Dahlia currently was in that very Perfect Rebirth stage through entering Deep Meditation.

But again how was she able to do it when just earlier a few minutes ago she couldn’t even enter the most elementary Shallow Meditation stage.

This was all because of Avian, or rather he was the cause of it as Dahlia while being trained to learn how to be separate from Avian by being 1 meter away from him, couldn’t concentrate at all as she constantly would look for Avian out of anxiousness and fear, Avian noticed that this was fundamentally interrupting her Meditation training, which is why he had no other choice but to let her come up close to him since that clearly didn’t go anywhere.

Dahlia getting delighted, didn’t waste any time nor looked shy as she snuggled up to Avian like a little baby chick snuggling up to its mother, it was at that moment that Dahlia returned to her meditation training causing her to almost immediately entering Shallow Meditation, Focused Meditation and then finally Deep Meditation.

Seeing her not responding to him when he called out to her, Avian originally assumed she fell asleep, but after looking at her some more Avian immediately realized this was likely not it, it was only after Gabriella came back and affirmed Avian’s suspicion that Avian knew that she had really entered Deep Meditation.

And just as Gabriella had said if you looked at it from an outsider’s perspective you would think Dahlia had some monstrous talent when it came to meditation, but Avian could already guess without even trying that if he moved away from her and leave her by herself, she would immediately turn back to her earlier no progress anxious state.

Avian was greatly troubled by this fact, but also delighted, as this meant Dahlia could grow at the earliest and fastest way possible, but needed to constantly stay with Avian at close proximity if she wanted to maintain this growth.

It would be fine if they went to sleep which is where she could go into Deep Meditation while clinging onto Avian who falls asleep, but not in most other situations especially not combat where magic users had to sometimes go into a meditative state mid combat to recover their lost mana while the vanguards protected them, Avian wasn’t a Vanguard but his current fighting style revolved around being up close and personal with his spear to cause damage a place Dahlia clearly had no place in being with him.

Of course he could still always choose to stay with her on the backline as he now had 2 reliable Vanguards at the frontline, but Avian was not satisfied by this as he wanted too wanted to grow in strength from experience.

Avian at the moment could only hope that things would start getting better from here on and that Dahlia would heal quickly both physically and mentally, her newly acquired ability to Deep Meditate could do a lot of good to her as time went by.

-I see, so it was that after all, well there is not much we can really do but see what will happen next, though it is surprising that she feels so well with master around to be able to go into Deep Meditation, a mentor of mine who was a [Wizard] and who also instructed me about meditation told me that some people find certain stages of meditation easier than others, I for example have not yet learned how to do Focused Meditation properly and find Deep Meditation and Shallow Meditation far easier even though Focused Meditation should have been easier then Deep Meditation, my mentor said the reason this phenomenon happens is because of the experiences each and every person goes through in life that affects their perception of the world, different perceptions make them naturally more attune to different ways of meditation that makes them more comfortable with reality, though I don’t how much of this is truth or simply my mentors own philosophies speaking.

Hearing this Avian momentarily pondered as he stopped writing in his book and also stopped practicing as he had just heard some valuable information he didn’t think much about before, the Mentor Gabriella had just spoken up sounded like an extremely wise guy, it was unfortunate that her mentor likely wasn’t alive anymore considering how nostalgic and saddening Gabriella looked when she recalled her mentor.

Raising his head, he looked her in the eyes before speaking.

-At least your mentor left a reliable knight before passing, I especially liked yesterday and wouldn’t mind a repeat.

Avian’s extremely suggestive words, instantly turned Gabriella’s serious expression into mush as her face turned just as red as her red hair and red eyes, flustered Gabriella couldn’t help but recall yesterdays’ events, she was so embarrassed after “ that” that she couldn’t properly face Avian this morning without recalling their night before, it was only now that she had mustered some proper courage and was able to talk with Avian normally, but now that he mentioned “it” things returned back to her being embarrassed as she quickly thanked Avian for the compliment before excusing herself to see how the others were doing basically running away.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

Avian sighed a bit as he watched his loyal knight run off like a scared rabbit when they already had a rabbit, then again he didn’t dislike that about her as he returned back to his book and practice, today he wasn’t going to train with them as he didn’t feel the need currently since he was satisfied with his current built.

What he really wanted to do today was get a breakthrough with his [Hemomancer] blessing today as he had come to an inspiration earlier this morning that he wanted to test, and from how it was going, he felt confident he would be able to do it.

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3 hours later.

Having finished their morning training and prepared themselves, the party finally went into the first to experience their first ever hunting trip.

Their layout currently was with Ogra at the very front followed by Deborah and Cornelia, Avian and Dahlia before finally ending with Gabriella who stood at the back.

Their formation fully protected everyone in the middle and gave them almost no blood spots preparing for anything unexpected.

Everyone had their weapons drawn at the moment, some looking relaxed and carefree while others looking tense as this was their first being going into a forest that had been newly explored and was still full of monsters.

This was mainly Cornelia and Deborah though, as they never once had to fight a monster in their entire lives having mostly lived in peaceful areas where most monsters had been fought off.

Dahlia too was a little tense, but she was holding onto Avian the entire time and put more faith in him than anyone else giving her a bit of courage with Avian present.

As they walked, Avian and Dahlia were constantly scouting with their [Blood Sense] and [Spiritual Sense] ability to make sure nothing came too close to them and ambushed them, so far they both hadn’t spotted anything, another discovery Avian made was that Dahlia’s [Spiritual Sense] range was higher than his [Blood Sense] ability giving them a better scouting tool, but Avian still participated on the lookout as he didn’t entirely put his faith on Dahlia too much.

Noticeably the forest started to get darkest the further they went inside, feeling this wasn’t good for them, Avian turned to Dahlia before asking.

-Dahlia, can you make a small light overhead, the forest in this area is starting to get darker and we need vision in case something unexpected happens.

-Ah…yes!

Following Avian’s command, Dahlia concentrated for a second before clasping her hands in a prayer like position and chanting, as she chanteda fleeting image of a ember like creature with simple facial features appeared beside Dahlia before immediately disappearing as if it just came to cheer her on.

-[Lamp Light]!

Finishing with her chant, 4 small torch like flames suddenly appeared mid-air illuminating their area and everything around them.

Everyone looked on with wonder for this magic as it was now quite more convenient traveling forward making everyone give Dahlia compliments, Dahlia felt, but happy about being useful as she hugged Avian tighter.

Before going out here, Avian had asked Dahlia if she could make more spirit contracts to get more spells, Dahlia did as Avian asked and made many more contracts with different types of spirits to increase her arsenal of spells, the contract she made with each spirit was the same as Nixie not taking much of her spiritual energy at all as she still quite a lot left even after she made 3 addition spirit contracts of the same level as Nixie.

Currently Dahlia had made 4 spirits contracts possessing all 4 basic elements just like Avian advised which were water, earth, fire and wind, she currently still had enough space to make 8 additional contracts with similar expenditure, but Avian told her to not waste her slots since it was extremely difficult to recover them once they were spent and wait until she needed certain spirits or found rare or powerful spirits to make a contract with.

Dahlia did just that, and for one thing Avian was very satisfied that she listened to him, though his previous day’s speech about doing what you wanted seemed to go out of the window now, Avian took Dahlia’s best interest in mind so he thought it was fine for now, at the same time Avian wondered if Dahlia’s capacity to contract over 12 spirits like this was average or not as he didn’t feel this was natural considering how much power she had gotten after contracting those additional 3 spirits which gave her more options and a few notable offensive techniques that were quite powerful for a beginner like her.

Then again it depended on the kind of spirit she contracted with too as there were 3 types of spirits in this world that all had different inclination towards growth, Avian wasn’t yet sure if it was better to generalize or to specialize as a [Shaman], but he would wait and see.

-There…is something coming… there are 6 of them…

Dahlia suddenly spoke, everyone nearby hearing her loud and clear as they momentarily tensed up in preparation, Avian whose [Blood Sense] didn’t nearly have as much range as Dahlia’s [Spiritual Sense] didn’t see anything yet, but after a few seconds he too saw 6 creatures running at high speed towards them, he didn’t initially know what they were, but hearing growling and barking, Avian and most of everyone else became aware of what they were facing.

Gabriella who stood at the back steeled her face as she gripped her sword and shield tighter, their ever battle as a party was about to begin and she was not about to lose anyone or have any injured as a main Vanguard.

-Everyone! Stand in a circle! Keep your backs against each other and don’t let yourselves be surrounded! We are facing wolves!

Acting on her orders, everyone did just as Gabriella said, as soon as she finished the wolves had also finally arrived, the [Lamp Lights] above them illuminating their area and giving much vision, but the wolves hid behind trees and bushes, surrounding them as 6 a single wolf could be seen approaching them with its dark gray fur and cold red eyes.

Most notably were its huge dagger like fangs that came down its upper jaw like a sabertooth tiger, you could immediately tell how sharp those were just by looking, no wanted to be on the receiving end of those.

GRRRRRRRR!

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