First Mission
William became a prisoner of his greatest desire. While gaining strength was his greatest desire in this world, wealth was his greatest desire in his previous world.
Right now, looking at the piece of black iron in his hand, he could feel both.
He wanted to go down and look at the tunnels below. He thought, "I'll just take a look, if I don't find it, I'll come back."
He went into the tunnel where the worm came from. He pointed his flaming sword down and saw that it was big enough for him to pass through.
He rolled up his sleeves and went down. He could not walk completely upright, he was slightly bent. 'How big would a worm have to be to make this tunnel?'
The walls of the tunnel were smooth and clean, almost as if they had been cut by a machine. Some places were even bright enough to reflect the light of his sword. As he walked about fifty meters deep and another hundred meters into the center of the narrow tunnel, he felt the metal element intensify. If there was something, it had to be here somewhere.
Still, the tunnels were the same size, and the walls the same shape. Finally, with his sword, he carved a wall out of the most concentrated elements.
Among the falling stones, he found a piece of black iron half the size of what he had extracted from the worm.
'This is only the beginning,' he thought.
He was sure that he would find more. The deeper he went, the more metal elements he could feel.
Right now, even this place could actually increase the speed of meditation for him many times over.
William's eyes were shining. Of course, he wanted to go deeper for the grand prize.
Although he was a prisoner of his greed and wanted to dig deeper, he was a person who was afraid of dying.
So, after dropping the black iron piece into his dimensional bag, he began to walk extremely carefully and slowly.
After a while, he began to feel the fresh air coming from the front.
'This is a good sign,' he thought. If there was air circulation in such deep caves, there was definitely a way out.
When he went about twenty meters down and fifty meters ahead, he saw a very faint light in front of him. It looked like moonlight.
'Have I reached the exit?' he thought.
After walking about ten meters into the light, he realized he was wrong. The tunnel opened into a large cave. Moonlight reflected from a bucket-sized hole in the ceiling of this cave.
He shivered to the bone as he turned his eyes to look at the floor where the moonlight was reflected.
'Sh*t. I'm dead,' he said to himself.
Inside the cave lay a worm the width of a house and long enough to cover the entire floor of the cave.
William dared not move. From the size of this creature, he could guess that its level was very high. Even though the creature hadn't noticed him, he could feel the pressure it was spreading. He could barely keep his body from shaking.
He remained in the same position for about half an hour. Finally, gambling that the creature would not notice him, he quickly backed away using his flame steps.
After running for a while, he turned and looked back. He had heard no movement.
He was sure that if the creature had followed him, he would have heard the creeping sound from outside the mountain.
At that moment, a thought of greed entered his mind. 'Could it be dead already?'
After stopping, he cautiously decided to turn around. He reached the entrance of the high cave. Looking at the worm, he noticed that it was still motionless. It wasn't moving at all. There was no sign of life as far as he could see.
Just in case, he made the stupidest move in the world and it worked. He silently cut a small stone from a rock with his sword and slowly threw it at the creature.
The moment the stone touched the creature's body, William ran again with flame steps. When he reached the point he had just reached, he felt no movement and turned back.
The creature was still in the same place. William gathered all his courage and jumped from a height of three meters onto the floor of the cave.
The ground he landed on was as hard as if it were made of metal. After approaching carefully, he could feel that the creature had no life energy left in its body. The pressure the creature gave off was not as strong as when it was alive, but it was enough to make William sweat.
William knocked on the dead creature's body like a knock on a door.
It was definitely hard as metal. He felt the creature's body by touching it for a while.
Now he was sure. It was this creature that was spreading the metal element in this small mountain. For the metal element emanating from it was more than in the ore chamber of the dark elves.
He wandered over its body and twisted through the body of the dead creature. Finally, he dared to draw his fire sword and began to look around. Besides the hole where the moonlight was visible, there were dozens of other tunnels in the cave. The tunnel he came from was even small compared to some of them. He felt like an ant.
So far, there were no living creatures in sight.
As he walked around the worm, he realized that the scattered rocks were actually black iron. It was as if every piece of rock near the creature had turned to black iron.
William considered meditating, but it was definitely not safe here. He didn't want to leave this place either. First, he collected all the black iron he could find. He had a harvest of at least a hundred kilos.
As he collected the last piece of black iron, he found himself at the creature's head. The creature seemed to be alive. It was as if it had opened its mouth and was screaming with all its fury.
An idea struck William at that moment. 'What if I go inside the creature?' he thought.
The creature's mouth was too wide for teeth to reach him. He thought he could get between them.
After entering the creature's mouth, he realized that it had indeed died a long time ago. Who knows how many years it had been like this.
He couldn't find any saliva-like moisture on its body, except for the elements. All his body parts had turned into dried flesh, even metal.
The inside of the creature was like a cave. Somewhere, this cave narrowed as he walked with his flaming sword. After crawling out of the narrow passage, William encountered a sight he would never forget.
A huge heart, radiating a great metallic glow, hung like a chandelier from the creature's body. This was truly the opportunity of a lifetime for William. Even if he didn't know it, the creatures that began to elementalize their bodies were powerful creatures that William couldn't understand.
Because William was a bit greedy and a bit ignorant. He thought that the metal heart might be a very valuable material. He wanted to cut it off. Jumping with all his might, he swung his sword at the veins between the heart and the body.
"DINGGG!!"
The sword had bounced back with as much force as it had struck. He felt a great pain in his hand as he struck with almost all his might. It would almost bleed and tear.
William realized that at his current level, he could not harm this creature. All he could do was cultivate by meditating inside the creature.
He immediately sat down under the heart and began to meditate. He could sense many times more metal elements than in the ore chamber of the dark elves.
After a while, with the relief of meditation, he closed his eyes and concentrated on absorbing the metal element and qi.
The meditation technique was truly effective. He could already feel that his offensive and defensive techniques using the metal element were getting stronger. He felt that he could definitely reach the peak of the Iron level in a few days.
He felt that it would be child's play for him to transform the qi power in the form of a mist into a drop of liquid. 'Just like water that collects at the top of a pot.' He thought.
All he had to do was patiently practice the meditation technique.
After taking the meat out for a while and cooking it with his sword, he ate it. Then he began to meditate again with satisfaction.
In this way, he had practiced meditation for several days. He could feel the metal element around him, which was still abundant, though slightly diminished.
He was tired of meditating constantly, but he did not know when he would have another opportunity like this, so he wanted to advance to the bronze level.
What he didn't expect was the sound of a scream that interrupted his meditation.
It was a scream like a worm he had killed.
"ZIIIIII!!" "ZIII!!!" "ZIII!!!"
It wasn't just one. He could hear the voices of several creatures with different tones.
He could barely hear the sound of creatures crawling outside. William thought it was time to leave. He would encounter more worms if he waited any longer.
Since he couldn't cut the heart, he decided to stop.
He thought that the worms could sense something happening in their ancestor's body and that someone was absorbing its power.
As usual, William should have left quietly without the cub worms informing their father.
He cautiously walked through the narrow hole again. When he reached the creature's mouth, he saw some worms outside staring at him, and they weren't even at the iron level yet. He quickly circulated the qi in his body, showing his strength at the peak of his iron level.
However, those little creatures seemed to have gone crazy. They didn't care how strong he was.
As soon as William left the creature's mouth, they rushed at him. William dodged the worms thrown at him and cut them all down with a single sword stroke. He didn't care if they were dead or had valuable body parts.
Because he could hear the creeping sound of a larger creature behind him. William knew he couldn't stay here another second. He jumped back to the tunnel he came from and started running. Luckily, the worms wasn't fast, and it didn't chase him, because it only felt the missing element in the body of its ancestor. William was able to safely reach the first worm he had killed.
The worm was almost completely desiccated and could turn to stone after a few years.
Ignoring it, he immediately pushed the rock at the cave door aside as far as he could get through.
The sun he encountered as he pushed the rock blinded him for a few seconds. After his eyes adjusted, the first thing he did was to check his surroundings.
He could see no movement around him. So he quickly started running in the direction he came from, into the forest.
He was so scared and ran without looking back that he reached the place where he had killed the green tree snake without realizing it. It was obvious that the road he had passed before had remained in his mind as the quickest route.
The body of the snake had disappeared. Only the bushes and small ledges that had been smashed during the fight remained as a trace. It was probably free food for other creatures.
As he was about to jump onto the branches of the trees again, a huge mouth greeted him, just like the one he had encountered in the snake ambush. His sword was already in his hand. He quickly swung it into the mouth that was coming towards him.
"DINNNGG!!" Again he heard the voice he was beginning to hate.
After parrying the creature's attack, he was able to see its face. This creature was the one that had chased him up to Worm Mountain.
The two of them stared at each other for a long time. Then the sneaky little wolf came walking slowly again.
William looked him in the eyes with hatred and shouted.
"Son of a bitch! I did you a favor by not killing you, but this is how you repay me!" he said.
Then he lunged at the little wolf with all his might.
The mother or little wolf, whatever it was, jumped in front of the little wolf with great agility and took a defensive stance. But when it looked at William, it noticed that he turned with all his might and ran into the forest after taking two steps.
Surprised, the wolf simply looked behind William. Its expression was just like a human's at that moment.
By the time it regained consciousness, William was already too far away to be seen.
It growled at the little wolf next to it and started to run after William.
William, on the other hand, ran like crazy, using his fire steps. He knew that he would be caught eventually, but the closer he got to the academy, the more support he could find.
After all, it was impossible for him to escape at the speed of the Silver Moon Wolf. Besides, the forest was the wolf's home.
William had landed on the academy's side when he had faced the wolf's ambush. So he had prepared a way to turn around and escape.
Looking back, William saw the wolf rush toward him in a blur. He had been running for a few miles but had never encountered any other humans or creatures around him.
After a while, he felt the wolf's teeth at his ass. He turned and greeted the creature with his sword.
Another "DING!!!" voice was heard. He prayed that he could cut it again.
William wasn't really that afraid of the wolf. He just didn't want to get into an endurance fight with it.
He had already reached the peak of the iron level. As long as the wolf didn't use its bloodline power, he could even be considered an equal.
The atmosphere between the two had once again turned into an art movie. They both looked at each other, searching for a weakness.
After staring for a while, the little wolf came back. He was still staring at him like a fox. (Little wolf have personality. So, I will use 'he' for it.-him-)
William couldn't stand it anymore. In his body, he used the iron body, the fire steps, and the fire sword.
He looked at the little wolf, "You son of a bitch!" Then he looked at the big wolf.
"You did this to a fox? I've had enough of you," he said and was thrown at the big wolf.
The big wolf must have felt his insult because it lifted its head to the sky and roared and glared at William angrily.
It was as if it were saying. "How dare you insult a noble Silver Moon wolf like me!"
The two began to fight. The little wolf just watched from the side, smiling calmly, knowing that he couldn't come between them. His face truly looked like a fox.
Whenever William slashed or stabbed with his sword, he was met by the wolf's fangs or claws. Since he wasn't good enough at swordplay, he couldn't attack fast enough to reach its weak spot.
He even suffered some injuries in the fight! The wolf's claws were definitely sharper than the sword in his hand.
William realized that it couldn't end like this. He had to carry out the idea he had had in his head since the beginning of the battle. He slowly approached a large tree. Then he slowly changed his position again, trapping the wolf between himself and the tree.
He jumped to his feet with all his strength. He was at least ten meters in the air!
The wolf jumped with him, and it wanted to bite him with its sharp teeth. It had never met a human that could withstand so much.
William used all his strength to fend off the mouth coming towards him. By sending more Qi into his sword, he was able to exert more power, making it heavier. But even with that, he still heard the voice he hated.
While the big wolf was still in the air, his own feet touched the branch of the tree. He bent his knees like a bow and threw himself out.
His target was the little wolf watching from the side!
The little wolf was about to turn and run when he realized that he was about to make a move on himself, but would William miss the opportunity?
He jumped on top of the wolf and pressed his full weight against its neck. Then he pointed his sword under the wolf's neck and shouted.
The wolf, whose feet had just touched the ground, snarled and howled as it saw its friend captured. It was such a loud howl that it sounded like a calling.
After a while, the air became thick with fear. Dozens of other wolf howls came from far away. They came quickly and surrounded William. The vast majority of these wolves were iron level. What pleased him was that there weren't any bronze-level wolves. But even then he knew that he couldn't escape without his hostage.
The big wolf looked at the puppy in William's hand, then looked up at William.
It was as if it was telling him to let him go. William knew that if he let him go, he would never be able to escape from so many Silver Moon wolves, he might even be the baby wolf's food!
He knew that wolves were smart. They would probably understand what he meant when he spoke.
William yelled. "If you come any closer, I promise I'll kill him first."
The wolves stood still. William continued to speak.
"I just want to go home. I promise I'll drop him off at the exit of the forest. Now go," he said, looking at the baby wolf below him.
The little wolf looked at the big wolf first. The big wolf nodded and pointed in the direction of the academy that William was trying to escape from.
The baby wolf started to run fast with William on his back. He wanted to get out of this embarrassing situation as soon as possible.
William felt very comfortable. His fur was as comfortable as a chair. It was certainly more fun than riding a horse.
After a while, they were less than a kilometer from the edge of the forest. The wolves were still in packs chasing William and the baby wolf.
The big wolf stopped the baby wolf with a growl. It looked at William and said, "Leave him and go!"
William didn't think he would keep his promises, but he knew that with the Academy so close, they wouldn't dare attack. For the Academy was now used to their mass attacks. Perhaps thousands of its brothers had died in front of the Academy.
He left the baby wolf. The cub immediately returned to the big wolf and looked at William's face with hatred.
It was as if he wanted to drink all of William's blood for humiliating him in front of his friends.
William began to walk backward without turning around. He slowly backed away from the big wolf and the pack.
When he reached a sufficient distance, he saw the wolves leave, howling. But he also turned around and started walking towards the academy.
When the academy was in sight, he encountered a man coming towards him like an arrow from a bow. The middle-aged man was a teacher. On his chest was a badge that the academy gave to teachers.
"Did you just meet the wolves?" he asked.
"What do you think?" William asked, showing claw wounds on his shoulder and arms.
The teacher didn't seem surprised.
"Were they packs?"
"Yes, but they weren't big."
"Hmm. I get it, okay. Be careful these days, packs of wolves have appeared." He said and quickly returned in the direction of the academy.
William thought to himself, 'Really? Is that all? Should I be careful? How you could be a teacher like!'
He didn't say that the wolf pack was a strong iron-level pack.
That little brat had stuck in his mind. He decided to wait for his revenge. When he reached the bronze level, he would slaughter the entire wolf pack by himself.
He continued on his way to the academy.
...