A black muscular steed trotted through the mountain road, following it were two other horses, brown in color. Mounting the black steed was Robert, the new Lord of Grayston town, and the other two were Mike and Isidro. This burly hunter was eager to join Robert in the hunt when he heard they would hunt snow eagles. He brought Isidro along as he was a much better shooter.

The narrow pathway spiraled the dark mountain three times and still, they were only halfway through. Robert's black-red hair was flailing in the wind as it blew from the bottom of the mountain to the top. Even through his wool and leather jacket, he felt the chill of the wind in his left arm. Looking down, the path that leads to the mountain was there, slithering like a snake through the valley. The thick fog that gave them a hard time seeing was now dissipating, revealing a grass field.

"Ai! Slow down !"

Robert who was engrossed by the natural beauty of the valley was startled into reality by the rough voice of Mike. Pulling the rein, Robert slowed his horse down. He waited for Mike and Isidro to catch up. Mike was having trouble with his thick beard and mustache as it was whipping around. His red hair also fluttered around, resembling a flame. Isidro's deep dark blue hair, on the other hand, was held down by a hairband.

"We'll leave 'em here, " Mike said, pointed to the horse he was riding.

"Alright !"

Robert nodded and dismounted the horse. He brushed its mane for a moment before following Mike and Isidro who already continued the trek on foot.

Snow eagles were aggressive about their territory. Humans or animals, anything that placed a foot inside the valley of this mountain was chased and hunted by these fearless beasts. Their population had to be controlled, or even the ecosystems that were in the nearby mountains were affected.

Soon after, the road disappeared and a steep rocky terrain appeared. Mike walked in the front, His arms held a repeating rifle, a giant sword with engraved patterns in the blade rested on his back. Robert walked right behind him, armed with another prototype repeating rifle. This rifle that Robert have devised had many improvements from the first version. He has had the old firing mechanism removed and the glyph firing mechanism by Darell put in. He also included a magazine loading mechanism, movable vertically into the gun. One could now fire seven shots before having to reload the gun.

Mike was overjoyed on testing this gun. The part of Goldfair battle he hated the most was the reloading of his rifle, and now he could fire away many times without being bothered to reload. He even made a few custom magazines so he has twice the normal clip size.

Isidro's new rifle was rather long, and this had only four bullets in the magazine. But the cartridge was rather long and had much more amount of black powder in them. There was also a rather large scope, enabling him to hunt at a distance. The improved accuracy of the gun exited Isidro, but his face didn't show this excitement. It was as cold as always.

Three men, armed with strange weapons, climbed through the rocky steep. Except from some wild plants and weeds on rock bases, there were no other living beings in sight. Robert's palms were red from gripping on the steep, the cold sharp rocks have already bruised his hands several times. Although his physique was rather weak, he was still a Journeyman magic user, and this had given his body a rather high toughness.

After climbing another hundred feet or so, They reached a flat terrain. Surprisingly this terrain was green, rather than the grey-black rocks they had been seeing all this time. A grass patch and there were some trees most of them thick than tall. Just as Robert was about to walk forward, An ear-piercing screech greeted him.

Rising his head, Robert saw an eagle, as white as snow, gliding from atop the tree. The low flying wind-beast flew like an arrow from a bow towards them. The strong winds from its wings buffeted the grass on the ground, causing many of the leaf blades to fly away with the wind.

These snow eagles had a wingspan of 4 meters, twice the size of a fully grown bald eagle. And the fact that this gigantic avian was less than 30 meters away and closing in on him caused Robert's heart to skip a beat.

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Regaining his composure in the next moment, Robert took his rifle up, but before he even aimed at the bird, a gunshot rang out from behind him. A cloud of smoke rose and in the next split-second, the bird that was closing in on them jolted, A few of its feathers from its left wing have scattered in the wind. Isidro knocked the top of the magazine, another round fell into the chamber.

Flapping its wind around to regain balance, the bird let out a screech and returned to its old trajectory. But this time with two other snow eagles on its tail. Robert sneered and ran forward.

"I'll take the right side," Robert sneered as he rushed forward. In each of his stride, a rock unearthed and gave him a push forward.

Mike was happy at the sight of a snow eagle, but now there were three of them, he was pleasantly surprised. Running towards the left to flank the giant birds, he followed Robert's actions.

When Robert reached about twenty meters from his target, he tactfully pressed down his leg to the ground and gave it a little bend. Four boulders rose in front of him, three forming floating steps.

Not slowing down, Robert jumped onto the first step. This two-meter high target would've been a hard reach for Riley, and impossible to even imagine for the old Robert. But a little more force to the earth was all it required for the now Journeyman level mage to jump into the boulder. Just as the first stone that Robert's left leg had stepped on started to descend from his weight, He took another leap. And then another one from there reaching the final rock.

All this happened in less than a second and Robert was now six meters high, in front of him floated another rock, half the size of the others. Robert threw a right straight at the boulder with his palms open. A boom resounded as the earth magic pushed the boulder forward, towards the incoming snow eagle.

The boulder moved as fast as an arrow towards the beast, but only grazed its wings. The agile bird only needed to move a bit sideways to avoid the peril. But as the bird turned its head from the boulder that flew past it to the man responsible, all it saw was a cloud of smoke, and its world went dark.

Mike on the left side had already fired half his magazine. He knocked the top of the magazine, the magazine moved down and the gun was ready to fire again. This 8th bullet was the fifth one to find the target and had sealed the fate of the bird.

Turning back, It seemed that Isidro managed to finish off his bird with only two shots. He was currently scanning the sky for any other arrivals. Seeing that there were no more spirit beasts nearby he lowered his gun.

Mike looked at Robert with reverence as they were carrying the bounty of the hunt to a tree shade. He had been in many hunting parties before, and this was not the first time he was hunting snow eagles. But this was the first time the hunt was over in a single minute. It usually took a team of five or more hunters several tens of minutes to slowly wore a snow eagle down and hunt it.

This young lord has fashioned such a fearsome weapon. These firearms were lethal in Goldfair but were not overwhelming due to their load time. But now that there was only a small delay between firing shots, he could only imagine how much power a weapon like this can have in the hands of a disciplined army.

The hunt continued at another part of the mountain, this time they could only find two eagles. Apart from the eagles, the party couldn't find any other beasts, spirit or otherwise in the mountain.

The hunting party threaded down the mountain, Mike and Isidro were carrying some heavy bags with them. Robert only had a big leather pouch and a small bag. After the hunt, he only wanted the blood and heart of the animal, thus everything else went to Mike and Isidro.

The small bag with Robert contained some feathers and bones of the bird, he took them to experiment and study. Mike who butchered the birds eagerly gave Robert the bones, even selecting the best ones for him. These bones had many uses, they made for excellent blowgun, thus Mike assumed that it was Robert's reason of interest.

" 'Twas a good hunt, We can go for another round in the azure river if ya like,"

Mike was brimming with energy and apparently wanted to continue the hunt.

"Another day, Mike"

Robert could only reject the offer, He had many things to do in the town. And as he had already finished his objective here there was no reason to stay behind.

Isidro didn't want to go for another round, but hearing the destination, he hoped the lord would say yes. Water was his domain and a hunt in the river was a walk in the park for Isidro. He wanted to show Robert that he was not only a sharpshooter but also excelled in the field of magic. But alas, he'll have to wait for another day.

Isidro was 25, and all his life, he had never been so close to someone who held this much power. When he was in the small army barracks in the Greyston town, the highest officer he had met was the sergeant from the Goldfair city. Now being with the town lord, this was his chance to prove himself. He gazed down the mountain, thinking how farther he had come from his old sorry life.

Descending the mountain, the three mounted horses galloped towards Greyston town.