According to what he'd learned from books, the deeper one ventured into the mountain range of the Red Dragon Volcano, the more Sub-dragon Species monsters appeared. Past a certain depth, the red dragons themselves would emerge. The vast majority of adventurer guilds only explored within the range where Sub-dragon Species monsters appeared—they knew perfectly well they lacked the ability to challenge a red dragon.
After entering this mountain range reeking of sulfur, like one enormous oven, the first thing Jhin needed to do was further refine his magic.
But before that, he still needed to acclimate to the environment here.
Compared to the regions he'd visited on past adventures, the Red Dragon Volcano was exceptionally "warm and hospitable." Monsters large and small launched attack after attack on him and Kyaru, as if the searing heat in the air were continuously detonating the warmongering genes within their bodies.
After the Prismatic Javelin's blades thrust up from the ground to clear out a great swath of Blazing Poison Scorpions, Jhin didn't spare so much as a glance at their corpses. He turned and pulled Kyaru away from the area—roughly three hundred meters to their front-left, a three-meter-tall monster was charging straight at them.
Even though he intended to train himself, he had no desire to waste time on small-fry that could be swept aside with a casual flick of the hand.
Earlier he'd considered finding a spot to carve out a cave to avoid the monsters, but unfortunately, the idea was beautiful while reality was cruel. The Red Dragon Volcano was home to a creature called the Magma Worm, which lived underground and specialized in ambushing creatures hiding inside caves.
Jhin had only dug the cave about two meters deep when he sensed a monster attacking from beneath his feet. After slaying the wrist-thick worm with his sword aura, magma slowly oozed out of its body and filled the cave back up. Just like that, the cave-digging endeavor was declared a failure.
He was nursing a headache over the fact that, at this rate, he'd have no time at all to refine his magic—when a sharp "swish" came from behind his head. Something tore through the air, like a keen blade slicing through silk, producing a sharp and crisp sound.
The wind element coiling around his body burst open in an instant like an air-cannon shell, the surging gusts blasting in all directions and shoving the would-be ambusher back. Jhin gripped the Resplendent Blade and slashed a wave of sword aura behind him.
"Clang!"
The sound of metal striking stone rang out. He turned to look at the massive crimson falcon beating its wings in the air—a white scratch had appeared across its metallic-sheened feathers.
"That's a Sub-dragon Species monster unique to the Red Dragon Volcano—an Iron-Feathered Crimson Eagle. The feathers on its body can be shot out like arrows, and they're very fast." Kyaru clutched her staff and took cover behind the pitch-black war plate. This speed-type monster was the kind she struggled with most, so she decisively gave up on attacking with magic and chose instead to feed Jhin useful information.
"An elite-class monster?"
"No. An ordinary monster."
"An ordinary monster that can tank sword aura... Looks like we're going to be spending quite a bit of time in this volcano." Even as Jhin spoke, his hands never let up. Wave after wave of sword aura swung toward the Iron-Feathered Crimson Eagle, but it dodged every one with ease.
It had originally thought this would be a simple hunt, but the Iron-Feathered Crimson Eagle never expected the human before it to be far tougher than imagined. The sword aura may have only left white marks on its feathers, yet the force contained within made it ache faintly. Had it not been for the iron feathers it took such pride in, it would likely have died on the spot long ago.
Just as its beastly pupils locked onto its prey, weighing whether to fight or flee, its field of vision uncontrollably plummeted downward.
What's going on?
The Iron-Feathered Crimson Eagle slammed into the ground with a thunderous "thud," kicking up dust. Jhin walked over to it, plucked out a feather, and held it in his hand, examining it with great interest. For some reason, after the owner's death, these feathers had lost their metallic luster and turned into ordinary feathers.
Within the time-stop, the very moment he'd run his light sword through this monster's neck, he had indeed felt a resilient resistance transmit from the blade into his palm.
Could it be that all Sub-dragon Species monsters possessed some sort of defensive mechanism similar to dragon scales?
Jhin decided to leave this question for later, to investigate on other monsters. Stowing away the Iron-Feathered Crimson Eagle's corpse, he continued leading Kyaru in search of a suitable place to make camp for the night.
The two of them wandered around for an entire afternoon and never found a fitting spot. Everywhere was just as scorching, and the warm, hospitable monsters kept delivering themselves to their door one after another.
During this time they also ran into other adventurer guilds. With a few sacks of water, Jhin successfully learned how to evade these monsters, as well as how to camp out at night.
As it turned out, the reason the two of them were so popular with the monsters was that he'd been using the wind element to dispel the heat waves. In the Red Dragon Volcano, most monsters possessed heat sensing and would instinctively seek out things colder than the surrounding temperature—whether human or plant, anything cooler than its surroundings was their favorite thing.
To evade these monsters, one could only adapt to the temperature here. If it became truly unbearable, only then should one use magic to cool down. There were heat-resistance potions and the like, but they were prohibitively expensive, and few people bought them to explore here.
Next was the matter of camping at night. Growing in the Red Dragon Volcano was a special kind of leaf called the Crimson Fragrant Fruit Leaf, which only gave off its peculiar scent at night. To humans, the scent smelled perfectly ordinary, but to the other monsters that lived in this mountain range, it was unbearably foul—almost no monster would want to come near it.
To camp at night, all one had to do was plant these waist-high leaves in the ground, and no monster would come to disturb them of its own accord. Jhin bought one of these leaves directly from another adventurer guild for thirty thousand Eris. Although in terms of price, buying a single leaf was hardly a good deal, the knowledge he gained couldn't be bought with that little money.
Neither of these two pieces of adventuring know-how was ever mentioned in books. Only the adventurer guilds who spent years operating in the Red Dragon Volcano would have summed up these two sets of experience to make their own exploration easier.
Waving goodbye to the big-sister warrior who had warm-heartedly taught him all sorts of little tidbits, Jhin recalled the band of Beastmen he'd encountered in the village and shook his head with a scoff. "If they'd just had the same attitude as her, it wouldn't have come to losing their heads. I wonder if they'll even be buried together."
"Jhin, I've checked it. There are no magic markings or anything suspicious on it." Kyaru handed the Crimson Fragrant Fruit Leaf back to him. Seeing him stow it into his storage space without a second thought, she asked uneasily, "Do you trust my judgment? After all, this is a very important matter."
"Of course I trust you. If I didn't, why would I have you check it?"
"But..."
"Enough with the chatter. I'm going to lift the wind element barrier. If it gets too hot to bear, remember to tell me."
"Mm..."
Even though the heat left him looking like he'd just been fished out of the water, the method really did work. Compared to before—when they couldn't walk a hundred meters without being attacked by monsters—now hardly any monsters came at them on their own.
That night, with camp set up, Jhin also discovered a pleasant surprise.
His [Life Spring] skill had risen to Lv2.
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