Dante’s Immortality – Chapter 61

“That’s enough training for the day.”

Dante heaved a sigh of relief, then released his hold on the first pose in the spectral attunement. Surprisingly, he did much better than he had the day before. It almost seemed like he was twice as flexible. “We are done training already?” It was still early in the morning, and they had only been training for a bit over two hours.

Victoria gave a curt nod. For some reason, she seemed far more irritated than she had the day before. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to be the cause of her irritation. “I have to go meet with some of the other masters so I can negotiate a time to finish our training.”

That was news to him, he assumed that they were completely isolated after travelling so deeply into the Wastelands. “There are other people from your guild here?”

“Of course, few locations are suitable for the training that is required for the guild. Unfortunately, more guild members training here also means that our training will take longer than it would have otherwise.” Victoria walked back to her pack and tossed him a sack. After that, she pulled out three different plants. “While I am organizing our schedule, you’ll be foraging for alchemy ingredients. Most of the pill ingredients are fairly common, but three of the twelve are hard to come by.”

Dante caught the sack, he was slightly surprised she would trust him to be left alone and not try to escape.

Victoria held the plants out for him to inspect. “Luckily, they all grow around here. Honestly, I don’t expect much. But if you can find any of the three, the day won’t be wasted.”

Dante looked at them carefully, doing his best to memorize every detail of the plants. Two of them didn’t seem like they would cause any problems. One was a bright red flower, and the other had violet leaves. Both would be easy to see from afar.

The third plant was entirely different though. A single stem connected to green leaves. That was it. There was no odd color or shape, it looked completely generic.

Victoria watched him inspect the plant with a slightly amused smile on her face. “The three are called Scarlet Grard, Daydream Lavender, and Thove. That last plant is the rarest because it is the most difficult to identify without an Herbalist Classification, despite the fact that it is the most abundant. The easiest way to identify it is by the smell.” She held the plant up for him to test.

Curious, Dante leaned forward and sniffed lightly, then instantly jumped backward while uttering a curse. The smell was definitely one he was familiar with. Even if the smell wasn’t nearly as concentrated, he would never forget that foul odor.

The amusement on Victoria’s face was slightly more pronounced for a brief moment, then was gone entirely. “I’m sure you won’t have a problem identifying that one if you come across it. There are a few rules to keep in mind while you are out in the mountain range though. Well, two really. If you follow them, you probably won’t get yourself killed anytime soon.”

Victoria made sure she had his full attention before continuing, and she definitely did. He was more than willing to follow any rules that would increase his chances of survival. “First, stay away from the mountains entirely. Not only are the creatures near them extremely dangerous, but several of the predators specialize in stealth. If you were caught unaware, you would die immediately.”

“The second, and most important rule, is to keep your skills hidden at all times within the mountain range. Revealing your abilities to the other assassins would make it far harder to finish your training, and far more dangerous as well. Obviously, if your life is on the line, use your skills. But even then, you need to pick and choose which skills you want your opponent to be aware of.”

Dante froze. Victoria just said that so nonchalantly, but he was having a difficult time coming to terms with her words. Not only did he have an ‘opponent’, but she said ‘other assassins’. Not only were there assassins, but other assassins. The implications of her words were clear. Dante glanced at Victoria, looking at her in a new light.

Everything that she had told him made so much more sense now. Even the ominously named spectral attunement and her ethereal grace seemed justified. But the news took him completely off-guard.

Sure, Victoria behaved somewhat strangely. He suspected that her guild was unlikely to be normal based on how she had been teaching him, but out of the hundreds of guilds in the Outer regions, he never would have thought that she was a part of an assassins’ guild.

Seeing his expression, Victoria rolled her eyes. “Relax, you aren’t actually joining the guild. If we didn’t need to use this mountain range, there wouldn’t be any contact with the guild at all during your training.”

He wasn’t sure how he felt about the new information. Initially, he was disgusted at the thought of training as an assassin. But the more he thought about it, the more he realized that it didn’t matter.

He couldn’t bring himself to care that Victoria was an assassin. Killing for money may be morally corrupt, but he couldn’t see how it was any worse than what any other combatants did. In fact, after dealing with all of the noble houses, he found the straightforward line of work to be somewhat refreshing.

After thinking it over, Dante gave a nod. Passing up the opportunity to learn from someone with the skill that Victoria had would be a massive mistake. The stealth that assassins focused on would not only help him in fighting as a lone combatant, but it would also drastically aid him in his journey across the Chaos region.

Victoria’s hand flashed out, and Dante easily caught the item she threw. It was a ring that had the symbol of a closed eye.

“That ring should keep you alive if you run into anyone.” Victoria turned to leave, but then glanced back. “Most of the predators in the range are nocturnal, I suggest you make it back well before sunset.” After saying that, Victoria gracefully stalked into the dense forest of the mountain range.

Dante stood there, alone. If there was a time to try and escape, it was now. Thus far, he had gone along with Victoria as a matter of self-preservation. But now that she was gone, so was his reason to stay.

Oddly enough, he didn’t want to leave though. It wasn’t just that he wanted to learn from Victoria, even though he did, it was that he had no idea what to do if he did escape. He had absolutely no knowledge of the Wastelands, aside from the fact that it was ruled by warlords.

Giving up on any thought of leaving, and hopelessly wandering the Wastelands aimlessly, Dante walked toward the dense forest that surrounded the vast mountain range.

On his way, not only did he put on the ring that Victoria gave him, but he also created a sword and two daggers. The sword was for clearing the underbrush as well as for self-defense when used with one of the daggers. The third dagger was going to be his hidden weapon. If he wasn’t going to be using his Create Blade skill when he got into the forest, getting disarmed was definitely a possibility.

After making the weapons, Dante looked down at himself and the tattered clothing that he was wearing. He hadn’t had the opportunity to change his grimy clothes after playing the part of a farmer when he was attempting to sneak into Grimspeak.

Thankfully, the baggy long-sleeved shirt and loose-fitting pants that were usually used to block out the sun while working in the fields provided ample room to hide a dagger discreetly.

For the first dagger, he scrunched up the waistband of his rugged pants and carefully threaded the blade though. It resulted in the dagger being loosely held by what resembled tiny belt loops, and even though he would need to be very careful of it accidentally slipping out, the dagger could be quickly drawn.

He looked over his clothing carefully to find a hiding spot for the second dagger. There were a few locations that might have worked, but none of them would allow him to draw the blade instantly.

After around a minute, he had a moment of inspiration and placed the dagger against his forearm so the long sleeve of the shirt completely covered over it. Then, he held it in place with his Manipulate Blade skill.

He played around with it for a moment, first making sure the dagger could quickly be drawn into his hand, then practicing the flicking motion that he had seen Victoria use when drawing her dagger.

His movements weren’t nearly as clean as hers, but it would suffice in concealing his Manipulate Blade skill. The mana drain also wasn’t a problem. At 2 mana per second, it would only slow down his regeneration, which wouldn’t be an issue if he wasn’t using his other skills.

Done preparing, Dante stepped into the thick foliage, eyes scanning for red or purple plants.

As the large lizard jumped at him, Dante lazily blocked its mouth with his sword while stabbing it through the jaw from below with his dagger. The creature died immediately, and both of his hands were preoccupied while the third and final lizard leaped toward him.

Unsurprisingly, the people following him didn’t make a move to help him in his seemingly perilous situation. He hadn’t thought that they would, but thought it would be best to try and draw them out anyways.

At the last second, Dante spun and plunged the dagger into the last lizard, easily dispatching it.

That done, he continued to stalk through the forest while his pursuers trailed in his wake.

He wasn’t sure what their goal was. At first, he thought they were the assassins that Victoria had mentioned. But that almost seemed impossible given their clumsiness.

Not only could he hear the creaking of branches and the cracking of twigs, but he could also see movement out of the corners of his vision as he scanned the forest for plants. Their presence put him on edge at first, but after the first two hours of being on high alert, it seemed unlikely that they would attack him.

One thing that was pissing him off though, was that he was the only one being attacked. It seemed like immediately after entering the forest he had been under constant threat of attack from various creatures, and even though they were all ridiculously weak, it was still annoying to deal with the constant assault.

He didn’t know how they kept the creatures at bay, but it was one of the first things he would ask them if he got the opportunity.

After walking through the forest for almost thirty minutes, and still not seeing the faintest trace of the plants Victoria sent him to find, he came across a mid-sized stream. With a smile on his face, Dante carefully crossed the stream, then turned to watch the forest behind him.

He didn’t know who was following him, but if they wanted to continue doing it, he would find out.

Or at least he thought he would. As soon as he stepped on the other side of the bank, a tiny black fox stepped out of the forest and began growling at him. He didn’t think much of it though; the black fox was far smaller than a regular fox, being roughly the size of a large rabbit, and didn’t appear to be much of a threat.

Dante raised his sword, preparing to dispatch the fox when he saw the glint of steel out of the corner of his eye.

Spinning to confront his attacker, Dante brought his sword up to deflect the fatal blow while holding his dagger out to ward off the black fox that was now charging toward him. His attacker, who only appeared to be a year or two older than him, was much too slow. He was able to easily bring up his sword to meet the incoming dagger, and position himself so he wouldn’t be in the path of the incoming swing, should his strength be lower.

After that preparation was done, he divided his focus. The fox was much faster than he had thought, but still slower than him. Focus divided, Dante batted away the incoming dagger and pierced the fox through its chest simultaneously.

He was in no way prepared for the result.

The first sensation that he was aware of was the electricity. It shot through his sword, going directly through the handle before running through his arm and spreading into his chest. Not only was the electricity a complete surprise, but it also caused his muscles to tense up.

The flinch from his muscles tensing cause his dagger to deviate from its intended path at the last moment. It still severely wounded the tiny fox, but it was in no way fatal.

As soon as the fox was cut by the dagger, it hissed in pain and twisted around the blade, latching onto his wrist with its razor-sharp teeth.

Dante released an involuntary curse, but didn’t have time to dislodge the fox. Instead, he dropped the dagger and punched the sword from his right hand. Somehow, the sword was still electrocuting him even without being in contact with his attacker’s dagger, and he couldn’t release his grip on the weapon with the current running through his arm.

The skill that his attacker used was truly treacherous. Even if there were several obvious weaknesses in the skill, it could easily disable heavily armed or armored attackers.

“Bastard, that’s mine!” The now recovered attacker was coming back at him with dagger extended, and he didn’t hesitate to meet the attack headfirst.

Dante flicked his left hand, which still had the fox attached to it, and brought his hidden blade out.

Despite his attackers slightly higher than average agility, he easily maneuvered around the incoming thrust, allowing it to nick the fox as he plunged his own weapon in the attacker’s gut in a non-fatal attack. As soon as the dagger hit the fox, he could feel electricity running through its teeth and into his mangled wrist for a brief moment before the fox was dislodged and fell to the floor, no longer moving.

The boy who’s gut he punctured actually screamed in pain as he fell to the floor clutching his stomach, but Dante didn’t focus on him any longer.

He focused on the five others that were now surrounding him instead.