"Hehe, you're going to die here, Grey"

Grey stood in place upon beholding the man's appearance that was familiar to him. Which caused him to remember the guild that stopped by their house for a tea the other day.

'This man,' Grey screamed in his thoughts as he saw an adult man standing fiercely in front of him. His red eyes were glowing as he was surrounded by red aura of unpleasant amount of mana.

'If I was right he's the guildmaster of Black Serpent guild named Claude. But what is he doing here? And did he just said he's going to kill me?' His mind cracked open as questions flooded his thoughts.

"Are you perhaps surprised to the point that you can't even move a finger?... hesitating whether I'm an enemy or an ally?" The man named Claude formed a grin on his face as he looked down at the kid with pity. Then, he pointed his index finger with long sharp nails at him. "That's no good. Eliminating a prey without any resistance... is boring." He let out a slight giggle before completely losing himself and started laughing hysterically. "AhahahahAHAHA! Pathetic!..."

Surprised as he is, Grey screamed at his body to move as he felt himself being exposed to great danger. And as more questions piled up in his mind, hesitation started to shake his body lightly. 'Damn it. Move. I need to move.' His body was tensing and his jaw clenched with desperation as he saw Claude slowly walking towards him with an evil smile.

At that moment, Grey could already sense the overwhelming power behind the man's confident smile. He could feel the high density of mana flowing out of the man as the red aura surrounding him became even darker together with his red eyes growing brighter.

"You refused to fight huh?" Claude clicked his tongue and narrowed his eyes. It seemed like he got no choice but to eliminate the pitiful child. "Very well, I'll make you fight."

After hearing his words, Grey thought that Claude would try to attack him and force him into an all out fight. But it seemed like he had something up his sleeve as he looked somewhere to his left with a mischievous grin.

Claude's eyes was glued at that direction for a second and caused Grey to slowly avert his gaze to that direction. And to his surprise, he saw his beloved mother, Emily.

But it wasn't what he was expecting. The scene he just witnessed got his stomach turned upside down, his heart beating like lightning and his mind was filled with rage as his face grew even worried.

"Mom!" His mouth let out a faint cry.

Right in front of him, he could see his mom being lifted in the air by her neck. She was struggling to breath as an unknown man held her high with a smile on his face.

"Now then. Fight like your rage and anger told you. Hate me. Hahahahahahaha..." Claude laughed hysterically as he Grey looked at him hopelessly. "You're just a kid. You can't save any—"

As much as Claude wanted to finish his heartbreaking speech, Grey had already managed to jump and draw his sword, ready to cut his head. "Bastard!" Grey was gritting his teeth in anger as he swung his sword with his full strength.

But Claude managed to react with his unbelievable speed and before he could do a counterattack, Grey suddenly pointed his left index finger at the man who's holding his mom in mid-fight, causing Claude to be dumbfounded.

It took a while before the man realized what was Grey was up to and at that moment it was already too late. Claude watched the kid shoot a highly concentrated beam of mana from his fingertip, firing it towards the unknown man who dared to touch his mother.

"Mana art 05: Piercing beam!"

The beam of highly focused energy quickly traveled and penetrated the mans chest. Bloods splattered everywhere as the man collapsed on his side and died on the spot, dropping Emily on the ground. Grey hesitated for a moment and looked at the man pitifully, but he quickly turned his gaze to his mother.

"Mom!" Grey abandoned his fight against Claude and swiftly moved to his mom's location with a deeply worried face. 'Damn it. I let my guard down even for second, and now mom got herself exposed in danger.' He quickly rushed to check his mom's breathing pattern and she seemed fine. But one more thing kept on worrying him. 'Dad and uncle Reynold was supposed to be with her. I wonder what happened in their location.' Grey looked at the direction where red smoke was coming from and then glanced at the man he just killed earlier.

Grey saw the man wearing a purple uniform and a pointy hat that the Black Serpent guild usually wore. 'As I thought, they're from the same guild. But why would they do such a thing? I thought they're supposed to be fighting monsters for the villagers?'

"It's no use." Claude suddenly spoke, pulling Grey's attention. "You're probably asking a hell lot of questions. But it's no use. You won't be able to answer those for yourself." He slowly walked towards him and increasing his pace as he spoke. "Humans or monsters, there's no difference." He yelled and rushed towards Grey with his sharp nails ready to claw him.

Grey saw his agile movements and prepared his sword to counter his attack at the right moment. But to his surprise, the man vanished from his sight as a red smoke of mana scattered all around him.

"What the..." He doesn't know what are those red smokes for, but he could tell that it would be dangerous to inhale it.

Grey kept observing the surroundings for a few more seconds and without him noticing, Claude appeared behind him swinging his hand in a clawing motion, aiming for the young man's neck. But surprisingly, Grey managed to lean forward by instinct and evaded the attack.

And before Claude could even react in surprise, yellow bolts of high voltage lightning surrounded Grey and struck his right arm, causing him to jump back in surprise.

"What the hell, lightning?" Claude's eyes widened in shock for a moment before he chuckled. "This is interesting." He snap and flick his fingers in excitement while scratching his palm with his long sharp nails.

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Grey got his mom quickly protected in a stone wall using earth magic. "You're going to pay the price for getting her involved." After knowing that his mom is somehow safe, Grey levitated in the air as he carelessly emitted lightning bolts from his body. "After a few minutes of talking to you, I gotta hell lot of questions to ask." he stated before flying diagonally towards Claude's direction at lightning speed. He extended his sword to his right-hand side and did a long sweep, aimed at the man's neck.

Then, once again, Claude vanished from Grey's sight as red smokes filled the atmosphere, causing him to halt and cautiously looked around him. He tried holding his breath before forcefully blowing the smoke around him by cunningly casting 'Wind pulse'.

After all the smoke was cleared out, Claude immediately appeared in his sight with a laughing face. "You're fast, yet, easily fooled by your eyes. You're a child indeed." He sneered.

"What do you—"

Grey tried to ask him but Claude for the third time, vanished as red smokes spread throughout the air. 'Tch, what kind of sorcery is this?' he asked himself while gazing around him, looking for his enemy. And just when he got another idea to blow away the red smoke using wind magic, a hot ball of flame impacted on his right shoulder. This caused his sword to flew from his grip. "Coward, cut the cheap tricks. Come out and fight."

Then in the middle of the red smoke, he heard the man's voice laughing. "Hehehe. You're truly a fool."

"BAM!"

Another fireball was thrown at his direction and luckily exploded a few feet from his legs. Grey was thinking about casting a wide range spell and quickly hesitated when he heard a lot of screams all around him that possibly came from the villagers. But then, another lifesaving idea came to his mind.

He went and immediately flew upward. On the the way up, he accidentally breathed in some of the red vapor, causing him to cough slightly. In any case, he managed to escape the mysterious red smokes. From above, he could see parts of the Hotstone village cover with the thick red vapor. "Damn it. What's going on?" He asked himself as he couldn't see damn thing with all those smokey areas.

'The smoke seems safe to inhale though. What exactly is the use of it?' he thought. 'I still need to get back to mom.'

Then, several fireballs came flying towards him from every direction, surprising him. The fireballs are fast and more compressed than normal fireball spell, resulting to it being almost unavoidable. But Grey somehow managed to barely dodge a few with his lightning speed but some still landed onto part of his body, causing him some burns on his legs and neck.

He tried looking around to find where are those spells being fired from and saw a glowing red light from inside the smokes. He assumed that it was probably Claude causing that glow and proceeded to rise his sword and swung it downwards, aiming at the glowing red light.

"Mana art 07: Crescent moon!"

An arc of blue colored mana escaped the tape of his blade and landed directly at the spot where he wanted it to go. The impact sent shockwaves on the ground, clearing out some smoke along the way. "He disappeared?" He uttered, looking dumbfounded at the spot where his attack has landed, leaving traces of doubt on his face as it was almost impossible to evade that attack at that point. But still, he lost sight of his enemy and the only thing left was the cut on the ground caused by the destructive mana art.

Then, a cold breeze of wind brushed through his back followed by shallow cut appearing on his left neck that slowly bled. "Huh?" He soon realized the small wound and wiped the blood that dripped down his lower neck.

Then he heard a slow and chilling laugh behind him. "Hehehe. Play time is over."

Grey turned and looked behind him just to see Claude flashing his sharp nails with a deadly smile, levitating in the air.

Claude flew towards Grey, ready to slash his throat with his sharp nails. He swung left and right but failed to caught anything as Grey keeps on evading while moving backwards. When the child started keeping his distance, Claude quickly fired two fireballs towards him and exploded near his face. Then, he quickly closed the distance between them in one movement and coated his nails with mana before clawing Grey.

Which Grey immediately parried with his arms. But suddenly, he felt lightheaded as he slowly lose balance. The kid quickly flew down as he felt a pain on his left shoulder. When he looked at it, he realized that he was already soaked in his own blood. "Damn it. When?" He asked himself, gritting his teeth while desperately balancing his flight and moving away from Claude.

"Hmmm, it seems like that's the best it can do." Claude suddenly spoke, causing Grey to stop for a moment.

"What do you... mean by that?" Grey asked while catching his breath and landed on the ground carelessly.

Claude smiled at him with pity. "Hmmm, would it be useful if I tell you?—Well, it doesn't matter anyway." He said, slightly chuckling. "That red smoke that you've been avoiding earlier was never meant to cause any harm to anyone."

"I don't understand." Grey complained as he cautiously not letting his guard down.

"Witches are known for creating potions. That is, of course, a fact. That red smoke earlier was a potion of some kind that evaporates in the air after getting exposed into hos temperature." Claude explained. "However, it wasn't meant for attacking purposes. What it simply does is to mess with the senses of people who got exposed to it by touching or inhaling it. That, of course, means that your eyes, ears, and your sense of touch will be hindered useless."

"What? Something like that exists?" Grey widened his eyes after hearing the long detailed explanation.

"Me disappearing and reappearing was all in your mind. You not feeling the wound that I caused you was also in your mind." Claude grinned annoyingly as Grey felt even more in danger. "Ohh, and I almost forgot, it should be taking effect by now."

The young wizard suddenly felt something cursing down his body. A burning sensation rose up from inside of him. "This is... poison?" He looked at his hands and his veins bulging and was purple in color.

"That's right, poison. That's my power. An origin magic of a high caliber capable of instantly killing anyone with one blow." Claude brought his tongue out just to annoy the kid and proceeded to approach him.

"What?" Grey was thrown into confusion as he stared hopelessly at himself. His chest started tightening and his consciousness was slowly fading. "But...when?"

"Just a moment ago. With my nails." Claude stated as he got in front of the child, flaunting his rather long nails while licking the stains of blood on it.

"Wha—What?!" Grey hopelessly uttered before, all of a sudden, a wild beast appeared on his side and bit the left side of his body. Then another monster got behind him and bit behind his left leg. Blood came gushing out from his fully exposed wounds. He coughed as he fell on his knees. The monster biting him didn't even let go of his small body. "Why? Why are you doing this? You, why are you fighting with monsters?"

"As I've said earlier, monsters are no different from us humans. It's good when you have the monsters on your command." Claude looked up, smiling. "The almighty god has chosen me to command the beasts. I'm the one chosen to annihilate the human race. Hahahaha, Grey, you're death will bring joy to them." He suddenly started talking while looking at the sky, hysterically laughing.

'I've came all the way here after suffering thousand of battles against demons. And I'm going to die in this place... pathetically like this!' He screamed in his thoughts. At that point, Grey was barely even breathing as he could hardly hear Claude's voice words. The only thing he could clearly hear are his own thoughts and his heartbeat. The monster biting him wasn't even moving and the strength of its bite was unchanged.

"Farewell," The last words that came from Claude's mouth before he thrusted his hand into the poor child's chest and pierced all the way through his back with his nails.

Grey's heart stopped instantly as blood splattered everywhere. Claude's hand remained buried in his chest for a second before he pulled it out to confirm the young mans death.

He looked above and screamed, "Grey Crossford... is dead. Hahahahahaha. Finally, the bearer of *********** has fallen."