...Yep. I said it.

Hundreds of them. Remember what I said earlier about Thistle Walkers travelling in groups? Yeah...I meant large groups. They tended to band together in groups of a hundred or more, moving simultaneously, patiently waiting for their prey to arrive. Apparently, they were omnivores - meaning they could sustain themselves perfectly fine from the environment itself, just like normal plants, but...well, every living being has their preferences. Thistle Walkers just happened to prefer meat. More particularly, human flesh.

Apparently, according to the background info provided for this quest, this forest was originally a tourist attraction for visitors of Jilin City. Its hiking trail used to be extremely popular, until a few death incidents occurred fairly recently. At first, people just thought the hikers had been careless, and died from an accident. Things like that weren't uncommon during hikes, after all.

However, as the death toll continued to increase, people soon realized that these deaths were no accidents. Drones were sent to investigate the cause, and found the Monsters behind all this - Thistle Walkers. Authorities were soon called in, and the Hunters' Guild put up a quest to exterminate the threat lurking within this forest, known as the Forest of Alpheridian. Quite the lengthy name, but it in fact relates to the long history of this place, tracing back to as far as the 15th century...but never mind that. I'm not here to give history lessons, I'm here to kill some plants.

Now, normally, thistle plants grew in open areas, such as plains. They were rarely found within forests. However, Thistle Walkers were different - they could be found anywhere you could see green nature, from grasslands to even tundras at times. In this case, they were in a forest.

Mei Gui and I entered the forest slowly and carefully, keeping a constant eye on our surroundings. I didn't expect the Thistle Walkers to just be here at the very entrance, but you never knew. Ever since the deaths, the forest has been cleared out and closed off until further notice - also known as whenever the threat within had been eliminated. Thus, we had no one to interefere with our operation, which was nice.

The two of us ventured deeper into the forest, back to back. That way, we could watch each other's blind spots, forming a 360 degree circle of vision all around us to make sure no enemies could sneak up. Unfortunately, since we were moving this way, we were extremely slow. That wasn't necessarily a bad thing though, since we could survey our surroundings more carefully this way.

As we continued, however...I noticed that no plants were in the area. With the exception of the trees forming the forest, no other plants could be seen on the ground. This was extremely odd, considering forests were supposed to be filled with greenery and nature.

And then, as we headed even deeper, I saw - the first thistle plant.

Mei Gui noticed it too, and we immediately stopped walking. Normal thistles did not grow in forests, so this was definitely a Thistle Walker.

But...if that's the case, then why is it on its own?

I looked around, but didn't see any other Thistle Walkers within eyesight.

That's weird...

Then, after some debating, I decided to use Ace to kill the Thistle Walker. We were still out of its detection range, so I could kill it easily with a single shot. Sure, I could've used magic too, but Ace was more precise, and was silenced too, so it wouldn't attract any attention.

I pulled out Ace from its holster, hanging on my cloak's waistbelt, and aimed it at the seemingly harmless thistle. With a single pull of the trigger, a Chaos-imbued bullet shot out, silent and deadly. The projectile struck its target, penetrating it completely. The Thistle Walker, now with a hole in its body, collapsed onto one side, its fake roots now out of the ground.

Mei Gui and I cautiously proceeded closer, and inspected the Monster. It showed no sign of life. I let out a sigh of relief and reluctantly picked up the carcass, before stuffing it into my Space Locket. Thankfully, I had gloves on. Since everything put into the Space Locket are stored separately and don't contact one another, I didn't have to worry about the dead body of a Monster contaminating other stuff.

A Thistle Walker could be easily killed - quite frankly, it was the weakest Monster in terms of individual strength. Yet, it was classified as a Rank 2 Magic Beast - simply because of just how deadly they could be as a group.

However...there had only been one Thistle Walker here. And that fact bothered me.

"Mei Gui..." I began.

"Yes, Master...I find it suspicious as well," Mei Gui replied, having already understood what I was about to say. "I will activate my Third Eye to scan around us, just to be safe."

I nodded in agreement, and she went to work.

And then, suddenly, Mei Gui's eyes shot open. "Master! We're surrounded!"

I immediately narrowed my gaze. "What?!"

As if on cue, I heard the rustling of leaves...as hundreds of Thistle Walkers dropped down all around us - from above. The little bastards had been camouflaging within the green leaves of the trees - that's why we hadn't noticed them. And that one lone Thistle Walker we just killed was nothing but a bait. Not only that, but we couldn't even fly away, since a few Thistle Walkers remained on the trees, ready to latch onto us the moment we tried to fly off.

Since when...did these Rank 2 Monsters know tactics and strategies?!

Mei Gui and I quickly moved closer to one another, back to back.

"Tch...!" I raised my hand out, and chanted within my head.

Level Two Fire Magic - Abomination Fla-

"Wait, Master!" Mei Gui interrupted me, realizing what I was going to do after seeing a spark of fire appear within my palms. "If you use Fire Magic, that would burn the whole forest down!"

I gritted my teeth. She was right. She was right, but...

"But it's the only sure-fire way to kill them all in one go!" I yelled in response (no pun intended), as the Thistle Walkers inched closer and closer. The moment they got within attacking range of us, they would lash out with their spiked arms, and drag us onto the ground.

"Master, use the environment!"

What? Use the environment...? Damn it, I don't understand...wait, this side is a slope going down...I got it! But...I need some help to cast that spell-!

"Mei Gui! Conjoined Release!"

"Understood, Master!"

Turning around, she clasped her hand around mine, and together, we poured our mana into a single spell that I had managed to learn off a book in the library back at Shenzhen Magic High School. It was the only Level Three spell I remembered though.

Level Three Water Magic - Flood!

A torrent of black water erupted in front of us, and began flowing down, towards the incoming wave of Thistle Walkers. There were also ones closing in from our left, right, and behind, but with this, all of the Thistle Walkers in front of us had been washed away, down the hill. I took Mei Gui's hand, and slid down the slope, along the water, right before the Thistle Walkers could reach us.

Mid-way down, I activated Flight, and Mei Gui and I took off into the air. Once we were safely levitating above the forest, I finally let go of her hand.

"Well, shit...my lower half is completely drenched now," I muttered. "I wish there was a spell to just instantly cleanse and dry clothes. That would be awesome."

Mei Gui, hearing my words, moved closer to me and began wordlessly rubbing the wet parts of my cloak with her own's sleeve.

I smiled at her cute attempt to dry off my clothes. "Mei Gui...that's not going to work."

"..." she didn't respond, and merely continued to rub, harder than before.

I chuckled and let her do as her please.

"In any case...these Thistle Walkers are smarter than I expected," I said, frowning. "Since when did Rank 2 Monsters possess such intelligence?"

"Master, I agree. These Monsters were acting extremely weird, but at the same time, organized," Mei Gui replied, deep in thought as she continued to rub on my cloak.

"Could it be..." I murmured thoughtfully.

"What is it, Master?"

"Hm...this is only a possibility, but...what if someone was controlling these Thistle Walkers?"

"Controlling Monsters...that is not impossible," Mei Gui muttered. "I believe there are certain spell branches of Curse Magic that can do that, from what I have read on the second floor of the Library of Infinite Beginnings. However, in the same book, it was also stated that most of them have been long lost to history."

"I'm guessing these books didn't actually teach you the spell names or what they did specifically, huh?"

Mei Gui shook her head. "Unfortunately not, Master."

I sighed. "Yeah...thought so. The books on the lower levels of the Library are virtually useless."

Then, turning back to look down below, where the Thistle Walkers were still at, I furrowed my brows.

Now then...how am I going to deal with these things?