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After Aquarina seemed to say that she'll think about becoming friendly with Zack, we reached an area of the jungle that wasn't mapped. With that, I took out my pen and began to map things around us.
I used Heavenly Sight to glance at the surroundings with great detail. In fact, there was a special part of my sight ability that could even combine with magic, so I had conjured a spell named "Eye of Light" which shared my eyesight with a floating bulb of light that can do reconnaissance. After that, I used it in combination with Heavenly Sight.
The result? I could look across most of the area where we were from the skies, which made mapping very easy. Thanks to this, I often get praised for how accurate my mapping, fufu.
As we walked, I continued to flawlessly draw the map without even looking at the paper.
"W-Wow… Sylph, I never get amazed enough with you. How can you even draw without looking at the paper?" Zack could not help but ask.
"Didn't you know? Sylph has an amazing spell that can let her see around places… it's called… erm… what was it? Eye of something…" said Aquarina in response.
"Eye of Light. I combine it with the Blessing of Theia, the Great Goddess of Sight, allowing me to see through a lot of stuff. Thanks to it, mapping the place becomes easy," I said, continuing where Aquarina left off. Suddenly, my eye of light appeared right in front of Zack. Through my eyesight, I was able to see his skin in great detail, even down to a microscopic level, which was rather dizzying… maybe I could use this power to disinfect places? Well, not like it matters as of now.
"Uwah!" Zack got scared and fell on his butt. On the other hand, the floating bulb of light floated around him before flying into the sky again.
"…was that thing alive?" he asked.
"Not really," I replied.
"How can it be alive? It's just a spell," Aquarina added.
"Oh… I'm not that good at magic in general, so I didn't know," he said in response to our words.
Indeed, Zack was terrible at magic.
He was, however, very good at fighting. He had gathered many skills over his life, as well as techniques. And his axe arm was very nice, plus he could do a lot of aura-based slashing attacks with his axe even at his young age, showing off his amazing talent. After all, it's something that only people that had experience over many years should be able to do.
Due to that, he held a lot of weight in the party, easily disposing panthers by himself with his axe alone.
We continued walking around the area but quickly after, we came across a group of five panthers. From their appearances, they were furious, seemingly part of a pack. I wasn't sure if panthers were in packs back then, but this was another world, so make that double unsure.
The panthers were a type of beast-type monsters named Shadow Claws. These panthers specialized in unleashing aura-based shadow attacks with their claws. In fact, these were an evolved version of the panther I had once killed with Aquarina, often being around mid to peak strength in Tier 1.
Well, nothing too hard.
With that, I stored the paper in my clothes and quickly unsheathed my blade…
"A-are we going to fight?" asked Aquarina rather fearfully.
"Of course! You've been training, right, Aquarina? Let's slay these creatures and get done with it. You're plenty strong so you can do it for sure," I told her.
Aquarina's eyes shone brightly with blue light as her aura of mana began to come out of her body. After that, she took out her little magic knife, which was gifted to her by her father.
"Y-Yes… I can do it! As long as you're with me, Sylphy-chan…!" said Aquarina.
"Good! That's the spirit, Aquarina. You're finally not being a chicken!" said Zack as his axe was covered in a green light. Surprisingly, his element was wind, although he couldn't use magic. In any case, his element still showed up on his own slashing attacks using his axe.
"D-Don't call me a chicken, idiot!" replied Aquarina, becoming distracted as the Shadow Claws leaped towards us.
"GROAR!"
One of them got incredibly close using a movement ability, leaving an afterimage of shadows behind. Soon, it slashed the air, unleashing three slashes made of shadows directly at Aquarina!
Aquarina was too distracted and couldn't react in time, but I was right by her side, so I quickly infused mana into my blade as many Embers were unleashed around it. Soon, my blade was covered in flames. Using the strength I've gathered through my swing training, I went ahead and unleashed a strong slashing attack with flames.
"Blazing Blade Arts: Blazing Slash!"
FLAAAASH!
The flames impacted the shadow-infused slashes as both magic-infused attacks exploded in the air. The other panthers were already around us and leaped towards us all together, however, I unleashed several slashing attacks at them from behind me by moving swiftly through the enhancement of Metabolism Acceleration and Flashing Light.
SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
"GRAAOOO…!"
Three panthers were left with big burned wounds over their bodies, falling back and stepping down.
Meanwhile, the one that had attacked Aquarina rushed towards me and tried to attack me from my back. Before I could kill it, however, Aquarina moved with a flashing speed I had not seen before. Her body was covered in water, but she was walking in the air with it!
"HYA!"
SLASH!
She suddenly slashed through the panther's neck while running around in the air by covering her feet with water. In response, the beast groaned in pain as its entire throat was sliced open, with blood gushing out like an ocean of crimson-red liquid.
BOOM!
The beast died right after falling to the ground!
"Haah…"
Aquarina sighed in exhaustion. She didn't know it, but she had done something rather amazing.
"Great job!" I said.
"I-I'm going to grow stronger to protect you, Sylphy-chan…" said Aquarina. Her eyes suddenly flashed with a conviction I had not seen before in her.
Aquarina… you've really grown up a bit.
"Come on! Help me out!" Before we could continue to bask in the current atmosphere, Zack cried out as he was handling the wounded panthers all by himself.
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