Such a sum of money could not be carried around in cash, so I had to put it in the bank, on a new card, leaving myself eighty thousand for living expenses. However, something slightly outside our plans happened. On the tenth day of our "vacation" on Taihu Lake, Xu Zhao Ting's temperature rose to thirty-eight, and he generally felt unwell. As for me, I felt better; my temperature was a whole degree lower, only slightly above normal.
I had to go get a doctor and bring him to Zhao Ting, as well as arrange for another day of lodging in the room, which was not very pleasant, as the landlord was a fat, non-mage Chinese man who felt everyone owed him. An unpleasant type to the core; after this, I felt even worse. Zhao Ting will pay me back for this; I didn't bring him along for this.
As for his condition, it turned out to be very simple: банальное overwork, and quite severe at that. As it turned out, he had had a fever for four days and had been feeling unwell. The doctor was an initial-level healing mage, and I had to pay five thousand for him, and that was just for the examination! Of course, the money came from Zhao Ting's budget; what else is he for? In short, the doctor said that this condition is common among initial-level mages on Taihu, as after school, they rush to gain experience and raise their cultivation before entering university. Usually, they can't last more than six or seven days and fall ill just like Xu Zhao Ting, so he held out for a long time.
This happens due to the sudden use of a large amount of magical energy in a short period, which was not the case before. The doctor was also very surprised that I only had mild discomfort, as I am a wind mage, and they last even less, about four to six days, as they use their power more often for reconnaissance and distracting monsters. I spun him a tale about how I tortured myself with training during school, and the tragedy of Bo City strengthened my body. In fact, I wasn't lying much, but I think I feel so good because I'm a mid-level mage in two elements.
After a short conversation, we decided to rest for a couple of days and then resume work according to the schedule: six days of work, one day of rest. So, it turns out to be exactly a week, a funny coincidence. Naturally, I didn't sit by Xu Zhao Ting's bedside. No, I helped him a little, brought him a jug of water, placed a mug next to the bed, and then returned beyond the safety boundaries to the lake shore. Where, climbing high into a tree, I began to cultivate and master the wind element stars. I was curious how long I could cultivate continuously, as I had never checked it after breaking through to the mid-level.
It turned out to be quite long, almost twelve hours in a row, I was mastering the wind stars, achieving significant progress with another star. The strength of a mid-level mage and magic control made themselves known. However, despite a slight migraine, I cultivated for another hour, simply expanding my wind nebula. After that, my head began to ache unbearably, and I hurried back to the city. This continued for two more days, after which Xu Zhao Ting recovered, and we again went into the jungle for triton eyes.
This time, I didn't go anywhere looking for trouble. I had enough running and acrobatic maneuvers with the tritons. After all, besides killing them with my two daggers, which I told Xu Zhao Ting I bought with the money I earned, I also distracted them and lured them into traps. Far from always did Xu Zhao Ting start the fight first; more often than not, I attacked them, lured them to a convenient place for extermination, and then he joined in, gradually killing them.
After this sortie, rather uninteresting weekdays followed. We acted according to the plan: six days of work, five days of rest. Sometimes we stumbled upon alligator herds, from which we hastily retreated. Sometimes we were attacked by a pair of red foxes, which we successfully killed and took their pelts to the market, where we sold them, dividing the earnings equally. In fact, in a month of such work, we earned about one million three hundred thousand yuan, earning an average of one hundred to one hundred and forty thousand per sortie, not counting unexpected trophies. This is the total amount earned after deducting expenses for food, lodging, and clothing, which wore out and spoiled quite quickly; we changed it every week, on the day of rest. My personal money was about eight hundred thousand, a rather large sum for an initial-level mage, right?
But here, one must consider that usually, a group of three to six initial-level mages goes on this mission, and also that not all of them work like us. Most often, two weeks to a month in a relaxed mode, after which they receive an initial rank in the league and leave to complete other, more interesting and promising missions. Why are we so special? Partly it's my fault, as I constantly drag Xu Zhao Ting back to hunt tritons. Forgive me, guy, I need to cultivate. By the way, we also received an initial rank, but we are as far from the mid-level as the moon is from a car. Yes, that's how unconventional it is, ha.
During this month of cultivation in these jungles, I have progressed quite far in controlling stars. In the wind nebula, I controlled twenty-five, and in the space element, only one. Of course, I spent less time on it, but I still expected at least two! However, it turned out that mastering space stars is more difficult than wind and lightning stars! They simply don't listen to anything; no persuasion helps to win them over. These stars, as I've already said, behaved like spoiled, arrogant aristocrats! I had to flatter them like no one else!
After a month, I decided to resume my expeditions for game and training at full strength. At first, everything went perfectly. I killed a couple of alligators, about a dozen foxes, and in a little over two weeks, I earned an additional six hundred thousand yuan from them. But then, one day, there was a very interesting battle with a sharp-horned orongo. This beast is like a deer, with long, winding horns growing from both the crown of its head and its jaw. The ones growing from the jaw can be retracted under the skin, not hindering them when eating. These beasts mostly belong to the higher servants living slightly southeast of Taihu Lake, closer to Huizhou. They live in large herds, up to over ten thousand individuals, so mid-level mages are better off not encountering them, even at their peak. As they say, they'll overwhelm you with numbers, or in their case, horns.
A little more about these animals: they are quite fast, matching higher servants, even surpassing them. They are up to two meters tall, not counting their horns, and their fur is not much less durable than that of alligators. So, even despite their numbers, they are very dangerous opponents. However, their horns are valued as components for offensive and defensive artifacts, so there are quite a few daredevils who decide to lure them out individually or in small groups from large herds. This is helped by the fact that they are mostly herbivores, but they don't shy away from meat. They don't attack themselves and are quite peaceful creatures, but proud. They may ignore entire crowds of people walking near them, but if you try to lure them into an enclosure or, worse, ride them, a weak mage will face inevitable death.
So, I encountered a lone male sharp-horned orongo when I decided to take a walk to the east. At that moment, we had moved far south from the lake, looking for either tritons that had wandered here or red foxes and one-eyed wolves that inhabit this area in abundance. In fact, I was practicing my skills on wolf packs, which numbered from five to ten individuals. It was difficult; I had to move a lot and dodge attacks, but, firstly, it was fun, and secondly, it helped improve body and magic control. And I didn't have to bother with wolves; they had nothing valuable anyway.
But on one of my expeditions, instead of a pack of ordinary wolves, I met this male. How he got here and why he was alone, I couldn't understand. I had a choice: calmly pass by or try to fight an opponent of equal strength that I hadn't fought before. The three-eyed leader doesn't count; that was trickery, not my skills and pure strength. So I decided to risk it and attack.
To begin with, I started to approach as closely as possible to deliver a more precise strike, but I was spotted! How he did it, I don't know, but oh well. I stood by one tree, peeking from behind it, preparing to jump to another, when he ran at me, extending his horns, which were on his jaw. He ran fast, but I managed to form a wind blade spell and swing my hand in his direction. I aimed for his chest, but hit slightly lower and to the left, striking his leg, which almost fell off, exposing a cracked bone.
From this, the orongo stumbled, almost tumbling, but managed to regain balance and turn towards me as he ran past where I was standing. He stopped about five meters in front of me! It was damn dangerous, but I had already finished constructing the lightning star path and released it with a light, smooth movement of my right hand, sending wrath of lightning directly into the open wound.
The orongo, from the received blow, reared up and took a step back on its hind legs, and its leg simply flew off to the side. However, the absence of a leg and the numbness of the muscles after the lightning strike did not prevent him from lunging forward in the next second, aiming his horns at my chest. He almost succeeded; I literally shifted down and to the left at the last moment, and one of his horns plunged into the tree right next to my neck. After that, he jerked his head, and because I continued to move, his horns tore the tree apart right above my head! It was terrifyingly scary; I felt that one wrong move and I would have died!
Immediately after this, using the wind step, I jumped away from the orongo and ran as far away from him as possible towards a tree I could climb. This tactic worked well against alligators; why wouldn't it work here? He ran after me, almost keeping pace! This is what speed equal to leaders means. What would have happened to me if I hadn't killed the black crane so quickly a month and a half ago? Its speed is higher than some weak leaders!
As a result, I quickly realized that I wouldn't be able to climb the tree, and in fact, if I didn't do something, sooner or later I would be impaled. I started to form a lightning star path to try to slow him down and gain a more advantageous position. I didn't have the opportunity to turn around and aim properly, so when the wrath of lightning was ready, I just waved my hand back, hoping for luck.
As a result, I hit him. The orongo slowed down, and I shot up higher into the nearest tree, thankfully one was nearby. Only after that did I see that I had hit him partially on the horn and partially on the left leg. On the leg, at the joint, there was a large wound, and the leg itself was held only by flesh, as the bone had fallen out of the joint; this was very clearly visible. As for the horn, it was covered in cracks; it was now unusable for sale, no one would buy such a thing.
However, this hit was incredibly lucky, as the orongo could no longer pursue me; he could barely stand! Taking advantage of the fact that my opponent was perfectly open for attack, I used wind blades and completely severed his leg, after which he fell and began to glare at me maliciously.
I then safely climbed down from the tree, approached him to within ten meters, and began to prepare the wrath of lightning and another wind blade. The orongo did not tolerate such blatant audacity and tried to reach me by crawling. But at that moment, my stars behaved strangely again: seven lightning stars and seven wind stars merged into a fourteen-star path, and in my hand was the combined and perfectly harmonizing and resonating energy of two elements. I didn't miss the moment and released this energy with a wave of my hand towards the orongo. A lightning-wind blade appeared, which shattered the horns along with the orongo's skull, instantly killing it and burning half of its body to charcoal. This magic, by my estimate, should equal mid-level magic! That is, the fusion of lightning and wind amplified the magic by about four times! And the energy consumed was as if I had released a single wind or lightning spell. Yes, this is a killer! I had seen something similar when I was reclaiming the source and one-eyed wolves, but then, due to the source and the desire to use it as best as possible, I didn't investigate this phenomenon, but now, given its effectiveness, I need to focus on it.
There was no point in taking anything from the orongo; the most valuable horns, which could have gone for seventy to one hundred and twenty thousand each, were irretrievably destroyed, and I decided to postpone the magic experiments until tomorrow. So I hurried back to Xu Zhao Ting and began cultivating.
"What's on your shoulder? It looks like blood?" Zhao Ting asked when I arrived. Looking and touching my shoulder, I then realized that the orongo had left a scratch on my shoulder! That scoundrel!
"Oh, just a scratch, I caught it on a branch," I said, taking out a bandage and hydrogen peroxide. "Don't worry, it's not very deep. I have another question for you: have you thought about where to go next? Maybe closer to Huzhou?"
"What? You're finally agreeing to leave this place and stop this terrible triton hunt? Really?" Xu Zhao Ting remarked sarcastically. He couldn't be blamed; after all, we are still here only because of me.
"No, no, it's just that with the onset of autumn, triton activity will decrease, and new individuals will stop appearing; all that exist will hatch and grow. So the state might suspend the mission," I replied, bandaging my shoulder. The scratch was indeed not deep, but sufficient to use a bandage, though not to the bone.
"We can go to Huzhou, but it's not as safe around there as in Suzhou; there are pack leaders, and we'd be hunting tritons again. I found out at the league that we can enlist with the military for a while, in places where there aren't enough people. For a hundred thousand a week, they'll feed us, give us drinks, and provide lodging. We just need to follow orders and help clear the territory of monsters," Xu Zhao Ting replied, scratching his head.
"And what's the benefit for us, and why does the army need it?" I asked, looking at him skeptically.
"Well, the army gets manpower in problematic areas and potential members. Also, don't think we'll be given rest like ordinary soldiers; we'll be taken on all clearing missions, from weak servant lairs to killing strong leaders," Xu Zhao Ting replied confidently. "And our benefit is that we get a hundred thousand a week each, plus we don't have to pay for lodging and food. We're earning about the same now. And in the army, we can gain more experience and skills."
"In principle, it's logical, but I'm not a big fan of the army," I replied, putting the remaining bandages and peroxide into the first-aid kit, and also taking an antidote pill, which helps against some local weak poisons. Who knows what the orongo had on its horns.
"And so what? Can it bother you that much?" Xu Zhaoting asked with slight indignation, to which I shrugged.
"Besides, hunters are now being recruited into the military unit of Bo City to exterminate the sharply increased number of monsters in the vicinity after the tragedy. I heard that Zhang Xiaohou and He Yu joined there as privates. It would be good to visit them."
"You should have just said you wanted to meet them," I said in a slightly surprised and indignant tone, after which I thought about the souls of the pack leaders, which I could get under the guise of the commotion, and added.
"Alright, I wouldn't mind seeing them either. We'll just work here until the end of summer, only a week left, and on the way there we'll stop by Shanghai, I need to see my relatives."
"Okay. I don't mind," Xu Zhaoting said, lying down on a worn sleeping bag. I'm sometimes surprised that they're only a couple of months old.