Chapter 29 - 29

There was already another carriage waiting at the city gates for Alex and his group.

Alex stopped his carriage and greeted the two people without getting off.

Those two gave Alex a death stare which he casually shrugged off. Yesterday, those two had told Alex not to bring his carriage so that they could all go together, but Alex not only brought a carriage, it was much better and more elegant than theirs. How were they supposed to make an appeal to Sheri like this?

Thomas's eyes shone as he looked at the carriage and thought something.

"How about we..."

But when he turned around, Alex was already driving his carriage ahead..

Dirren and Thomas gritted their teeth and their eyes got cold. How dare a tier 1 weakling ignore their warnings and foil their plans.

"Thomas, please calm down. We will teach that weakling a lesson once the mission is done. You don't have to be angry. Once we are done with him, we can have their loot, the girl and their carriage can also be a bonus. Calm down...."

Dirren pleaded to his companion who had gripped the hilt of his sword while his entire body was shaking in rage.

After reaching a cave in the forest near the city, Alex and his party dismounted the carriage.

Dirren and Thomas came after a few minutes and saw Alex holding the face of his flame winged horse and saying something to it. The horse also nodded its head as if it was able to understand Alex's words.

"You two are here. I'd like to thank you again for helping us. Let's get going. We will be hunting lower level tier 2 mana beasts inside the portal that has opened inside this cave." Alex said, ignoring the clenched fists and killing intents the two were radiating.

"Alright, take us in and please be mindful of our requests or I won't be able to stop Thomas once again." Dirren whispered in Alex's ears with a kind smile which didn't look all that kind.

Alex didn't mind and led the way.

Bright light flashed in front of their eyes as the party of five entered the portal.

"Whoa!" Lucas exclaimed after opening his eyes. He was standing in front of a large expanse of grassland which none could tell was present inside the dark cave.

" That is a Barrier hound, lower level tier 2 mana beast which usually prefer to move in groups. Our mission today is also to kill at least five of them and bring their cores back to the association." Alex said while pointing at a green coloured mana beast which was the same size as a regular dog.

"You shouldn't stain your hands with these puppies. Let me and Dirren handle it." Thomas said, looking at Sheri and smiling.

Alex could feel Sheri's piercing gaze at his back full of rage and contempt, but before he could say anything, Thomas and Dirren had already charged towards the mana beast which immediately fled.

Alex and the other two followed at the back.

The Barrier hounds continued fleeing while Dirren and Thomas followed from behind while attacking it savagely, but irrespective of what attack they used, none could land on it.

Most of their attacks were off target, whereas the ones that were aimed accurately got deflected mysteriously before reaching it.

Finally, after they were deep inside the grassland, the Barrier hound stopped.

The two pursuers laughed haughtily and immediately charged at it. Thomas immediately swung his sword with all his might to look cool in front of Sheri, but instead of cutting the mana beast into two like he had expected, the sword hit something solid that he couldn't see and the barrier hound was immediately tossed far away.

Howwlllll!!!!

Howwlllll!!!!

Howwlllll!!!!

One after another, countless howls were heard from the forest and a large group of hundreds of barrier hounds appeared and surrounded Dirren and Thomas.

They immediately tried to escape back from where they had come, but they hit a translucent greenish barrier. They turned around in panic and tried to escape in another direction, but their faces fell. They were surrounded by layers upon layers of barriers from all sides. It was like they were placed in some airtight container with lids closed.

Thomas began attacking the barriers desperately. He was one whole tier above those barrier hounds, but his attacks could only leave cracks on the barrier.

In essence, the combat capabilities of barrier hounds were the same as peak Tier 1 mana beasts, but the barriers that they created could even withstand the attacks of mid stage Tier 3 augmenters, so they were placed in tier 2 for their defense.

But they also lacked any kind of attacking abilities and could only use their barriers to hit their foes. That was the reason why they preferred to move in large groups. Just like what was happening to the two simp brothers, they trapped their foes in airtight barriers and exhausted them before blunt attacks with their barriers when they hunted in large groups.

Each one of the barrier hounds could create upto five barriers at a time, so it was very difficult to escape from the prison that they created, especially when their numbers were so great.

Since physical attacks were not effective, Thomas and Dirren started using their skills and spells. This increased the rate at which the barriers were shattered.

Alex had no doubt that those two would be able to break free, but that would require a lot of time and mana.

[Mana analysis complete.]

[Reverse Mana generated.]

After watching from the sidelines for a few minutes, Alex stood up after reading the new system notification.

" Both of you, limit your powers to low level tier 2 and follow me. We will begin our hunt. And Sheri, you aren't allowed to use the spear. I want you to learn using just spells and Lucas can gain combat experience. And it will also help you gain battle awareness, so learn from those two and don't get surrounded by these mana beasts."

Saying this, Alex walked towards the barrier hounds towards the end of the group surrounding Dirren and Thomas.

Alex wanted Sheri and Lucas to cultivate their battle awareness, at the same time, he required the mana cores form barrier hounds for his weapon. Now that he had begun his life as an adventurer, he couldn't delay making his weapon any longer.

He had read about this collective harassment and hunting tactic of Barrier hounds in the mission info, so at first he was going to use himself as a decoy while having Sheri and Lucas to hunt them. With the help of his reverse mana, he could easily cut through the barriers.

But the timely help of the two simp brothers was greatly appreciated. Alex was sure that they had been eying Sheri from the start, so when they proposed to join their mission, Alex was sure that they would be the perfect decoys.

[Mana beast : Barrier Hound]

[Level : 43]

[HP : 5300]

[MP : 4860]

[ Skills : Mana barrier, barrier thrust, barrier prison]

[Abilities : combined barrier sealing]

[Strength : 400 Agility : 320]

[Endurance : 440 Intelligence: 380]

Alex charged in at one of the barrier hounds that was the furthest away from the centre of the encirclement.

Using 'conceal', he arrived near it and swung his sword. Being a tier 2 mana beast, it's perception was high and it was able to erect a barrier around itself.

Alex swung his sword and it easily cut through the barrier to leave a long and deep wound on the barrier hound's head. Before it could react, Alex swung his sword vertically upwards and the Barrier hound was beheaded.

Alex didn't waste any time and immediately attacked the next one.

Even when Alex had silently killed the first hound, the ones nearby had all been alerted, so the second hound put up all five of its barriers between Alex and itself.

Alex's sword just cut through those barriers like paper before stabbing in its forehead. Fire stream was cast and the barrier hound died by the lethal flames hitting its brain directly.

The other barrier hounds all had noticed Alex killing two from their ranks, but they weren't the least affected and continued eyeing their two prey at the center of their encirclement.

Barrier hounds formed large groups because they lacked the offensive powers and only working as a group guaranteed a successful hunt, but they couldn't care less if a few from their group of hundreds died.

As long as Alex didn't do something outrageous to provoke the ire of their entire group, they wouldn't pay him much heed except for the ones he was attacking or the ones near him.

Inspired by Alex's success, both Sheri and Lucas charged in as well. Sheri launched a series of water bullets at the nearest barrier hound, but due to the limited power, they were easily stopped by a barrier. Some of the water bullets curved in their path and hit the barrier hound.

Sheri was after all a tier 4 mage. Even though she was limiting her power, her mastery of tier 1 spells was near perfection, especially considering that she had learnt only a handful of basic spells.

Sheri was able to kill one barrier hound after putting some effort, but that wasn't the case with Lucas who had swung a real sword for the first time in his life.

Lucas swung his sword with all his might, but it struck a barrier and rebounded out of his hand.

Lucas bent down to pick up the sword.

Alex was not far away, was watching his two companions while fighting the barrier hounds. When he saw Lucas crouching down to lift the sword, Alex facepalmed.

Alex sent a wind blade towards the barrier hound that was pouncing towards Lucas's neck, baring its fangs.

"Oii Lucas. What do you suppose you're doing? Do I have to remind you what I told you yesterday about how to hold a sword? And that's a sword dammit, a s.w.o.r.d. Stop whacking it like an axe and don't give those hounds a chance to attack your neck. Even if they have lower attacking capabilities than most of the tier 1 mana beasts, their fangs still can pierce your flesh. You'll be dead before you know it if you bend down before them." Alex shouted sternly.

Despite the attention that he gained by shouting, it was still better than losing a comrade for lack of experience.

"Yes I got it. I'll do it just like you taught me yesterday." Lucas said while taking a stance which was much better than his previous one.

While Alex and his friends were busy fighting the barrier hounds at the perimeter, Dirren and Thomas were having a hard time breaking through the myriad of barriers that were surrounding them. And to make matters worse, they were having difficulty in breathing due to lack of oxygen in the airtight barriers.

Dirren used a rock buster, a tier 2 earth type spell which projected rocks at his opponents which would explode on contact, thus leading to explosive damage. Nearly ten of the barriers in the way of the attack were obliterated.

Had it been some other time, Dirren would've been very smug about it. But right now, it only deepened his frown. There were a freaking hundreds of barriers piled against each other in each direction.

Thomas was faring no better than his friend. Both of them were augmenters, but Thomas was more on the balanced side, whereas Dirren was a pure augmenter with a muscular build and all.

But they had to use mana while attacking because physical attacks didn't affect the barriers much.

Also, looking at Alex who was silently killing barrier hounds at the perimeter, the veins of his forehead bulged and he was having a very hard time suppressing his rage.