Even without Hansen's reminder, the adventurers in the exploration team tensed up after entering the forest. Even Hilton temporarily forgot about his jealousy with the magician and took out the grimoire to stay alert. After all, nothing was more important than his own life.
The future Supreme Magus Your Honor unsheathed the longsword at his waist and pretended to swing it around. After all, Rob was a sixth-grade quasi-magus. Although he didn't have his staff, a high-level magician's perception of the elements would not disappear. If there were magical beasts like the two-headed wolf nearby, Rob would be able to sense it in advance based on the fluctuations of the magical elements in the air.
Of course, this wasn't the only way a high-level magician could detect an enemy. However, other methods required the support of corresponding spells, such as the Eye of Truth and Hearing Enhancement. These were the two most commonly used spells by magicians when they were on guard. They consumed little mana and had good effects, so they were very popular among the magicians.
In addition, the quasi-magus also had some small secret skills that he had figured out himself. Unfortunately, he didn't have a staff, so he could only stare at them. Relying on his extraordinary perception, Rob faintly sensed a group of small things in the north of the team. They had been wandering around the moment they entered the forest.
Judging from the fluctuations of the magical elements, it should be a group of Little Dryads. These were small monsters that lived in tree hollows. Their attack power was relatively low, roughly equivalent to a twelve or thirteen year old human child. However, the Little Dryads mastered a magic called Whispers of the Forest. Although this magic would not cause substantial damage to the adventurers, it was really annoying.
Last year, this mere first-grade magic beat Petrification and Gravity and was finally selected as the "Top 10 Most Disgusting Magic of the Year".
After being hit by this magic, one would hallucinate as if all the trees around them had suddenly opened their mouths and surrounded their ears to perform a special Deyun Society show. Those with weak mental fortitude would directly break down. Even a strong-willed person would feel uncomfortable with a group of lively trees in their head. The Little Dryads relied on this little trick to scare the logging workers in the mountains and protect their little nests.
Environmentalists might think it's not bad to have these little things in the forest, but if you think so, you'll be fooled by their thin, weak bodies and innocent appearance.
In addition to teasing and scaring lumberjacks and anyone else who posed a threat to them, the Tiny Dryads also had many bad habits. Sometimes, they would sneak attack the unlucky ones who were alone. The Tiny Dryads would first use the Whispers of the Forest to harass you. If you were scared and ran around the mountain, the Tiny Dryads would happily follow behind you. They would shout and throw stones at you, consuming your stamina and continuing to torture your nerves.
When you ran out of strength, they would swarm up and knock you out with their advantage in numbers. After that, they would take out sharp stones and carefully cut off your flesh piece by piece. They would then distribute the flesh piece by piece to each of the little treemen who participated in the "hunt". They would bring the flesh back home and tie it up with straw ropes. After that, they would hang it on the treetop to dry. After that, they would store it in the cellar as their food reserve for the winter.
Some of the more artistic Tiny Dryads would even carve your bones into art pieces and place them at their bedside. During their leisure time, they would cultivate their spirit.
The elves didn't have a good impression of these despicable neighbors. Every forest where the elves lived would have a forest patrol team specifically responsible for cleaning up the nearby Tiny Dryads. Every winter, they would send out a lot of people to search all the tree holes within a hundred miles. As long as they found a Tiny Dryad, they would be hung on the nearby trees. No one was left alive.
Because of this, the number of Tiny Dryads near the elves' settlement had decreased sharply. However, these cunning little things learned guerrilla warfare. After the patrol team cleaned up an area, they would secretly move in. When the patrol team returned, they would move to another area that had just been cleaned up to avoid being hunted down.
They would observe the Tiny Dryads that had been hung on the trees. Based on the freshness of the corpses, they would determine when the area had been cleaned up last time and how long it would be until the next cleaning up. In addition, their reproductive abilities were also very strong. This caused a lot of trouble for the surrounding elves.
However, Tiny Dryads were fellows that bullied the weak and feared the strong. After being wiped out by the elves for so many years, they had never launched any actual resistance. At most, they would sneak attack one or two lone elven civilians. When they encountered the patrol team, no matter how many companions they had on their side, they would only flee like a swarm of bees.
Not to mention facing an adventurer team head-on. When the quasi-magus discovered these little things, he didn't intend to warn the others. In fact, as long as there wasn't any fatal danger, the future Super Magus, Your Honor, would have no qualms about being a bystander along the way. When Lolo and the others worked hard to slay the monsters, the little attendant would act as a cheerleader at the side, cheering and cheering for them.
The adventurers called the primeval forest area between the tunnel and the city wall the outer city, while the other side of the city wall was called the inner city. The path that the team had chosen now was the safest route from the outer city to the inner city after many adventurers had explored it before.
Of course, the so-called safe was only relative. It didn't mean that there wouldn't be any monsters along the way. In a place like the underground, unless you had strong senses like Rob or some other special methods, it was impossible to not encounter a monster. In fact, even the future Super Magus, Your Honor, had almost failed miserably in the afternoon.
Not long ago, the team had been attacked by a Burrowing Beetle. This thing's shell was comparable to metal, and it was very difficult to slash at it. When surrounded, it would even run underground. The elven archer and the old thief struggled for a long time before they finally lured it to a slightly harder piece of ground. They planned to get rid of this trouble here in one go.
The quasi-magus, Your Honor, on the other hand, was slacking off as usual. He climbed to a nearby rock and gave pointers.
But at this moment, something unexpected happened! On a banyan tree about ten steps away from Rob, a black shadow suddenly shot out from the dense foliage. Like an arrow, it pounced at the back of the Archmage's neck. That was where the Archmage's chainmail couldn't protect him.
Everything happened too quickly. Everyone's attention was still focused on the trapped beetle. No one thought that in the blink of an eye, danger had befallen the young man not far away.
Lolo didn't forget her promise. She kept some attention on the little attendant, but when she realized something was wrong, it was already too late. She didn't even have time to warn the young man.
At the critical moment, it was Rob's extraordinary battle sense that saved his life.
Although he didn't turn around, the Archmage's heart was suddenly filled with alarm.
The first rule of the survival manual: Never doubt your own instincts!
Amidst the sudden attack, even though he didn't even see the attacker's face clearly, the young man subconsciously used the movements he had learned during training. His longsword completed a block behind him in an unusually ugly posture.
With a clang, something hit the blade of the sword. The thing wasn't big, but the force of the hit was enough to make the Archmage's wrist hurt. He almost lost his grip on the weapon in his hand.
After the attack failed, the thing fell to the ground and curled up its body. Only then did everyone see what it looked like.
It was a small emerald green snake, less than five inches long. There were gray patterns on its abdomen. It was hard to detect when it was hidden among the leaves.
"It's the Zapata Flying Snake." The elven archer recognized the attacker at a glance and nailed it to the ground with an arrow.
It could only be said that the quasi-magus, Your Honor, was a little unlucky. This small snake that almost killed Rob was not a magical beast. Although it moved very fast and was quite poisonous, it didn't know how to use any magic. In other words, the young man couldn't sense its existence through the surrounding elemental waves.
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