The journey on the sea was new for Kurono while Shiro had some experience with sea travel. They used the map to travel away to the Pandora continent while avoiding dangerous regions as it was clearly marked on the map that some areas were territories of powerful monsters of the deep like the Leviathan and the Kraken.

It took them two days to arrive in Pandora away from any big city. They ate fish caught from the water and drank water after purifying it using magic.

Over the course of the journey, Shirou managed to fully deploy his UBW and remade some of his legendary weapons for instant usage.

The duo got to know each other especially since they were stuck together for who knows how long. In the two days, Shirou saw Kurono's magic and understand where he stood.

Kurono was physical stronger than Shirou because of the experiments but his reinforcement magic was very rough so he was on the same level as Shirou.

He didn't know any powerful spells and directly utilized the magical energy in a rough manner. Watching Shirou, he had been able to shape darkness into different kinds of weapons and armors but it lacked the magical affects of those weapons.

It was unfortunate but Shirou couldn't help him since he was also not an expert. Regardless, both of them grew stronger in those two days.

Kurono was mesmerized by the UBW and decided to make his own domain that allowed ease of combat. It wasn't anything special, just letting his darkness spread and then control it in the area.

But the biggest change for Kurono was the knowledge on how a rail gun worked and its blue prints. One of Shirou's low mana but high attack point method was utilizing a rail gun.

Kurono use his modern world knowledge to attack with dark bullets like they were being shot by a gun, canon or an anti-tank rifle.

With this his attack power was increased by a factor though he was unable to produce the optimum level because of the lack of lightning and the dark magic being unable to replicate the affect properly with its rough application.

He would need more practice with the magic to get it right.

Other than rail gun, he also got the drilling spear and chainsaw blade.

Along with the offence, now Kurono could cover himself up in armor made from his dark magic. It increased his defense a lot since it was made to look like an actual armor with the proper details from Shirou.

In these two days, Shirou helped Kurono polish his fighting style and magic usage. He was able to do more damage, take less damage and even perform surprise attacks on people by boosting himself at the right moments by unleashing mana bursts.

On the other hand, Shirou was able to polish his mana and increase his reserves as the world was filled with it.

He also learned about the normal system of this world from Kurono's rudimentary knowledge that was given to him and by observing his performance.

The magicians of this world would interact with the mana of the world and absorb the energy into their body, polish it, let it flow through their veins like he used to do and finally form rings around their heart.

It was process that took time and each ring represented another level of difficulty that could lead to death. With each increase in the ring, the mage had access to more mana, the body's life force increased and it became more powerful.

The affect was less pronounced for those who didn't train their bodies.

Magic warriors and Knights utilized the mana to surpass the level of humanity in physical strength, using mana in a similar manner to Kurono.

Understanding the process after watching Kurono go through it for a time, Shirou decided to test it out once they arrived at their destination.

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Arriving on Pandora, the duo landed in an area way from the port town of Daidalos as they needed some rest and didn't want to get involved with anyone at the moment.

That port town also held people from the Holy Empire so it was bad news for them.

Shirou looked around the area where they were and it was a forest away from any city or village. Picking up the ship, he put it inside the forest just in case.

It would have been destroyed by the waves if left unattended.

The action attracted the monsters in the vicinity but the duo was ready to rumble. They were dressed in their combat clothes they had brought at the Port town, the light armor, chain mail and normal swords.

"Kurono take care of them. I want to see your real fighting skills." Shirou muttered calmly as he focused on his surroundings. They were near a cliff from where they came from and in front of them were goblins riders and a hobgoblin.

The monsters were armed with crude weapons except for the Hobgoblin who was their leader. None of them seem to show any level of higher intelligence and showed desire to kill them.

With one look at the duo, the beasts charged at them seeing that there was no threat.

Kurono heard his words and raised his sword at the incoming enemies, and unleashed his bullets. The bullet shower was much stronger than before with the proper knowledge and it pierced the monster easily.

With the charging enemies done, Kurono locked onto the leader and used the anti-tank shot. The attack hit the target on the chest, leaving a large hole.

Shirou could see that Kurono showed no hesitation in his actions, they were smooth and natural.

The enemy was also too weak.

"How was it?" Kurono asked, he was curious about his opinion.

"Very good but we need better opponents. For now, let's rest and then we will find a city or village." Shirou replied as the map didn't have any more information since the humans from Arc Continent had yet to explore Pandora while the Pandora citizens didn't share the map with them.

Pandora used to be ruled by the great demon king in old time but now it was broken into multiple Kingdoms. There were also places that were completely wild so there was no actual map of the current Pandora, but only broken pieces of it made by different Kingdoms.

"Can I fight that assassin that you fought off?" Kurono nodded as Shirou used his magic to throw the corpses over the cliff.

"No, she is too strong for you and too fast for you to keep up. My magic was messing up with her magic or her magic would have messed up my mind and body. Lastly, she was in plain sight so it wasn't good for her. Even those guys that came for us at the start would give you trouble one on one." Shirou said without sugar coating his words and walked away from the area of the massacre as the blood would attract the beasts.

Erasing their presence, Shirou and Kurono walked away from their arrival point while Kurono thought about his words.

The fight had seemed so simple that he had failed to realize that the fighters were using magic for combat.

He had fought Shirou on the ship and forgotten that Shirou was reducing his speed for his sake.

In the past such a thing wouldn't concern him but now Kurono didn't like the idea of this weakness. His enemies were the White Sacrament and they had Apostles that stood at the top.

His enemies were great in power and numbers while he was just a weakling that couldn't even defeat some hunters.

How could he avenge all the people that died from these experiments? How could he get vengeance for the suffering he endured?

Kurono remembered those things very clearly and used them to push himself away from complacency. He wanted power and he had been focusing on increasing the rings while bettering his usage.

But from the info they had received, it was impossible for anyone to normally arrive at the level of an Apostle.

He needed another way. He needed a weapon. He needed armor. He needed knowledge. He needed a team. He needed a blessing from another immortal to combat these savages.

On Pandora, there were shrines of other immortal beings and people could be granted favor if they were accepted.

Kurono had already planned on trying it out to increase his prowess while Shirou also wanted to check it out and see if it could help them get back home, or provide him with an increase in power.

After some distance, the duo stopped and sat on the trees. Kurono thought about his plans, he could follow Shirou who would get involved with the Empire regardless of their actions towards him or live peacefully in some village.

He was just an average school boy before so the option of peace was very attractive for a moment but the rage was still within so Kurono had already decided to follow Shirou.

But before that he wanted to grow in power as he was a burden, so he intended to let Shirou do his thing and find him later.

On the other hand, Shirou was meditating and communicating with the mana following the method of this world.

They rested for two hours and fifteen minutes, the time it took Shirou to form the first ring around his heart.

His previous experience with using the veins as mana pathways helped him through the process and with the ring around his heart Shirou could feel that his mana prowess had increased slightly along with his body.

He was already above human level after his one year of training but this increased his base strength again.

"Let's go." Shirou opened his eyes and let out a heavy breath before jumping down from the tree to continue their journey into the unknown region.

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A.N Hope you enjoyed and comment