Chương 223: Wilderness Survival Exam Part 3

In the morning when Damion woke up, he found Phil had returned to camp with an enormous snake. Since the Ferocious Beast was dead, he could not tell what Rank it had been, but seeing how Phil had sliced it in half and carried it back to camp, it could not have been that strong. After putting a few fresh logs on his campfire to keep it alive, Damion decided to head out and scout the area.

He was not worried about Ferocious Beasts messing with his camp, but he did want to make sure no one stole his tent, so he pulled the entire tent, still setup, into the Magic System Inventory. When he returned to camp later, he would just place it back. Phil was enjoying a bit of breakfast snake, and did not join Damion in the air after he flew off on his Ice Sword. Which was fine with him.

With Concealed Aura active, Damion felt he had a better chance of finding a Ferocious Beast to fight on his own, so he was not worried about leaving his familiar behind. High in the sky, Damion circled the area around his camp, slowly widening his search for Ferocious Beasts as he spiraled outward. He was not in a hurry, but all he was able to spot after a half hour of flying were a few classmates, Damion began to feel he was wasting his time.

Ordinarily, at this time of day, he would be running laps around the school. Flying used up a little mana, but with his mana regeneration as high as it was, controlling his flying sword was basically effortless. Damion was about to start heading back to camp, when in a distant group of trees, he spotted a student trying to fight off a group of what looked to be black spiders.

At first, he was too far away to tell the Rank of the spiders, but he quickly closed the distance and saw they were all F Rank, while the student turned out to be a young woman was an E Rank Dark mage. As Damion approached he cast a few Ice Shards at the spiders, which he could now tell were Shadow Web Spiders. Each one was about half a meter in size.

Shadow Web Spiders were known for their webs that were cast with the Shadow element, making them very hard to detect and even harder to get rid of once they were stuck to you. The Ice Shards that Damion cast killed several of the spiders instantly and caused the rest to flee. A moment later he was hovering just inches off the ground looking at the young woman who he had saved and could now identify as Inara Tynan.

Inara's dark hair was in stark contrast to her pale skin and bright violet eyes, making her unmistakable among the final term students. As an attractive young woman with a very rare affinity, she had many suitors among the students, though Damion did not know much about her, he had heard she had a personality more commonly found in Fire mages.

"Don't even think about taking the corpses," Mage Tynan yelled at Damion. Her tone did not surprise him too much, but he had thought she would show a little gratitude. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"I just saved you. You could at least say thank you."

"Please. I did not need saving. See that," Mage Tynan pointed to an area not far behind her, in the direction that she had been retreating. There was an area of disturbed ground and with True Sight, Damion was able to spot a D Rank artifact of some kind, hidden in the dirt.

"A trap?" Damion guessed.

"Yes. I was leading them all into a trap. And then you came along and spoiled it. Go. Fly away now, oh, great rescuer of women." Damion smiled lightly at the woman who was still glaring at him as he willed his Ice Sword higher into the air but said nothing as he flew away. He had not intended to spoil her trap, nor was he trying to play the hero. He simply saw someone, that appeared to be in need of help and flew over to help.

'Since this is a test for all the students, perhaps I should just mind my own business,' Damion thought as he made his way back to his camp. After Damion flew off, Inara, was beside herself. Despite the brave face she showed to him, she was actually quite happy to have had a one-on-one encounter with her idol.

'I can't believe I said that to him!' Inara screamed internally as she chased after one of the fleeing spiders.

'Oh, he spoiled my trap, but I lured far more spiders than I could handle. I wish I had thanked him. No. I couldn't do that. He messed up my plan. Next time, I'll make sure to thank him.' When Damion got back to camp, he found that Phil had gutted a good portion of the snake and had gorged itself. Unfortunately, in the process of eating, the Snow Hawk had made a disgusting mess of the camp.

"Phil, I know you get energetic when you eat, but can you try not to make such a big mess."

'Good. Share.'

"I'll stick to my rations," Damion responded to his familiar's message from their bond. He looked around at the messy ground. Thankfully, Phil had not spread the gore to his table or other items he had left out.

"I'm going to clean up. Take that out of the camp if you want to keep snacking. Otherwise, it's going to be burned up." Phil looked at Damion for a moment as it considered his words and then hopped over and flew up with the snake carcass gripped in its talons. Once the Snow Hawk and its meal was out of the camp, he pulled the few personal items he left out into his spatial artifact and retrieved his sword from the Magic System Inventory.

He could cast Fireball as a spell now, but for what he had planned, Damion wanted the versatility of his sword. Aiming his sword at the center of camp, he channeled his mana through the blade, being careful not to put more power than a D Rank and cast his fire pillar attack. Fire leapt from the blade and scorched the earth in the camp, turning the blood and guts left behind by Phil to ash.

Once Damion was finished scorching the ground clean, he put his sword away and stepped into the middle of the burnt campsite and cast Frost Over. Since getting the spell from the Blanche family, he had not had an opportunity to use it in a real-world setting. With Damion as the focal point, ice spread out around him, putting out the last bits of flame and coating a meter radius around him. He cast the spell several times in a row, causing the ground to become white and freeze over.

The temperature in the area had even dropped by several degrees.

'Hmph, my own air conditioning,' Damion thought as he started taking his items out of spatial storage. Phil flew over and landed on the ground and scratched at the surface with its talons.

'Good.' Glad that his companion approved of the change he made, Damion retreated inside his tent where the recon drone could not spy on him and began working on his artifact.