Leo opened his eyes and got out of bed. He went down to the inn to leave for the rental office. He was going to see the apartment he was going to be leasing. As he went down, he saw that everyone was very vividly talking about a subject.
As he was leaving the inn, he overheard what it was they were talking about.
“I know! That was tens of thousands of lives! Gone!”
“But the emperor favors the Whitmore family among all of the dukes anyway. There is nothing that can actually be done. Apparently, the duke himself did this.”
Leo was immediately intrigued when he heard the name, Whitmore. The reason was because of Daphne. She was in reality, a Whitmore. He immediately went to the group that was carrying on this conversation and asked them what they were talking about.
“Hello, I couldn’t help but overhear what you were talking about. Could you explain what happened?” He politely asked.
“You don’t know? Everyone only found out last night, so you must have slept early. Duke Whitmore visited a city that is managed by Eldridge. It’s one of those smaller cities. What was it? Soonheaven?”
“Solhaven?” Leo asked.
“Yes. That one.”
Leo’s eyes immediately narrowed. “What happened then?”
They shook their head. “A tragedy. The duke destroyed the entire city, killing everyone in it. Only a single person survived. The Magistrate of the city was kneeling on the ground at the entrance of the city. People say that he was mourning for all the deaths.” He said.
Leo shuddered. He knew exactly why this happened. It was because Daphne was forced to live as a commoner in Solhaven and the Whitmore Family couldn’t bear that. He didn’t expect that nobles would care so much, but the evidence showed it.
He clenched his fist while thanking them for the information. He left the door with anger. He was angry because the people he knew there were now dead. Trevor, the person who had given him that one small opportunity that made him who he was today, was gone.
Miller and his daughter were gone. Maybe even Clarice and Evelyn and their team too. And in a way, he was the cause for all of it. If he didn’t let Daphne become an Aura Knight, she wouldn’t realize that she was a Whitmore. They wouldn’t have found out. And the 70000 people there would have been alive.
He was the cause of their deaths. His anger turned to regret. He started blaming himself and felt intense emotions. It had been a long time since he had felt emotions like these. The last time was when he had failed to get any work for an entire week as a kid and he and Daphne had to starve.
As his emotions peaked, he decided that he needed to find a way to relieve his emotions. The best way to do that to him was to project that anger onto something. He didn’t want to do anything to a human, so he decided to go to the Eldridge Forest.
He walked slowly into the forest and walked straight into it. He didn’t try to wander around to look for an easy opponent. He had his cloak on and was walking straight into the forest until he found an opponent.
On the way, a 1st Circle Thunderhoof Deer was crossing the path. Before it could finish crossing, a Shadowbind Bolt slammed it, making it fall to the ground. It completely trapped it onto the ground and didn’t let it leave.
As the spell slowly absorbed the deer’s energy, Leo walked to it and killed it with a single blow. He kept walking forward without stopping to collect the Beast Core. As he kept walking, he saw an entire pack of wolves gathered in his sight of view. He altered his path to meet them face-on.
By the time they noticed him, they were faced with a huge barrage of Flame Bursts that exploded, killing all of them. He still kept walking forward.
He spent a total of 3 hours killing 34 1st Circle Magical Beasts and 16 2nd Circle Magical Beasts before encountering the first 3rd Circle Magical Beast. At this point, almost three fourths of his magic was depleted, but he didn’t seem to care.
He was there to simply vent his emotions. He immediately launched all the spells he knew at the 3rd Circle Stone-Faced Monkey. The animal was surprised at the barrage of spells like the mage had no concern for running out of magic.
It quickly defended itself but was unable to take the unexpected swarm of spells. Before it could even try dodging, the spell all made its effect and exploded in a loud fashion. The monkey was blasted back.
It quickly got back up, only to face another Flame Barrage. This injured it so heavily that it could not get back up again. On the other side, Leo was breathing heavily. With this, he had finally almost run out of magic. He was breathing heavily while slowly recovering the lost magic.
His venting spree had finally gotten him to gain his cool. He took a deep breath. He didn’t bother actually killing the Stone-Faced Monkey because he knew another Magical Beast out there would do the job.
As he walked back, he didn’t encounter any Magical Beast on the way. There was a very clear path in front of him. This was because he had burned away all the trees in his path. He walked down a smooth path and got to the gate.
By the time he got back, it was in the late afternoon. On the way back, he had taken time to think about what happened. He was only a small reason why the people were dead. But he realized that the reason why he even thought like that was because he never tried to blame the person who actually killed the people.
Who did the Duke think he was? God? Leo made a resolve to become strong enough to actually make the person who did this answer. Even if Daphne was related to him, it wouldn’t matter.
With a clear goal in his mind, he went to the rental office. He was only changing his goals, not his process. With clear-cut goals, his reason to enter the Aura Knight Academy increased. This was because every Aura Knight Academy was also bordered by a Magic Academy.
They shared the same campus. This was because some nobles chose to be Aura Knights while commoners could also try to become mages. The only problem was that there were a total of 10 spots open every year for commoners to become mages and they were all awarded to only the most talented commoners.
But that wouldn’t affect him. He wasn’t going to try to join the Magic Academy. The only reason that mattered to him was that they were on the same campus. This was because they would have a library filled with knowledge pertaining to magic. This meant he would be able to learn much more magic than with just his tome.