Warlock Apprentice

“Why so persistent?!” Angor cursed and tried to fly higher. “Don’t tell me Toby stole its eggs or something!”

He took a quick glimpse at Toby, who was sound asleep in his pocket, together with his unconscious body. Toby fell into this state as soon as he sensed safety.

Angor scanned Toby’s body while escaping and did not find any external wounds. Perhaps Toby was too tired to wake up.

He then looked back and saw the giant snake still in hot pursuit. He didn’t feel too threatened since he was no longer in the confined caves. Surely the snake couldn’t suddenly move faster than before by flying?

Unsurprisingly, the snake levitated itself by covering its long body in a white fog. Then it dashed to where Angor disappeared like an arrow.

Behind the flying snake, the “troll swimmer” and the “hermit crab” also emerged from the ground and began chasing him.

“Why the heck do they hate me so much?!” Angor complained without slowing down.

Thankfully, the Overwatch Base was not far from the Shaded Dunes. Even with the snow, the guards of the Moonfrost Union easily saw the coming enemies and all headed this way.

A single individual headed to Angor’s position faster than all others while confusing all the guards he left behind.

In the next second, Angor heard Sunders calling out to him.

“Was it two hours, or three? What are you up to this time?”

Angor smiled when he saw the familiar gentleman suit.

“Professor! Thank the spirits. I’m saved!”

…

Sunders was drafting an initial research project regarding the dream wasteland when the loud noise of monsters interrupted him. He looked up from his work only to see Angor leading three powerful monsters to the base.

“The little fool’s at it again?!”

…

Sunders’ arrival fully reassured Angor.

The gentleman looked at Angor’s soul, then checked Angor’s body. Telling from the pale face, he could tell that Angor had been neglecting the body for quite some time.

“Mind yourself. I’ll deal with those things.”

“Thank you very much—”

“Remember, the next time you’re looking to die, do it somewhere far away so I don’t see you.”

“… Oh.”

Angor returned to his body and was briefly stunned by fatigue. When he could see clearly again, he saw his professor already engaging the snake.

The guards of the Moonfrost Union also came. Though they only looked at Sunders fighting the snake with the look of disappointment rather than joining the battle.

Compared to random demons, the wizard-level monster held resources and riches all over its body. Anyone who claimed its corpse could easily add six digits to their account even if they did not take the time to carefully assort the body parts. But since Sunders was the first one to fight the monster, the others couldn’t recklessly participate in the fun without getting Sunders’ consent.

Their frustration came to a halt when they saw another two monsters entering their view. These two appeared to be slightly weaker than the flying snake, but they meant a lot of money as well.

“You brought ALL these things with you??” Sunders questioned Angor while fending off the snake.

“I-I didn’t bring them! I just kinda, passed through, and they began chasing me for no reason.”

Neither Sunders nor the guards looked convinced.

While Sunders was giving Angor the cold eye, the guards were actually impressed by what Angor had done. It was no easy task for an apprentice to bait three wizard-level monsters while staying alive.

More importantly, Angor looked perfectly fine. There wasn’t a single scratch on his body.

“Well, that’s Mister Phantom’s student for you,” a guard muttered.

The captain of the guards moved ahead of everyone and called, “Mister Phantom, and uh, Mister Padt. Will you let us handle the other two monsters?”

Both Angor and Sunders agreed. While Angor was only glad that the guards would help him get rid of the nuisance, Sunders was not in the mood to fight off three monsters at the same time.

Seeing their decision, all the guards rushed to the coming monsters like hungry wolves attracted to meat.

It took Sunders about half an hour to successfully finish off the snake.

Away from him, about a dozen wizards of the Moonfrost Union were still struggling with the hermit crab and the troll. Meanwhile, more wizards came from the base and joined the fray with the hope of getting a share of the loot.

Angor casually observed the battle. It was not easy to find so many wizards hunting monsters together.

As expected, it would take multiple wizards to take on a monster of the same level. When the two monsters still looked fine, several careless wizards were more or less hurt. This was the reason why the guard team had to allow other wizards to help at the cost of decreasing their reward.

Sunders was obviously the biggest winner by killing the snake all by himself. After retrieving the snake corpse into the Gravity Garden, he floated to Angor and asked in a cold tone, “Let’s head back. You will tell me what you just did.”

More people were directing their attention to Angor when they learned that it was he who attracted the wizard-level monsters. Or in other words, three moving piles of money. But now, they could only look at Sunders escorting Angor back to the base.

Even though the Abyss was full of wizard-level monsters, wizards didn’t have enough resources to effectively track them down. Sunders was not the only one who wished to figure out Angor’s business out there.

…

“Speak. What happened in the past few hours?” Sunders sat down in his study and gave Angor a blank stare.

A bit embarrassed, Angor pointed to his pocket where Toby was sleeping peacefully.

“It was nothing, really. I was just looking for him…”

He carefully explained what he went through.

Sunders found it strange that Angor somehow ran into so many monsters in the Shaded Cave. The place was thoroughly explored by people before, who did not report the presence of wizard-level monsters. Also, many apprentices had been fishing for shrimps there without a problem.

This could be the result of the “unlucky curse” left behind by the Pilgrim of Misfortune. Though Sunders highly doubted that his student was carrying the curse. The snake monster could have easily killed a good number of guards using its mind-manipulation aura. Angor would be long dead if the curse was affecting him.

Perhaps Angor was just… generally unlucky.

“They might be coming from the underground river, from other entrances we don’t know. However, wizard-level monsters tend to have their fixed territories and do not usually wander off too far. There could be a reason that forced them to change habitats.”