Tyler sighed deeply in disappointment as they arrived at the entrance to the Farbel’s Pass. He wasn’t able to get a clear picture in his mind of the cave that housed the entrance to the mine due to the vast quantities of similar-looking hills, cliffs and caverns so he had no choice but to teleport here instead.

Teleporting inside the cave directly was also very risky as they could end up jumping right into a very dangerous situation. Sensing something, or perhaps it was more accurate to say not sensing something, he carefully turned his head around but he could no longer feel the strange presence that had been lurking in the shadows around him.

He was well aware that he was being followed ever since he returned to the city last night by some kind of ghostly figure but had chosen to ignore it. Z had mentioned that the mayor of the city had a Ghost legion that specialized in the gathering of information for his personal use and as expected, it would seem like he had taken an interest in Tyler.

Tyler didn’t mind such a thing though as it was bound to happen sooner or later and it was best it had happened now while he was aware of it and could react accordingly. Still, there was no sense in thinking about that now so he quickly put the matter to the back of his mind as Nadine drove the carriage through the Farbelts pass. It didn’t take long for them to be attacked by monsters given that the sun had already set and the sky was almost black in a moonless night.

The frost salamanders they met along the way were by far the weakest of the monsters they encountered during their trip to the mine. The Farbelt pass was home to a variety of monsters including the intermediate class monster, the one-horned bears, and the ice falcons which were the more troublesome monsters to deal with.

However, Tyler hadn’t needed to lift a finger during their ride as Nadine had taken the initiative to fought the monsters even before Tyler had the chance to make a move. Her reaction time seem to have improved greatly and she was eager to test her newfound strength to the limit.

Seeing how eager she was to fight, Tyler didn’t bother interfering with her fight as he focused on learning the |Flight| Spell which was proving quite difficult. He hadn’t spent so much time on a single page inside a spellbook before and he was starting to understand why learning higher-tiered spells were considered to be very difficult.

However, if only a tier 3 spell was giving him so much trouble then what would happen at the next tier, the difficulty was bound to increase the further up he went. Something was certainly off here and after studying for more than an hour, he could finally understand why.

His lack of understanding of the most important runes in the book was throwing him off a lot.

He could not build a rhythm and thus was constantly having to start all over again. It was one thing if he didn’t understand anything in the book as he could just focus on memorizing the magic circle before the runes that form it while having a vague understanding of the spell which would allow him to cast it.

However—

That was not how Tyler had been learning his spells. He had prioritized learning to read and understand magic runes before learning the spells which made it easier to construct as it would simply be writing words in a circle to form a sentence. Just as one would do in any language.

He could not fathom for the love of him, why everyone wouldn’t use this process as it made learning spells easier. Yet, they went with a method that took days or even months for one to understand and learn to cast the spell.

However, Tyler had learned from the conversation he had with Nadine that it was insanely more difficult for them to learn to read and understand basic magic runes which was a surprise for him as that had only taken him a single day. However, her description of how it was for her allowed him to understand something.

The magic library wasn’t just a magic library because it housed magical books and items of incredible value and power. His immerse concentrated state whenever he would focus in there was probably an effect of the library itself and the knowledge on magic runes in there was more complete. The information on magic runes out here was almost non-existent and it was hard for anyone to be able to read up to the intermediate level which was why they had chosen this crude method of learning spells.

Even then, learning the spell this way had a significant downside as it would take a long time for one to max out their proficiency with the spells, hence they would need to construct the magic circle whenever they would cast the spell and could not use the spell to its full effects.

While casting his spells, Tyler had only ever constructed the magic circle ones, and that was the first time he would use the spell. However, some would need to constantly do that as evident by the summoning spell that was used by the third son of a certain family.

Although, when summoning something that large, the magic circle would usually appear in an appropriate space. The speed of its formation told the entire story as it had taken a while for the summoned elemental to appear allowing Tyler enough time to memorize the magic circle although he still did not understand it nor did he have any idea on how the spell would work so he could not use it just yet.

He would make a note to learn an analytical skill that would help him with such a thing in the future. Back at the matter at hand though, it would seem he needed to spend a long time before he would be able to learn the |Flight| spell which was a bummer.

“I did it, lord Ty, did you see that? How did I do?”

“Huh? Or Hmm, yeah great job.”

Tyler lied in the flow of the moment as Nadine excitedly asked about her performance against several large one-horned bears whose corpses laid on the ground with their heads caved in as they had literally been beaten to death by her with the aid of her Bo-staff which was obviously still intact as it had been split in half in the exact spot it would normally be separated in two by Nadine.

This was not due to any form of luck or abnormal coincidence as it was a magic weapon and would not be destroyed until its durability had been reduced completely.

Nadine seemed to be in a good mood as she happily retrieved the bodies of the intermediate class monsters and returned to the carriage as they continued their trip that took more than three hours due to the constant attacks they faced.

Tyler sighed as he patted Nadine on the head and returned to learning his spell until they arrived at their destination. Parking their carriage at the previous location, they entered the mine without any forms of illumination to avoid as much unnecessary confrontation as possible.

However—

That once again proved useless as an army of Ant Giants marched towards them. They came from a tunnel to the right and seemed to be headed in the same direction as the pair probably towards the opening the Hunters had dug to the adjacent tunnel.

Tyler remembered that there was a group of Ant Giants digging that tunnel the last time they were here as well. It would seem the place held value to the monsters for some reason. However, Tyler couldn’t figure out why as the metals shouldn’t be of any actual value to them.

Thinking that way, he suddenly remembered the tunnel had a larger concentration of gold than the ones on this side which meant that place was probably a separate mine of its own. Most likely a higher grade one judging by the strength of the monsters they had encountered there and monsters were attracted to rare ores so that was probably the reason.

However—

The monsters were truly an unlucky bunch as they had to run into them twice in a row. There were around twenty of these ants marching at them after sensing the pair.

The tunnel was large, but it still wasn’t large enough for the monsters’ numbers to pose a threat to them as the monsters approached in a line of twos.

“Twin Max-magic- Lightning.”

Two bolts of silvery-white streaks of electricity jumped off her fingertips and decimated the approaching monsters, killing more than half of them in a single hit. She then charged in and with the use of her Bo-staff and her superior physical abilities, she tore through the monsters like they were nothing.

Retrieving the cores and bodies of the monsters, Tyler and Nadine continued down the labyrinth until they reached the tunnel that had been dug by Dohel’s group. Entering the new tunnel, they were immediately attacked once again by nearly invisible threads that would’ve surely caught them in a trap if both of them weren’t skilled in sensory magic and had amazing reflexes.

Tyler sighed as he recognized the monster that had attacked them.

Lesser Djieien

The spider-like creature was perched up in the ceiling as it weaves its webs to attack them. Tyler was just about to retrieve his weapon from the void when Nadine suddenly charged in with an intense aura.

“Hey, don’t be reckless.”

His words fell to deaf ears as Nadine eagerly rushed in at the annoying monster that had given her so much trouble the last time they were here and again the monster took off running the moment it sensed a bit of danger from Nadine’s glare.

“Hey wait!”

It was useless, her mind seemed to be in a sort of high from her newfound strength as Nadine chased after the monster deep into the tunnel just like the last time they were here. However, she was not the same person she had been the last time as her speed now far exceeded the intermediate ranked monster.

Dashing past the fleeing creature that didn’t seem to understand how she had appeared before it, she flooded her staff with mana, and a bow that promptly cave in the skull of the white spider-like creature, reverberated across the tunnels as Nadine smirked in victory.

However—

Several strings of glimmering blood red and steel-like threads suddenly attached themselves to her limbs and yanked her in all directions. Her body was thus suspended above the ground and she was unable to keep hold of her weapon. Surprise flashed across her eyes as she finally sensed several monsters that had been lurking in shadows move towards her.

There were more than ten Lesser Djieien all around her and they moved closer towards her as their threads constantly tightened around her skin, and were surprisingly able to break through her defense and cause her to bleed. Her blood seems to be getting absorbed by the webs which explains why the monsters were only approaching her slowly as she got weaker with each passing second.

They were quite intelligent creatures as she would’ve been able to launch a desperate counterattack if they had charged blindly at her.

“I can’t believe even the monsters are more reasonable than you. That is quite disappointing.”

Her expression seemed to finally calm down as though someone had suddenly poured a bucket of cold water on her as she saw her master walk out of the void with his weapon at hand and all ten Lesser Djieien promptly dropped down to the ground as though they were puppets whose strings had been cut.

Walking towards the bound Nadine who seemed to have finally returned to normal, Tyler gently flicked her in the head. Of course, his strength was still too great to fully control and a red spot appeared on her forehead, causing tears to gather around her eyes.

Sigh, “I can’t believe there was someone foolish enough to get caught in an obvious trap like that.”