43 Battling a rank-2 magician 3

The black-clothed man felt so enraged, that he wished to tear apart these people with his own nails and teeth. His wrath was endless. His blood was boiling with hatred that it threatened to drive him to insanity.

His brother's corpse was unrecognizable.

Originally, he and his brother chose a spot and set up a camp, deciding to rest for the night. However, before the daylight completely fades, his brother had located five people with a beast in the far distant.

At first, they had no intention of going after this group, as they were too tired to follow them. They thought that this group would continue traveling and settle only when the night completely descends.

However, they didn't think that they would luck out so much that the group would choose to stay and also spend the night under their sight.

So, they changed their plan and decided to rest first, and then fish for the gemstones from the magician in that group later in the night, as his brother was still to reach the peak of the first rank and unlock the forth spell.

Few seconds ago, he was in the distance looking through the scope observing things. He wasn't worried at all, as his brother's invisibility spell was simply that fearsome.

Also, the especially bright night made it so that even in the distant, he could still make out the figures of people.

According to the plan, he expected an explosion at the location of the group. As his brother was suppose to unpin the grenade, then, throw it at these people, killing them in their sleep.

However, and unlike the expected, the explosion happened way off course. At that moment, he knew that something had gone wrong. Thus, he dropped the scope, and used his mobility spell to go over as fast as possible.

And now, not only has his brother been killed, but was also smashed into bloody pulp.

He couldn't imagine how violent his brother's death must have been.

In his mind, the most probable culprit was the summoned beast. So, he wanted to kill the thing first, and then finish off the rest afterward.

To avenge his brother and to calm the burning rage in his heart, those filthy things that dared to kill his brother had to die in the most violent way possible. And it had to be done with his own hands.

Unfortunately, he had made a critical mistake, a one that put him in a tricky situation.

When he saw his brother's corpse on the ground, he momentarily lost his rationality to an insane, mindless rage under the shock of the sight. Which lead to him casting four consecutive spells, thus wasting a precious magic energy, and only managing to take down one enemy at such high cost.

He only have a common grade artifact, which naturally meant that he had to be exceedingly careful when casting spell, and not waste a single point of magic energy.

But now, not only he used a mobility spell to rush here with haste; he had actually casted 4 spells in one go.

If his enemy was one person, it wouldn't be a problem at all, but… this wasn't the case here. More ever, he had no idea how many magicians or warriors were in the group.

Unfortunately, the mistake had already been made.

So, facing the intense, instantaneous retaliation from the group, and being forced to use yet another spell to defend himself, he snapped back from his mindless anger, and managed to suppress his explosive emotions.

After calming down, he got the readings of these people stats.

"One magicians, one warrior, one peak ter-1 magical beast." he judged that the summoned beast was a magical beast due to its having innate spells, which was something only magical beasts have.

This reading caused his expression to go dark…

Since there was a summoned magical beast here, it meant that there should be a summoner among them! However, his artifact didn't reveal any summoning magician at all.

This could only mean one thing – that the summoner had an artifact with grade higher than his own artifact!

Also, his artifact did not display the stats of the man that had a long octopus arm popping from his back, which also meant that this man was a magician with a higher grade artifact.

This was awfully bad news!

'No wonder my brother fell to these dogs…!'

Even though the black-clothed man was rank-2 magician, he did not stop his defensive spell. He did not dare to, as he was facing three way continuous assaults.

In a second, the fiery rage in his heart dissipated, and an assertive glint flashed through his eyes.

He wasn't a foolish man, he was anything but. His cunning nature soon took over, and replaced the uncontrollable anger in his mind. Him surviving so far and reaching his current level was not a fluke. And although his brother's artifact made a good contribution toward these results… but the main reason for it was thanks to his sly mentality.

Although he was a rank-2 magician, knowing that this person with the octopus arm that was frantically swinging it at his wind barrier was a magician with a higher grade rank, and that the girl crying in the back was most likely the summoner, giving that the summoned beast was standing between him and her, he started re-evaluating the situation.

The number of people that he had seen acquiring an artifact was simply way too low.

As for those with rare grade artifact similar to his brother… they were as rare as those whom had won the lottery.

However, before him, were actually two of them…!

He really felt cheated: 'Is this punishment…? From all the people we could have come across, we actually stumbled across two magicians with rare artifacts…!'

The problem was, being unable to see their stats meant that there was a possibility that one or both of them might have already advanced to the second rank…! The same as himself.

He did not like such odds.

Although him getting his revenge was a obligation that did not accept debates, he didn't want to throw away his life uselessly just like that.

Thus, he wanted to leave himself a room to retreat.

His devious nature urged him to leave the scene, and wait until he recovers his magic energy and come up with solid and safe plan to kill these animals.

However, they had killed his brother! He wouldn't be able to calm himself down… not until he at least kills another one of them.

The problem however, was that he was being assaulted from 3 different direction on the same time. On one side, was the warrior using a firearm to attack him. On the other side, was the magician with the whip-like spell. As for the front, it was the beast!

Luckily, he had advanced the wind barrier spell to the second rank! Otherwise, the wind barrier spell in its basic rank-1 would have collapsed by now.

Although, right now, he wished that he had advanced an offensive spell instead. In which case, he would have killed all the four of them with the initial attack!

Gnashing his teeth to the point of issuing a crackling sound, he knew that based on his magic energy consumption rate, killing all of them was out of question now.

And the prime reason for that – was the summoned beast!

Magical beasts according to the artifact knowledge had much more magical energy than magicians.

And that meant, that there was a considerable chance that this beast can maintain at this rate of attack till his own magic energy runs out. In which case, he'd fall in these people's hands.

However, on the same time, he was not willing to just retreat like that.

Thus, with an expression that was both grim and hideous, he made a move.

…

Ramie's heart was cold. His magic energy was running thin, on the verge of running out.

Yet, that mage's shield was taking the attacks from them without showing any sign of collapsing. Apparently, he had advanced this defensive spell to the second rank. As if his defensive spell was rank-1, then it would have shattered long ago under this kind of assaults.

At this point, the battle was a gamble of who would runs out of magic energy first. Of course, knowing that the spell that this man had advanced was a defensive one, it meant that their chances of surviving past this grim night was better than expected. Because, if that man had advanced an offensive spell, then they all would have died already.

All of the sudden, ramie felt a killing intent sweeps at him from within the dome.

'This man is going to make a move!' he concluded.

Immediately, the wind shaped dome exploded outward, revealing the man inside.

Ramie felt a deep killing intent locks on him. Obviously, he was the target of the man's retaliation.

Ramie did not know that the man suspected the azure gazelle king to be the killer first. However, and after seeing the attacks from the three of them, he singled him out as the prime suspect of his brother's death.

In response to the killing intent, Ramie swung the vine with the last bit of magic energy he had at the man – to kill before he gets killed. At the same time, he threw himself to the side, to avoid that attack that he knew was coming for him.

Boom!

Rip!

It happened at the same time…

Ramie's vine violently smashed at the man's force field, causing it to flicker intensely.

At the same time, a sharp, compressed grape-sized bullet of wind tore its way through the air at high speed toward ramie, giving off a sense that it could penetrate anything in this world.

Although ramie had jumped virtually the same moment that the wind mage casted his spell, unfortunately… the high velocity of the wind bullet was still something that ramie couldn't evade with his average reaction speed, even despite knowing that the attack was coming.

Rip!

Like a high caliper sniper bullet ripping apart its way through thin, weak branch of tree, the wind bullet hit ramie at his left arm, a bit further the shoulder. The area of contact exploded apart violently, and with a splash of blood, his arm flew away, rotating.

Ramie fell to the ground, and moved both of his arms to receive the ground… however, only one arm responded to his will. As for the left arm, a torn tissues and the dripping blood was all what came to his field of vision.

'This…!'

Staring at his shoulder, only few centimes of flesh were all what left from his left arm! He had lost an arm, just like that…!

On the other end, the moment the dome of wind around the wind mage disappeared, the beam of lightening and the last few bullets from lance barraged the force field around him, causing it to flicker intensely at the same moment he shot an attack on ramie. Also, ramie's vines smashed at him too.

Under the intense assault of attacks, the force field was pushed to its limits, as it endured the pressure of the three way assaults. However, it still did not break apart.

With a terrifying killing intent that raged with hatred in his eyes, the wind mage immediately casted his movement spell, kicking off a cloud of dust, as he fled off.

Unfortunately, even despite their combined attack, the force field still endured the damage.

It wasn't strange. After all, that man was still rank-2 magician!

So, even despite their numerical advantage, not to mention the summoned beast on their side, they could only force him to retreat. And that was only because his magic energy was running low, and not that they threatened his life or anything.

None of them possessed an attack strong enough to break through that man's defensive spell, which was completely understandable, given that it was rank-2 spell! As for the force field, if they could have hammered it with attack for a while more, then breaking through it wasn't completely out of question. However, it wasn't as if that man was stupid enough to give them that 'short while'

'The artifact…!'

Shaking himself awake from his shock, ramie realized that his arm where the artifact was was cut off. However, before he could process the implication of losing his artifact, he saw the silver bracelet resting around his right arm's wrist.

Apparently, the strategy of cutting off the hand that had the artifact wasn't effective.

Looking at his shoulder, were his left arm was suppose to be connected, ramie was stunned.

'I can't feel pain… I can't feel pain at all… is it because that am is a state of shock…?'

Ramie raised his head, and stared at the fleeing figure that was floating away in the distance.

What he was feeling now – was the most intense killing intent he had ever sensed thus far, even stronger than the killing intent of the snake headed beast.

They did not win this battle, it was merely suspended. The menacing intention that he was perceiving from this man indicated that this fight was far from over.

Ramie was certain that this man was not going to just flee and forget about them…!

He was definitely going to attack them again! Most likely, the moment his magic energy recovers. Especially that now he was familiar with their spells. Chances were, the next attack he launches would be their death sentence. After all, the minced corpse on the ground was evidently his brother!

With that thought in mind, ramie felt darkness creeps to his conscious… he knew that he was going to pass out.

Today, he had received a lethal hit to his chest, lost a lot of blood, and now he had lost an entire arm!

His last thought before sinking in the world of darkness… was hoping that his bloodline vitality was strong enough to stop his bleeding injury, and save his life.

He hoped… that the wind mage wouldn't attack and kill him along with everyone while he's unconscious.

***

'Shity author… give me a break already, can't I just be overpowered right from the beginning, like the rest of the MC's… And have beautiful women fawning over me for no reason at all?!' this was the last thought ramie had, right before he passes out.

…