Riding on his metal bird, Gabriel asked, "How about the other scent that you mentioned? Is he here too?"

Nodding his head, Grimm replied, "Yes."

Gabriel's face turned grim after hearing this. However, Grimm was not able to see his facial expression due to the elemental vapors that were floating around him.

It would appear that there was a partic.i.p.ant that even Gabriel was afraid of.

Grimm and Gabriel thus kept flying at full speed.

Half a day later.

Grimm was able to smell the scents clearer and clearer. In fact, along the way he could sense that there were some elemental energies scattered around unevenly. These were indications that fierce battles had occurred along the way.

They were close to their target.

Overwhelmed by hatred, Grimm's heart was beating violently.

His hatred for Hattori the Hidden… his hatred for him implanting Symbiotic Insects into Lefay and forcing her to become a Black Sorcerer-apprentice. This, in turn, forced her to carry a bounty on her head and to be hunted by Demon Hunters—she was forced to go through all these without any legitimate means of getting help.

Grimm was worried too. He was worried that Hattori not willing to deal with him or coming up with some extremely difficult condition. This would essentially close up Lefay's survival chances entirely.

Grimm was feeling so crossed and frustrated as he was now entirely on the pa.s.sive. He was forced to give in due to his weakness was being exploited.

Even though energy sealing could aid in ensuring Lefay's survival, Grimm knew this was just a temporary solution. Besides, even if he was able to seal her up using some extremely powerful seal… living inside a seal for an extra decade was no different than dying.

What Grimm wanted was to repent. He wanted to at least have some sweet memories on this journey of being a sorcerer. Thus, he would fight for it with all his might. He would not settle for some deluded comfort by agreeing to some form of compromise.

On the other hand, Grimm had asked Myna to spend a vast amount of Sorcerer Essence to have Duke Krakatoa seal Lefay.

Without Grimm being around, Krakatoa would definitely notice Lefay was a Black Sorcerer-apprentice. However, he would a.s.sume that Grimm did not want to release the Black Sorcerer-apprentice out to cause havoc in the world and break the laws of the Holy Tower but was not able to kill her due to her being his wife—thus, he needed Krakatoa to seal her.

She was just a Sorcerer-apprentice. Thus, with a little bit of bribe and them being on the same level as sorcerers, he would not kill her.

Hmm?

As Grimm was deep in his thought, Gabriel let out a cough and pulled him back to the task at hand. He could see a ray of scarlet light flas.h.i.+ng in a distance.

"No, not him too?" Gabriel mumbled.

As they got closer to the scarlet light, Grimm was able to see what that was—it was a male sorcerer, wearing some sort of sorcery tool on his sorcerer robes, releasing raging flames around him.

Hmm?

So, this was due to the feathers?

Grimm noticed the scarlet red feathers on the Demon Hunter's robe. The secret of how the robe was releasing all those flames was the feathers.

"Gabriel, finally you show up. Third Ghostpepper and Kuryak have already engaged with the target. I am not able to compete with them… but if I could stop you from going after the target, Kuryak would definitely pay me handsomely. Hehehehe."

The Demon Hunter leered at Gabriel as he darted towards them—like a meteorite falling from the sky.

In his eyes, his target was only Gabriel. He had completely ignored Grimm.

Kuryak's bounty was to take down Gabriel. Even if he killed Grimm, there was no extra reward anyway.

"Curses! Not only that darned Third Ghostpepper is here… even Kuryak's here. This is the worst! d.a.m.n you, Roqhiroo! If I've known this, I should have ditched him in that demon-hunting mission. So, he had joined forces with Kuryak…"

From their words, Grimm could deduce what was going on.

These Demon Hunters knew one another from one of the demon-hunting missions. They even knew each other's combat capability through some kind of conflict it seemed.

Hustling his metal bird, Gabriel suddenly turned and ordered, "Grimm, I'll leave him to you. Don't worry. I'll pay you fifty Sorcerer Essence later no matter I succeed in clearing the Demon Hunter Consociation mission or not."

Slap!

Fifty Sorcerer Essences had appeared. And they were thrown at Gabriel.

Those were thrown from Grimm's hand.

Shocked at his action, Gabriel asked, "You?! What is the meaning of this?"

Grimm coldly replied, "This is your fifty Sorcerer Essence reward. I'll resume onwards. Don't worry. Like what Master Peranos said, I'm not interested in that Demon Hunter Consociation mission. You can count on that. And I'm not your slave, you moron."

Grimm had suffered enough from Gabriel's arrogance.

If it wasn't for Master Peranos and head of the academy's close relations.h.i.+p, Grimm would not even waste fifty Sorcerer Essence on him.

Paying him fifty Sorcerer Essence now was to merely thank the head of the academy.

"You… Ah! Grimm, you're dead!!!"

Finally understanding what the situation was, Gabriel was so furious that the elemental vapors surged under his sorcerer robe and tore it to shreds.

Then, like a bolt of lightning, Gabriel darted towards Grimm as metal scales formed on his knuckles. The force of his flight was so strong that the air current in the surrounding areas was cracking loudly—like a series of lightning exploded around him.

This power… what a monster!

Yet, Grimm had already antic.i.p.ated this.

"Wild Instinct Level 1, activate!"

Boom!

Two fists met!

In that short moment when the two knuckles, armed with metal scales, clashed, a powerful surge of shockwave burst out to the surroundings. The shockwave was so powerful that the lightning that exploded from this rippled across long distances.

Suddenly, Grimm's eyes shrank under the Mask of Truth.

Creak…

Grimm's sorcerer robes were in tatters from the shockwave. And slowly, a powerful force was quaking through his knuckle to his arm and then to his back. Then, the force burst out fiercely and pushed Grimm twenty meters away.

Letting out a grunt, Grimm quickly retracted his aching arm.

Gabriel's fist probably had over 1500 damage.

On the other hand, Gabriel's eyes widened as he saw the metal scales on the back of his knuckle had started to retract—as though they were affected by some kind of curse.

If it was not for this, Grimm's arm would definitely be crushed.

What kind of curse was this?

Gabriel quickly a.n.a.lyzed and deduced what was going on.

This thing could quickly gather biological information from him and then launch a counter-attack in just that short moment. On top of that, it could ignore his double-layer defense sorcery completely too!

Gabriel had misunderstood something, obviously.

"Hehe, Gabriel! You'll stay where you are. Don't worry, I'll keep you entertained!"

A fireball darted towards the metal bird and exploded, causing fire elements dusting around in the air…

Picking up the scents earlier and continued on his pursuit, Grimm also recalled that weird distorted sorcery earlier.

When their fists met, Gabriel was attacking with rage—his fist was carrying a layer of Level 1 Wild Instinct.

Grimm, though, had been utilizing force field to support him while activating Wild Instinct. This in turn caused a repulsion force to lower some damage, protecting Grimm.

And Grimm had found something peculiar from this clash—force fields could weaken Wild Instinct?

It would appear that Wild Instinct and Life Code Rupture had some form of correlation. This would definitely be useful in Grimm's research on elemental sorcery and refinery sorcery in the future.

As he was going through these thoughts, Grimm was also warping onwards using his dimensional distortion.

He could feel a tinge of chaotic elemental ripples ahead…