Black Clover: Untitled (SI fic)

[Desire]

"Ahh," A soft groan could be heard in a room.


A boy opened his eyes.


'Too dark, where am I?' He looked at the surroundings and could see him being in a jail? A cage more specifically.


'Did somebody capture me? I can't remember anything... maybe my memories are somehow deleted' The boy thought calmly.


He had a moment of panic, but he crushed it instantly.


During Times like this, panicking is just a fool's errand and he had learned this from experience first-hand previously.


'Let's see what is the last thing I remember?... Hmm, I went to sleep before that...'


'Okay, so My memory is blank after this, so either they were somehow removed or I was caught somehow in the night and now I am here' He thought while looking inside other people's cages.


He could see people with pale faces and faces that he could judge easily.


'They... They have lost hope, huh' He looked at other people's faces and clenched his hands.


He took deep breaths. 'It's fine, I- I won't lose hope even if I am a few seconds before my death, losing hope is the same as death' His resolve grew strong.


He is going to escape this unknown place at any cost.


He looked around and closed his eyes, waiting to gain more information.


He will also act like he has lost hope, so that whoever is keeping him here will not think he is odd one out, as that would make him taking action more difficult if he caught their attention.


'So, time to blend in' He closed his eyes and pretended to be sleep for now, planning his next actions which would depend on who the jailer is.


'Also, what's with this different feeling I am getting? This is not uncertainty but something else' He tried to focus outward, on his body, probably thinking that it was something with the air.


His eyes opened and widened. 'What the fuck?' A wave of panic spread throughout his heart, this time much greater than when he realized that he was in an unknown place.


He tried to forcefully calm himself.


It took him half a minute to calm down enough to rationally think.


'This is not my body, it's somebody else's body, how the heck am I in this body?' Thoughts ran at very high speeds inside his brain, faster than ever before.


His body's fight and flight mechanism had been activated and adrenaline was coursing through his blood.


All of that blood was going towards his head, due to how much thinking he was doing.


He was replaying his entire life and finding possibilities for such thing happening or just connections which could lead to this.


He had some assumptions previously, but having a big picture is always advantageous.


His musings were interrupted by a loud bang.


He saw a tall man with a broad chest and a well-built body coming inside.


He passed everyone their plates from the gate only by shifting them on the floor.


Despite it being thrown fast, not a single drop of porridge from any of the plates was dropped on the ground.


It just shows his skill.


'Pretend like you have lost hope like others' Our main character chanted inside his head while mimicking his facial expressions


"I Will fucking kill you when I escape" A slaver angrily said to the slaver.


The guy just looked at the angry shouting slave with contempt in his head and then shook his head.


"It seems you are dumb, I have given you multiple opportunities to not kill you, but it seems you have chosen this route, Don't blame me for what happens next," The guy said while unplugging a button of a bag that was tied to his waist.


'Japanese? Am I in Japan? Also, will that guy take out a gun' He instantly recognized both of them speaking in Japanese and the severity of what was going to happen.


However, his surprise increased to shock when he saw a book floating in front of the man and to horror when the guy released a fire spell that started burning the man alive.


"My last mercy to you would be killing you swiftly, I could have tried to slowly burn you, but that would have been too cruel" The guy said after not even ashes were left of the slave.


He looked at every other slave and as expected saw a look of horror on their faces.


'This guy... He is dangerous' He would have been on alert if it was just a gun, but seeing that he could even torture others if he so wishes to, this increases the severity of the situation again.


He hadn't hidden his look of horror even after the guy went away from the room.


Just in case somebody else is watching or if the guy has other ways to monitor him, due to why not as if one could spew fireballs, then it's logical to take precautions against such magic.


Inside, however, he was planning his escape. 'This is probably a moving vehicle or probably a carriage, as I could feel this moving with subtle shifts of my body which is hard to notice normally, also that guy, he had a clover symbol in his book...'


Everything had clicked for the boy.


He had transmigrated into Black Clover and is now being transported somewhere as a slave.


It took him a while... around 10 minutes to come to the fact that he has now a new body and identity and the world has changed.


Due to not having much attachment to his old world, he only had to come to the fact that he would be living in a medieval fantasy and have to forego smartphones and anime.


'Finding information would be very difficult now, Just having a search engine makes things so much easier, Ig the fact that people realize the importance of something only when it's lost is true' He internally shook his head.


'Maybe this could be an AU or set in modern times... but let's expect worse' He was a devout follower of Murphy's Law.


'Anyway, it doesn't really matter, my goal is to just survive and try out different things, for that I need strength and power as without those, the hierarchical world will just make me a casualty of a young master or something' He internally giggled at that while closing his eyes outwardly.


He rambled about some things internally, just entertaining himself while brainstorming about how he would escape.


'Okay, now this is going to be risky, but I would rather not expect what would happen to me when this carriage reaches its destination as that is unknown' He hardened his resolve.


'I will start trying to feel my mana, everyone in this verse has that, except some abnormalities, but let's assume that I have some mana, doing so could risk the slaver knowing about this, but I am ready to take the risk, I am not going to regret this decision' With that he didn't wasted time and started to find something different in his body which was not present in his previous body.


He had always done some form of meditation in his previous life, so his self-awareness of his body was not bad.


In just around fifteen minutes, he found the weird energy in his body.


'Okay, now I don't know how to manipulate this exactly, but I have read and watched a lot of weird stuff and have some theoretical knowledge about how to approach any unknown energy.


But that all is theory, It's time to test if those theories work or not' With that he tried to move the energy inside his body only.


He had found the source of his mana in the solar plexus.


However, that was only where it was mainly concentrated, he had noticed that it was present throughout this whole body.


He went with the solar plexus for now as it would be as he thought that it would be easier to work with trying to move mana in an area where there is more as sensing mana inside his body it is easy.


'Magic could be used even without having a grimoire, just having a grimoire makes it easier, but we have seen characters using magic when they were kids, so it should be possible'


'Time to start moulding it inside my body for now' With that he started going on a grind to hone his control.


Time was ticking and for now, just being able to use mana would be a boon to him.


***


Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters:


at p@treon.com/Desire96


Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

A few days passed till the first time our protagonist gained consciousness and came to the fact that he had transmigrated.

How does he track how many days have passed since that day?

Simple, by counting the number of times he gets food.

He had gotten comfortable with the mana sensing inside his body and could mould the mana into basic geometrical shapes quite quickly.

He had also started moving the mana inside his body and gained a decent competency in that.

Due to mana not leaving his body and technically not being used, he could do this exercise most of the time, one thing he had noticed was that when he moves mana, some of it gets converted into a lower form of energy, which he simply called the "waste energy" as it's a chaotic form of mana.

Its analogy could be similar to how "heat" could be seen in his previous world. A lower form of energy is converted from a higher form. The lower form of energy has no way to get converted into a higher form, thus total usable energy is always decreasing, despite the total amount of energy being the same.

However, he doesn't knows whether "waste energy" could be converted back into "mana"

What he knows is that it leaves his body and gets dispersed in the environment.

He was worried that the guy could notice his actions through this, but after sensing a bit in the environment, he realized that there was mana everywhere, and so was "waste energy", but sensing the latter was harder.

He looked at the new plate of food he had gotten and quickly consumed it fully.

He looked around the other slaves who were eating food.

He decided to delay what he was going to do for later and focused on refining his internal control by working on compressing an amount of mana.

Time passed and luckily for him, he had his cage at the corner and the guy in the cage on the exact other side most of the time, so he lay down on his back such that it was diagonally facing the others', so that nobody could see his front side.

He first concentrated on the mana in his solar plexus, then moved it to his palm and then released it.

He could see blue mana dispersing in the air.

'Okay, Let's see whether that guy comes here or not' He decided to test the waters by checking the amount of mana that was going to be outputted and dispersed in the air.

It was risky, but he felt that it would be not really easy for the guy to always monitor the inside, plus even if he had a way, it would be very hard to determine the source until and unless that guy has an exact pinpointer device or magic.

So, he was gambling on the latter's existence.

To gain something, you need to risk something too.

After going back and forth between internally focusing on compressing the mana and, externally releasing it, he realized that the guy either can't notice him releasing mana or is pretending that hasn't noticed yet.

Either way, the next day, he didn't use mana, in the range of before and after 1 hour of the Guy coming to give them food, and gauged his reaction, which didn't really give him any useful info as the guy was same as ever.

With that days passed, and he practised compressing mana inside his body in various shapes and even experimenting with mana output, very careful with the latter, as he didn't want to risk it much.

One day, during the night when everyone was sleeping, He placed his finger near the lock and released mana from his finger which took the shape of a key.

After one minute, he was able to form the right key.

He just in case tried that again in the next minute and instantly opened the lock.

However, He was unsure of whether to escape now or later as in the last few days he had seen when the slaver used to open the door, it was raining heavily, so he didn't really want to escape in such conditions and not having a grasp on the exact location.

Also, he didn't really have combat power enough to kill the slaver in a sneak attack, so those two things made him close the lock and get back to his training despite knowing that there was a possibility that this carriage could reach its destination the next day.

With that some more days passed and he noticed that it wasn't raining heavily anymore outside.

'So, it's finally time to escape... I can't wait to meet all the characters from the cannon' A weird expression could be seen on his face, which after a few seconds disappeared like it never existed.

'Calm down, those characters are real, so they would have more depth to themselves, they could even be different from the original, plus what's the guarantee that I am not close to cannon timeline, maybe I could in time of hundreds of years after cannon events or could be during the reign of any of the first 26 Wizard Kings.' He decided to rely on his rational side, as that is one of the things he is good at.

It was the current dead of the night and He quickly opened the lock of the cage and went out.

'Let's see, should I open all these people's cages too? They could serve as distraction' He mused while looking at around 30+ slaves.

'No, that would take too much time, which I don't have currently, plus I want my escape to be sneaky' With that he went to the door of the carriage

He created a blade of mana with his fingers and cut through the gap between the door, such that on the other side, the lock split into two.

Just as the door opened, He who was crouching, quickly caught both the pieces of lock before they hit the ground and made some sound.

'Hehe, I wouldn't be able to have my mana be that sharp just a few days ago, taking my time and training was the right thing to do after all' He internally chuckled while getting out of the carriage, which was static, indicating that the guy is probably sleeping.

He quickly closed the broken door as much as he could.

'Okay, now that is out of the way, let's esc-' His thoughts were caught in his brain as he noticed the slaver who was watching him with wide eyes.

Both of them looked at each other.

Our main protagonist despite not being a Joestar, subconsciously used their technique.

He threw the lock pieces to the guy's face while running exactly away from the position.

'That won't hit, I misjudged my strength' He thought while running in a zig-zag-like pattern.

Suddenly, he dived sideways and saw a kick hitting the air at the place where he had been standing previously.

'This guy is fast, Is it mana enhancement or his natural physique or both?' He had thought that mana enhancement should be a technique too, but hadn't really thought of a way to implement it practically.

'My only way to damage him is releasing a mana blade at my maximum mana output and going for his neck or heart while compressing it'

"How did you escape?" He asked, but instead of the boy running away, he lunged towards him.

"I am not the only one who escaped alone" The boy suddenly said making him startle and look at the carriage's door looking for any signs of other prisoners escaping.

Generally, being an experienced mage, he wouldn't have looked away during a battle, however, due to the fact that he was facing a harmless boy who didn't even have a grimoire, and due to the unexpectedness of the situation, he made this rookie mistake.

His eyes widened as he felt a decent amount of mana released from the boy's finger compressed in the form of a blade going straight for his neck.

However, Even if he was caught off guard, he still was an experienced person, his instincts kicked in and he rotated his body in an unnatural manner such that the mana blade passed right beside his neck.

He rotated his body and did an axe kick straight at the boy's gut sending him flying like a cannonball and hitting the trees, breaking those.

'Fuck, that hurt, Luckily I had anticipated that and had moved my mana in the body to the abdomen right before the kick connected and released it from there, softening the impact or I would have definitely died' He had also the same for his back, so he didn't suffer injuries from crashing in the trees.

The slaver was also surprised that the boy survived as He had thought that there would already be a hole in the boy's gut due to the subconscious attack of his was done on instincts.

"I would have normally let you live despite trying to escape me, but it seems you are too dangerous for me to let you live" The slaver summoned his grimoire and looked at the boy who was looking at him with fear.

***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

'He must have very good instincts to not only create a mana blade with that much compression but also to move mana inside his body to lessen the impact' The man thought while readying a fire spell which would have high speed to reach the boy who was far away from him.

Little did he know that the boy had done all that on his own skill, the compression part was trained by his own and the movement of the mana inside his body was not instinctual but all predicted by him beforehand and done consciously.

It seemed to be the end for the boy but a unexpected roar caught the attention of the man as he turned around to see a boar charging at him.

'Fuck, when did that reach here, no way, that boy distracted me from my sensory field to be activated properly and his mana usage should have attracted the boar, I am fucked if other animals come' The man panicked momentarily as the boar was charging straight for him at lightning speed despite it having a large stature.

It was after all a mana beast and is deadly.

The man knew that he didn't have any spell to kill the boar with 100 per cent certainty at this close distance, so he made a quick decision.

He fired a fireball not at the boar, but at the carriage, at quick speed.

Before the boar could reach him, screams could be heard from the carriage of pain and agony.

Being burned alive is very painful, especially when the caster made a spell which would not kill them quickly, but make them last long so that they scream.

This made Boar change his direction to the carriage as he was attracted by more noise and there seemed to be more people there.

It definitely was not sentiment fully, otherwise, he wouldn't have made that move.

Anyway, the man's gamble played well as the boar had changed his target, he quickly used a spell at a very high output and just as the boar reached near the carriage, he launched it at that carriage so that the boar wouldn't dodge it.

The boar was instantly burned alive and his bones weren't left behind due to the strength of that spell.

'And there goes my goods, well I could always earn more as long as I live' The man placated himself about his loss, but his eyes suddenly widened as he felt the world spinning.

He saw the moon shining brightly above, followed by the boy standing beside his fallen body with his fingers down.

Despite him being the murderer, he didn't have any blood on his body.

The boy suddenly ran away from his body.

'He should have used those screams as a cover to hide his footsteps from me and formed a mana blade exactly at the time I released the spell, making me have my guard down... was that a coincidence or was all that planned?' The man wondered as that was his last thought before he died.

The boy far away noticed the man's head which was now on the ground and his grimoire which had started disappearing now fully disappeared.

'Okay, so he didn't have any spells which activated when he died, now should I loot him?' The boy looked at his headless body.

However, something in him told him that it was a bad idea.

He thought for 5 seconds and a realization hit him, he quickly started running away from the scene at full speed.

In less than a minute, many mana beasts had appeared in this position and started fighting as these were mindless ones.

Meanwhile, our main protagonist was running at full speed. 'Is it a way for me to increase my running speed?' He tried by releasing mana from one of his feet which was going away from the ground, he felt himself being pushed forward at a higher speed and almost stumbled but, he quickly released the man from his other foot which was now going away from the ground to balance himself.

'Damn, this is awesome, but the mana requirements are high' He frowned while stopping using mana and changed his directions as he didn't want to be trackable to either other animals or possible accomplices of the slaver.

After a few minutes of intense running, he stopped and crouched inside a bush after checking it and nearby bushes thoroughly.

His breathing was heavy, but he made sure to breathe such that it didn't made much sound while inhaling much air.

'So, those guys are dead huh' He thought about all the other slaves who were in the carriage, not only did they lose their lives while being baited, but also didn't have painless deaths.

'Then again, like every world, this one also follows "strong killing the weak", well, in my previous world, money was the main strength indicator along with some other factors, but here it would be your lineage + your strength, as despite anime not portraying it straight up, the clover kingdom was divided into the forsaken realm, noble realm and royal realm or something along those lines'

He didn't feel much remorse over their death, as he wasn't really directly responsible for their death, he had to survive he did that, if he had a chance to use them to survive, then he probably would have killed them himself.

He after all was a selfish person and recognized that.

'Anyway, I don't know how to survive, this is an unknown forest, and I don't know how to kill and skin animals... Yeah, I would rather stick with a vegetarian meal, I would have to look at non-poisonous stuff here' He sighed while closing his eyes and looked at his mana which was slowly recovering.

He noticed that now its recovery rate increased when he was actively focusing on it.

Meanwhile, he started shaping the mana and compressing it in different shapes while his mana regenerated, it didn't require as much focus as before, so he wasn't exhausted mentally much.

After around an hour or so, he recovered his mana.

He looked at a rabbit nearby which was eating some grass.

'Why isn't it sleeping? Well, not as it matters, I don't know if rabbits sleep in day or night, I need to test something out' He closed his eyes and focused on the mana inside his body.

He started shifting all the mana inside his body in his solar plexus and whenever it got full, he compressed it further.

He thought that this act alone would take around a few minutes, but he had underestimated the difficulty of the task heavily as it took him a few hours to get all his mana to be centred in his solar plexus.

Night fell and Day came.

he had to take multiple breaks throughout the night to let his focus be maintained, and his not sleeping last night was also a debuff-like factor.

Despite it being multiple times when his progress declined whenever he took breaks, he finally reached the state of his mana completely in his solar plexus and compressed as much as it could.

The rabbit was long gone, however, he now realized that he needed to sleep, otherwise he would be not able to take optimal decisions.

'This body is also young, so I have to sleep more, anyway, I don't have an alarm, so I would naturally let this body wake up' He thought while moving to find a place to sleep.

However, he noticed that as he was moving, some mana was going out of his solar plexus.

He redirected his effects to prevent that and after a few more hours, he was able to prevent any mana from leaking from his solar plexus while walking.

'Fuck, I need to sleep quickly, things are getting difficult now, plus hunger is also catching up to me' He quickly tried to find a cave or something, but after half an hour of not finding anything, he decided that he is going to dig inside the ground and cover it with a stone and sleep there.

He soon found a big stone and decided to dig near that.

Throughout all this, he had noticed some animals roaming around, but due to him not getting in their sights plus his mana being compressed inside his body, they failed to detect him.

He quickly focused inside his body and started letting mana flow from his solar plexus to his palms.

He noticed that mana was not going only to his palm as intended but going to his other parts. 'I will deal with that later after I wake up, first need to sleep' He quickly started digging by releasing mana bursts to soften the ground and then remove the soil manually.

Soon, he formed a hole inside the ground and slept there after covering the other opening with a leaf as most of it was covered by the rock.

***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

His eyes opened and he looked around to see the darkness except some light that was peeking from the leaves.

'Okay, I am still alive, cool, thought would die somehow while being trapped here' He cautiously peeked out of the small hole and only came out of that hole when he noticed that no animal was nearby.

He also noticed that when he had slept, a lot of the chakra that was concentrated in his solar plexus had spread throughout his body.

'Well, It would take a long time for me to make it automatic, but Let's see if any animals notice me' He decided to transverse the forest to find some food, looking at the sky, he could deduce that it was still around 3-4 hours before sunset, enough time for him to find some food.

However, just after a few steps, he noticed a rabbit heading towards him.

'Okay, that thing is ferocious, plus the fact that it's hopping makes it more bizarre' He had noticed that some of the mana was being released from his body despite his trying not to, that was the reason for him initially compressing all the mana in the solar plexus as that way it won't escape.

The rabbit suddenly skyrocketed at him with his paws in front of him, seemingly intending to tear open his flesh, but he had foreseen this before only, so he had dived down before only, making the rabbit go and hit a tree, however, it after hitting at that bounced back from it and rushed towards him again.

'This guy is too fast, I can't even see him moving, only able to dodge when he Is charging' he dived in another direction, barely dodging the headbutt- no pawbutt of the rabbit.

'Let's see, he is using his leg strength to do this feat, which means that it's mana enhanced, how annoying' This time our protagonist, released mana bursts from his palms, making him quickly stand and dive as the rabbit had decreased the time between successive pawbutts.

The area where his paws were landing was having a crater-like shape.

'I am hungry, I don't think I will be able to escape this guy, Have to kill him now' He started racking his brain to find solutions to this predicament.

Due to hunger, his brain was not working properly, so he decided to acknowledge the fact that one strike of the rabbit's paw would kill him and the fact that he was so fast made it harder for him to exactly pin point where his paw would hit, unlike slaver's leg which was not that fast, plus had a bigger surface area.

Adrenaline started pumping throughout his entire body and he finally felt a sense of danger.

His brain started working and finding solutions to escape this predicament.

'One way is to somehow escape his senses and hide my mana, but not only it would be hard, just completely suppressing my mana takes a few hours, so that option is out'

Suddenly his eyes widened in realization as he dived again with a deadpan.

He quickly rushed towards a wall, which was very high.

He then stumbled backwards, and the rabbit took the chance to attack him, but mana burst from the boy's body, making his upper body rotate and dodge that, not only that, but he then used it to face backwards, where the rabbit hit the wall.

Just as he came out, a blade of mana rushed towards its head, killing it.

'Fuck, finally it's over, the answer was so simple, I just had to use the gap between his successive charges, which he used to prepare those in the first place' He shook his head and then escaped from the place.

At least tried to.

'Fuck' He noticed a dozen of rabbits that were in the area, looking at him.

He released mana from his feet while jumping side-ways, just as a rabbit passed through that area.

He quickly reached a tree and climbed it.

However, while doing that, some rabbit's paw hit the tree and it shook violently.

He had to release some mana bursts from his lower region to increase his speed and be erratic to dodge it.

Just as he reached the branch, he quickly jumped from the branch away, just at that instant, the whole tree fell down, in courtesy to the rabbits causing so much destruction.

The gap between the branch he jumped from and the branch he landed on couldn't be shortened by his jump, so he quickly released some mana from his feet, which let him forward.

A rabbit who was smart had aimed to charge initially at the spot according to his original trajectory, but due to this change, it missed our protagonist by a few inches.

'Fuck, these guys are not only too many, but smart too, I can't use that tactic as some other rabbits will charge during the time one takes to charge, I have to somehow lose these guys, or start dwindling their number' he frowned, while landing on the branch and crouched on it while his one hand was on the spot where his head was with a mana blade.

A rabbit decided to kill itself while putting his head on the mana blade and then MC's hand, making him stumble forward towards the ground from the branch.

He dissipated the mana blade and let it fall himself on the ground, however, just as his foot was going away from the branch, he released a lot of mana from the branch making his fall very quick.

Instead of using mana to soften his fall, he did a roll on the ground.

The dead rabbit's body landed on the ground in the next few seconds.

'Tch, their blood is different from human blood' He noticed the blood in his hands while looking at the dozen rabbits looking angry now.

"You guys started this, better get ready to die," He said with a calm face and motioned with his palm to come at him.

'I need a sharp object or something, my mana won't last long, plus I am hungry too, fatigue is starting to catch up, and adrenaline is only keeping me conscious till now, I would have gotten unconscious by the amount of energy I am expending' He internally frowned but didn't show his trouble outside.

Three rabbits headed for him, He created a rod with mana, between both of his hands, with thorns coming out of it.

All three of them hit the mana rod with such impact that the human was sent rocketed backwards like a cannonball.

He released mana from his back outwardly reducing his momentum till he hit the back of a tree.

'OUCH' He felt a lot of pain, but luckily none of his bones broke, nor did he show his pain outwardly.

The three of those rabbits had died due to the thorns piercing their head.

'That was a gamble, but it seems they generally are aiming for my heart instead of head, I wonder why or was it a coincidence' He picked up one of the rabbit's corpses and threw it to those rabbits who were still at the moment.

"COME AT ME AND DIE" He said like a madman and luckily for him his bluff worked as those rabbits started backing away and soon ran off.

'I am almost out of mana, one more mana burst and I will go to mana exhaustion which has a high chance of making me unconscious, especially when I am hungry'

He got up and started moving but he felt the world spinning.

He looked at a tree with some purple apples on it.

He looked around and found out that this tree was only his option.

'Well, it's do or die, time to take a gamble' He climbed the tree the normal way and soon, stood on a branch.

He took a bite out of the purple apple-looking fruit.

"Damn, at least if I die now, it would be in peace, the taste is so good" He started gobbling up the food and soon entire tree's apples disappeared.

"Now, that's what I call a good meal" he patted his stomach while looking at some beasts that had come to look at the aftermath of the commotion, but due to our MC already removing the blood from his body before climbing this tree and currently within its leaves, they didn't notice him.

He then lay down on a thick branch and started focusing on recovering his mana.

He noticed that the rate of regeneration was higher than usual. 'Oh, is it due to that purple apple?'

He decided to not focus on that for now and quickly moved all his mana towards the solar plexus, due to not much amount present inside his body, he was done in around 15 minutes, any new mana that formed inside his body, he quickly moved it to his solar plexus.

'Now, that's a shortcut I found for this technique'

***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

Days passed and Our protagonist continued honing his control over concentrating all his mana in his body in one spot.

Soon, it turned into weeks and he could now converge all his mana within an hour to his solar plexus.

His training had comprised of concentrating the mana, dispersing it, concentrating it and so on. The former took hours to accomplish while the latter was done within seconds.

It was like building a sand castle.

He had also gone to gather fruits and change locations only when he had completely concentrated all his mana inside his body as he didn't want an encounter like the one with rabbits again.

That one could have cost his life if he had made one mistake.

He even had a good level of control over the mana when he is sleeping or unconscious, such that not much goes away from his solar plexus.

About choosing solar plexus has the main point to gather mana? Well, it didn't really have any special feature other than the fact that it was near to middle of his body and could supply to all parts of his body.

The other factor is his meta knowledge and Chinese fics or novels he had read, which might lead to this bias.

Anyway, the solar plexus is not a unique place in his body for mana concentration as he could concentrate all of his mana at any point.

Our protagonist was currently sitting on a branch of a tree while biting on a red apple.

'These things are definitely tastier than my previous life, I could bet my pinky finger on it' He thought while taking another bite out of the apple.

He suddenly sensed a large explosion hundreds of meters away from his location.

This was not a new thing, as conflicts between stronger animals happened on a daily basis, but the thing that attracted his attention was that explosions were getting louder.

'Jeez, who is the being who can't let me eat in peace' He quickly swallowed the entire apple and focused on reducing his presence to utmost nothingness.

It has worked always till now for battles between stronger animals as they generally are not focused on their surroundings much compared to their enemies.

He still was prepared to run if his cover was broken in the unlikely situation.

However, soon the explosions suddenly stopped and calmed down completely.

'Did the battle get over? Or did a third party come making the other two stop fighting and choose peace as an option or something' He internally joked while trying to find something while looking at the direction from which sounds were coming.

A few minutes passed like this with no sounds coming, our protagonist hadn't moved an inch from his crouching position on the branch, hidden in the leaves due to his cautious nature.

'Should I move or wait a bit more?' He wondered about his next move.

"Oh, didn't expect a kid to be present here" A whisper-shout could be heard by the boy.

'What the fuck' Even without this thought materialized fully, he had moved his palm with a mana blade from where the voice came.

To his surprise, he felt the blade connecting.

He turned around to see what exactly was happening.

"Oh, you also have toys to play with? That really is an ingenious use of mana now" He looked at the spot where his mana blade had pierced and saw it hitting the palm of the speaker, yet, no scratch could be seen there.

'What the fuck, that thing could kill a normal human or mage more than 10 times, I didn't even feel any obstruction from mana, does this means that this is physical strength completely, like the durability of that body?' He was so baffled that he didn't even move.

He hadn't even looked at the face of the person who had sneaked upon him due to the absurdity of the situation.

"Well, you attacked me, so it's natural for me to attack you too, right?" He then saw the fist slowly coming at him.

No, slow would be a wrong statement, it was more like his brain was replaying the events of what happened slowly to him due to whatever happened during that time was very fast for his perception to catch up.

Just as the fist was a few inches away from his position, he released the maximum output of mana from his forehead forward such that the speed made him go backwards and his head downward.

He barely was able to dodge the punch.

Due to the sheer force of the punch, the air was thrust backwards, causing a loud boom to occur, he was hurled backwards due to that along with his initial momentum by mana burst.

He quickly back-flipped in the air and landed while doing a crouch and looked at the attacker with a grim expression.

'I almost died' His eyes widened as he finally noticed the attacker.

"It's Mereoleona fucking Vermillion" He blurted out as he noticed the attacker's face.

He didn't mind saying that out loud as during this moment, keeping his facial expression was very hard, and she would have deduced that he knew her beforehand already.

"Oh, you know me? I didn't know that my fame was that big now" She said in a chilling voice.

"I didn't know that either till now," He said while going over what exactly happened in the previous exchange.

"Still, didn't expect you to dodge that squirt, can you dodge this?" She disappeared from her spot and reappeared from above him, aiming an axe kick.

However, he had already mana burst out of the way before her kick landed on the ground and formed a crater.

'How annoying, not only I can't track her movements or mana, but her attacks could one-shot me' He ducked under another punch using mana bursts.

Despite doing only a few bursts, he was almost running out of mana, as each of them took too much mana as Mereoleona was too fast.

Soon, he was dangerously close to the bottom and stopped using mana bursts, making him not able to dodge the next move.

However, before it could land, she stopped the punch a few inches away from his face.

'Okay, as expected she won't kill me, I am sa-' He found himself getting a hit on his head from above.

"Ouch, what was that for?" he rubbed the part of his head, which was now resembling a bump.

"For attacking me earlier, what else" She smirked.

"You were the one who startled me like that, who sneaks on a kid?" He accused her while pointing his little fingers towards the big woman.

"I was expecting a spy or something, not a kid suppressing his mana fully, which most mages can't do properly" She shrugged.

"Tch, your flattery won't work on me, but I will forgive you just coz I am in a good mood" He rubbed his nose.

"Cool, kid so what are you doing here?"

"I am training duh" He took a moment to answer.

"In the middle of a grand magic zone?" She asked baffled.

She was brave/idiotic enough to go to jungles to train when she was young, but they never were grand magic zones.

"Oh, we are in a grand magic zone?" He asked baffled.

'No wonder I feel my mana rising when I ate those fruits, must be an effect of being raised in this region'

"As far as I know" She folded her arms. "How old are you?"

"I don't know" He shrugged. He didn't know the age of this body. Plus he didn't want to lie to Mereoleona, he had a feeling that she could tell if one was lying.

Plus she was a captain-level magic knight, she should be able to detect those due to some random way or just her experience.

"Oh, let's see, you seem like a 9-year-old to me, unfortunately, I don't have a spell to check that" She gave him her estimates.

"Oh, that seems young"

"Indeed, so? Would you now say why are you here?" She asked him

"Do I really have to?" he made a face which spoke troublesome.

"I might not look like it, but I am a magic knight, so helping people unfortunately comes under my duty, and I am curious enough"

'Oh, so she is self-aware, that she looks more like a thug than a magic knight' He thought and immediately got a bonk.

"Ouch, I didn't even say anything"

"Your expression says it all" She gave him an unimpressed stare.

"Well, I woke up being in a cage, with some other people in similar cages and a jailer who was transporting us in a carriage, all people were below the age of 15 as they didn't have a Grimoire, and the jailer had one"

***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

"Oh, interesting, how did you escape?"

"Well, I trained my mana control while days passed and when it reached to a good level, I tried to break the lock and escape, but the guy noticed me, which led to a confrontation between us, which I lost, but a mana beast came and charged at him... blah blah...and I was able to kill him and then escape" He omitted the important details and details like he was the only one who escaped and didn't bother to free others and so so.

"Oh, do you remember his face or something, any sort of dressing similarities, anything would help," She said while writing whatever he said in a notebook.

'Woah, so she has the patience to do this kind of stuff too, I definitely thought that she only knows how to fight' This time he didn't changed his facial expressions.

"Cool, I will drop you out of the forest then"

"Wait, I don't want to leave, I think this is a good place to train" He protested immediately.

'This place is really best to train due to the mana concentration and honing my instincts which would be hard otherwise, I would rather be away from the place with young masters as long as I could'

"Oh, why do you want to train?" She asked amused.

"To get stronger"

"Oh, why do you want to get stronger then?"

"So, that nobody messes with me, plus fighting and investigating mana is fun too I guess" He answered honestly.

"Ohhh, Meet me in around 10 years, You might become a worthy opponent for me" She said with a smirk that was primal in nature.

He sub-consciously shivered.

"Hell, I will defeat you within 7 years" He tried to put a strong front to hide his fear.

"Do you even know how to skin animals and cook them?" Her question caught him off guard.

"I don't know," He said shamelessly

She looked unimpressed.

She took out a cubical object from nowhere and a book came out of it.

'A spatial device? How interesting? does it work with runes or something?'

"Here, this should give you a variety of techniques of how to skin animals according to their body structure, you know how to read right?" She gave him the book.

"Let me check" He quickly opened the book and sighed in relief that it was Japanese only, if it was some other language, then he would have been in trouble.

"Yeah, I can read it, finally could eat some real food instead of plants" He cheered, he was getting bored of eating fruits and stuff, checking for poison and all by looking at how many animals ate that food.

It was too tedious and time-consuming process.

"Oh, if you are so kind, then do you have some books on mana control or something, I feel like seeing already existing techniques and already established principles will save a lot of my time" He shamelessly asked.

"yeah, sure, but these are the ones that could be found in the general library, if you want something more advanced, those are generally reserved for magic knights or monopolized by nobles or royals" She summoned a few more books and gave him, they were in a carry bag.

'Woah, the day feels so bizarre, I was just joking with that statement, she actually gave me the books, also, why is she carrying these?' He was puzzled but didn't bother to ask.

Who will argue against a gift horse in the mouth?

"Kid, do you know a good bathing spot in this forest?"

"Hmm, There is a hot spring nearby, Let me lead you to it, Wait a minute, I will come back after hiding these" With that he went to his temporary hideout and kept the goods he received and then guided one of the strongest people in clover kingdom to the hot springs.

None of the animals approached them due to Mereoleona not hiding her mana.

It seems there were no suicidal fellows today.

"We are here" He motioned his hands to the large ass hotspring.

"Nice, I needed a place to relax after some training I did"

'For some reason, why do I have a feeling that some beings were abused while she was "training"' He sweatdropped at the thought.

"About those books, why are you car-" His words stuck in his mouth as he saw Mereoleona getting naked.

"What about those?" She removed the last clothing and dived into the hot springs.

"Why are you naked? No,a more proper question is aren't we supposed to not show our naked bodies in other people's presence?" He instantly changed his question.

"Who decided that? Those decisions are on an individual to take" Her words silenced him.

"Well, it doesn't really matter" He sighed.

"Why don't you join me?"

"Hmm, Sure I guess, It's been a while since I took a bath" He didn't have even an ounce of shame when he said that he hadn't taken a bath for so long"

"So, what were you asking about earlier?"

"Hmm, I forgot" He actually had forgotten what he was going to ask momentarily.

As he was trying to recall what he was going to ask her, she asked a question of hers.

"How did you train so far? I could see your chakra control to be unrefined, but it's really amazing that you reached this point without any books for reference or an instructor"

"Well, just thought of some exercises as I went along, their effectiveness indicator is how well mana is in control within me I guess" He shrugged and summarized what he was technically doing.

"Interesting, I am really looking forward to your growth, don't disappoint me" He shivered again due to the intensity of her gaze.

He felt like he was being looked at by an apex predator and helpless to do anything.

It was more absurd that she was naked.

"Ahem, anyway the water has the right temperature here" He tried to change the topic.

"I forgot to ask, but what's your name?"

"I don't have any" He replied subconsciously.

'Name, huh, Not like it matters'

"Oh, how about I name you Akeru?" Her sudden statement caught him off guard.

"Um, why Akeru?" He asked curiously.

"I just thought randomly and it was the name of the last thug I beat"

He looked at her incredulously and then started laughing "hahaahaha!"

She also started laughing.

"Why not? I shall refer to myself as Akeru from now on" He or now Akeru decided.

At least his name would now remind him of something funny from now onwards.

"You are a very funny kid, anyway, time for me to leave kid" With that she got up from the hot springs and put on her clothes in a flash.

"Well then, till we meet again I guess, I would at least be a magic knight level next time we meet, that's also considering within 5 years, if we meet that is"

"Don't die kid" With that she turned around and paused.

"Hmm, actually take this kid, My brother had given me a few of them and I forgot about these till now, I guess there was no situation for it to be used" He caught an orange emblem that had an animal engraved on it.

"I forgot what it does, but it should give you at least access to the library when you go out, just show it at the main gate of Vermillion House, Cya" With that she disappeared from the spot, causing shockwaves to be created due to her speed.

Air was blown away and Akeru found himself going inside the water.

He came out of the water and put on his clothes.

He put the emblem in his pocket and headed towards his hideout, which was just a few branches, which he had moulded, such that it was kind of a platform for him to sit, or lie down.

'Let's see, I first need to check out the book on cooking animals after skinning them' He sighed and started flipping through the book

He started first looking at animal types he was familiar with and even found out the exact species of some, leading to focusing on them first.

'I know that I don't mind killing animals or cutting their heads, but this must be some other level of this' He made a disgusted face and started looking for prey to kill.

Days passed, and he was now able to get food easily and his training time increased.

Time passed quickly.

***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

Nearly 1.5 years passed since Mereoleona visited him and gave him 'Gifts'

Two beasts could be seen fighting each other.

On a closer look, you would notice that a beast and a human were fighting each other.

The human was none other than our protagonist Akeru.

He was fighting a lion-like beast.

The lion lunged at him and Akeru used his daggers to block his palms while deflecting it such that he wasn't holding his full body weight on himself.

Now, somebody will ask how he got the daggers?

Simple, these were not daggers, but bone pieces that Akeru was using as daggers.

'Fucking work' He infused the mana in the bone daggers, they glowed bluer, but apart from the lion's claws being ground against his daggers, nothing changed.

Lion landed on the ground and tried to bite his legs, but Akeru had already kicked towards its neck, deflecting him from biting him.

'Safe, but I really need to figure out this technique I am trying to create before I lose a body part or something'

The lion skidded a few metres away but roared towards Akeru.

The lion then roared towards Akeru, a vibration of air hurling towards him, but the latter had already rolled away.

All the trees were obstructed within 100 metres of the Lion's position in the path of roar.

'What a ridiculous attack, I would die if it hit me' Akeru thought while circling around the lion, which the latter seems to be doing too.

'Well, it would be a danger if he could hit me, otherwise, it's just useless' Akeru smirked.

Now, one may ask, why is Lion trying to kill him other than obvious reasons one could think of?

Well, there is a special story behind this encounter.

Akeru was in the mood to try to meet and ambushed one lion and killed it.

He then decided to cook its meat and took two bones out of it as his previous bone daggers were close to being broken.

So, he sharpened those and then ate the meat.

However, the lion that Akeru ate was this lion's pack member and he decided to take revenge by coming after him.

Akeru hadn't hidden his tracks which he usually does as taking a big beast like a lion is hard and he had targeted it due to it being alone, however, it seems that has only backfired on him.

Suddenly Akeru burst mana from his foot and rushed toward the lion, the latter also coming towards Akeru.

Akeru at this time had learned how to enhance himself from mana, at least passively.

So, his physical stats have increased severalfold from his base form, which was just of a 10-year-old child.

The lion released another roar, but this time Akeru slid down on the ground barely dodging it, such that he was under the lion's body.

He saw the lion raising his paw and intending to stomp on his head.

'Well, time to do or die' Akuru's face turned into a maniacal smirk.

He was very literal in those words. If he fails to do the technique, then he will die.

The bone glowed blue and this time, they turned more blue unlike before.

'Finally' He thought while passing the dagger through the stomach of a lion as he was still skidding.

Before the paw could squash his face, the dagger cut the lion into two, blood pouring out of it.

The lion was cut into 2.

'What the fuck, all the blood and organs came onto my face' Akeru made a disgusted face, but despite that didn't say that out loud.

He had a habit of saying things in mind and it was just reinforcing in this case.

***
It's been 3 years since Akeru submitted himself to the uncivilized life.

He could be seen moving through the forest with a lazy expression, and his posture indicated that he was relaxed.

Somebody might mistake him to be walking in a garden with looking at the greenery, but he was still in the same grand magic zone.

Animals seem to be running away as soon as they see him.

He had earned a reputation throughout the entire region for his notoriety of eating each species in the whole zone.

Mana beasts call him "Stalkerish Glutton".

You won't even know when he attacked and killed you and ate you.

Everything is done in mystery.

'Hehe, moving through the forests has become so much easier than before, still I won't dare to claim that I am strongest in the forest' He knew that there were beasts that would give even senior magic knights a run for their money and he was nowhere near that level.

Heck, just beating a magic knight head-on would be a very difficult feat if not straight impossible without a grimoire.

'Time to leave' He moved his leg forward and dashed straight in the front at a very fast speed.

He had enhanced his leg muscles with mana and they gave him similar boosts as using mana bursts, but not only they are massively chakra efficient, He didn't have to worry about the recoil of the high momentum.

Soon, he came out of the forest and found himself in front of a dirt road.

He currently only had a bag strapped over his body.

He travelled for nearly an hour or so before he had to stop.

"Hand over all your money and goods right now" 5 people with black clothes came in front of him suddenly with daggers pointing towards him.

'What the hell?'

"Boss, it seems we have caught a hobo, I don't think looting him is worth it, he doesn't even have proper clothes" One man suddenly said.

"Fair enough, let's not waste time" With that the man in the middle turned back and started walking away.

Akeru had a tick mark on his face, so what was wrong with him using leaves as make-shift clothes? What would you expect from training straight for 3 years, his clothes were not wearable anymore in the first few months only.

The bandit leader heard a thud behind him. "What is it you fo-" He turned around to only see a punch heading for his face and the world blacking out.

'Hehe, at least I would get some clothes now' He made an evil smirk and started stripping off their belongings from the guys and looking at the loot they had in their bags.

Luckily, he found a half-pant, considering that he was looking at adult people's clothes, which was fortunate on his side.

The upper t-shirt he got was too loose for him, but it was better than nothing.

He then started moving away, but suddenly he had an idea.

He started stripping the clothes of all men and took it along with him.

After a few minutes of walking, he threw it in a bush.

'I am not petty, I am just thanking them for the clothes and some money that I got from them by letting them train their tracking ability and resilience ability.' He self-righteously nodded and started making his way through the nearest habitable area.

Aftera few hours of walking, he realized something crucial.

'I am lost' He internally cursed and decided to camp here, in a plain area, luckily there were some trees and after checking them, he slept in those.

A few days passed travelling like that and he finally saw the first instance of civilization.

'What the fuck... How the hell I am in front of Royal Capital? Isn't it supposed to be in the middle of the kingdom or something?' He was dumbfounded at that.

"Move hobo," Somebody from behind said that and he instinctively side-stepped.

He didn't even bother looking at the person and then looked at the map that was nearby present.

"You- Where are you going?" The guy seemed to be irritated that the person who he deemed insignificant didn't even look at him.

His ego was hurt.

Akeru closed his eyes and sensed the mana of the guards and other people nearby.

He mentally nodded while looking at the map and engraving the important places in his mind.

Before the guy could touch him, he did a horse kick backwards at the pelvic area of the arrogant voice.

"It hurtsss~" The guy dropped to the ground while clutching that area with both of his hands.

Akeru quickly used mana enhancement and started running away from the location.

He went in the random direction and started using mana bursts to increase his speed without looking back.

In a few hours, he looked around and sighed.

'So, this is the commoner realm, hopefully no young masters' He crossed his fingers while looking around.

***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters there:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

Akeru strolled through the streets while looking at the various shops.

'Proper Civilization finally, I missed it...' Akeru thought while observing the things carefully and finding out the differences between his world and this world.

Other than the fact that this world was in a medieval setting other than his Modern world, this world had mana.

That alone changed a lot of things.

'There were some gaps in the cannon or more like possibilities for such things to happen, but I guess that side was not explored I guess' He thought while looking at a noble being teleported with a person beside him who had a grimoire open.

'Anyway, I don't think it would be wise to go to Vermillion House directly, I don't know the value of that emblem despite getting it from arguably the strongest person in Vermillion House, that fact alone worries me' He frowned while looking at beggars begging on the street.

"Please give m-... Uh, Go somewhere else, this is my spot for begging" The teenage girl changed her tone from polite to outright angry.

"Yes Yes," Akeru lifted his hands in surrender while quickening his walking pace.

'Despite wearing the sto- gifted clothes from Bandit's, I still am mistaken as a beggar, I wonder if that is a good thing or not' He thought while being amused at his situation.

Due to how he had lived in his previous life and in this life living in an Isolated area from the civilization for years, he was very open-minded aboutthe social status of a person.

'Still, that girl was unusually beautiful, it won't be unusual for something to happen to her like in a cliche plot unless...' Akeru looked around and looked at the faces of people, from commoners to beggars and to some nobles.

'These guys are definitely pretty, or beautiful, whatever the word suits in this case, any of these people could do modelling in my previous world, how interesting, is it due to mana or due to some factor, maybe evolution or something?' Akeru thought.

Due to watching so much fiction, he thought that other than mana being a reason, it could be due to humans evolving for a long while and this civilization being much older than his previous world.

In the canon, it wasn't revealed how old this world is and how old humans are, so from a non-technical standpoint of view, a person who doesn't know the intricacies of evolution, this theory seemed plausible.

Akeru's eyes suddenly widened. He quickly looked around and finally found a mirror.

'It's unbelievable that in more than 3 years being in this world, I haven't looked at my face properly due to one reason or not, it's the moment of truth'

"Young Man, do you mind helping these old bones to carry these things?" As if fate itself wanted to not look at his divine face, it stopped him from looking in the form of an obstacle.

'Uhh, Should I just ignore her?' He thought while seriously considering ignoring the granny.

It was a granny in a red cloak.

However, his eyes widened as he looked at the granny.

No, more specifically at the amount of luggage near her.

He looked behind her and noticed the shop.

"Did you earn all this from gambling?" His shock could be heard from his tone.

'People win things from gambling?' It was like somebody had poured water on his perception of reality.

"Indeed, it seems I was lucky" Her smugness couldn't be heard despite her old voice.

"But how do you think I could carry all these things with small bones of mine?" Akeru decided to use the same tactic as the old granny by using the same tone she used when making a request.

"I think you have a hidden power inside you that could help me"

"Huh" 'What the hell? Is she bullshitting or can she really sense that I can use mana? Is she a retired knight or something' Akeru maintained his calm face however internally, he was anything but calm.

He had thoroughly checked out her body subtly while talking with her previously, but due to her robe, it was hard for him to get a proper check of whether she had some weapons inside or a grimoire.

"Fine" He sighed and decided to carry the bags.

He didn't want to provoke a person who could probably be a hidden expert.

'This world is really dangerous' He internally cursed while helping the lady.

This lady was so despicable that she let him carry all the stuff.

'Hmph, I won't use mana enhancement despite this much weight, I will just pretend that I am a normal kid' Akeru won't let this old lady have the last laugh.

What if she wanted to take him as a disciple or something if he showed that he could already use mana?

What if she was in contact with some hidden cult or something who sacrificed children, he had seen something similar in anime itself, so his caution was up to the maximum.

He continued walking at the old lady's pace, time passed.

5 minutes

10 minutes

20 minutes

'Does she live far or something, this town is really big huh' He thought while looking around.

40 minutes

1 hour

"When are we gonna reach ?"

"We are close," She said and continued walking

2 hour

'Woah, are they selling ice-creams? Are refrigerators still a thing in this world?' Akeru was making a mental note of shops in the town.

3 hour

"When are we gonna reach?" 'This old lady could walk for 3 hours continuously despite taking a bit of breaks in between, she definitely is not ordinary' His mental image of the lady had firmed in his mind.

"We are here" Akeru looked at a mansion which could be described in one word as "Haunted house".

The granny turned around. "Why don't you- Where are you going?" She saw her items placed on the ground and the boy running away.

"I forgot that I have some stuff to be done," He said while running.

"Wait, I have a reward for you!" The granny shouted.

"I am good, I didn't did this for any reward" He didn't stopped, instead he increased his speed even more.

He was really terrified when that lady said reward.

'That lady is upto no good, Let me take few more turns and I will use mana enhancement to run away' He thought while following the way he had came before.

"Who was that kid?" A voice said beside the granny.

"Just a commoner boy, I thought he has some talent in controlling mana due to a hunch, so I decided to let him follow me here" The granny said in a voice which didn't sound old.

"Oh, so, is he talented? did you found out?"

"Nah, he seems to not even have proper affinity with mana, his body wasn't even releasing any mana, more like it didn't had much" The old lady shook her head.

"That's a shame, we could have at least used him as a sacrifice in the ritual, why did you let him go?"

"I was going to invite him, but it seems his luck is good or something as he ran away by giving some excuse"

"Should I chase him?"

"Leave it, we don't have time to waste on talentless wastes, have we been found out by magic knights?" The granny asked in the air.

That voice was seemingly coming out of no particular direction.

That person definitely was using some form of magic to hide his self.

"Not yet, but they have increased the patrol for some reason in this city, do you think they found out us or we have been suspected to be found?"

The red-haired granny started moving inside the mansion, the door already opened.

"It could either be a coincidence or they might have found about us one way or another" She frowned

"But we didn't even let any trace of our existence, how could they find us? Everyone is under a curse magic which prevents them from betraying our organization, I have personally made sure that" The unknown figure felt that she was indirectly hinting at him divulging information and betraying them.

"They might have other means to find about us, like some form of prophetic magic"

"Those kind of magic exists?" The person's shock was clearly visible in his voice.

"The world is big, don't underestimate the Empire's forces" She said and disappeared in the mansion.

Akeru had unknowingly escaped a calamity.

***
Lol, this work would be a bit of AU to expand more on the world, as I think a lot of possibilities exist with help of mana, so some things would change, but overall the cannon world would remain unchanged.
***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters there:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

Akeru finally stopped running after he was sure that he was at least dozens of kilometres away from the place.

'That granny was so suspicious, I am glad that I escaped' He didn't know how right his decision was.

He might have died already if he hadn't run at that time.

'Let's see, what was I thinking, yeah, not going to Vermillion House straight away, I first need to get some knowledge about this world, I don't want to appear like a transmigrator, I also need to know the political situation of this world, as this is real life not anime' Akeru mentally made up his mind.

'But, first, there is the most important thing to do' He in the next instant made a very serious face.

People who were near him, when they saw his face took few steps behind in terror on seeing him.

He quickly made his way to a nearby shop, which had glass as its walls.

'Won't they be first to break when somebody starts to fight here, then again, these guys probably have very much trust in the magic knights' He thought while shaking his head off the random thoughts and looking at his reflection in the glass.

He saw a face in the mirror, which then turned into shock and terror.

"Aahhhh"

"kyaaaa"

Akeru finally calmed down his heart when he realized that the person in reflection wasn't him.

"Ahem, Sir what do you want?" The other guy also calmed down and asked him as the salesperson he was supposed to.

"Nothing, my bad" Akeru straight left the shop.

'What a useless shop, it doesn't even have proper reflective glass on its outside, I would never buy anything from this shop' He cursed while ignoring how absurd his words were.

If a clothing shop like that doesn't put transparent glass, which allows people from outside to look at their products, then how are they supposed to attract customers and tell them that it's a clothing shop?

He finally found a shop that was selling mirrors and had put one outside for a demo.

'What kind of days are these, to look at my own reflection, I need to go to a mirror shop' He internally joked at his circumstances and finally looked at what he wanted to finally.

"No way!... I look average" Akeru was so shocked that he said this out loud.

'Where's my unparalleled charm which gives even people of the same gender to favour you' He found out that he didn't get the package a transmigrated person was supposed to get.

People around him looked at him weirdly.

"Mommy, what that guy is doing?"

"Don't look" the kid's mother said in a hushed tone while bringing the kid away.

Akeru had heard both conversations due to enhancing his ears with mana since he had ditched the granny.

"Ahem," He quickly left the scene, no change in his expression.

His Poker face could not break even then.

'My appearance doesn't matter, after all, under the flesh, everyone is bones only, it is pointless to care about appearance' He recalled the statement he used to say himself previously and chanted it again.

He bumped into somebody.

"Kid, look where you are going"

"My bad handsome nii-chan, please forgive me" He put a cheeky expression while saying that.

"Ahem, I will forgive you," The guy said, from his appearance, he could be said to be from a rich household and his appearance was even more average than Akeru's.

'Hehe, typical rich people who are said to have a good appearance' Akeru moved away from the place and steadily walked.

After 20 minutes, he moved into an ally.

'Nice that I am wearing gloves, Let's ditch it completely' He said while throwing away the purse he had stolen and then the gloves.

He put the money in a plastic bag with him and moved away.

He was afraid of somebody tracking him with that purse.

He had chosen his target while seeing the guy being not too rich, but kind of well-off, such that stealing this much money wouldn't really be that harmful to the guy's financial condition and he didn't have that much background to research him.

'Just in case, let's go to another corner of the city, I would have to change my clothes later too' Akeru finally blessed himself to have an average face.

It was easier to blend in with the crowd.

He took out new gloves so that he would be able to hold the money when paying for something and then started heading towards a restaurant.

'It's almost evening, I would also have to find an inn to stay in later, or maybe I should find an inn which gives food at all three times of the day' He made up his mind and started searching for an inn.

Soon, he found out and entered it.

A burly man was behind the table at the receptionist.

"I would like a room for night and dinner too"

"Dinner would depend on what you eat, so its payment would be done during your meal, for room, it would be 4000 Yuls for the night," THe man said.

'He definitely is scamming me, but whatever, It's not like it's my money' Akeru proceeded to pay the money and then went to have dinner.

He then went out of the inn and disposed of the gloves far away from the inn, he had used to pay for both instances.

'It would be all for nought if somebody has some advanced form of tracking, that could detect the person directly, but I could only do this much at a reasonable level of caution, anything more would take too much time to execute, which would be harmful to me if I waste too much time' He thought while covering himself with a blanket.

'Woah, this is soft' He thought while melting in the bed.

Thirty Minutes Later.

'I can't sleep on this soft thing' He grimaced and proceeded to sleep on the ground.

The next morning, he woke up with a few goals in mind. 'Have to get some information about this world, better to find a library or something along those lines, let's first have breakfast'

He looked at the receptionist who had changed from a burly man to a stunning lady.

'Is it his wife or daughter or someone completely unrelated' He wasn't really able to deduce the relationship between this woman and the man.

She looked at him and smiled.

Akeru felt something in his body when he looked at her smile.

He had to do his best to not show her outwardly.

"Do you want to extend the stay, Sir?"

"No, I want to checkout" Akeru said with his stoic face.

He then did it and without wasting any time headed out from the inn.

'Fuck, that lady's smile was so scary, I bet she has some malicious intentions, the way she looks at me is creepy' Akeru shivered while running away from the place discreetly.

He didn't have to dispose of the glove as he hadn't done any transactions at the moment.

He then proceeded to get some breakfast and after asking the shopkeeper, he got the location of where the library is.

'Both magic and common knowledge require you to pay money, these guys really like to monopolize information' He internally cursed while missing his previous life's internet, where information was mostly free.

He arrived at the reception of the library.

There was a board nearby that told about the price of reading required.

Akeru's eyes internally widened. 'Woah, 3000 Yuls for an hour? and magic things require 9000 Yuls per hour? What type of inflation is it?' He proceeded to pay the amount for one hour and decided to extend it if the library had some useful stuff.

He first looked at all the magic-related stuff and only a few topics caught his attention.

'If I were to steal this book, how many guards are there nearby?' He discreetly decided to scout out people guarding this.

'Not worth the risk' He after some time concluded and then moved to general-looking stuff.

Hours passed and he finally exited the library.

'This world is really big, plus the laws are ridiculous, there's not a thing called value for human - or more specifically commoner life, no wonder they are so unrestrained'

'Anyway, time to get some money'

***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters there:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.

 

[Desire]

After getting some money from pickpocketing, he decided to get some clothes from a nearby shop.

He entered the shop and his eyes widened.

"It's You!"

"It's You!

2 People could be seen pointing fingers at each other while shouting.

This naturally attracted the attention of many people in the shop who were looking at the newly formed commotion.

The person Akeru was pointing at was none other than the person he had seen when he was looking at his own reflection.

"My bad, what do you want Sir?" The guy asked.

"I would like to see some clothes that would fit me and are more durable and resistant than normal" Akeru regained his composure as naturally as an apple falling to the ground.

"Let me show you our collection" The salesperson escorted Akeru and showed him some of the most durable and resistant clothing.

Previously, the reason for Akeru shouting when he was trying to see his own reflection wasn't due to the salesperson being ugly or something.

It was quite the opposite, the guy was stunning if Akeru dared say.

It was due to this fact alone,that Akeru at the moment thought he looked like that making him be shocked.

It was unknown why the salesperson had shouted like that.

"Do you have some clothes which are equipped with runes to enhance them?" Akeru suddenly asked.

"We do have some in our collection, but prices of those are naturally very high"

Akeru proceeded to see the collection.

'70k for a basic grade protection enchanted T-shirt? Leave it, Even if I decide to spend money, I won't trust the unknown runes on clothing, what if the person responsible for creating it decides to kill me using this if he somehow became my enemy?' Akeru decided to forgo this and got back to looking at the normal collection.

He looked beside him and saw some mages using fire magic to iron the clothes.

'Damn, what type of control would be required to do it? Oh wait, that's a spell, still, can such a spell naturally come in one's grimoire, I bet they trained it' Akeru was impressed by the display.

After completing the shopping, he decided to pay and left.

'Even though, this money was stolen, why do I feel hurt in my heart when I spend this much amount' He thought while clutching his chest.

For the next week, it was just Akeru going to the library and staying in random inns.

'The magic knights here are increasing recently, I wonder why' He thought while looking at purple-clothed people.

People especially made way for them when they saw them.

'At least we don't need to bow or something, it would have wasted too much time' Akeru thought while approaching an idiot-looking guy near a Wasabi stall.

"Nii-chan, why are magic knights patrolling in this area?" 'More like Loittering, but I bet this guy would take offence to that as he seemed very "patriotic" of magic knights' Akeru indifferently thought while making an innocent expression outside.

"Oh, somebody was pick-pocketing in this town continuously and magic knights are trying to find him," The guy said while shaking his head.

"What an idiot person, are they not scared of magic knights?" Akeru said while making a similar expression as the guy he had asked of.

'Ahem, I need to escape now from this city, these guys seem to be too free to come after a pick-pocket' He internally cursed the knights while separating from the guy.

He glanced at one knight who had his grimoire opened.

'That seems like tracking magic, No wonder I encountered them so much, they had a rough idea about my location' Akeru thought while discretely moving away in the crowd.

"Everyone stop and don't move, our target is in the area," The other guy who hadn't opened his grimoire said out loud.

Akeru was at the back of the crowd, near an alley opening, He decided to bolt.

"Stop!" The guy who had shouted initially said while started chasing him.

'Just my luck, I should have seen it coming' Akeru was calm, he took many turns in various different alleys.

"I said stop!" The guy again shouted while taking a turn.

However, his eyes widened when from his peripheral version, he saw a kick going back to his head.

'I didn't sense him despite my mana field on' This was his last thought while blacking out.

After doing the kick, Akeru landed on the ground while crouching.

He quickly did another mana-enhanced strike to make sure that the other person was unconscious.

He quickly lifted the guy and dumped him in a garbage dump while taking his grimoire away.

He than proceeded to take the grimoire and after a few more turns, he dumped it in another green garbage can.

After that, moving far away, he dumped his gloves which he used to touch the guy and changed his location again.

'Let's see, those guys have probably blocked the official gates to go in and out of the town, so my best bet would be to go through this forest, it connects to another city but would take a few days' He had already seen the map previously, so he knew that this information was correct.

He quickly tied his bag to his back tightly and sneaked into the forest without getting detected.

He had a few close-ins with city guards, but overall he was able to escape.

Just as he reached the forest, he went out and started enhancing his legs and running at full speed.

He occasionally used mana bursts from his feet to increase his speed.

After running like this for nearly an hour, he stopped.

He hadn't run in a straight line sometimes running with the help of branches, such that it wouldn't be an obvious trail.

He looked up in the sky, 'Let's see, it's around afternoon, I should have a few hours before having to hunt for food, time to try this out' His poker face broke into a weird smile that would put people few feet away from him, as that kind of smile felt unnerving on a kid.

He looked at a nearby tree and ran over it.

With a few steps, he reached a branch

'This should do' He looked at the long branch and swiped his palm at the part where the branch was connected to the tree.

He fell towards the ground along with the branch.

He landed on the ground without any noise with the long branch in his hands.

He then put the branch in between both of his legs and bent down.

'Let's see it's said to be easy for mana to be infused in a cylindrical shape-like object, Despite this branch not being made up of special material, it should work I think' He closed his eyes and focused on guiding his mana towards the broom.

The broom started shaking and after a few minutes of struggle, Akeru found himself lifted off the ground and floating in the sky.

'Woah, this is g-' He realized that he was falling now and quickly used mana to change his orientation such that he didn't fall head first.

'Fuck, this is a bit tough, but shouldn't take that long' He thought while continuing the trend and practising.

A few hours passed by and sun was halfway towards the ground, indicating that it was few minutes before sun completely hid from this view.

Akeru looked at the sun slowly going down while floating in the sky with the branch.

'Hmm, I feel like I am forgetting something' He thought while stroking his chin, trying to remember what he was forgetting.

"growl..." His stomach rumbled like lightning.

He facepalmed 'Fuck, I was supposed to go and hunt, It's almost night time and I am nearly out of mana'

However, He was in a conflict, 'I want to try flying, but getting food now is of utmost priority, plus if I get completely out of mana, than that is just a death sentence in this forest... but I still want to fly' He suppressed his urge quickly and landed on the ground.

He ditched the branch and made a run for finding animals while enhancing his legs.

'Let's hurry up, Even without mana, I could take care of most animals' He thought arrogantly while looking around.

He saw a boar which made him stopped.

'Wait, this is not even a mana beast...' Akeru realized that he was not in a grand magic zone, but rather a normal forest.

"Noooooo My delicious meat" He yelled loudly while dropping on the floor, his expression melancholic.

***

Join my Patreon to support me and get up to 20 advanced chapters there:

at p@treon.com/Desire96

Check out my other works too.