"Every magician's duty is to protect humanity from the monster threat." Every magic association in this world is more or less intertwined with this slogan.
And I tell you, they are absolutely right. The moment you leave the border of the safe zone, you'll inevitably encounter some magical monstrosity that will surely try to devour you.
One of the duties of any educational institution in this world is to show how weak we are compared to the magical fauna. At Tian Lan School, they conduct a field practice for this, the main goal of which is for students to face a real Monster.
For half an hour now, we've been riding school buses to the military camp on Mount Xuefeng, which means "Snow Peak." During our journey, Mo Fan is supposed to break through to the second tier of Basic Fire magic. Good for him, except I made the breakthrough to the second tier of Poison two months ago, and Shadow almost a month ago. Turns out I'm cooler than the main character! I could stroke my ego a bit, but I realize this is still small-time stuff. Truly serious opponents wouldn't even notice the difference in what's hitting them.
At the second tier of Poison, I unlocked Acid Strike. This magic dissolves organic matter and acts like acid. For Colossal Rats, for example, it can dissolve their snout down to the skull, which doesn't actually affect their combat capability much, except for burning out their eye. But it works very well on muscles, limiting their agility. If you manage to hit the belly, they start losing their guts. It's a repulsive sight, but the effect is very strong, especially when their entrails get tangled in the surrounding branches. With luck, you can even end a fight in one blow. One-on-one with a monster, ending the fight in one blow! My penetrating poison is definitely OP!
Of course, you can't kill a One-Eyed Magic Wolf in one hit; my poison only leaves a severe burn on them. But I didn't expect to defeat a middle-tier Servant so easily and simply ran away from them. In monster hunting, the key is to soberly assess your strength and not harbor illusions.
The second tier of Shadow allowed me to take another person with me; I even carried a couple of people in my shadow as an experiment. Also, you can't use other elemental magic while in the shadow; the most you can do is form a star path and hold the spell ready, as the surrounding space instantly drains all energy from spells. The person you drag into the shadow feels weightless and follows you as if tied, while you spend three times more energy to hold them.
Also, with the breakthrough to the second tier, my spiritual strength doubled. This was a much more pleasant moment.