After Adore excused herself from Ryan, Armond, and Blaze, Adore made her way into the building and started to work on finding a quest to go on with her companions. Blaze actually followed her since she didn't have much to talk about with the other two and honestly didn't like them that much. Blaze caught up with Adore and engaged in a short conversation with her before Adore asked the lady for the quest. Adore said goodbye to Blaze and left, continuing on her way.
The quest she had received was in the forest, not a dungeon. The forest was called the Abyssal Forest, and it was known for its many treasures and dangerous mystical and common beasts. The forest had six layers that led to the middle, where the highest-tier mystical and common beasts resided. Since the forest only had six layers, the highest-tier monster in the forest was tier 6, which was located in the center of the forest. Adore was heading to the second layer of the forest. Some beasts in the forest had villages and communities within it.
Mystical beasts were mostly not all that aggressive and usually kept to themselves due to their level of intelligence. Sometimes, they would interact with humanoids and other intelligent races that made up the cities and towns in the main world, which people called the civilization most races found themselves apart of. The real problem lied with lone mystical beasts.
Since beasts had to consume the flesh of their prey to strengthen themselves, they sometimes weren't picky with what they killed. Lone mystical beasts typically fall into this category. Additionally, there were mystical beasts that acted like bandits, forming groups to terrorize non-combatant civilizations of mystical beasts in order to kill and consume their flesh.
This was the type of mystical beast that Adore and her beast companions were going to be dealing with. The village in need of help, however, consisted of fairies rather than mystical beasts. Although some fairies are very powerful, the fairies in need of help are our spore fairies, who are only about 3 feet tall. All fairies possess highly concentrated mana, which is why they are usually very strong. However, spore fairies do not develop offensive abilities until they become 3rd-tier mages. The reason for this is unknown to most people, as fairies are very secretive, and not much is known about them.
The only reason people know this much is through observation. It is not very common to see a spore fairy below Tier 3 utilizing offensive magic. Therefore, most people have naturally come to this consensus. There is usually at least one 3rd-tier mage in a spore fairy village. However, that seems not to be the case for this particular village. The group of mystical beasts terrorizing this village is a pack of 2nd-tier wolves with lightning affinities. The wolves have been stalking the village for a while, but luckily for the spore fairies, they made a united effort to create a 4th-tier barrier to protect their village. The problem arises when the wolves take turns stalking their city, waiting for them to leave so they can prey on one of them. This has become an issue for the fairies as their food and medicine supplies are running low, and they need to venture outside the barrier to scavenge for fruits, vegetables, and herbs.
This is where Adore Quest comes in. Her job is to eliminate the wolves so that the spore fairies can finally leave the village in search of food and medicine.
Adore was also interested in discovering what a spore fairy looked like. It is stated that most fairies appear humanoid, but there are instances where fairies can be mistaken for mystical beasts. This particular type of fairy usually has two forms: a beast form and a humanoid form. Many fairies of this kind typically utilize their beast forms for various advantages.
Adore was aware that spore fairies fell into this category of fairies with dual forms. However, the type of beast form they possessed depended on the specific variation of the spore fairy. There were three types: wolf, rodent, and foul.
The specific type of spore fairies was not specified in the quest, but Adore knew for certain they were not wolves. This was because wolves were not only rare but also the only type of spore fairy with offensive capabilities prior to reaching the 3rd-tier magically. However, they were known for their significant physical strength. Adore believed that even though the spore fairies might not stand a chance against mystical beasts or even common beasts on their level, it was unlikely that there would be a village of them without at least one member reaching the 3rd tier. Strangely enough, according to one of the books Maven had given her, the wolf-type fairies were usually loners.
So the only options left were rodent or foul for the type of spore fairies. Adore could assume that if it was foul, they could simply fly out. However, she hadn't read much about this particular type of fairy, so she didn't know if they could just mimic the appearance of a foul without actually having the ability to fly. Though it seemed unlikely, she still considered it a possibility. However, she was heavily leaning towards the rodent option, as it seemed to be the more obvious choice given the circumstances.
If they were rodent types, she wondered what specific type of rodent they would be. There were quite a few possibilities, but she hoped they leaned more towards mice. She desired to encounter as many different mice as possible in this world, and even though these fairies were technically not mice but resembled them, it would still be good enough for her.
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After a long walk, she had finally reached the abyssal forest, which turned out to be incredibly vast. She immediately released all of her companions and ventured into the forest. Adore was aware that they would undoubtedly come into contact with various beasts on their journey to the village. While most of these creatures would be far below their levels, every encounter mattered. She was also pleased that she wouldn't be the only one facing the enemies attempting to kill them.
As soon as they had ventured a few hundred feet into the forest, multiple enemies wasted no time in launching attacks. A swarm of insect-like creatures, classified as mid-tier common beasts, began converging on them in groups of tens. These beasts resembled enormous pillbugs, standing at least 2 feet tall with ugly, oversized faces and shadow affinities.
The group quickly sprang into action, each member employing their own unique abilities. Thomas opted to forego using his sword and instead unleashed powerful, vibrant red-fire attacks to combat the creatures. Twyla, on the other hand, utilized her electric abilities to zap and claw at the beasts.
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Robby, on the other hand, used his light magic to strengthen his body and fearlessly attacked the insect-like monsters head-on. Alice, in contrast, chose not to utilize her life and nature's magic affinity. Instead, she charged at the bugs, clawing and biting into their hard shells, cracking them like eggs.
Adore, on the other hand, dispatched whatever came at her with a barrage of water and ice bullets, instantly killing them. During this skirmish with the insects, she realized that her newly developed sensory abilities not only allowed her to detect their location and movements but also enabled her to identify their weak spots. Adore figured that while this ability might not be as effective against stronger opponents, as she obtained more power and became more attuned to her lineages, she might be able to sense weak spots up to tier 4 or 5. When she fully fused with all her lineages, she could only imagine how powerful her senses would become; perhaps she'd even be able to detect 8th-tiers weak spots.
Robby, on the other hand, used his light magic to strengthen his body and fearlessly attacked the insect-like monsters head-on. Alice, in contrast, chose not to utilize her life and nature magic affinity. Instead, she charged at the bugs, clawing and biting into their hard shells, cracking them like eggs.
While Adore dispatched whatever came at her with a barrage of water and ice bullets, instantly killing them. During this skirmish with the insects, she realized that her newly developed sensory ability not only allowed her to detect their location and movements, but also enabled her to identify their weak spots. Adore figured that while this ability might not be as effective against stronger opponents, as she obtained more power and became more attuned to her lineages, she might be able to sense weak spots up to tier 4 or 5. When she fully fused with all her lineages, she could only imagine how powerful her senses would become, perhaps she would even able to detect 8th tiers weak spots.
The group eventually managed to finish off all the bugs, although Adore new this wasn't the last of the encounters like this they would face. True to her expectations, every few hundred or thousand feet, they encountered new enemies, all of which were no higher than tier 1 but still annoying. The frequency of attacks only subsided when they reached the second layer. From there, their progress slowed to attacks only happening every mile or so of walking, they soon ended up stumbled upon three high-tier-2 dirt beasts, which immediately launched an onslaught of earth projectiles, spears, and spiked attacks. Adore thought if she was to fight these beast herself they would probably pose a bit of a challenge for her, given that there were three of them, but nothing she couldn't handle. Curious to see how her beast companions and Thomas would fare against the threat, she chose to observe the fight from a safe distance, away from the range of the projectiles.
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"Crimson shield"
Thomas started the encounter by blocking the attacks with a fiery red shield, successfully defending against the onslaught. Meanwhile, Alice skillfully maneuvered from behind Thomas, evading the incoming attacks with agile movements. She then infused mana into her legs, enhancing her speed.
"Life arows"
Alice aimed a slew of arrows at the dirt beast closes to her, which was left of the one attacking Thomas. Some of the arows hit the dirt beast, making it feel weaker in the spots the arows hit. To defend itself, it put up an earth shield, blocking the rest of the incoming arrows. Once it did, the dirt beast attacking Thomas rammed its tusk into his sheld casing the shield to break, but at the cost of its tusk caching fire, and it frantically moved about aggressively trying to put out the fire as Thomas jumped back a few feet to avoid being hit.
"Dark claw"
Three shadows darted towards the dirt beast, delivering three swift crescent slashes that left deep gashes on its side. The creature let out a deafening scream as it rived in pain. Thomas then unleashed a massive crimson crescent energy slash that slammed into the dirt beast horizontally, splitting it in half. Twyla seized this opportunity to devour the beast's flesh.
As the others engaged the dirt beasts, Robby found himself being pursued by one of the creatures after he had broken off one of its horns with a powerful golden energy blast. Meanwhile, the dirt beast that Alice was attacking was behaving differently. Alice had dealt a decisive blow by smashing a massive 10-foot branch into the beast's shield, shattering it instantly. She then followed up by smashing the branch into the beast's head while it was still disoriented. The creature woke from its daze, and fled in terror as Alice began running after it and raining down a barrage of arrows that all found their mark.
"Don't run; dinner's your sole purpose; be my obedient food; be a good boy or girl; and die for me," Alice said in a menacing and theatrical manner.
As Alice continued to rain down arrows, the dirt beast grew slower with each hit, as if its energy was being drained with every arrow. The more it struggled, the more unbearable it became for the beast. Its legs began to tremble, and its once swift running turned into a slow walk. Eventually, the beast found itself struggling to even take a single step, and it finally collapsed and fell to the ground.
"Nature whip"
Alice created a powerful nature whip, resembling a branch, and struck the dirt beast's head with all her might. The impact was devastating, causing the beast's brain and blood to splatter everywhere. The sight left Alice in awe, as she had never seen her nature whip at full power before. In the past, Alice would occasionally smash her friend Robby into a paste in the soul space without any real consequences, but Twyla had warned her to be more careful as it could still be traumatic. Alice still enjoyed smashing people against walls and floors in the soul space, but she had stopped smoshing them into paste. This was the first time Alice had used her nature wip to kill something outside of the soul space, and she found it incredibly satisfying. After taking a brief moment to savor the victory, Alice began to devour the beast's flesh.
Adore watched in terror as Alice unleashed her powerful nature whip on the dirt beast. She couldn't help but wonder if this was how Alice sparred with the other mice and Thomas. If so, it explained why Thomas had been complaining lately. Adore hesitated for a moment, considering whether she should bring up her concerns with Alice later, but ultimately decided against it. She felt that some rough training might actually benefit the others. As Adore focused her attention on Robby, she initially thought that she should intervene but quickly realized that she was mistaken.
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Robby was still fleeing from the dirt beast, desperately trying to escape its clutches. Fear consumed him as he ran for his life, his mind racing for a solution. In a moment of desperation, Robby came up with an idea on the spot. As the dirt beast closed in on him, Robby's legs began to glow with a golden hue. His body blurred as he swiftly maneuvered to the left of the beast, coming to a sudden stop. The speed at which he executed this move was too fast for the beast to keep up with, causing it to crash headfirst into a massive tree, shattering its other tusk in the process.
Robby prepared himself for the next attack, knowing that once the beast snapped out of its daze, it would be consumed with fury. And true to his expectation, as soon as the dirt beast regained its senses, it turned towards Robby and charged at him with unstoppable rage. However, before it could reach him, a blinding light engulfed the scene.
"Light ray"
A huge ray of light struck the dirt beast head first, disintegrating its head right off its shoulders, leaving it crashing to the ground. Robby walked up to it slowly and kicked it a couple of times to make sure it was dead. Once it was confirmed that the beast was, in fact, very dead, he started to dig in and eat away at the dirt beast.
Adore it needed some work, but so far, so good. Even though they barely incorporated any teamwork and just ran around all willy-nilly, it wasn't terrible. She knew it was probably her fault they didn't know how to work as a team, given that they probably only saw her fight solo all the time. But she was sure Thomas had to have fought on a team before; he had even kind of collaborated with Twyla when killing one of the dirt beasts. But she guessed that if she wanted them to be able to coordinate with her, she would probably have to teach them herself. Believe it or not, Adore had plenty of experience being on a team. She played plenty of sports, and anything she did, she did well.
But she didn't have all day to sit here in thought. She had a village to save before it got too dark, and she was going to do exactly that. So she rounded up everyone and made her way in the direction of the village she needed to help. And boy, did they need it? It was not looking good for that village, not at all.