"Come on, as your first buyer shouldn't I get a discount?" Ryan pleaded, in his hands were seven lower grade crystals, he's been like this for about ten minutes already.

"No, you became my first buyer by luck! I chose you, so you're not getting any discounts."

"Come on man, this is all I have, look at it!" Ryan handed Cronix his seven crystals, and Cronix reluctantly looked over them.

When he was finished he sighed and handed Ryan a formation, "Here, I'm only giving you this because one of your crystals is almost a mid-tier."

Ryan's eyebrows tilted a bit, he already looked through the crystals when he had them, and there weren't any crystals that were almost mid-tier.

"Oh, I think my eyesight is starting to get a bit better." Cronix shook his hand, his patience with Ryan was running out.

Ryan finally realized what Cronix was doing and snatched the formation out of his hand."Thank you, and if I find more mid-tier crystals, I know who to go too." Ryan said before running off.

Cronix's lip twitched, but in the end he could only shake his head.

That was the last of today's formations, so Cronix left the mines, and as he approached the forest trail, a silver glint caught his attention.

Cronix's heart jumped, and his face grew slightly pale,

Just like that day...

Cronix looked at the crow perched on the tree, he simply nodded his head, and speed walked through the trail.

But the crow didn't leave Cronix alone, it flew down and circled around his body before landing on another branch.

Cronix frowned, and his eyes stayed on the crow.

The crow stared back for a moment before cawing at him, and circling around his body again, it then flew away inside the forest, looking back to look at Cronix.

This time Cronix kind of got the hint, and after a moment of hesitation, he followed the crow into the forest.

After seeing Cronix following it, the crow flew faster. Cronix couldn't keep up with the crow, and after ten minutes of running, the crow was too far ahead for him to see.

Cronix sighed, he stopped moving and surveyed the area. He made certain nobody was around before his wings extended out of his cloak.

He quickly flapped them, gaining the momentum he needed to lift off the ground.

When Cronix was fully in the air he took in a deep breath, "It's been far too long... But we have something to do." Cronix sighed and flew after the crow.

It only took five minutes to catch up with the crow, and thirty minutes to finally get to the location the crow wanted to go, which was equivalent to an hour and 40 minutes on the ground.

When Cronix landed he was immediately greeted by a horrible stench. When he examined the area he quickly found the source, it was a dead animal carcass.

The animal resembled a wolf, but it was larger, about the size of a bear, and a white horn protruded from its head.

All the wolf's fur was black except for the four white lines connecting to the horn, each line circled around a different wolf leg, and for the fur on its lower back forming the shape of a crescent moon.

"That's... a Lunar Wolf!" Cronix looked at the crow with bright eyes.

There was a gaping hole in its chest that revealed where its heart used to be. The crow flew closer to the corpse, and dug its beak into the injury, taking out a black gemstone the size of a fist.

"It was in the Star Core Magician stage!" The gemstone was the star core of the beast, but this discovery didn't cause as much excitement as it caused fear.

Cronix looked around the forest, "Do you think whatever killed the beast is still around? It didn't even take the star core, what stage would they be in."

The crow completely ignored his worries, it hopped in front of Cronix and dropped the core, its meaning clear.

Cronix picked up the beast core, but he didn't immediately absorb it.

The lunar wolf was one of the few creatures in the world who could utilize the dark element, and its core would be very beneficial to him.

But when he looked at the crow, there was a pang of guilt, so Instead he tossed the core at the crow who caught it in its beak, and he said. "You found it, it's yours. Besides, I've kind of been straying away from the magic path."

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The crow gave Cronix a meaningful look. This core was also going to be extremely useful to the two star Caster crow, who could also utilize the dark element.

The crow's species was very mysterious to Cronix. The crow was obviously a bird, but He never heard of a bird species that matched the crow's description and could use the dark element.

The crow flew up and landed on a tree. It sat there and directly swallowed the core, absorbing it from the inside.

Cronix looked at it stunned, it was a freaky sight to see it swallow the core whole. But after his shock subsided, he sighed,

Couldn't it have waited until we got back to the village, who knows what beast would come when it completes its remaining stars.

But it was too late, the crow already started, so all he could do was wait and pay attention to his surroundings.

Cronix took out some incomplete teleportation arrays with six lines or less and placed them around the area.

While this wouldn't do anything to the thing that killed the lunar wolf, it could hurt Caster stage beasts that would be interested in the Caster crow.

Just like with Cronix, once the crow creates a new star it would release a faint magic aura that, depending on the species, magical beasts would be able to sense.

Some curious animals might wander over hoping to find a type of snack in the form of a two star Caster crow and a five star Caster Kereta Genus.

After setting up the teleportation arrays, Cronix created little strings of mental energy connecting to every array. If someone were to sense these mental energy strings, it would look like a spiderweb with Cronix as the spider at the center.

It only took a minute for the crow to create the third star using the beast core, Cronix felt the magic aura being released.

The first few minutes nothing seemed to happen and during this time, Cronix put the lunar wolf's body into his magic bag, there was a bit of excitement in his eyes.

I can't wait to try using a star core Magician's blood for a formation, it's going to be so much more powerful than using my own...

Cronix started to fantasize the power of the formation, but suddenly a growl pulled him from his thoughts, and a few seconds later a lightning blast shot towards him.

Cronix cast his own dark magic blast intercepting the lightning and then activated the nearest formation. The formation exploded and instantly a large chunk of the beast's body flew out.

It was merely a three star Caster so it was fairly easy to kill. Cronix used his mental energy to grab the dead beast's body, and put it inside his magic bag.

I need to pay more attention to my surroundings, I guess it would be a great time to practice that...

Cronix spread out his mental energy, until there was a fifteen feet circumference around him. Everything in this area, Cronix could feel, from the leaves on the trees to the bugs flying in the air, he could feel every single thing in this area.

This was how Cronix's mental energy evolved from learning the external senses technique, he learned the external touch part.

Cronix closed his eyes, right now vision would only be a hindrance to what he felt from his mental energy.

While Cronix waited for the next magical beast, he decided now would be the best time to get back to the magic path; ever since reaching the fifth star, he hasn't made any improvements.

Cronix began absorbing the magical energy into his stars, while still being aware of his surroundings by using his mental energy.

It wasn't long when the aura of a fourth star Caster was released by the crow, this aura was stronger than before so it was destined to bring about some beast.

The first of the beast was a giant blue bird the size of a dog, with a green pattern going from the beak to its head to its tail feathers, it had the air of a four star Caster, a teleportation array quickly took care of its presence.

A beast that uses the water element, its blood could be useful...

Cronix grabbed it and shoved it inside his magic bag, but right when he finished, Cronix felt another creature enter his mental energy range.

Cronix activated the nearest formation, but that wasn't enough. Cronix frowned and activated the other three formations in that area, but while that did slow down whatever beast it was, it didn't kill it.

"This is getting troublesome." Cronix glanced at the crow, and let out a breath of air. He took out five more incomplete teleportation arrays this time with seven strokes, and waited for the beast to approach.

That didn't take long, and the beast quickly got into five feet range,

Damn it! it's a five star earth beast! Why does a five star want a four star Caster

The earth beast was as big as a small boulder, it rolled into a ball with its armor surrounding it on all sides, practically creating an impenetrable defense.

Cronix threw three of his formations, and activated all of them at the same time; this blast was enough to blow the beast away, but not enough to break its armor.

Cronix frowned, he gathered his mental energy inside his body, and focused it all on one spot on the beast's armor.

When that single spot had his mental energy focused on it, it suddenly had a small frost on it, slowly turning into ice.

But the ice was quickly destroyed by the constant rolling of the beast, and it rammed into Cronix while he focused on creating the ice.

Cronix was thrown fifteen feet in the air, he let out a loud groan, but he quickly used his mental energy to activate all the formations in the area before falling on the ground using his wings as cushions.

The beast was knocked into the air and for the first time, the beast's body was exposed, Cronix used this opportunity to take out an eight stroke teleportation array, he threw it along with the other two seven stroke arrays.

This explosion finally harmed the beast and a sharp cry was heard, before the beast landed. The beast wasn't dead, but it no longer thought the four star crow was worth fighting for.

It quickly rolled away, but an evil glint appeared in Cronix's eyes, "I wasted some of my strongest arrays on you, yet you want to run away!?"

Cronix spread out his wings and flew towards the earth beast. He flew faster than the earth beast could roll, so he quickly landed in front of the earth beast.

Cronix gathered all his mental energy in his right hand and launched the mental energy towards the earth beast pushing the beast back, but how could the earth beast let that happen?

The earth beast increased its speed, and contested with Cronix's mental energy. However Cronix didn't only have mental energy, he gathered the magic elements into his left hand, and also launched it towards the beast.

This time all the beast's resistance crumbled before Cronix's attack, and it was thrown back, the armor of the beasts parting a little.

Cronix grabbed his last eight stroke formation and sent it through the little parted bit with a small amount of lingering mental energy in form of an imprint to activate it anytime.

The formation slipped through the parted bit, and coincidentally the earth beast closed its armor again right at that moment.

Cronix instantly activated the formation, and it exploded inside the armor, leaving the earth beast's body completely exposed to the blast.

Once the explosion happened the body went limp, and there wasn't any sign of life.