Escape

Killing intent flashed in her bloodshot eyes as she yelled furiously; questioning about the person responsible behind this incident. 

Given her vigilance, after experiencing this dreadful situation, first thing that appeared on her mind was betrayal. And since dead man hold no grudges, she didn't even suspect Lucius or others who had already died. 

Instead, she started suspecting her own allies. She felt like there was a mole in her circle. 

'Is it Leonard? Or is it Emma? It couldn't be any of those other guys who themselves weren't aware of my schemes. Perhaps is it, Rafaela?'

Several thoughts appeared in her mind as she contemplated about the culprit behind this incident. But no matter how hard she thought about it, she couldn't come up with an answer. 

With the competition coming to an end, she could only give up on her initial target Rafaela and put the blame on someone else. Plus, she also had sustained quite a lot of injuries which meant she would need some time to recuperate her injuries. 

And going after Rafaela in such situation would only put her in danger. 

As a wise man once said, "A person needs to know when to advance and when to retreat"

Given her condition, Seraphina although a bit hesitant still decided to abandon the mission and retreat, "We'll head back for now"

**** ****

Despite the throbbing ache in his muscles, due to the adrenaline coursing through his veins, Lucius kept on going as he blindly dashed through the treacherous labyrinth of danger. 

Even though he was unaware of his location and his destination, he still couldn't afford to slow down. But even so, he couldn't let his guard down and rush without any vigilance either.

While he may not be aware of his surrounding but he still needed to keep his guard up to avoid any living entity he could meet along the way. 

Right now, with his mana nearly depleted and given his tattered and exhausted state, he was one of the most easiest prey one could hope to encounter in this dense forest which reeked danger in every corner. 

Finally, after somewhile, as he depleted all his energy and could no longer bring himself to move forward, he halted his movement to take a moment of breather. 

With the moon casting an eerie glow through the canopy of trees above his head, Lucius found himself deep within the heart of a dense forest. Towering trees, gnarled branches reaching out like jagged fingers blocked out most of the moonlight, casting ominous shadows on the forest floor.

Still a little light is better than no light. At least he wouldn't be blinded completely and see to some extent where he was going. 

However given the dense vegetation around him, it was rather silent. And the only sound he could hear at the moment was the sound of his frantic breathes and the rustling of the leaves. 

One may find this eerie silence soothing and peaceful but not Lucius. He would rather prefer to hear sounds of beast or monsters in this dense forest than not hear anything at all. 

At least by hearing those sounds, he could determine the route to avoid. 

But now would anyone believe that a forest this dense doesn't house any monsters and beast in it? It's unlikely to happen. 

Thus, instead of feeling relieved, Lucius found this silence extremely unsettling and ominous. 

While stopping for a moment of breather, Lucius tried to recuperate as much energy as he could to keep on advancing forward. Who knows what kind of danger he would encounter if he sat there for a long time?

"System"

Lucius while trying to stabilize his breath called out the system. 

[Yes, how may I help you?]

The system replied. 

"How many blood points do I have right now?"

Recalling about the havoc he had caused a moment ago, Lucius asked.

Even though he might not have managed to kill each and every single one of them, still considering the sheer magnitude of the damage he had caused, he didn't believe that he wouldn't have killed at least ten of them. 

Ten was the least he was hoping for. And if he had even ten points, he would be able to summon a novice beast at the least. 

Right now, he had to use every arsenal present at his hands. 

[You currently possess 103 blood points]

Upon hearing the reply of the system, Lucius's eyes perked up as he felt quite shocked while finding out about the blood points he currently possessed. 

"103?"

Lucius abruptly parroted the number mentioned by the system.

[Yes]

The system affirmed nonchalantly; unbothered by his surprised reaction. 

Although he expected to have killed a lot in that explosion but he didn't expect the numbers to be this high. Afterall there weren't even that many people on the scene to begin with. 

Thus, he had no option but to ask the system about these strange phenomena, "Why is it so high?"

[The blood points you get are based on the opponents you kill]

[For example, if you kill a person higher than your level you will get more blood points as bonus. At the same time killing someone weaker than you grant you low blood points or may not even grant you any blood points at all]

The system clarified about the allocation of the blood points. 

'So, basically what it's trying to say is that I should go after stronger opponents than fiddle with opponents weaker than me, huh?'

Previously Lucius had assumed that he would get one blood point per kill so based on that assumption, he had assumed that he would posses about 10 or more blood points currently. 

But he never assumed that he would posses more than 100. Thus, for some while he was quite perplexed and shocked about the blood points in his possession. And it took him quite sometime to digest this information.

"So, what can I get with this blood points?"

Lucius asked

[You can either invest this blood points on your attributes to strengthen yourself or you can summon ten creatures of novice class or one creature of standard class that might be of help to you given your current situation]

[Note; Creatures will get summoned at random and other feature such as shops will remained closed until you upgrade the system]

"So how many points do I require to upgrade the system?"

[100 thousand for your first upgrade]

Just by hearing that astronomical sum required to upgrade the system, Lucius felt like his soul had left his body. To collect that many blood points in his current scenario was totally impossible. It was like asking him to murder an entire village or go up against somebody extremely powerful than him. 

And he would rather murder an entire village of people weaker than him than go up against somebody whom he couldn't defeat. 

Regaining his composure, Lucius came to a conclusion that it would be better to summon a creature than to invest those blood points on his stat. 

After experiencing the might of that novice creature which brought him back from the brink of death, he knew that the creature summoned by the system would be more powerful than himself. 

With such belief, Lucius then decided to summon a creature. 

But just as he was about to make his decision, he became extremely startled, "Wha---?"