Only Wisdom Awakened - Chapter 55

Shadow’s embodiment
“See you then”

Hans left the house, but this time, he wasn’t going to stay outside only for a single day.

He put on his warm coat and started heading towards the gate he had failed to close the last two times.

Just beside the entrance, was standing a pile of water and food, at least enough to last for about a week if rationed carefully, and also a couple of basic necessities.

‘Well, I did tell them to send some food, but I didn’t expect so much’

Yesterday at work…

Hans had just returned from the gate, and was reading some documents regarding the

New American Hunter academy project in his study, when a knocking came from outside the wooden door.

“Knock knock..”

“Come inside”

Entering the room, was a young woman with a sharp smile, that held in her hand a file filled to the brim with documents.

“Good evening Emily” said Hans holding his chin with his hand, worried about what she was coming to him for.

“Good evening mr. Hans” said the woman chuckling.

“Cut that ‘mr’ out, would you?

She nodded, but Hans knew damn well it wouldn’t have been so easy to make stop.

He sighed heavily before continuing:

“Anyway, why have you come here?”

“Can’t I just Pay a visit to a friend?

Gasp.. could it be.. now that you have become the branch leader you don’t see me as a friend anymore? Sniff, sniff.”

Hans was watching the woman’s acting with an emotionless face, quite bothered by it.

‘Should I just kick her out?’

Emily saw Hans’ face, and reacted accordingly, raiding her hands to surrender:

“Hey, hey, I’m just joking, I’m just joking”

She then cleared her throat, as if wanting to restart the conversation anew.

“I came here to inform you that the association needs to clear that B-rank gate as soon as possible”

Hans watched her full of doubt:

“Why is it? There should be stil three weeks before the gate break.”

“It’s not because of the gate break, but because of the money”. She rubbed her fingers against each other to signalize it.

“Money?”

“I don’t think the association is in such a dire situation as to need money immediately”

“No, you don’t understand, we don’t need just any money, but the money from clearing the gate.”

As a teacher explaining to a clueless student, she began explaining in the simplest way possible.

“You see, when the gates first appeared, the government decided to award higher ranking awakened with higher privileges, and what better way to do it than money?

The higher ranking gates, that at the time were D and C-rank, were almost entirely exempted of taxes, so that people would be more eager to conquer them, even if by risking their lives.

But a little bit more than five years ago, a problem arose”

“Ohh” admired the explanation Hans, even if he effectively couldn’t care less.

“A C-rank gate appeared, and it wasn’t just any C-rank gate, it had just one mob, that was identified by the scouts.

It was a spectre, without a physical body, meaning that it wouldn’t have brought any profit for the raiders, instead, it would’ve just endangered their lives.

The tax exemption wasn’t of any use since you couldn’t tax something that doesn’t exist in the first place.

As the time for the gate break ticked, the government did something unexpected, never seen before: they put up a bounty on the monster, no, they put a bounty on the gate, and at that time it was considered quite a huge sum for awakeneds, soon enough the gate was cleared, and the government kept their words.

From then on, instead of lower taxes on higher ranking gates, they decided to award people with a fixed fee, to encourage them even more.

Now, as the amount awakened earn increased exponentially, it became quite the small amount, and was transformed into a kind of leaderboard to see wich guild cleared more gates.

Every month the coins earned by each guild are counted and released publicly.

The awakened association must not fall behind the big guilds, but with the change of the president last weeks, we are currently lacking a lot of points, and the only way to make up for that is clearing the B-rank gate.

In case we were to fail, the association branch might lose a bit of its authority and standing in Chicago.

For this reason, you must clear the B-rank gate in less than four days, when they will count them.

Me and the association will support you with all our might.”

She then patted her chest proudly.

“Thank you for the help but I’ll clear it alone”

“But-”

“No but, the only reason the gate isn’t closed yet is because I couldn’t find the boss, otherwise, we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now.”

“You can’t find the boss? Could it be..

A special condition one?””

After this exclamation Hans showed extreme curiosity, since that he didn’t know about it.

This triggered Emily’ s teacher personality, that began to explain once again:

“Yes, a special condition monster, they are monster that appear only in special condition.

For example, the phoenix shadow, boss of the A-rank gate [golden paint], appeared only for fifteen minutes every day, during the sunset, and if not defeated in time, hunters had to wait the whole day again to fight it for a few minutes.

Other than that many monsters appear in specific situations, for example, some appear during sunrise, some only when it rains, some only with the sun, and some only in the dark.

There was even an occasion in wich the monsters only appeared under the full moon, luckily, the hunters were patrolling it all day and night, so they managed to quickly exterminate the monsters and close it.”

“Mh, I get it now, if what you are saying is true, then there’s a high chance that the monster I’m searching for is one of those.

I’ll return tomorrow in the gate, and I won’t leave until I exterminate the monster.”

…

That’s how he ended up alone in a desert with only some bottles of water, a few meals and a sleeping bag.

He still searched all day, in case it was just a well hidden monster, but he couldn’t find anything.

As the sun started falling, almost touching the horizon, Hans started preparing for the monster appearance.

He remained on alert for the whole sunset.

Even as the temperature became more pleasant instead of scorching, he remained vigilant.

However, twenty minutes passed, and not a single shadow passed from Hans senses.

“Haa, no luck today, I guess I’ll try again tomorrow.”

He put down the sleeping bag, and opened some of the packed food.

He was calmly eating his sandwich, protecting his body from the cold wind with the thick coat he had taken off when entering the gate.

Suddenly, his shadow started growing bigger and bigger, enlarging into different shapes and even invading the third dimension.

Hans was stunned watching the scene, with his mouth opened, the food still inside.

A pitch-black monster emerged, its body untouched by the bright moonlight, embodying the essence of shadow.

{mystic insight}

[boss monster

race: shadow walker

Name: none

Lv: 187

Strength:253 dexterity: 196

Endurance: – wisdom:159

Blessings:

{void blessing (currently active)

your body is eternally pitch black, you are able to absorb light, you can only live during the night, you are able to shapeshift.}

Skills:

{shadow manipulation(B-rank)

Description: you have complete control over shadows of non-living objects, you are able to manipulate them and use them at your wish.

Effect: manipulates the shadow of non-living being, to either attack or defend.}

Description: a creature born from the shadow of living beings, the larger the shadow, the stronger the creature.

Holder of the blessing of void, he does not exist during day time.

His body is made out of nothing but shadow, making him untouchable by physical attacks.

Evaluation:

Currently-low rank A,

Max-low rank S]

The shadow’s shape was that of a scorpion, it wasn’t as big as the ones Hans was used to, but it still emanated a much stronger pressure.

As his first instinct, Hans rushed backwards, casting countless fire spells, that he launched towards the anomaly.

As a result a huge quantity of dust was sent flying everywhere.

‘Did i get him?’

Asked himself Hans, not detecting any movement.

But contrary to his expectations, the monster remained unscathed and unbothered by the attack.

Only two things were strange, first of all, Hans’s shadow had disappeared, and second of all, the monster didn’t possess a shadow.

The monster shape suddenly changed, slowly rising and becoming smaller, it was a shape Hans was very familiar with.

His body.

Even if with no hairs and no pupils, it was definitely his body, but a little bit bigger and higher.

There weren’t many things that created a shadow around them, just Hans’s half finished sandwich, his bottles of water, and his sleeping bag.

But even those soon disappeared, gathering towards the shadow’s black hand, forming a sharp javelin-like object.

When the weapon was finished, the shadows of the objects completely disappeared.

“I get it now” muttered Hans seeing this.