"What did you find?" A merchant asked the scouts.

The scout responded: "A horde of frost bears. There are 4 elites, 20 ordinary, and the remaining 87 are rankless."

Dante looked at the horizon. With his sharp, silver, draconic eye, he was able to confirm what the scout had said.

'It's probably my first time seeing an elite monster.'

On every rank, the monsters were categorised into three classes, judging by their level of danger.

Ordinary — they were the normal monsters and beasts that could easily be killed.

Elite — these were strong, intelligent, or both. They were hard to defeat in a 1v1 and could be killed only by brute force or by experienced fighters.

Lord — Ignoring the strength and intelligence that surpassed the elite monsters, they tended to have tens or hundreds of monsters and beasts under their control. Defeating a Lord monster in a 1v1 was almost impossible unless in some special cases like by an experienced assassin.

So, how can you know which class the beast falls into? Here's the thing, you can't.

These classes are just imaginary labels for categorising the beasts in the same rank. If someone wanted to know the class of a specific beast, they'd need to judge themselves and tell the others that they felt like that specific beast falls into that specific class.

In other words, the scout was able to say which beasts were elite and which were ordinary only because someone said so and wrote that in a book.

There were many books that described the beasts with their classes and the abilities they showed to be given those classes. Obviously, these books weren't always accurate.

"So, what's the plan? We can't just go back."

One of the mercenaries, a bulky bald man, suggested: "If you give me a few minutes, I can create a wall from earth to separate the elite monsters. Then, we can kill one side before the other passes through the wall."

After a short discussion, everyone agreed on this simple plan.

As for the spoils, they all agreed that if someone killed a beast then the corpse belonged to them unless someone helped in killing it.

Why would they care about the corpses? Because some merchants wanted to buy the corpses for their trades.

They immediately walked toward the beasts horde, close only enough to allow the bulky mercenary to see everything.

The scout opened a bottle that spread a strange smell: "This will help to hide the smell. The frost bears have sharp noses."

"I'll start now, get ready." The bulky man whispered, drawing runes in the air.

Dante held his Grade 2 enchanted sword firmly, standing beside Daniel who wielded a long staff with a brown crystal at the tip.

'This reminds me, should I try to get a staff?'

In this world, there were weapons for those who relied on pure magic attacks. The staff was one of those weapons.

By using it as a medium in casting, the spell could gain an effect depending on the staff, such as less mana consumption, stronger power, faster speed, and so on.

Dante's fighting style relied on using a one-handed longsword, which meant his other hand was free to use a magical weapon.

'I'll think about that after we reach the town.'

Just then, Daniel and Dante noticed Emeralda sneaking to them. They immediately glared at her with disgust.

"Don't even dare to touch my pure dignity."

"One kick wasn't enough, huh?"

Emeralda's face flushed for the hundredth time as she showed them a green longbow: "I'm an archer… I need someone to fight in front of me."

"Oh..." Dante and Daniel nodded in understanding.

Even though they knew each other for only a few hours, she apparently preferred them over the other mercenaries.

Unfortunately for her, Dante wasn't the type to fight with a team, and Daniel himself was a long-range fighter.

As for Jin, the drunk man, he was still in the carriage, protecting it and the merchants in case a beast appeared while all the other mercenaries were away.

'Though I don't understand how he is going to fight while drunk. That man needs to fix his addiction.'

As Dante was lost in thoughts, a giant wall suddenly emerged between the beasts horde, separating them almost equally.

"NOW!"

"Attack!"

Dante was the first one to move. He instantly turned into a shadow with his sword, crawling with inhuman speed toward the bears.

The rankless bears were as big as a human and had short claws. The ordinary Rank 1 bears were a little bigger than humans and had sharp teeth and claws. As for the elites, they were over three meters and had glowing blue marks on their fur.

ROAAAR!

One of the two elite bears noticed Dante as it roared in his direction. Suddenly, the bear opened its mouth, then the blue marks glowed brighter.

Just then, the bear unleashed a freezing beam toward Dante.

Shadow Technique — Shadowstep!

"...!"

Dante suddenly disappeared, causing the ice beam to hit an unfortunate tree.

The elite bear's sharp eyes widened as it looked left and right, searching for the shadow that had escaped.

Crack!

Just then, it heard the sound of something shattering. Turning around, it saw a human cutting through a barrage of ice shards, dangerously close to the bear's back.

'Damn!'

Dante cursed inwardly. He was about to kill the elite bear, but the other elite bear had noticed him and launched a barrage of ice shards at him.

Dante kept dodging and slashing the ice shards relentlessly, ignoring the ordinary and rankless beasts that started to shift their gazes toward him.

Shadow Technique — Shadowstep!

The next moment, Dante dipped into a shadow and emerged behind the elite bear that was attacking him.

The elite bear turned around instantly, as though it expected Dante, and swung its ice claws toward him.

Dante crouched and barely dodged the attack, covering his sword in shadow flames.

In the crouching position, he gathered his mana and power at his legs before launching himself upward. With a rapid speed, his sword slashed the bear in a diagonal uppercut.

The bear was too slow to dodge. A long cut appeared across its chest, spreading dark flames to its fur.

Before the bear could recover, Dante raised his left arm above his head. He cast an explosion of flames, and the explosion produced a force that pushed Dante downward.

Taking advantage of the force and speed of falling, Dante slashed downward. His sword sank into the fur and flesh of the bear's chest in a deep diagonal cut, crossing with the old cut and creating a bloody X.

While the bear was about to register the pain, Dante launched himself toward it like a spring, using the force of the fall, and pierced the bear's chest with a flaming thrust.

The bear let out a scream, its eyes turned completely white in pain. The next second, it collapsed onto its back and its Wheel of Luck disappeared. Dante had pierced its heart, killing it in an instant.

Suddenly, another ice beam was shot toward him. Dante smirked before dipping into a shadow and disappearing again.

The bear turned around immediately, its mouth still open and glowing, ready to unleash another beam. Surprisingly, it didn't find Dante anywhere.

BAM!

All of a sudden, the entire body of a rankless bear fell into the elite bear's head. The elite bear brutally threw it away in its anger. Just then, it finally found Dante… carrying a bear?

Before it could understand anything, Dante threw the bear he carried toward the elite bear.

Its eyes widened in realization — this human was casually treating the bears like throwing weapons!

The elite didn't hesitate. It instantly attacked the rankless bear with an ice shard, splitting it into two. But as it was about to shoot a beam, a ray of shadow suddenly pierced its right eye.

ROAAAR!

Its mouth opened widely as it glared at Dante with intense anger, then it aimed at the ground.

Dante understood its intent instantly — it wanted to spread the effect of its attack to the entire battlefield, ignoring the other bears.

'As if I'm going to let you do this!'

Dante looked at the closest rankless bear that tried to attack him and grabbed it by its leg before channeling his mana into it.

Dante was enhancing the bear!

The bear started burning in shadow flames, feeling that it was going to explode due to the mana overcharge.

Then, using all the muscles in his body, Dante threw it toward the elite bear.

The elite bear immediately fell to its four legs and dug its claws into the ground. Once the overcharged bear touched the elite bear, the overcharged bear exploded!

BOOM!

A huge explosion of flesh, bone, blood, and dark flames. Dante had channeled into the bear more mana than its body could handle, turning it into a living bomb!

The area where the elite bear had once stood was now hidden by a cloud of blood. Once it disappeared, Dante burst into menacing laughter.

Only half the elite bear remained, and a part of Dante's misfortune disappeared. It was certainly dead.

'Two mana cores, two elite corpses, and less misfortune. It was worth the effort. Now, let's get more cores.'

Obviously, Dante had attacked all the beasts alone for the spoils. If had waited for someone to 'help' him, he'd have had to share the elite bears' corpses.

Dante looked at the ordinary bears. With an intelligence higher than the rankless bear, some of them recognized him as a dangerous threat and didn't dare to attack him.

As Dante was about to attack the closest ordinary bear, he suddenly remembered something.

'Wait, where are the others? They're taking too long.'

Dante looked back immediately.

"...."

All the mercenaries were staring at him with different emotions instead of helping.

A rankless bear lunged toward Dante, but he easily dodged the attack and gripped the bear by its neck, lifting it up. Then, he looked at the mercenaries and smirked: "Oh, so you are okay with me taking all the spoils? Thank you!"

Crack!

Dante twisted the bear's neck and charged toward an ordinary bear.

The mercenaries finally snapped out of their daze and launched their attacks at the bears.

"AIM FOR THE RANK 1 BEARS!"

"WIND BLADE!"

"DON'T LET HIM TAKE ALL THE CORES."

"GRAAAH!"

A/N: Yeah, I just realized it's called Shadowstep, not Shadow Step. Now excuse me, I have to edit that in the old chapters.

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