Arvell concealed his presence and dashed at the boy situated to the far right of their group.

If there was evidence that the boys were killed, a thorough investigation would have been run to identify the culprit, but simply beating them up wouldn't garner that much attention.

Since Arvell didn't want any charges of murder, he wasn't able to upright kill them, but due to the examination rules, he wasn't really allowed to beat them up either.

If they caught him doing so, they would have failed him instantly.

While Arvell didn't fantasize about himself as some champion of justice, blatantly ignoring stuff like this while being able to stop it wasn't something Arvell was too fond of.

Hence why he decided to take a page from Lucas's little group.

If he wasn't caught, how would he get in trouble?

All he needed to do was make sure that no one there could identify him.

If he could break their line of sight, he wouldn't need to worry about being identified and punished.

Fortunately, Arvell had a small stockpile of various utility-based elixirs which included his smoke bomb.

The smoke bomb was a tool Arvell had to primarily use against humans.

While most beasts were fully capable of locating other organisms using only their body scent, humans were far too dependent on their eyesight, almost pitifully so.

If he could take out their vision, beating them up would be almost too easy.

Especially considering just how strong these kids were.

They were nothing more than weak brats who just managed to form their mana core.

Even if they were the same age, Arvell was leagues ahead of his peers.

After all, if having either Aether or Nether is better than having mana, having both would be far better.

Fighting ordinary people his age was almost too easy for him.

While he might have trouble fighting the kids of wealthy nobles, the boys before him would be nothing more than a warm-up.

Even if Arvell concealed his strength, he was more than confident of being able to effortlessly beat up Lucas's group.

He kicked upwards with his right leg, hitting the boy square on his jaw.

*BANG*

"MHMMMM!"

The boy cried out in pain before his eyes rolled up, and fell unconscious.

Hitting someone in the jaw was an easy way to rattle their brain, thus knocking them unconscious.

The boy collapsed like a house of cards, while Arvell reached into his inventory.

[Inventory]

Grabbing 2 swords, one for each hand, he threw them straight at the 2 boys that were still left standing.

*BANG*

*BANG*

In order to make sure they didn't die from being impaled in the gut, Arvell put a spin on the swords, causing them to smack them in the head with the hilt.

Before the swords could fall back to the ground, Arvell dashed to the falling boys and caught them.

'Done.'

He threw the 2 blades back into his inventory and took one last look at the collapsed boys.

While they had a hard time seeing in the smoke, it wasn't too hard for Arvell with his trained senses.

Even if he couldn't see them, he could quite easily hear them.

Having no experience with hiding their presence, these kids were practically announcing their positions.

Being a skilled hunter, Arvell certainly wouldn't give up on such easy prey.

Arvell exhaled with a dull expression

'Sigh… If they could put up a bit more of a fight, it would have been actually fun…'

Lykos shook his head.

'You have too many expectations of ordinary people.'

'Still, couldn't they have tried a little harder?'

'You make it sound like they got knocked out on purpose.'

'But they did? Who just yells threats in these kinds of situations? If they shut their mouths and listened instead of screaming, maybe they might have caused some trouble for me.'

Lykos couldn't help but nod at Arvell's point.

Yelling and making their location known like that was quite stupid.

'If this wasn't an exam they would be dead. Let them count their lucky stars they got out with only a few fractured bones.'

Arvell turned his attention to the girl, who was looking around her fearfully.

'The smoke's going to disperse soon, so I should get going before she sees my face.'

Arvell threw her one last look before disappearing from the scene, leaving only a confused girl and 4 unconscious boys with several bone fractures.

The girl was too terrified to move away from the place she was standing, opting to stay almost perfectly still.

She didn't know what was going on, but she was thankful that she didn't have to face humiliation at the hands of those boys.

At least for now that is.

Who knows when they might come back to continue what they started?

The girl didn't even know if this was a human or some kind of beast attacking, but she was leaning on the former since she heard her aggressors yelling threats aimed at humans.

'Could this person be saving me? Or are they the same as Lucas's group?'

She had already been tricked once today, so she wasn't willing to openly trust anyone who claimed they were going to 'help' her.

Lucas's group helped her in a pinch when she was struggling to kill a beast and offered to partner up with her, telling her that if she stuck with them, she'd have a higher chance of passing.

Through the girl's naivety, she wasn't able to see through their deceptive smiles.

Smiles that masked their sinister true intentions

It was only after they made it far away from any perceivable group, that they revealed their true natures.

Feeling confident no one else would intrude on them, they attacked the poor girl intending to **** and kill her.

After facing this kind of betrayal, and the trauma of almost being assaulted, the girl wasn't about to just trust any people she just met ever again.

However it seemed as if the girl's fears were unfounded, as when the smoke dissipated, she found only 4 horribly injured boys passed out around her.

Looking around, she couldn't see any signs of the person or beast which attacked them.

'Was I really saved?'

Hope returned to the girl's eyes, as she began to cry tears of relief.

"Thank you! Thank you for saving me!"

The girl silently muttered to herself before running away from the scene, unaware that the object of her thanks was listening in.

A soft smile formed on Arvell's lips.

'Getting thanked like this feels nice from time to time. But I don't plan to make it my life's ambition to end crime or anything of the sort, that sounds like a pain.'

He turned around and took off, heading deeper into the woods.

Lykos's mouth curved into a smirk.

'Who knows? You could become a guard! You already have plenty of experience stopping sexual assaults.'

Arvell cringed.

'Why does this keep happening? Like just steal their money or something. Keep it in your pants for crying out loud! There is more than life than fulfilling your libido!'

'Spoken like a true loner! As expected of someone who with the title of 'Forever Alone'!' Lykos teased.

Vein's bulged on Arvell's forehead.

'When will you give that a rest, I'm still thirteen! I still have many chances to find a lover in the future!'

'Talk like that when you can actually find one!'

Arvell grit his teeth in annoyance, before deciding to ignore Lykos for the time being.

***

30 MINUTES LATER

Lucas opened his eyes with a disoriented look, before feeling a pang of pain originating from his stomach.

"W-what happened…?"

Suddenly the memories of the silver flash flooded in, as Lucas's eyes widened in realization.

"Urgh…"

The memory of the horrific punch made his pain feel even more vivid than it did before.

Clearly remembering how he got the injury made him feel like he re-lived that hellish experience.

He shivered in terror as he remembered the feeling of oppressive terror he felt from that person.

It was as if he was nothing more than a slab of meat on a carving board, with his only option being to let himself be killed whenever that being wished.

He'd never experienced anything like this ever before.

Lucas was even surprised that he'd managed to survive.

He was sure that he was dead the instant he fell unconscious.

Slowly pulling himself into a sitting position, he looked around only to find his 3 friends all lying unconscious on the ground.

Neither the culprit nor the girl could be found anywhere nearby.

Inhaling deeply he shouted to his friends.

"GUYS WAKE UP! WE NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE!"

Being unable to muster up the strength to walk, he resorted to yelling at his friends to get their attention.

"COME ON GUYS WAKE UP!"

Instead of seeing his friends wake up, Lucas noticed something else.

*SRSSS*

It was the sound of something dragging on the ground?

The boy couldn't quite turn around due to his abdominal pain, so he opted to yell at whichever asshole was behind him to show himself.

"Which f*cker is behind me? Show yourself!"

He heard the noise slowly approach him before abruptly stopping.

"Who the hell are you!"

Sweat began to drip down Lucas's neck.

Being in a situation where he couldn't turn around due to the pain, he was starting to shake in terror.

However, instead of receiving a response, Lucas noticed something else.

His shadow… Was growing?

It got to the point where the sun in the corner of his eyes was no longer visible.

"What the hell is going on?"

At this point, Lucas began to panic.

Something was definitely wrong.

"Hiss?"

He looked up to see what appeared to be a giant figure looking down on him.

"Oh, lord…Please save me…"

The figure's mouth opened wide, before falling onto Lucas, swallowing him whole.

***

Author's Note:

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT:

Chapter 18 was missing half of the chapter due to me accidentally deleting it while editing. I put the chapter back up, if you all wanted to read it. Thank you to everyone who pointed it out, and I'm sorry for the late response

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