Chapter: 208

“Mana detected… absorbing.” a faint green aura appeared around the black cube sitting on Viladore’s desk.

It was afternoon at the moment so Viladore was sleeping in front of his desk after he dozed off, not woken up by the cube talking to him as it operated.

“Master? Mana detected…” the cube said in it’s hollow voice to Sullivan who was napping nearby, yet no response came from Sullivan other than a slight snore.

The cube began absorbing mana, it was initially smooth and flat on each of its surfaces, but slowly a small lump began to appear on one of its sides. The lump seemed to be semi-solid as it moved around; more of the black crystal was growing and forming as it absorbed the ambient mana.

“…Mana sense lost. Appendage growth 13% complete. Re-initializing mana detection routines…”

Twenty minutes later, Viladore was still asleep even after the black cube made progress on it’s growth.

In a short amount of time it had formed a small lump, which with enough time, would go on to form the first parts of its body.

– – –

“It was probably just a one-time kinda thing. I’m sure he’s not usually like that.” Trenly said to himself, still a little frustrated with Jay.

He was meeting Jay for a job which he needed to avoid a life of adventuring, so he made sure to hide his insecurities and keep a positive attitude as he entered the association.

Opening the door, he saw Jay giving him a light smile.

“Trenly?”

“Jay? Hey, how are you” he shook his hand..

“Good thanks. Sorry about not meeting you the other day… They wanted me to go on an important mission…” Jay scratched the back of his head, a regretful smile on his face. He decided not to mention the details of the mission as it still weighed on his mind.

“It’s all good. I ended up finding your shop anyway, heh” Trenly smiled “Though there wasn’t much I could do, I can’t just break into your shop and start working.” he shrugged.

“Heh, good. At least you know where it is… well, are you free at the moment? We could head down the hill and I can get you started at the shop… hmm.. Oh.. actually, I haven’t bought any meat in a while so there will be nothing to butcher…” Jay scratched his chin.

“Say, you’re good with a bow right? Would you want to try catching something? Maybe you could hunt something today and tomorrow we can butcher it? Since you hunt it I’ll let you keep the profits too? Does that sound good?”

Jay was asking a lot of questions all at once, but Trenly nodded positively through all of them before finally replying.

“Sure, that will be great. It’ll be good to see the process from start to finish.” he smiled.

Trently was quite happy with the deal as he had become an avid hunter; afterall he was raised as one by his father, and was one of the higher level bow users on the first mass-adventurer outing to the Carter’s Demise dungeon – clearly, he was talented.

“Awesome,” Jay smiled with a nod, “and don’t worry, once the shop’s up and running you won’t need to hunt anymore.”

“How about you come over tomorrow with some time? You’ll be ok hunting tonight or tomorrow morning right?”

Trenly smiled back with a head shake “Heh, don’t worry about the hunt, It’ll be over before night fall.”

“I like your confidence. Well, I’ll see you then.”