Jon’s Point of view…

After the rankings, Nicholas had told us that there would be a two day break before the Round 2 group battles. So after a long and exhausting day, the three of us returned to the inn.

“Alright everyone, we will meet at the tavern below for dinner by the 9th bell after mid-day. Make sure to not be very late or else I will start to eat myself and there may not be a lot left for you then”

Hearing this, both Krog and Hein straightened their postures into one resembling a salute performed by the knights at the royal palace.

Haha, they remind me of perfectly trained German Shepherd puppies! So cute! Hahaha.

…

Back in my room, I took out Erebus.

‘So you can finally hear me?’

‘..’

Although there was no response, I knew it could. During the final battle, although I tried, I couldn’t stop all the needles. However, just before they reached my skin, they would slow down for a millisecond, enough for me to reposition myself to better deflect them. Noticing this phenomenon, I invoked mana vision and the I saw it. Erebus was covering my entire body, and when the needle got close, it would concentrate more of its mass there, effectively increasing the mana density in front of the needle, causing it to slow down, ever-so slightly.

‘So you will protect me? Or is it that you want this’

Thinking this, I removed one of the needles I had stolen from the stage. Erebus instantly reacted by leaping towards to needles. After a second, it jumped off the needle, back onto my shoulder, leaving a poison-less needle. I also noticed that it had grown slightly larger. With this, I know that it can eat mana poison and grow, it can also eat light mana and grow more in density. However, I need to test out one last thing.

Holding out my hand, I collected some of my mana in one and a needle in the other. This time, Erebus seemed a little confused and hesitated for almost 5 minutes before deciding to go for my mana. I then did some more experiments with it like collecting the external mana and my mana, etc.

My findings were that Erebus can eat almost all forms of mana, along with almost all forms of mana related materials, and all forms of poison. It prefers my mana the most, and the mana poison right after that. Then follows mana related materials and lastly follows external mana. It hates normal poisons, but it can use it to grow. I told it to eat some of the poison from the goblins’ spears, in exchange for 2 drops of my mana, and it gladly accommodated. I also learned that it can change form into something visible to the naked eye! Imagine the things I can do with that.

Anyway, it was about 7 pm, and it would take another 2 hours before dinner. So I decided to put all my efforts into forming my new spell. This one will definitely break the barrier of level-2!

…

After an hour of gruelling trial and error for the spell, I think I have got the final outcome! With this, some very irritating opponents can be dealt with!

I took Erebus with be and went to Krog’s room, followed by Hein, who were both delighted to hear that we would be having an early dinner.

After checking on Shem once more, we went down for a hearty dinner!

“Dinner!!” screamed Krog

“Bwa Bwa! Bwo poulb fry pfum off bish Bon!” muttered Hein with a mouth full of deliciously juicy and tender medium rare chicken breast.

[SM: Praise the almighty Mister Chef]

…

While we were sitting on the table, trying to digest the exorbitant amount of food we inhaled, Krog spotted something under the table, roaming around my legs.

“He Jon…What is that?”

“Oh this? This is Erebus.” I said as I lifted up Erebus in his new form, an all-black Rottweiler, “He’ll be going along with us on our adventures!”