After finishing dealing with the boar’s materials the two ate stew along with their beasts. This time it was Noel who made it, Owari was terrible at cooking. The boar had a metal affinity, unfortunately it had faced a mid and high silver ranked magical beast pair so it died before it could do anything. Owari stuffed its hide and tusks inside his pack. Metal element hide and leather was valuable since it was as tough as steel and as maneuverable as leather. Owari himself didn’t wear armor but most people did. Even Noel had a combat vest and sturdy pants on.

The next day came and it was time to do some spelunking. Or it would be if they found some open caves that went into the mountainside. After some looking they ended up leaving the forest. It was unfortunate but the forest was empty of any viable caves. Unfortunately it was not as safe out in the open cliffside of the mountain. They ended up having to carefully climb in some spots. In other spots they sidled along thin strips of rock. Sometimes they had to walk up steep hills.

Over the day they traveled quite far, and Owari got good looks across the area and was able to make some good maps. They ran into half a dozen cave entrances, however none were promising. Some went decently far, but they didn’t have the right rock types for what he was looking for. By the end of the day they found nothing and ended up doubling back a bit to stay inside one of the more shallow caves.

The next day the two woke up and made their way around once again. It wasn’t until about one in the afternoon that something happened. Unfortunately it was anything but good. As they were climbing up a rather steep cliff Owari suddenly reacted. Despite being 20 meters off the ground Owari jumped over and grabbed Noel suddenly before kicking off the cliff wall and out into the open air.

Noel had felt something wrong as well but had been less decisive than Owair in reacting. As they free-fell through the air a wave of flame spewed across their previous location as a drake flew over at high speed. It then swerved up and missed the cliff wall in a masterful maneuver.

As they fell through the air Owari used the phantom step lowering his weight and making himself more floaty. Noel on the other hand remained the same weight. By the time the drake had come back around Owari had already landed. As he did he grabbed Noel tightly to his chest and awkwardly rolled to kill the momentum. After that he released her and let her stand at his side.

“What’s a drake doing over here?” Noel was shocked.

“It’s got a rider.” Owari answered as the drake flew down and landed in front of them.

A man jumped off and landed next to the drake. He was dressed in scale-like armor, probably made from scales shed from the drake. He had brown hair, and was rather fair-skinned. He radiated an aura of charisma and nobility. It was probably because of the drake by his side. “So you’re the one causing trouble. It was a pain keeping tabs on you for so long. For an independent hunter you sure have a lot of free time.” The man scowled.

“So did I kill someone or something you care about or is this random violence?” Owari asked curiously, not at all seeming afraid.

“I’m from the Howling Wulf Agency. I’m here to deal with what those before me were too incapable to do.” He sneered at Owari. As if he was sure Owari’s calmness was faked.

“Oh I see.” Owari answered with boredom clear in his voice. “Which one do you want to take?” He asked Noel.

“I’ll take the drake, you’re better at dealing with people.” Noel answered a bit awkwardly. She’d prefer not to fight the drake, but she wasn’t keen on killing people even if she was able to handle it now.

“Alright.” Owari nodded.

“Don’t talk as if I’m not here. Trash like you-” Before he could finish Owari used phantom step to rush him while pulling out his sword. “The hell?” The man suddenly changed expressions as he pulled a claymore from his back and blocked Owari’s strike.

“No talking. Only dogs bark when it’s time to fight.” Owari smiled viciously as he pulled his sword back and stepped forward, slashing again.

“Who’s a dog?!” The man was enraged and ordered his drake to attack.

As his drake opened its mouth and prepared to bite down on Owari it got a rude awakening. Noel jumped and created two sonic booms as she flew into the air and then towards its face. She pulled her arm back and sent a haymaker straight into its face. Her hand flashed brown as she smashed the drake, before it was knocked away a sonic boom rang out and smashed the drake with another equally powerful strike doubling the force behind her attack.

The drake’s head snapped to the side and it missed completely. Before it could recover she shot towards it once again and hit it with a flying kick in the chest sending it reeling back as she jumped back and landed after doing a backflip to reorient herself. After that she entered a solid stance and punched once again sending out a wave of force and pushing the unstable drake back even further slamming it into the cliff wall.

Meanwhile Owari swung his blade at the man over and over. The man on the other hand blocked strike after strike slowly calming down and getting into the groove of the fight. He was slightly afraid of the fervor Owari showed but otherwise he was more skilled so he wasn’t on the losing side.

The man suddenly kneed Owari in the gut in a moment between swings. Then he elbowed Owari in the face sending him stumbling back, however to the man’s shock he barely saw a blade coming at his face in time to tilt his head. The sword swing managed to cut his face. As he looked up he saw Owari resetting his nose with a smile. Clearly he took the hit for a chance to hit his opponent.

The man jumped forward, twirling his sword as he swung his sword down in a single fluid motion. The sword erupted into flames as it came down. Owari entered a sword draw stance and swung up to meet his opponents strike as his blade was enveloped in silver winds. The two clashed and mixed, the silver wind and red flames combined and as the sword clashed canceled one another out exploding into bit and flying in all direction cutting both of them up.

The man stapped back subconsciously to dodge, however Owari ignored the sharp and hot energy and stepped forward stabbing his sword and the man’s face. He managed to use his sword to parry Owari’s attack. After that he rotated his sword and swung down from above as his sword burst into flames again. Owari however spun in place using the momentum of the parry and sidestepped the attack while swinging out himself. The man ducked under the strike only to find another one coming from the other direction.

He parried this strike only to find a third equally powerful attack fly at him from the other direction. He blocked this time, stopping Owari’s sword dead in its tracks. Owari however wasn’t deterred and instead he used the phantom step to retreat. As the man prepared to take a breather however Owari used phantom step again to re-engage on his own terms.

The man smiled a bit forcefully as he swung his sword in a horizontal arc causing flames to erupt and fly at Owari. Owari flipped his body around and flew upside down under the arc of flames and swung his sword at the man’s ankles. He barely managed to stab his sword into the ground in time to block the attack. Owari then kicked the ground and entered a handstand and kneed the man in the chest in one swift motion before kicking him in the face.

The man held his face and pulled his sword out of the ground. As he opened his eyes he saw Owari was gone. A moment later he raised his sword above his head as Owari did a front flip and clashed blades with him. However Owari was using the screeching wing and the sharp silver wind cut into the man’s blade and dispersed into sharp shrapnel like wind that cut into the man who barely turned his head in time to avoid a fatal shot on instinct.

Owari didn’t stop there and pulled his sword away to stab once again. As he did the man ignored the attack and raised his sword to swing down. It was as if he was resolved to die with Owari. However the truth was revealed as he stepped back while continuing his strike. He managed to slash Owari down from his right shoulder to his mid chest. However Owari ignored the injury and stabbed the man straight in the eye. It didn’t reach far enough to kill, but it had taken out half his sight.

Owari ignored his wound and rushed in again. The man swung his sword in a half panic, however Owari ducked under it and swung his sword at the man’s chest. He ignored Owari’s sword thinking his armor would protect him from such a flimsy blade. This was a mistake. Owari swung using the moth wing strike and sliced into the man’s armor deep enough to hit the man’s shoulder and sliced into him to the bone.

The man punched at Owari with his fist, however Owari sidestepped this simplistic and straightforward attack. He was reading his opponent and learning. As he dodged he kneed the man in the stomach and backed off. After that he used the screeching wing to fire off some silver wind at the man. His only response was to swing his sword using his flame arc having the two collide close to him.

The two energies mixed and exploded causing hot shrapnel like wind to shoot out, most of which hit the man splitting open various parts of his body. Some even pierced his gut causing internal damage. Before he could do anything about it however, Owari was already in front of him. Based on the cuts and blood covering his clothing he had definitely taken hits to approach so soon. The man was terrified by Owari’s dedication to killing him and the risks he took.

Looking at the smile on Owari’s face he realized Owari enjoyed this far more than he originally assumed. It was like he didn’t care what happened, as long as he fought he was having a blast. Owari ignored the man’s thoughts and swung his sword as normal. The man intercepted the attack only to spew out blood from his mouth as his stomach filled up with the liquid.

Before he could find a way to recover, Owari swung again causing him to have to block again. This continued for a few more swings when suddenly the man screamed and flexed all the muscles he could. Fire enveloped him suddenly and blasted outward in an explosion. Owari was barely able to place his arms in front of his face, activating his mud affinity and was sent flying. He skidded across the ground and forcefully stopped himself. His left arm was burnt in a few places, however on his forearm was a metallic arm guard that protected it from being too damaged, though the same wasn’t true for his haori.

The man wasn’t really doing well either. That technique was clearly not something he had full control over as he also sported some burns. However the worst of it was his internals. After having moved so violently he vomited blood and collapsed in a heap where he occasionally twitched. He was on his last leg. Owari looked over to see how Noel was doing at this point.

She had smashed the drake into the wall and collapsed a large amount of the cliff onto it. After that she had climbed on its back and pounded its neck and head over and over keeping it from aiming its firebreath at her. In the end it wasn’t dying but it also couldn’t do anything to hurt her. It was an endurance match, but Noel was losing. She didn’t have the endurance to do this much longer. However she smiled as soon as she realized Owari was done with his match.

She crossed her arms and a drone rang out for a moment before she spread her arms suddenly causing a massive shockwave to blast the drakes head causing it to swivel and its neck to snap with a crack killing it instantly. After that she jumped down and wiped her brow of sweat before walking over to Owari.

“Geez, why did you go and get yourself hurt like that? Couldn’t you win without injuring yourself for once?” She came over and inspected his injuries with a sigh.

“You’re the one who stalled so I could fight him. When did you get so strong?” He was curious. That drake was low gold level.

“I’ve been practicing my basics. I figured out how to maximize the force my body can exert and use it to effectively enhance my shockwaves.” Noel didn’t go into detail, but Owari guessed it was similar to his full strength moth wing strike.

“Well either way congratulations on reaching low gold rank.” Owari genuinely congratulated her.

“Same to you. That guy was definitely gold ranked.” Noel could tell because the drake listened to him to some degree.

“Let’s worry about that later. Go get the medkit from wherever it landed. I’ll dismantle this drake. Should sell for a decent amount and act as our proof of rank.” Owari got to work cutting it up as soon as he finished talking, after taking some blood clotting medicine of course.

Noel hurried to find the medical kit and soon enough Owari was dressing his wounds. Due to his preparations he had some burn cream and a number of bandages and patches for his wounds so he could cover up all his wounds. There was one wound though that was too bad for just patches. Owari pulled out the needle and the specialized stitching that he bought and slowly sewed up the wound.

“How are you staying so calm with a wound like that?” Noel couldn’t help but ask. Owari was already clearly faint from blood loss. If not for the mud affinity he got from Fang and his earth affinity from eating so many beasts, he would probably be dead.

“Panicking won’t save my life. Neither would flinching from the pain. I just do what it takes to maximize my chance to live.” Owari shrugged as he finished up.

“I hope you don’t plan to keep fighting like that with little regard for your life.” Noel grumbled.

“You were the one who let me fight so long. Besides I only did that to improve. Now I know how people with skill react to my movements more accurately and can shift my combat style between human enemies and beast enemies.” Owari had been testing the waters of combat with other people.

“Well you looked like you were having fun. I also wanted to practice my new technique to get a feel for it.” Noel wasn’t much different from Owari, she just put her body at risk less than he did.

“Well I’m glad everything worked out. That should mean we are both gold rank now I guess.” Owari considered it, he wanted to say he wasn’t because he could only win by being heavily injured. But his enemy was the same. He was heavily injured as well so even if he did win he wouldn’t have been better off than Owari.

“What should we do with all this material? It would be a shame to let it go to waste.” Noel looked at it regretfully.

“Things like this are why we have a large cage for Fang. We can put as much as possible in there with him for the car ride back., It’ll be a pain backtracking though so I’ll leave it to Fang. He can drag it all back with his mud tunnels.” Owari gave Fang the orders, which he dutifully complied with. After all, it was good training for his abilities.

The two got back on track and continued to look for their goal. Although Noel wanted to stop and go back so Owari could heal up first, he denied her. It was a long trip here and back and wasn’t worth doing. He just left the defense and offense up to her and did his work. Only occasionally would he use the screeching wing to provide aid at key moments.

The day came and went and the next day was actually another eventful day for two reasons. First was that they found a mine, it wasn’t abundant by any means. But after some tests Owari determined it was pretty good for the location. He was hoping he could find some more veins and that it was a large vein of lower quality. As for the second thing to happen, they ran into a large car-sized pangolin. As for why this was eventful, it was because it was high silver ranked and Owari recognized it. Only because its traits were similar to another smaller species nearby though.

“It should either be a mutant or a different but closely related species.” Owari stated as he observed the beast's habits. “Definitely has a force affinity.” Owari determined. “It should be good for you since it is closely associated with kinetic energy. It’s more precise but has less defensive options. It would be a good replacement for your offensive moves to increase the power.” Owari explained.

“Then I could focus my kinetic affinity on defensive options. I spend a lot of mana to increase my offensive powers. Alright, I might as well try it.” Noel jumped down from the cliff edge and used her kinetic affinity to create a small burst under her foot to slow her fall.

As soon as this occurred the pangolin seemed to notice her presence. It looked her way and raised its face a bit to sniff. After confirming what it wanted, it curled into a ball. After that it just waited. Noel was a bit surprised by this. She walked over carefully but it showed no signs of reacting. When she reached it she extended a hand to try and brand it when suddenly her hand was stopped. The more she pushed the more her hand was pushed back. Her progress was slowed to a halt. Not one to be outdone, her competitive nature flared up and she began to burn mana as she activated her affinity and pushed forward further.

Eventually she reached the scales of the pangolin and touched them leaving her brand. When the brand connected them she was surprised to find no resistance and soon the connection was established. As soon as this occurred it unfurled and looked at her curiously.

“Well that was easy.” Owari said as he approached.

“It seems to be quite docile, she likes me because I have the kinetic affinity. She was also slightly afraid because I could touch her. She was afraid I could hurt her if I put in the effort so she decided to let me tame her.” Noel explained.

“Well there’s no reason to complain about taming being easier.” Owari preferred this over what he had to go through for Mirra.

“Unfortunately it’s diet is quite picky and it mainly eats some large ant type insects in this area. That means I’ll have to leave it here to ensure it doesn’t starve. We also don’t have room for it.” She seemed disappointed.

“Soon enough people might be moving in. If you want we can have this space declared as a safe zone that isn’t to be touched. There doesn’t seem to be any gems in this area anyway.” Owari knew it would be a pain to find another location with large ant type magical beasts on short notice.

“Alright. In the future we can always find another source of food for it. It isn’t like ants is all it can eat. Just that the ants in this area are convenient.” Noel was already considering what to do about it.

“Well for now let’s keep moving. We'll only explore the area outside of the ants and pangolin’s territory.” Owari declared as the two of them went back to searching.

It was two days later when they finally found something else of note. Just like Owari hoped, there was a large deposit of marble. He couldn’t see it all, but inside a cliff face half of it was marble. Owari had Fang who had returned the day before dig into the wall away from the marble and confirmed it was quite wide. He couldn’t be sure of the depth, but it looked promising. He marked down the location on a map and the two of them continued their work.

The same day they found the marble they headed back to the car. Owari had removed his stitching and healed rather well by this point, but they still needed to get back to the city. There was supposedly a party held for geniuses at the end of january and if they hoped to make it they would have to leave shortly after returning to the city at this rate.

It took them one day to reach the car and another four to return back to the city. It was on the trip back that Noel finally couldn’t help but ask once they were in a safe setting. “What was with that guy who attacked us?”

“I killed a member of their agency, remember? They are just trying to get revenge.” Owari didn’t think it was too complicated.

“They’re going to keep escalating this.” Noel warned.

“That’s fine. As long as they escalate it at this pace they’ll only help me become stronger.” Owari chuckled.

“I could always tell my grandfather what happened. He would probably be really mad at the Howling Wulf Agency for attacking me.” Noel suggested.

“He’d be even more mad at me for endangering you due to my own personal grudges.” Owari shook his head.

“The Silverblood family always aids those in danger. Even more so the people we are close to. He wouldn’t blame you for this. He would be more likely to be proud I stepped in to help.” Noel assured him.

After some thought Owari finally responded. “It’s a toss-up, he may brush it off and do what you expect. Or he could use this chance to make me owe him a favor.” Owari drummed his fingers on the armrest. A habit he picked up whenever he thought seriously.

“I’m more likely to believe he will do the right thing.” Noel stood up for her grandfather.

“It’s your decision to make. Do whatever you feel like. After all it was you who was inconvenienced because of my personal grudges.” Owari shrugged.

“This is an important decision though.” Noel couldn’t help but ask for Owari’s opinion. After all this could significantly affect his relationship with her family.

“I don’t know your grandfather as well as you do so I can’t say much. All I know is from what little I have dealt with him he has dismissed me for the most part.” Owari didn’t have a great first impression of her grandfather. “It’s you who he likes so if you want to appeal to him you would know how to best do it. At the end of the day it’s true that my personal problems put you at risk.”

“Your problems are my problems.” Noel said with finality.

“Tell that to your grandfather.” Owari smiled.

“There’s no way that could go well.” Noel denied him. It wouldn’t be a great impression if the way he found out was because she got attacked with him. “I’ll just tell him that we both had gotten tangled up with the Howling Wulf Agency and now they are trying to kill us.”

“What if they deny having targeted you?” Owari fired back.

“They still attacked me. In the end hat’s all that matters. I’ll just imply that they had only targeted us just now. After all it’s not like they can admit to trying to kill you before this.” Noel smiled coldly.

“Perfect. Also tell your grandfather about the marble and gem mines. We should discuss how we’ll split it first and determine who we sell the rights to.” Noel agreed and soon talks began over the rights to the mines.