"Hey," I called out to Darius.

"Where?" He asked back.

"Fifty meters, ten o'clock," I said back. "They're your favorite little followers. Although, this time it seems they haven't noticed us first."

"Tch," He clicked his tongue as he readied his sword and lowered himself nearly to the point of crouching. He whispered a placebo of a chant — a complete nonnecessity for his current skill set — before erupting in a faint black glow that paradoxically made him harder to perceive even for me; if I wasn't intently looking at him, that is.

He shot off with a burst of speed that neared half of my own before Empowering myself in a dive and in mere seconds, he had appeared before the group of five roaming bats.

Shiiing!

He swung his sword about five times in the span of three seconds, cutting down all the bats before they could so much as squeak in despair. In the next moment, I casually landed on Darius' shoulder.

"That was a Rouge's Skill, right?" I asked as I looked at him impassively.

"Yeah, a damn fine execution of one too, right?" He seemed proud of himself as he responded.

"I guess," I probably looked quite silly shrugging my shoulders, "but, didn't you already decide to focus on Warrior Skills? I thought you spent the few hours I was away, stealing those magic berries off a C- Ranked Panther, practicing all the foundational Warrior Skills you learned?"

"Why bother?" He sneered as he said, "Like I said before, the simplicity of non-Mage Classes are all backed by one's physical state. It'd be better to just learn all the basic Skills I currently have access to, since just using them will inevitably increase my strength, speed, constitution, and so on."

"Won't that make you a mediocre jack of all trades? You might get a little more powerful than you would be otherwise if you learned and used a bunch of Skills from different Classes. But, it'll take you way, 'way' longer to advance in Rank if you spread yourself out trying to train a bunch of different disciples."

"It sounds to me like you're just jealous of all the new Skills I have," Darius laughed impudently. "What would a simple bird like you even know about having too many Skills to spread yourself thin trying to train, in the first place?"

Is this guy serious?

I jumped off his shoulder, flapping my wings once to get a full ten meters away from him when I landed. Then, with next to no effort, I began creating all the Magic Skills I had yet to learn right before his very eyes.

[Conditions Fulfilled: New Skills "Gale Lvl 1," "Compact Earth Lvl 1," "Geo Bullet Lvl 1," "Waterball Lvl 1," "Personal Water Lvl 1," and "Signal Cry Lvl 1" created!]

[Titles Earned: Wind Magic Novice, Earth Magic Novice, Water Magic Novice, Sonic Magic Novice, Elemental Magic Novice, Prodigious Eaglet.]

"What the actual fuck!" He cursed as over half a dozen multicolored Magic Circles materialized around me. I may or may not have decided to gloat by adding Magic Circles for the Fire, Strengthening, and Healing Spells I had been actively training to the display.

"Anyways, about that bit about me being jealous about your new Skills. Please, do go on," I rolled my eyes at him.

"This is absolute bullshit! How— No, 'why' have you been hiding all these Spells for so long? Are you really 'that' arrogant that you think you don't need all of them to evolve?!"

"You know, the more I talk to you, the quicker I lose faith in whatever retarded institution taught you everything you know," I said as I withdrew my Magic and ended the lightshow spectacle taking place around me.

"First you spew a bunch of garbage claiming that Mages are the superior Class. And now, after I manage to get you to see the light and understand that other Classes can be just as good, if not better, depending on the person, you think that trying to learn and master all the Skills you come across is better than specializing," I shook my head. "Really… Do I have to teach you something so simple?"

"Wh— Now, I know you're definitely bullshiting me!" I angrily said, "You… I… My father is a combat mage!" He finally managed to squeak out as his voice cracked, presumably from being so aggravated, "He didn't need to limit himself so stupidly to just one or two types of Magic. He is a master capable of performing Tier 6 Fire, Earth, Darkness, Death, and Lightning Magic!"

"Is that it?" I nearly laughed.

"Is that not enough for you?!" His face flushed from all the blood rushing to his head.

"No!" I yelled at him for his naivety and insolence, "That's not enough, at least, not according to your stupid reasoning! I mean, why stop at learning only six types of Magic? Why didn't he learn ten? Twelve? Hell, even twenty?! How is it that your glorious—" the sarcasm practically dripped from my tone through the Transmission Spell, "—father can't compare to me when it comes to something basic like, I don't know… Water Magic?"

"You— I— Ah!" His frustration seemed to peak as he foolishly decided to swing his sword at a tree to his immediate right.

Thunk…

"Damn it all!" His sword barely went an inch in and the equal and opposite force of his strike probably fractured his wrist.

Ah, crap. Now, he's crying and it makes me feel somewhat bad.

Even if he has been mostly an annoying burden that's been taking away my ability to kill and eat my way through speedrunning my ascension to power. It seems I've grown slightly attached to him after saving his ass no less than a hundred times over the past week or so since we met. Kind of like how a human would grow attached to caring for a harmless pet like a rabbit after a while; only my pet rabbit, is a teenage human with severe cognitive impairment when it comes to keeping his attitude in check and having a wider perspective.

"Come on, man," I flew over to him and gave him a 'gentle' pat on the back to shock him out of his funk as I said, "I'm only saying all this for your future well-being. Sure, I could've maybe said it less 'harshly,' but you can take the criticism; I know you can. You're not stupid," I almost broke into a laugh, but managed to pull myself together to say, "You're just misguided."

I mean, I wasn't lying. Everything I said, I believed to be true. Darius really couldn't be called stupid, idiotic, or any other version of insult. He also wasn't as incompetent as I first thought him to be, if his week's progress into learning most if not all the Warrior Class' foundation Skills and using them effectively against E to D Ranked Monsters — under my supervision, of course — was anything to go by—

"Whatever..." He sullenly said.

—Though, after putting everything I learned was good about him aside, he was still a childish brat most of the time; even if it probably was due to his snobbish upbringing, growing up in the royal family, or whatever.

...

A day and a half passed before we finally made it to the border between the Black Swamp and the Littleroot Forest. Finally, I had upheld my end of our deal, even if I could have left at any point after Darius had taught me the Transmission Spell.

"So this is it, huh?" Darius asked with a sigh. It had to be noted that for as easy as he was to anger, he was just as quick to forgive and forget. The dozens of times I'd healed him during our time together also might have helped restore some of his goodwill towards me.

"I guess so," I said before my eyes narrowed solemnly. "Just, remember what we've talked about. I remember you mentioned your exile to the Black Swamp was a final chance given to you by your former family, but by now, it should be clear that they obviously intended for you to die."

"They simply couldn't have predicted that a friendly Tamed Eaglet like you would go out of your way to help me," he mock said, repeating what I would have said as I told him my thoughts on the matter time and time again.

"Yeah, I get it," He sadly smiled, "I won't go back home to Violeteast City. I might have, if I'd managed to get through the Black Swamp alone and through some miracle managed to cure my birth defect. But now… Even if I ignored all the reasons you gave for me to not return, I can't say I'd have the thick skin to return with non-Mage Greater E Rank Skills."

"Yeah, well… Good luck," I said to him before turning around and taking off.

Before I could fly off back to my hunting grounds, Darius shouted at me, "Hopefully, we'll meet again one day!" His voice was getting quieter as I heard him say, "And thanks for giving me all these D Ranked Monster Cores! It probably won't be hard to change my identity with—"

Yeah, yeah. I rolled my eyes as I burst with silver splendor. By now, my Empower Spell had reached Lvl 5 and with a single Tier 1 cast, I would gain a ridiculous +15 Speed that lasted for a good five minutes.

Babysitting Darius as we crossed hundreds of kilometers through the Black Swamp might have been suboptimal for my growth, but that still meant that I was mostly responsible for killing the majority of Monsters that crossed our path; and that meant I'd still managed to level up twice and improve all of the Skills I actively trained.

Though, now that I'd been freed from my promise to take care of the unfortunate man and could now go on an all-out slaughterfest… I'm ashamed to admit that I lost myself to the thrill as my previously waning excitement skyrocketed.

As a self-aware Level 9 Eaglet, with a myriad of Magical Spells and Skills at my disposal, it really shouldn't have come as a surprise when I managed to Level Up to my Level Cap before night fell on the very same day Darius and I separated.

For as disheartened as I should have been to see Darius go, I couldn't bring myself to be anything less than positively thrilled to get one step closer to my ever-distant goal. Another evolution meant I'd be one step closer to absolute power. But, more importantly, it meant I'd soon instantly grow significantly more powerful — relatively speaking — after taking a quick nap, and that was actually what I was most looking forward to.

After all, if traveling with Darius had taught me anything, it was the value in changing things up. I realized, as I searched the skies over the Black Swamp for a place to undergo my next evolution, that the reason I had started to grow, well… maybe not bored, but, let's call it 'disillusioned' with Leveling Up, was because I never went out of my comfort zone and simply repeated what I knew would eventually bring about my inevitable rise.

Sure, it wasn't exactly fun or thrilling, having to take care of a fragile human like Darius when he was still around. But his mere presence made things a challenge for me, whenever we faced a relatively high-ranked monster. I couldn't just rely on hit-and-run assassinations, or fly away whenever I wanted; that might as would have guaranteed Darius' death.

It was dangerous. It was hard. But in the end, even if it was slowly turning me into the battle maniac I once thought I'd never empathize with, the concept of a challenge made my life more fulfilling.

Maybe I was growing insane after everything that had happened to me; being reincarnated into a Monster and living a Monster's life, might have done the trick. Or maybe there was something in my bloodline that encouraged me along this potentially cataclysmic path.

The only thing I could say for certain is that going forward, I'll probably take more risks if only to prevent the previous boredom that had been seeping into my life.