“Thunderous Rose Bloom!”
Elena’s sharp cry rang out almost simultaneously with Camilla’s warning.
She clapped her hands together and then yanked them apart, blinding lightning exploding in her palms, instantly transforming into three lightning roses, each over a meter in diameter.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The three lightning roses struck the three Corrupted Scale Lizards with perfect precision, and the explosive flash of lightning swallowed up the monsters in an instant. Amidst the piercing crackle, the Corrupted Scale Lizards didn’t even have time to scream before the savage thunder shredded them.
As the lightning faded, only three charred corpses remained at the spot, still emitting faint wisps of blue smoke.
From the moment the monsters lunged out to the moment they were annihilated, not even five seconds had passed.
The forest fell into a brief silence, with only the rustling of wind through the leaves and the faint birdsong in the distance.
Hiss, is this the oppressive force of Lou Ai in the early stages?
Camilla clicked her tongue. Though she had expected this, seeing it with her own eyes was still a bit shocking.
She rubbed her brow, suddenly realizing a problem—her team’s lineup seemed a bit too luxurious.
Lilian, the Empire’s fourth princess, majoring in alchemy but skilled in plenty of other areas, plus a dragon-blooded summon beast.
Elena, daughter of the Duke of Bardia, a prodigious sorceress, peak early-game firepower.
Emma, the future reincarnation of a Sage, affinity with all elements, with a knowledge reserve comparable to a library.
And herself—a girl who wanted to slack off, but was forced to unlock every skill tree and became a total cheat…
With this lineup, wasn’t it a bit like bullying for the new students’ combat test?
If there was any team in the academy now that could compare, it would probably only be Squad Seven, where Ophelia was.
“What’s wrong?”
Elena had noticed the subtle change in Camilla’s expression.
“Scared by my power?”
She grinned with a sideways smirk, obviously enjoying showing off in front of Camilla, to prove that even though she’d been one-shotted by Ophelia, she was still more than capable.
“That’s right, you’re just too amazing.”
Camilla answered honestly, while feeling a bit sorry for those Corrupted Scale Lizards—she thought they had picked the wrong opponent.
As second-rank monsters, they were supposed to be the tricky kind. Any ordinary freshman would need quite a bit of effort to bring them down. But Lou Ai had one glance and instantly blew them away—they didn’t even get screen time.
Rimuru chirped “puchi” from her shoulder, as if in agreement.
The four continued on, this time without running into any more monsters. Maybe the thunderstorm had scared off all the nearby creatures.
Five minutes later, they arrived at the Ancient Tree Ruins.
This was a circular clearing surrounded by seven unusually thick ancient trees. The trees were at least several centuries old, with trunks requiring four or five people to encircle, and their crowns intertwined high above to form a natural dome, letting only scattered sunlight filter through.
At the center of the clearing stood a half-human-tall, crumbling stone stele, its surface covered in moss and vines.
“The task says to activate the ruins’ stele to get the next task location.” Lilian said, checking the annotation on the map.
The rules for this combat test were simple: each team received a Task Map with instructions at the start, and as long as they completed the tasks over the three days, they would pass.
There were only two tasks on the map. One was to “check in” at five different coordinates, the other was to gather a set amount of materials.
The former was five out of twelve possible coordinates drawn for each team, meaning almost every team had a different route but all could pass. The latter was the same for all teams, but a bit tougher—few got full marks.
Elena walked up to the stone stele, reaching out to touch it, but Camilla stopped her.
“Wait, there could be protective mechanisms or traps—let’s check first.”
Saying this, Camilla gently pulled Elena back half a step and stepped forward to carefully examine the ground around the stele.
“Step back a bit.”
Camilla raised her right hand, palm up, and with a short incantation, three Magic Missiles swiftly condensed.
“Go.”
With a flick of her wrist, the three Magic Missiles shot toward a suspicious patch of ground.
Thump, thump, thump—
The moment the missiles hit the ground, something changed.
A ring of earth-yellow Protective Formation patterns suddenly lit up under the fallen leaves, about two meters in diameter, erupting like a fountain with a huge blast of dry dust and dead leaf fragments that shot more than two meters high before drifting gently down.
“…Pff.”
Watching the slowly falling dust, Lilian couldn’t help but laugh.
“If we’d just walked over, we’d all be dirt-covered right now.”
Elena pursed her lips.
“A pointless prank. Probably just a little obstacle the academy put in to stop students from finishing too easily.”
“It’s harmless, but effective.”
“Camilla, your observation is really sharp.”
Emma said admiringly—she hadn’t noticed anything odd about the ground earlier.
“Mm, it’s nothing…”
Camilla shrugged, recalling how she’d stepped on over twenty traps back when she played this chapter of the combat test.
The four stepped up to the stele. Following the instructions, Lilian placed her palm in the indentation at the top and slowly injected a bit of magic power.
The stele trembled slightly, and new text appeared on its surface—coordinates and description for the next task location.
[Second Task Location: Deep within the Shadow Marsh, Crescent Spring.]
“We did it.”
Lilian withdrew her magic and smiled. “Looks like Camilla’s hunch was right.”
Elena glanced at Camilla but said nothing.
Emma carefully noted down the coordinates and started calculating the route.
“Shadow Marsh is to the south, about five kilometers from here, but we’ll need to pass through Mist Forest. Visibility is low there, and it’s easy to get lost…”
“No worries, I’ll handle it.”
Camilla took a small tin box from her satchel. Inside were a compass, a little bag of Glowing Powder, and several thin cords in various colors.
“You… prepared all this yourself?”
Lilian was a bit surprised, recognizing that none of this was academy-issued equipment.
“Yeah, just in case.”
Camilla brushed it off. After all, she couldn’t exactly explain she’d cleared dozens of wilderness survival quests and was conditioned by habit.
She sprinkled some Glowing Powder at the entrance to the Ancient Tree Ruins as a marker for their return, then looked to her teammates.
“Shall we go now? Or take a break first?”
Lilian checked the time.
“It’s only ten in the morning. We have plenty of time, but if we keep going nonstop, Emma might get tired.”
“I-I’m fine!”
Emma immediately stood up straight, patting her flat chest in an effort to show she wouldn’t drag them down.
But from her subsequent coughing fit, it was clear her stamina wasn’t great.
“Then let’s take it slow and gather any useful materials we find along the way.”
Camilla made the decision.
“We’ll stop for lunch somewhere safe at midday, and reach the edge of the marsh by afternoon.”
The four left the Ancient Tree Ruins, following the woodland path southwest.
As she walked, Camilla used Rimuru’s senses to scan the surroundings. So far, everything was normal—only a few scattered first- and second-rank monsters, which scurried away at the team’s approach.
But her instincts told her this calm wouldn’t last.
“Hold up.”
As they were passing through a patch of ferns, Camilla suddenly called out, and Elena, leading the way, stopped immediately.
“What is it?”
“The ground.”
Camilla squatted down and brushed aside the thick carpet of fallen leaves.
Beneath them, the earth was stained an unnatural dark red, as if soaked by some liquid and dried, and there were drag marks.
Lilian also squatted, dipped a finger in the soil and sniffed it, frowning involuntarily.
“Blood. Faint, but real, and it’s not monster blood… it’s closer to human.”
Emma turned pale, lips trembling.
“Human blood? Did another team run into danger?”
“Not necessarily.”
Camilla checked the marks carefully.
“The drag marks go toward the marsh, and the blood’s dry—it happened at least a few hours ago. Also…”
She stood, gazing in the direction the blood led, her eyes growing serious.
“With this much blood loss, if it’s human, they’re badly hurt.”
The test had only started less than three hours ago, and already a team was badly wounded? Did they encounter a high-rank monster, or… something else?
Since this wasn’t part of the original story, Camilla couldn’t be sure what had happened.
Elena gripped her staff, face pale.
“Should we follow the trail?”
Lilian thought for a moment, then shook her head.
“Our first priority is to complete the test. If another team really is in trouble, the academy should have detected it through the locator beacons and sent help already. If we go off-route to investigate, we might just mess up the professors’ plans.”
She paused, then added,
“But we can move faster and reach the marsh sooner. If anything’s wrong, we can respond quickly or send word.”
“Agreed.”
Camilla nodded.
The four no longer delayed, quickening their pace toward Shadow Marsh.
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