Hero of Darkness

The next morning after Kahn awoke from his sleep, he started his weapons training again. Recently, he didn't have enough time to practice but it clearly hadn't skipped his mind.

No matter how the blessings from the War Deity helped him raise his mastery and perfect his techniques easily, he'd still get rusty if he didn't practice with them in routines. Only a fool would get complacent with their cheat codes and forget to even train the basics of the fighting skills.

He wasn't inside some fictional story where once you learn a skill, you don't have to work hard to perfect it or take it to a new level for your entire life. His only advantage was that the blessings allowed him to quickly comprehend the various battle techniques and skills far faster than anyone else. But that didn't mean that he'd always stay proficient in them without performing them for a long time. Because even Grandmaster rank fighters still trained themselves with their weapons in order to reach new heights and break into a higher rank. That was exactly what made them so different & exceptional from millions of people.

After his morning training session ended, he followed his usual routine of breakfast, ignoring the letters from rich businessmen and nobles alike, then spending his time reading a few informative books related to the demographics and geography of the world he was now living in.

He wasn't going to be an ignorant idiot like some childish protagonist of a book who randomly traveled to places without even gathering enough information about that place such as its natives, the culture they follow and what's the most important thing to know about that region.

And because he didn't have a know it all guide or a companion with him, he had to learn these things by himself so he wouldn't wander off in a wrong place or lose the track of where he was.

During the noon when he was finally alone, he started practicing the new Metamorphosis ability. He took off all of his clothes and started to change his form from one species to another. In the beginning, he stumbled in his footsteps as he wasn't used to walking on hind legs of a kobold or a minotaur and nor did he have any experience in walking on 3 legs like a nymph.

After spending hours practicing from one form to another and getting used to them.. Kahn finally heaved a sigh of relief.

And then he shifted to bloodline merge skill. Initially, Kahn only thought that he couldn't use skills that were bloodline exclusive but to his surprise; the abilities he already had learned without a 100% pure bloodline were also available. To summarize, Metamorphosis allowed him to change only in the creatures he had absorbed the 100% pure bloodline of while Bloodline Merge allowed him to mix in skills and physical traits he already had acquired even if he didn't have the hundred percent purity in those respective species and bloodlines.

In the first few tries, he could only merge two to three bloodline skills at best and his highest activation time was 4 minutes. This skill indeed needed a lot of practice and experiments done with it. Otherwise, it'd be nothing but a forgotten book on the shelf.

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Somewhere at this same moment, a fight occurred inside a huge merchant shop.

"Give them back! These are ours, you thieves! Or no one is leaving this building alive!" shouted a man.

A group of 20 adventurers were causing a commotion inside a well-established shop that sold weapons, equipments and even some rare materials harvested from the monsters.

These adventurers had broken few tables and glassed shelves that held the different products.

A group of men walked from inside of the building to confront these hooligans that were doing the property damage. But even they felt a sense of fear because the guards that were protecting them were few in numbers compared to these people.

"What's the meaning of this?!" asked an elderly old man who had a long and white beard.

The elderly was very familiar to Kahn.. It was none other than the old merchant association president, Nikola. And the huge and well-established settlement was none other than the same Black Griffin merchant shop where Kahn had previously bought all his gear and equipment from.

"President! These people claim that the goods we're selling actually belong to them and want them back. They're even threatening to burn down our shop if we don't comply!" shouted the demonkin manager.. The one who previously escorted Kahn during his shopping after Kahn handed down a letter written by Elanev.

While all this commotion happened, Kahn was busy experimenting with his new skills and he finally stopped after the sunset was on the way.

He thought about taking a small stroll across the city and visit his favorite restaurant where they sold that aromatic herbal tea. He kind of missed that exquisite and soul-soothing tea.

But when he left his bungalow and walked nearly half a mile, he heard a commotion coming from the nearby street. Kahn, whose senses and eyesight was far keener than any other normal human being because of his Hunter's Intent.. He quickly found the cause of this noise and moved towards the direction.

But as soon as he gazed at the center of the commotion.. He faltered in his steps and stood rooted on the spot.

Just a half-mile away from him.. There was a big oak-like tree on the side of the street.. And on that tree, a body was hanged.

Kahn quickly ran towards the location with all his might and at his full speed!

"Get out of the way!!!" roared Kahn towards the people that were encircling this tree, standing as bystanders. As soon as his loud roar reached their ears, some people started making a way for him.. It wasn't a request but more like an order.

Kahn jumped and leaped across the crowd for nearly 10 meters and landed right beneath the tree.. He looked at the slim and lifeless body that was hung from the tree branches.

"No... This can't be happening.." said Kahn was a ghastly and ashen face. He quickly took out a dagger from his space ring and cut down the rope.. Slowly taking down the body.

Kahn held the slim body in his arms and gazed at the fear-stricken and pale face of the corpse.

It was someone Kahn knew very well ever since he came out of the forest.

The body he held in his arms belonged to a young woman with long red hair.. She appeared no older than himself.

The deceased young woman was none other than.. Jessica.