The Villain has Perished

Chapter 6 Avenues

?"Young master…? Is everything alright?"

Lifting my eyes from the grimoire, I nodded to Sebas.

'He can't see Grimoire?' Noticing the lack of his reaction to the floating book, I sighed inwardly. If no one could see the Grimoire, then this could become a hidden card for me in the future.

Sebas didn't leave despite my gestures hinting at him to do so. I also knew the cause of it.

'Sigh, so today is the day.'

"Speak."

"Thank you, young master." He gave a small bow again. "My lord has requested your presence for the family dinner tonight."

"He should come himself, if he wants to meet me."

An awkward silence descended.

Sebas stared at me.

I stared at Sebas.

'Ahhh! It came out of my mouth by itself!'

"I'll relay your intentions, young master."

Sebas acted as if this was a natural response – my natural response – and left.

I calmly turned around and sat on the edge of my bed. Thankfully, my prideful trait didn't let me express my shock and stupefaction. I continued sitting with a calm demeanor, even though no one was watching me.

In nobility, one's conduct and bearings were the most important. And yet, I rudely asked the family head to come himself. Not to mention that person was someone who – if I got exposed – would hunt me to the end of the world.

"Haaah…"

'I can only try to not repeat something like this in the future.' Sighing, I focused on the Grimoire. 'Let's see what my attribute can do.

|| Use 50 Life Points to unlock Insect Avenue? ||

|| Confirm Yes/No ||

I tapped on the word 'Yes' written on the Grimoire.

Ding!

|| -50 Life points ||

|| Insect Avenue Unlocked! ||

The pages turned by themselves.

––

[Insect Avenue]

Baby Tarantula, First Mortal Awakening (New)

Jet Dragonfly, Master (Locked)

––

On the page, there was an image of a small spider shining brightly. Above it was a blurry image of a dragonfly. There were more images above those but I couldn't make out their shapes or information.

—

Species: Baby Tarantula

Rank: 1st Mortal Awakening

Summoning Cost: 25 Magic Power

Housing Space: 5

Physique: 15

Magic Power: 50

Skill: <Share Vision>

Description: Baby Tarantulas are by nature curious beings who love to explore. They have innate quality to hide their presence, which helps them to traverse dangerous areas despite their weaknesses.

–

<Share Vision>

<Level: N/A>

<Cost: 3 Magic Power per second>

<Description: Synchronize your vision with Baby Tarantula>

––

'It has a skill?!'

My eyes widened in surprise. Well, as wide as my prideful and expressionless trait allowed me to.

'My total summon capacity is 10, while one baby tarantula needs 5 housing space. So I can summon two of them at once.'

I decided to start slow and summoned one Baby Tarantula.

|| Summon Baby Tarantula? ||

'Confirm'

A small magic circle appeared on the ground. It had runes drawn inside that shined faintly and I felt something leaving from inside me.

Shortly, the circle dimmed and disappeared, leaving a fist sized spider behind.

It had brown fur with black stripes across its body and 12 eyes.

???d? n??a| ?om Stridulating, the baby spider looked around curiously and jumped everywhere with its 10 legs.

'Ohhh, naisu!'

It took me only a moment to realize that I didn't need to spend mana to maintain the baby spider.

This, along with the fact that it had a skill, made my excitement skyrocket!

'Let's check the skill'

Closing my eyes, I muttered.

"<Share Vision>"

Instantly, the world around me changed.

'Whoa, this is better than I thought!'

Everything was a lot bigger. The chair, the door, the room too, felt like an enormous expanse of land. My visual acuity increased by many folds, along with my color perception.

It wasn't disorienting as much as I thought it would be.

Above all, I had a full 360° vision!

'I don't need to worry about someone sneaking at me with this! And the high color perception can substitute for night vision!'

But there was a bigger discovery.

'I don't need to spend my magic power to use the skills of my summons!'

My vision continued to change rapidly as the baby tarantula jumped from one corner to another. Completing its expedition, the spider jumped out of the window before I could stop it.

"Wait!"

Landing onto a shrub, it picked itself and roamed.

'Is it autonomous?'

The baby spider entered an area where many people were training with weapons, and…

I lost my connection with it.

'Huh? What happened?'

Suddenly, I found my vision back to normal. I attempted to use <Vision Share> again, but it didn't activate.

'Did someone kill the Baby Tarantula?'

It might have been discovered, but I wasn't worried. By appearance alone, the baby tarantula looked no different from a normal spider.

'Still, it would be a problem if it didn't leave a corpse behind and disintegrated into nothingness.'

I didn't know much about my attribute yet, so I decided to stop summoning until I found a place where it wouldn't create problems for me to get caught, as it seemed the summoned monsters had their own will.

Satisfied by the discoveries, I checked the Insect Avenue in detail.

|| Insufficient funds. User needs 10,000 Life Points to unlock Jet Dragonfly ||

Going back to the pages, I read my details about Avenues.

[Avenues]

Insect Avenue - Unlocked

Beast Avenue - Requires 100 Life Points to Unlock

Plant Avenue - Requires 500 Life Points to Unlock

Reptile Avenue - Reach Master rank to check unlock requirements

There were more avenues after this, but all of them had rank restrictions along with other requirements to unlock them.

'Insect, Beasts, Plants, Reptiles, Undeads, Mechas, Spirits, Titans, Divine Beings, I can summon them all!'

And, although I couldn't read them, there were more avenues after this!

Summoner attribute was OP!

A shiver ran down my spine. I could see myself commanding a legion of monsters who attacked endlessly!

'First, I need to level up and increase my life points!'

My eyes glinted, and I picked the leftover magic stones.

'It's time to level up!'

————————

Sebas walked over to the training grounds.

A few minutes ago, he was notified of a commotion created on training grounds and asked to resolve it.

He frowned as reached his destination.

Other than the two peoples, who were standing near the edge of the grounds, and the large number of arrows sticking near the entrance, everyone was training diligently.

He could feel the awkwardness of the people as they gave side glances to the two persons at the edge every few seconds.

Sebas walked to the two people standing at the edge of the ground.

"Your highness, is there something we can help you with?"

Sebas bowed to a young woman with vivid pink and an air of confidence about her.

Her features were delicate and symmetrical, with large, expressive eyes that sparkled with intelligence and wit. Her skin was smooth and radiant, glowing with health and vitality. The light pink hair of hers was styled in loose waves that framed her face, drawing attention to her striking features.

"There is, Mr Sebas." She spoke confidently and gracefully. "I would like to know the identity of the one responsible for maintenance of the Lionel estate."

All the while she was speaking, her eyes were glaring at the arrows sticking near the entrance.

Sebas appeared troubled.

"I apologize, your highness, but I would need to know the reason for your question before answering you."

He bowed deeper when Charlotte turned her glare at him, but he didn't relent.

Jae-sung, who was standing beside Charlotte, was looking at her with a weird expression.

Most of the nobles who had been proved innocent returned after the banquet, while a few were held back.

Jae-sung, a baron ranked noble from the countryside, and Charlotte, the 2nd princess of the Swordsmith Empire, also stayed.

However, these two had a different motive for staying back. They were planning to leave with the convoy of the heir selected to oversee the Rite of Passage, as they were also participating.

Both of them got acquainted with each other at the banquet after Charlotte saved Jae-sung from being tricked by a few vicious nobles and losing all his belongings. They had been training together since then.

Jae-sung was surprised to find that Charlotte was the 2nd princess of the Empire. He had seen her graceful and confident demeanor, but in his defense, she never revealed her identity explicitly and was a very down-to-earth person – a quality that becomes increasingly rare as you climb the hierarchy of noble status.

That was not to say she was weak. Shockingly enough, she was able to keep up with him in combat.

She was strong, charismatic, and kind. But…

Jae-sung replayed the scene that transpired a few minutes earlier, in his mind.

'Kyaaa! Why is there a bug here!? It's too big! Kill it! No, eradicate it! Annihilate it!'

There was not a shred of her confident and graceful self left as she shot a barrage of arrows to kill the bug.

However, the corpse of the so-called bug Charlotte killed was never found.

Despite her claims that the bug was a fist sized spider, no one believed her. Not when there was not a single smudge of blood at the scene of crime.

It baffled Jae-sung that she wasn't worried about how she made a fool of herself but whether there were more bugs.

"Forget it, then." Charlotte ultimately sighed. "Maybe it was my mistake. I might have been stressed too much after the events of the banquet."

She stood up and left to continue training, followed by Jae-sung.

Sebas, who was looking at the two youngsters, thought.

'Should I set up a meeting between the young master and them? It will motivate the young master if he meets with strong warriors of his age. He might make some friends too.'