With the giants taken care of all normal operations could be resumed, so a day after the town had been attacked by the small tribe of mountain giants Mary and her team set out to complete their quest.

Enaril had joined them just as planned. After a few awkward hours, it became apparent he fit right in. He, like Mary Taimanu and Dehla wouldn't accept anything other than being the best. Like them he had plans to reach the leader ranks of the guild within the next two decades.

The quest would be an easy one. Mary made sure to pick a quest that was reasonably challenging while posing no real danger for them. They needed some action to work as a team and this would prove to be both challenging and safe enough to do so. They were hunting a lesser drake, something adventurers of their caliber had no problems with, hell they could kill a normal one by now. Of course a normal one wouldn't be any challenge, they were going after a plant variant, the most dangerous of the drakeling evolutions.

A week after leaving the academy in the direction of the mountains they finally arrived at the hunting grounds of the beast. Before they entered Mary thought it wise to plan ahead as the tale of the plantdrake that nearly killed her father was in the forefront of her mind.

“Alright, we are nearing its hunting grounds. I don't know how much you know about plant variants of monsters but they pose a far greater threat than even the evolved versions of the other variants. Has anyone of you ever fought a drake?”

“No.”

“That's good, because a plantdrake could very well be a different species. Unlike their brethren, they lack any weak points and like all plant monsters you have to destroy a certain percentage of their body's mass to kill them. Lesser variants reach up to twenty five meters in length and we will have to burn about a fifty percent of its mass to kill it. That will take a while.

Sadly, lightning and conventional weapons are nearly useless against them, a good thing is that Enaril will be able to upgrade his golem with its body as the plants they are made of are way more sturdy than what you have now.

It will most likely try a weaker version of the attack it would do when evolved, trying to drown us in plants while hiding behind the forest. Luckily it still lacks the power to completely do so, so our two wizards should be able to defend us while I will increase the power of Tai’s fire spells and Kaseo will try and cut off the legs of its body with force blades.”

“How will we find it?”

“Like we did with the spitting gibbon we will bait it to attack us. Trust me you will know once its attack starts. You all know what to do, let's go."

Only a few minutes after entering the normal hunting grounds of the beast Mary could spot it moving towards them. It was disconcerting really, how the monster had perfectly blended in the forest without moving.

“Incoming.” She warned her team.

The two wizards split up, one going to each side of them so they could wrestle the control of the plants from the monster. Like all plant monsters the monster moved slower than any of its other variants. Running would be pointless anyways, as even a slow walk was like sprinting to them due to its size.

It reached them soon enough, and the forest around them started to act up concerningly. Some trees even started to uproot themselves, moving to encase them. After the monster came in view, Mary started channeling certain parts of the air that would increase the power of any fire hitting the monster.

Taimanu started firing a steady stream of fire while Kaseo tried cutting off its limbs. Like she had hoped, the fire’s power was helped along by the air Mary gathered around the monster. The fight wouldn't be too hard, as the monster still lacked the control over plants their two wizards had so they could wrestle the plants out of the monster's control once they neared them. If they only had one wizard, the quest would have proven harder as Taimanu would need to burn some of the plants in defense and couldn't focus on solely attacking like she did now.

Suddenly Mary had an idea. As it was they would need about thirty minutes to destroy enough of its mass to kill it but perhaps she could do more than she thought if she used her new spell. While keeping up the spell for Taimanu Mary created a sphere of air which only contained the air that boosted burning. Afterwards she moved said sphere in one of the holes Taimanu had burned so far and used the spell to ignite a campfire to ignite its flesh.

And ignite it did, the monster's side literally exploded in an even bigger explosion than anticipated. A part of the monster just vanished, its flesh exploding with a loud boom. With her help, they managed to remove its limbs in no time and ten minutes after the fight started Mary and her team were looking down on the body of the lesser plant drake.

“I didn't know you were able to cast such a powerful fireball Mary, when did you learn it?” Taimanu asked excited as ever.

“The only fire spell I used was the one I use to ignite a campfire with. While we were coped up within the academy I developed a new spell that should work against masses of enemies and I adapted it a little just now. What you saw were the results.”

“That's quite the destructive spell, can you teach it to me?” Taimanu asked.

“Sure, but I will need some time to get the runes, I'm sure one of the teachers will be able to help us with that.”

While they had been talking, Enaril had already moved towards their kill. He had seen the beast fight and obviously liked the idea of upgrading the wood his golem was made out of, as he was already out of his old one and busy starting to raise a new one.

As it turned out he had to remove the monsters own mana out of its body first. Otherwise the monsters mana would interfere with his own and make it unresponsive. Luckily they had two wizards to spell things up. An hour later enough of the wood was free of mana so Enaril could begin his work while Galaan continued to remove the mana out of the rest. While the two elves were busying themselves with the corpse Mary and the rest set up their camp and extracted the monster core out of its head. With the apex predator of the surroundings gone the forest slowly returned to life.

Birds that had been silent for the most part started singing again and small game started returning to the area. Taimanu vanished for half an hour and returned with some small rabbits for them to eat. After the camp had been set up and the meat was cooking, Mary started to watch Enaril create his golem.

Creating constructs like that was something she had actually tried when she was a child only smaller and unsuccessful. Watching somebody who specialised in it was fascinating though. Her golems had always just been lumbs of one or several materials that moved only animated by her magic. It had been quite mana extensive so she gave up on it fairly early.

Watching the creation of an actual golem was impressive. The elf didn't just animate a lump of wood, he used his magic to form a working body with bones tendons and joints. Or a skeleton of a working body as he would used it as armor later on. Upon being asked, he told them the cost to move it would be cheaper when it was more lifelike, even if he sacrificed a little stability for it.

There was a second part why he could move with it as cheap as he could though, from what she managed to see in the battle, most of the movements were done by sheer strength so he only had to make sure the golem moved like he did without really animating it. That would reduce the manacost by quite a bit and would also explain his appearance.

Staying turned out to be the right decision as the elf needed a whole three hours to complete his new golem, they wouldn't have managed to get too much distance covered in the remaining daylight anyways.

“I think we should take as much of its body with us as possible, I'm sure most of the craftsmen in the academy would be glad if we did.” Mary said.

“And they would owe us a favor wouldn't they?”

“Yep, drake wood is quite expensive and I heard it’s quite sought after for weapons like bows or quarterstaffs for its ability to hold mana. We can also sell some of it if any of you need money.” She offered.

The quest would pay good enough but most people didn't have the support her father could offer so she always made sure her team was well off and could buy what they wanted by selling the rarer materials they gathered on their adventures.

“I know an enchanter that would probably enchant your golem if we gave him a good amount of wood as well.” Mary offered.

Having Enaril join them had several benefits apart from those she had initially thought about, with his golem being as big as it was he was able to carry more than the rest of them combined.

They arrived in the academy a week later. They sold half of the wood they brought with them to one of the merchants in the city. Seeing as the academy had a better supply of monster materials than any city of the same size quite a few enterprising merchants made it their home buying the excess materials from the students and selling it somewhere else. Her father had two merchants stationed here at all time as well, a fact she abused with glee for getting better rates than everyone else.

After selling what they wanted, they checked in with the guild, completing the quest and getting the reward. Mary took Enaril to Thoral after, intending to introduce the two.

“Hey Thoral, this is Enaril.” Mary introduced the two.

“Hello Mary, Enaril.” The dwarf greeted. “What can I do for you?”

“Not much for me, I only want a few new of my enchanted boxes with drake wood. You can do quite some things for Enaril though.”

“I don't have any drakewood.” He replied.

“That's no problem, we just killed one. I don't know if you heard about Enaril, but he has a particular style of fighting, and he in in dire need of some enchantments against fire.” She said.

“Oh, enlighten me.”

“Well, he sits in this huge wooden golem and hits things and I thought you would be interested in a trade. We have quite some drake wood from the last quest and you have skill as an enchanter. I thought you could enchant his new golem made out of drakewood and we supply you with some of the wood we gathered in exchange.”

“That certainly sounds like a trade I would be interested in, how big is the golem and how much wood do you have.” The dwarf asked, clearly interested in the trade. Understandable, plant drakes even lesser ones were a rare species and usually killed so fast that the students had no time to arrive there before other adventurers.