have been updated.}

Ouch. The System means it when it says a large penalty. But a level’s a level.

I look away from my messages to find Sylver staring at me with an incomprehensible look on his face.

Is he mad that I didn’t just sit back and watch?

Whether he is or not, he doesn’t show it as he just turns around and says, “The way to the stairs is clear. Leave me to my business.”

I blink in surprise before shrugging and heading over to the stairs.

Works for me.