Taking Out The Trash

After advancing to rank 5 of the hollow core stage Caxon opened his eyes as he stood up and stretched. As Caxon had finished Amon quickly returned to his shadow since protecting was no longer needed.

'Amon did you look for evidence of bandits like I asked?'

'Yes, young master there is a corpse of a man not too far from here that I believe could have been a victim of bandits.'

'Good take me there.'

After progressing to the fifth rank Caxon's current goal was to hunt down bandits. However, he was not doing this to be a hero. He simply remembered how much money he had found on the only bandit he killed and hoped he could make more by finding a base or just by finding more bandits.

Amon also suggested to use this time as additional training as they could easily find bandits who used different weapons, or fighting styles so Caxon would be more prepared in the future.

Amon also guaranteed that even if Caxon was caught off guard of made a mistake as the bandit wasn't above a bronze rank 3 Caxon would still be perfectly safe.

Caxon soon found a corpse of an old man with a long slash across his chest. His pockets were turned inside out and his shirt was torn apart. This man was clearly looted after he died and the wound seemed to be from a sword or blade of some kind, all signs pointed towards bandits.

Caxon continued to scout the area until he saw two men in hooded cloaks walking through the woods. Both of these men were rank 5 hollow cores and one of them had a sword with blood still dripping from the end of it.

As he got closer Caxon could hear the men talking.

"Another useless catch he barely had anything on him."

"I know but captain has put up really tough demands lately, if we don't get enough, he will say that we are stealing from him and kill us. I heard that the big boss has been threatening to send someone to take over for him and that's why he is so on edge."

"Well maybe the big boss wil..."

As the two bandits were talking one of them was suddenly cut off as a sword was thrust through his chest. The other bandit leaped back in shock as he drew his weapon.

"WHAT, a rank 4 kid thinks that he can start a fight huh. You don't know what you got yourself into."

The second bandit sneered at Caxon as he started his attack.

The bandit was still much slower then Caxon and his sword skills were not as good. However, Caxon noticed that they were more random since his technique was so much less refined than Amon's. Seeing this Caxon ignored any opportunity he had to counter attack and end the fight and simply defended against the bandit.

After a while the bandit noticed that Caxon was playing with him, as he shouted in rage and charged at Caxon ignoring his defenses. It was at this moment that his eyes expanded in shock.

As Caxon had felt like he practiced enough he summoned a small fireball and threw it at the bandit.

"WAIT HOW ARE YOU A RANK 5?"

This was the last thing the bandit said as after he was distracted by the fire Caxon quickly followed up ending his life.

'As I thought using elements and keeping my perfect mimicry will be very challenging. However, my mana control is increasing every time my mana core is improved so if I can't do it now, I definitely will be able to eventually.'

Caxon did not forget to loot the bandits before he continued his hunt. Unfortunately, Amon could not carry a sword so Caxon was forced to carry two, however they now used the bandits' swords which were much better in quality then the kobold weapons.

A week soon passed with Caxon's daytimes being spent hunting down bandits adapting to their styles and trying to use elements with mimicry. At night Caxon would spend a little time reviewing what he learned about the sword with Amon before improving his mana core and elemental comprehension.

Most of the bandits had at least a few coins on them some silver mostly copper, however he had gained 1 gold coin from one of the bandits. Most of the bandits also had some food on them so Caxon did not have to waste time hunting for food himself.

Every night Caxon would also summon Silver to hunt down forest creatures and eat them to improve his strength even more. Through this Caxon had learned that mana beast grows much slower consuming weaker beasts then themselves and since almost all the creatures in this part of the forest did not have a beast core Silvers growth was very slow.

At this moment Caxon was sitting in a tree looking at a campsite with tents surrounding a big fire and men walking around constantly.

'Amon what do you think?'

'As I have said I should be able to defeat the Bronze rank 3 everyone calls "Captain". However, it will not be very quick and I fear for your ability to hold off all of the other bandits in the area. If my fight takes too long you will be at a very high risk of being surrounded and if that happens there will be no escape.'

'Why can't you just do that shadow thing and kill the captain instantly?'

'Young master since my strength is only at the Hollow core stage a Bronze stage will have much better control over mana then me. Even with the shadow element he will be able to notice the change in mana and either stop it or at the very least block it before it does any harm. If he was at bronze rank 1, I may stand a chance but the difference between rank 10 of Hollow core and rank 3 of bronze stage is much more vast then you think. You will understand when you try to reach the next stage, changing your mana core stage is much harder than changing your core's rank. That is why most of the people in this world never become a bronze stage even, improving in the hollow core is a waste of their time.'

'Fine I will cultivate until I am a rank 6 and then we will pick off as many as we can from the shadows before making our real attack.'

With this Caxon moved away from the bandit camp before he started to improve his mana core. He relaxed on his training in all other areas to build his raw strength as that would help him much more in the coming fight.