chapter 46: Foolish actions

While Eon was searching, he heard commotion within the same forest, which made him curious.

Luke quickly dodged the creature's forward charge and let it crash through the trees cutting through them with its protruding teeth before stopping and repositioning itself to face its opponent once again.

With an annoyed exhale, Luke cast a spell, and a dark brown octagonal-shaped magic circle spun around his wrist as he commanded the very earth.

A giant fist made of rock formed from the ground and slammed against the creature's torso launching it back and causing it to crash through the thicket of trees and laying it on its back.

While the creature was down, Luke quickly cast another spell and had pointy spikes of earth spring from beneath the naked rat's body, hoping to have them pierce through its skin, but they failed, and instead, the spikes assisted the creature and pushed it back on its feet.

"Fuck! It's got tough skin"

He exclaimed in annoyance as he prepared another spell. However, betraying its giant size, the rat used its six pairs of bone-like teeth protruding from its face to suddenly dig and escape underground; the quickness with how it dug surprised Luke as he didn't expect it to move so fast.

"I suppose if you live underground, then you'll be adept at digging"

He said as he stretched out his senses and tried to detect the creature's presence, and as expected, it was headed straight for him.

The giant naked rat was a blind creature that could not see or even smell, its skin was rough, tough and thick with any pain receptors buried deep under layers of fat and skin. If it was a human, it would have died before it could even reach a month old, but it's alive.

This is because it is immune to most poisons, can eat anything that can fit in its mouth and has keen magical senses, allowing it to separate enemies and allies.

Luke felt a rumbling beneath his feet, and with a quickness, he launched himself up into the air, easily avoiding the creature as it sprung from beneath the ground, its jaws wide opened, revealing rows of sharp dagger-like and jagged teeth that served to slice anything that entered its mouth into fine pieces to be swallowed.

Seeing the opportunity, Luke, with slight quick thinking on his part, launched a small earth arrow; the arrow flew straight down, whistling as it cut through the air, entered the mouth of the creature, pierced through its inner throat and dived deeper into its internal organs.

The rat thrashed about in pain as its blood spewed from its mouth before it slowly stopped and fell limp on the ground and died.

Luke then landed right beside the creature and waited for it to stir, a spell ready in case it wasn't actually dead; seeing that it was actually dead, he relaxed.

"If I was a water mage, I could have just drowned the damn thing."

He said as he cast another spell, creating chains made from the earth and then pulling the creature out of the ground, and prepared to drag it back.

"Nice work, although I'd hardly call this a B-rank Quest"

Luke quickly jumped metres away and hurriedly turned to face his opponent; he prepared a spell, ready to attack at a moment's notice. However, the person did not attack. Instead, he sat on top of a tree branch in a low squat position.

Luke raised a brow at the man but seeing that there was no immediate danger, Luke relaxed a bit but remained cautious.

"Well of course I'm already an A-rank level mage, any quest below that, is child's play"

"If you're already A-rank level, then a rank-up quest should have been easy, but I suppose we all lie to ourselves"

Luke frowned deeply; he recognized the person before him; they met at the guild earlier today, and it seemed he might have stepped on the foot of an unforgiving individual.

"So what? You're here to taunt and make fun of me for what happened earlier today"

"Taunt you? Please, being petty is not a positive personality trait, I just spoke the truth, if you can't complete an A-rank quest then you aren't A-rank"

Luke's frown deepened and he began to clench his teeth, but tried his best not to get agitated.

"Then what rank are you? If you're judging my ability then that means you're of a higher rank, right?"

"It doesn't matter what rank I am; I can complete a rank-up quest if I want; I'm not a loser."

Luke's hands clenched harder and he began gnashing his teeth, it was clear that this guy before him was looking for a fight and he was very much tempted to give it to him but he couldn't do such a thing, after all, he's not a ruffian, plus he's got two wives to take care of, he can't be fighting with strangers in the forest

He decided to ignore the man and began pulling the creature he had killed back to the guild, he didn't have time for nonsense.

Seeing the man walk away Eon decided to relent in his taunting attempt, plus he was sure that Reniris wouldn't approve of him bothering the guy on her behalf.

So the young Dragonoid decided to get back into his quest, although he could not help but feel a sense of boredom. Maybe another training session with Reniris would be good for him; he also couldn't help but miss her even though it's been barely a day.

…

[Hours later]

After having finished his quest, Luke was able to receive his reward of 4000ixe but rather than immediately take the money home to his wives and son, he took a detour.

He stuck to the alleyways and back streets of the city, paying careful attention to hide from any eyes; his face was covered under his robes as he made his way towards his destination, which was closer to the slums.

As he made his way he couldn't help but be reminded of what type of deep shit he was in. If he doesn't rank up soon, he won't be able to pay back the massive debt he owns.

'Or rather that fucking bastard keeps increasing the interest, making it impossible for me to pay it back'

He thought clenching his teeth in anger but simultaneously regretting his choices that led him to this situation.

'No, it was worth it, otherwise, I wouldn't have saved them and I don't regret what I did''

He thought to himself, bumping into a homeless person but paying him no mind as he kept moving; the bag filled with his reward money was held tight under his robes.

He chuckled slightly at his thoughts; he was worried about his own family, yet it was his own foolishness and desires that landed him in his current situation.

It's been five years since his heart was struck by Ph'rite's arrow, fell in love for the second time in his life and this time it was at first sight and he risked everything to save the slave and her infant son, buying them on a loan he could never afford as CC-rank adventurer and setting them free and landing himself in the mess he's in right now.

His first wife had been furious, damn near destroying his marriage. However, she stayed and worked things out; she was more mad about the debt than anything as it wasn't unheard of for a man to have multiple wives.

With fierce dedication, he managed to rank up quickly, reaching BBB rank in a short time and being able to properly support both his wives; things were looking up until suddenly, he had a 2-year deadline, and he was nowhere near paying off his debt.

Or rather, he would have paid it off years ago, but it was unfortunate that the people he owed the debt to kept increasing the interest, just enough to keep him as a steady source of income. It was frustrating, but he could do nothing about it.

He was able to quickly make it to his destination, a relatively large house near the slum area and out of sight of the guard house. He knocked twice, and he was let in without any questions.

....

A/N: hope you enjoyed.