—————————————————————–
Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
—————————————————————–
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
“Ugh… Phew…”
“Haa… Haa…”
“Everyone, be quiet for a bit.”
Annoyed by the breathing sounds, Ainz frowned and looked back.
Taking in his four teammates at a glance, Ainz couldn’t help but sigh.
All four of them were staggering with unfocused eyes.
Their condition was visibly poor.
“Should we rest for a bit before going?”
“Please… some antidote…”
Ainz glanced at the glass bottle containing a blue liquid in his pocket.
Everyone kept asking for the antidote due to mana energy addiction symptoms.
But Ainz himself couldn’t feel much strain on his body yet.
There were two possibilities.
One was that Ainz’s ability to decompose mana energy was far superior to others.
The other was that his teammates were exaggerating now.
Thinking of the latter possibility, Ainz looked at his teammates with suspicious eyes.
“Here. Take only one sip each. Don’t drink it all.”
In the end, Ainz handed over the antidote.
If it was the former, it would be a big problem.
Trying to save the antidote could ruin the entire practice test.
He couldn’t shake off the feeling that it was a waste, but he judged that it was right to avoid risks as much as possible.
“Is everyone feeling a bit better?”
“Yeah. Now my body feels a bit energetic.”
“Then everyone lower your bodies and be quiet. I spotted a pack of black hounds.”
“…!”
The teammates followed Ainz and lowered their bodies, hiding in the bushes.
Black hounds?
Where?
They couldn’t sense the presence of black hounds at all.
Because the thick mana energy was interfering with the flow of mana.
But Ainz, who pierced through the dark fog with his superior eyesight, saw it.
The sight of black hounds drooling and running towards somewhere.
“1 o’clock direction. The scale is roughly 50.”
“Yeah. I see them.”
“If we kill them all, we’ll comfortably complete the test.”
Was there a need to kill them all?
Killing just 20 and immediately running away would be more time-efficient.
Although a few teammates slower than him would be in danger.
Ainz thought that way but didn’t say it out loud.
He just needed to use his teammates as bait and escape alone once he finished off the 20th one.
“They’re fast. It would be good for the five of us to snipe them at pinpoint, right?”
“No. Leave it to me.”
Now was his time to step up.
Ainz stepped forward with a grin.
The black hounds were running in a pack without noticing this side at all.
So if he unleashed wide-area magic, he could send at least 10 of them flying in one shot.
It was an opportunity to make an outstanding contribution and earn bonus points.
“I’ll sweep them away in one go.”
“Hey. Still, wasting too much mana at once is…”
“What? Waste? If it wasn’t for my magic, we would have been attacked by bandits in the mountains.”
“…”
And because of you, we all had to extinguish the forest fire and walk to Whist Forest.
Those words came up to the throats of the teammates.
They were starting to get angry, but no one could stop Ainz.
Ainz was a candidate for the successor of Wiegenschstein, one of the three great families, and had the most outstanding abilities among them.
“Watch closely. If I get the angle right, I’ll kill 20 of them at once… Huh?”
Ainz’s expression became strange as he stretched out his thumb to gauge the distance.
The movement of the black hounds, which had been running in one direction in a somewhat orderly manner, became strange.
The way they scattered and ran away was like an animal encountering a natural enemy head-on.
“Oh, shit.”
Kwang!
A green figure leaped out from behind a giant tree.
Two or three black hounds were hit by the club it swung in an instant, splattering blood with a cracking sound.
As the head of the creature, which was snorting fiercely, turned, the face of that bipedal monster was revealed.
A huge physique that seemed to be four times that of a human.
An ugly appearance like a pig.
And even long tusks.
It was an orc, a mid-grade magical beast.
“Why is an orc here?!”
“Shh.”
Ainz covered the mouth of a teammate who panicked in surprise.
Suppressing the teammate’s trembling, Ainz fell into thought.
Today was a day when the mana energy fog didn’t move, so the range of activity of magical beasts was fixed.
In other words, there was no way a lower magical beast like black hounds and a mid-grade magical beast like orcs would clash.
Did we read the map wrong and come too deep?
And at the same time, did the black hounds go crazy and enter the area with high concentration of mana energy?
It would be foolish to believe that two events with extremely low probability occurred simultaneously.
The higher possibility was a disaster.
“The orcs… are hunting the black hounds…!”
“I said be quiet, really.”
Fluctuation of mana energy flow.
That explained everything.
Black hounds running away to avoid high concentrations of mana energy.
And orcs running away from even higher concentrations of mana energy, encountering black hounds and beating them up.
It was clear that the concentration of mana energy in Whist Forest was changing now.
And at a considerably fast pace.
Otherwise, there was no way two migrating groups of magical beasts would clash.
“Ha…”
As if trying to show that Ainz’s thought was correct, the sky began to darken in an instant.
A pitch-black fog began to envelop the forest.
It was already dark due to the dense trees, but now it was as dark as the night.
“Ugh… Haa…”
“Haa… Haa… Haaa…”
To make matters worse, his teammates were already showing symptoms of mana energy addiction.
Now he could be sure.
This wasn’t just smoke or something.
How could it be an act when their faces turned pale and they were vomiting?
Ainz was also starting to feel dizzy as if his head was spinning.
‘Should I just drink it all myself?’
Even if he gave the antidote to his teammates, they would be in the same state again in less than 3 minutes, groaning.
Rather than that, wouldn’t it be better to send all his teammates back and drink all the antidote himself to sweep everything in the best condition?
Then he could earn bonus points too.
Ainz seriously thought that, but-
-With great power comes great responsibility. Remember that, Ainz.
Remembering Schlus’ words, he hung his head.
With great power comes great responsibility.
The great power here probably referred to his superior ability to decompose mana energy.
If he had such an ability, he had the duty, the responsibility, to show consideration to those who didn’t have it.
Because that was the proper attitude of a noble.
“Here. After taking one sip each, we’ll retreat right away. Be careful not to make a sound even while drinking.”
He handed over the half-empty antidote bottle.
After taking one sip each, there would probably be nothing left.
But it was fine.
He could endure mana energy better than others.
So it was right to accept this level of sacrifice.
Ainz finally understood Schlus’ words a little.
“Here, Ainz.”
“Then let’s depart…”
Ainz, who took the glass bottle without thinking, was dumbfounded.
There was still half a sip of antidote left in the glass bottle.
Looking at his teammates, they were all smiling at Ainz, their condition already improved.
Ainz shook his head and gulped down the antidote.
Although it was just half a sip, the effect was sufficient.
His narrowed vision expanded, and his body began to move well without delay.
“Guys. When retreating, we’ll sprint straight through the path between those two giant trees. I’ll snipe the magical beasts chasing from the rear. When mana runs out, the person at the very front will come to the back and switch positions. Repeat this until we leave the forest. Understood?”
“Okay.”
“Got it.”
The students nodded with a resolute look.
They couldn’t wait for all the magical beasts to disappear.
They would soon become addicted to mana energy again.
Moreover, since mana energy fog was rushing in real-time, the time to develop mana energy addiction would be much shorter.
“Run!”
Ainz and his teammates jumped up from the ground and started running.
At the same time, their activated internal circuits strengthened their bodies to the extreme.
Before they knew it, they were running through the forest at a speed comparable to horses.
“Ugh! So many are coming!”
Noticing this, a pack of orcs chased after them at a fierce speed.
They were by no means inferior in speed.
There were even some individuals that were faster.
“I’ll turn them all to dust… Huh?”
Ainz, who was waiting for the orcs to gather in the rear and aiming magic with his outstretched hand, was appalled.
The orc pack was widely dispersing to the sides.
‘Could it be to minimize the damage from wide-area magic…?’
Indeed, the intelligence of orcs was incomparable to the likes of black hounds.
Ainz clicked his tongue and erased the wide-area magic technique.
It seemed better to shoot down the closely pursuing orcs one by one with pinpoint magic here.
“Aah! Orcs in front!”
“What?!”
His teammates stopped in front of him.
Unable to control his speed, Ainz burst through between his teammates and-
“Hah!”
“Kueek!”
He kicked the chest of the orc that appeared in front.
The orc flew backwards with its ribs seriously caved in, never to get up again.
“Damn it…”
But the orc that appeared in front wasn’t alone.
Dozens… no, perhaps hundreds.
They had come around the shortcut and blocked the front in the meantime.
Now the orcs behind were also narrowing the distance considerably.
“Were S-surrounded! What do we do?”
“Calm down, guys. We’ll break through the encirclement with pinpoint fire and escape. See that part with relatively few orcs? There-”
“Ugh… Haa… I can’t endure anymore…”
To make matters worse, his teammates were showing addiction symptoms.
Even if they poured out all their firepower, it would be barely enough, but his teammates’ condition was already heading towards the worst.
‘I have to do it all alone.’
There was no choice but for him, the only one standing fine here.
Ainz clenched his fists and thought so.
Lightly unleashing flame magic over there to create a barrier of fire, and piercing five or six orcs over there with light magic…
He was devising such a strategy when-
Whoosh…
“Huh?”
Suddenly, a chill began to spread.
It wasn’t an illusion.
Frost was starting to form on the leaves of the bushes in real time.
It should be summer now, so how could this happen?
Crackle…!
At that moment, a gust of wind rushed in and enveloped the surroundings.
Ainz and his teammates, who closed their eyes for a moment due to the swirling wind, gaped as they opened them.
The orcs were all frozen white and unable to move.
“Hehe. It’s useless to try to burn down the forest.”
“…!”
A playful voice was heard.
It was someone whose presence they couldn’t feel at all until now, but right now, he was so welcome.
The man who climbed up a tree and was looking down at them with a smile.
It was Professor Sergei’s assistant.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
Save
Did he forget about the store where he could buy stuff