Chapter 96: An Alliance: An Abyssal Monster Appears!

Ryan glanced at the chains floating around her before looking toward her storage ring. A faint smile appeared on his face.

"Looks like I found the right person."

Leah said nothing, merely taking a fighting stance.

"I have the second badge," Ryan said directly. "You have the first. We can cooperate for a while."

Leah frowned slightly.

"Why?"

"Because the location of the third badge has already attracted too many people, and I don’t want to spend the remaining time fighting someone every few minutes."

Ryan sheathed his longsword.

"I doubt you want that either."

Leah furrowed her brows.

The proposal was indeed tempting.

Having two badges in the same team would give them greater control over the competition that followed. Even if they ultimately failed to protect both badges, they could at least avoid being defeated individually by other students.

But the problem was that she did not know Ryan very well.

And she had no idea whether he was genuinely willing to cooperate.

"Can I refuse?"

"Of course."

Ryan answered quite frankly.

"But if you refuse, I’ll have no choice but to treat you as a competitor."

"Wouldn’t you just try to snatch my badge because I have the first one?"

"I would." Ryan looked at her. "If necessary."

Leah: "..."

This guy was so straightforward that she hardly knew how to respond.

"Then why do you still want to cooperate?"

"Because I’m not sure I can protect my badge, deal with magical beasts, and handle all those students who keep coming after me at the same time."

Ryan made no attempt to conceal his thoughts. "I can defeat some of them, but there’s no need to waste all my time doing that."

"Besides..." He paused. "If you’d wanted to attack me just now, your first chain wouldn’t have landed in front of me."

Ryan looked toward the silver chain that was still hovering near the ground.

"You were defending, not attacking. So I figured you didn’t want to fight either."

After a brief silence, Leah finally withdrew two of her chains.

"We can cooperate."

Ryan smiled. "A wise decision."

"But I have conditions."

"Go ahead."

"If we encounter other students, whoever notices danger first must warn the other person. And if one of us clearly says we should retreat, the other can’t force them to stay just for the sake of a badge."

Ryan considered it for a moment.

"Agreed."

"Also, if you try to steal my badge, I’ll attack you immediately."

"You don’t need to remind me."

The two looked at each other, then shook hands.

...

The battle in the area surrounding the third badge had already spiraled completely out of control.

A Level 17 lightning warrior had just repelled two opponents when a Level 16 Splitback Beast charged out from behind a rocky slope and sent him flying. Another team seized the opportunity to snatch the metal box from the ground, only for an archer who had been lying in ambush in the treetops to shoot one of them in the shoulder.

Everyone wanted to obtain the badge.

Yet very few had seriously considered whether they would be able to protect it afterward.

Just then, a regional announcement suddenly sounded.

[Attention: The holder of the third Mana Core Badge has changed.]

[Current Holder: Identity Hidden.]

[Next Location Update: In Ten Minutes.]

Immediately afterward, a new notification appeared on the identity cards of every student.

[Remaining Screening Time: 04:21:36.]

[Final evaluations will be determined based on badge possession, magical beast subjugation performance, team contributions, and overall individual performance.]

This meant that even students who failed to obtain a badge still had a chance to achieve good results through their other performances.

However, for those who had already invested a considerable amount of time competing for the badges, this announcement came far too late.

Many had already exhausted their mana, while some had even lost the ability to continue fighting.

Meanwhile, the identity of the third badge’s holder remained concealed.

In the monitoring room, Victor shifted his gaze away from the announcement and looked back toward Leah and Ryan’s position.

The hours still left would determine the outcome.

As for that mysterious organisation who had yet to make any move, Victor did not continue dwelling on them.

If they made a move, he would naturally respond accordingly.

But until then, he would not allow a danger that had yet to materialize to interfere with his judgment of the battle unfolding before him.

...

Third Enclosed Ecological Zone, Northern Rocky Forest.

Ryan and Leah had been traveling together for less than five minutes when they sensed something unusual ahead.

The first thing they heard was a scream.

Immediately afterward, a series of dull impacts echoed from deep within the forest. Large sections of branches and leaves shook violently, and an ancient tree so thick that two people would have been needed to wrap their arms around it came crashing down, startling countless birds into flight.

Ryan stopped and looked toward the source of the noise.

"Looks like the third badge is up ahead."

Leah stopped as well.

She could sense chaotic mana fluctuations coming from that direction. At least five or six of them belonged to humans, but what truly caught her attention was an unfamiliar presence mixed among those fluctuations.

The aura was cold and oppressive, as though something was continuously devouring the surrounding mana.

"Something doesn’t feel right," Leah said with a frown.

"Agreed."

Ryan gripped the hilt of his sword, his expression gradually turning serious.

The two continued forward, though their pace had slowed considerably. Only after passing through a patch of collapsed bushes did they finally see what was happening ahead.

At the center of the rocky forest, a young man wearing silver light armor sat sprawled on the ground, his right leg twisted at an unnatural angle. Hanging from his chest was a black and silver badge, the very third Mana Core Badge that all the freshmen were fighting over.

Four other students lay scattered around him. Two were already unconscious, while the remaining two desperately crawled away, their faces filled with terror.

"Help!"

The young man in silver armor spotted the two figures in the distance and immediately reacted as though he had found his last hope.

"Quick! Notify the academy! There’s a monster here!"

Ryan’s gaze passed over him and settled on the shadows behind him.

The next moment, his pupils contracted sharply.

A magical beast nearly six meters long was slowly emerging from behind the fallen trees.

Its body resembled that of a giant wolf, but its limbs were much longer than those of ordinary wolves. Pitch black scales covered its back, and several curved bone spikes protruded from its shoulders. Most bizarrely, the light around its body seemed to distort as strands of dark purple mana continuously gathered into it.

The beast lowered its head and bit down on the nearest student.

"Ahhh!"

A scream rang out as the student desperately swung his short sword, but when the blade struck the beast’s neck, it produced only a few sparks.

With a sickening crack of breaking bones, his entire body was flung away. He slammed heavily into a rock wall more than ten meters away and never moved again.

The young man in silver armor turned deathly pale.

"Monster... It’s a monster!"

Ryan had already drawn his longsword.

Of course, he recognized this magical beast.

Anyone who had even a basic understanding of the Abyssal Magical Beast Compendium would recognize such a dangerous creature.

"Abyssal Bone-Spike Wolf. Level 45, Second Tier." His voice deepened.

At the same time, Leah’s expression darkened.