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Reyne popped out of the water. As she panted for breath, she paid close attention to the magical beast in the water which had flames on the top half of its body.

Reyne tightly grasped onto her icy dagger.

At this moment, the Hell Melgash actually spat out a huge fireball, which shot directly at Reyne.

Reyne hurriedly ducked into the water to dodge the fireball attack. Only by staying in the water would she have a chance at victory.

Otherwise, she would instantly be burned by the flames if she emerged from the water. She could only hide underwater and come out occasionally to breathe. Her plan was to kill the Hell Melgash with arrows.

Reyne’s only advantage was that the Hell Melgash was far too big. The Hell Melgash was unable to put its fiery head into the water, so it could only try to attack Reyne based on its senses.

Reyne constantly moved around inside the lake. This was a very large lake, so she managed to move to the distant shore, far away from the Hell Melgash.

Reyne prepared her bow underwater and then suddenly emerged – she shot at the Hell Melgash.

She only had three arrows left. She used her first arrow to aim for the Hell Melgash’s eyes, which was its biggest weakness.

Previously, Reyne had already blinded both of its eyes with her arrows. In that case, continuing to attack the weak point would be even more effective.

However, right as she shot her arrow, her injured left hand was suddenly unable to use its full strength.

The arrow shot straight at the magical beast. To Reyne’s surprise, her arrow actually only landed on the Hell Melgash’s teeth.

“This won’t work. With the injury on my left hand, it will be impossible for me to shoot so high.”

The injury on her left hand really hurt. A very deep injury had been left behind from the Melgash’s bite. On top of that, her injury had constantly been soaking in cold water, which made her left hand’s condition even worse.

As Reyne covered the injury on her left hand, another fireball flew towards her direction.

The large fireball crashed into the shore and left a large hole in the ground next to the lake. Water kept flowing from the lake towards the new hole.

Reyne noticed that the Hell Melgash had a plan. This magical beast was far smarter than she had expected. It wasn’t just shooting fireballs at random.

For magical beasts, recklessly using magic would be the same as using up its lifeforce. No magical beast would be foolish enough to recklessly use its lifeforce up and die together with its enemy.

By making such a large hole with a fireball, it seemed as if it was making a trap. The Hell Melgash was waiting for Reyne to be washed into the hole by the water. At that time, it would then strike Reyne’s body with a fireball, leading to-

Reyne would die if she took a direct hit from its fireball.

Of course, Reyne realized this as well, so she took out an arrow and stuck it with great force into the nearby ground before she was washed away.

The arrow was tightly stuck into the mud. Reyne tightly grabbed onto the arrow in order to support herself.

“N… no, I must hang on, otherwise I’ll fall into its trap!”

Reyne kept reminding herself that she couldn’t fall into the Hell Melgash’s trap. She never expected that a magical beast was capable of thinking up such a vicious strategy.

Could it be that magical beasts also had human intelligence? Or, maybe they had been transformed from humans!?

Perhaps even Reyne wouldn’t have guessed that her instinct was really accurate. These settings that she considered were actually Mirabelle’s designs.

However, Reyne rejected such a way of thinking.

‘I can’t. This isn’t the time to be thinking random things- the most important thing right now is how to defeat the enemy before me.’

Reyne was obviously nervous. She never expected that she would be forced into such a bitter battle against an S rank magical beast.

Just how had Kirsten won? Just how did she defeat the S rank magical beast Swordtooth Tiger?

Reyne gritted her teeth and inserted both her remaining arrows into the mud. She then successfully crawled over to the nearby calm lake water.

Reyne concealed herself in some land of lower elevation that was lower than the lake water. She took advantage of this blind spot to adjust and recover her condition.

She only had broken arrows left. One arrow had been broken because of the water trying to drag her into the hole, while the other wooden arrow had snapped already as well.

Reyne constantly gasped for breath as she hid in the magical beast’s blind spot.

She had stayed underwater for too long in this aquatic battle. She felt like her injuries were becoming worse. She knew that they would get infected if she soaked herself in water for too long.

She was wet all over, but it was impossible for her to bandage her injuries right now. She could only ignore her injuries for the time being.

Additionally, it was raining, which made it hard for her to persist.

‘I have to hurry… hurry and end this battle.’

Reyne’s consciousness was already becoming hazy. She was rather tired after killing numerous magical beasts.

“Damn it, my consciousness…”

‘No, I can’t fall asleep here. If I fall asleep here, that magical beast will eat me.’

At this moment, Reyne forcefully bit a part of her own tongue. The strong pain coming from her tongue helped to instantly wake her up.

“No matter what, I can only rest after I defeat this magical beast first, even if I faint afterwards!”

Reyne could feel the taste of blood in her mouth.

She snapped her broken arrows and then used some rope to tie the broken arrow halves together.

After that, she became somewhat nervous. This fight for her own fate was about to begin. The Hell Melgash was currently crawling towards her.

“I shall become a part of the iron blade to strengthen the blade…”

Reyne used a magic spell to strengthen the hunting knife in her hand. She then glanced at the Hell Melgash.

The Hell Melgash’s body was burning with flames as it walked to the shore. It turned around and discovered Reyne instantly. It was already sensitive to the scent of prey, so now that it discovered Reyne, it instantly pounced towards her direction.

However, Reyne jumped high up into the air and landed on its back. The Hell Melgash also noticed her presence, so it constantly jumped around in an effort to get Reyne off its back.

Reyne did her best to raise her bow and point the front half of the arrow at the Hell Melgash’s head as it turned around –

Since the Hell Melgash was blinded and couldn’t identify Reyne’s exact location, it kept furiously turning its head. This was Reyne’s opportunity.

Reyne let go of her hand and released her arrow.

‘Please, this has to hit!’

This was Reyne’s final arrow, which she had just patched together. She could only sincerely hope for it to hit. If this arrow could hit the Hell Melgash in its eye, the rest would be much easier.

Perhaps the gods heard Reyne’s prayer, as her arrow actually managed to accurately strike the Hell Melgash in its eye. At the same time, the Hell Melgash shook Reyne off its body. She crashed heavily into the water, causing pain to run all over her body.

‘No, my consciousness…’

Reyne laid in the water and gradually sunk into the water. Her strengthening magic had been dispelled. She released the hunting knife in her hand.

She originally thought that she could struggle a little, but it was still all useless.

She laid in the icy water and watched the lake water surround her underwater world.

However, she then suddenly saw someone unexpected.

‘Kirsten? Why is she here? Isn’t she supposed to be locked up in a dungeon with Mirabelle? Am I dreaming? If this is a dream, I hope that I never wake up. I want her to save me, just like she did three years ago. I want to go back to the time before Mirabelle came to Kirsten’s side-’

Kirsten carried Reyne out of the water.

“Hah… hah…”
“Kirsten, are you alright?”
“I’m fine, but it doesn’t seem like she’s fine…”

Kirsten looked at the now unconscious girl in her arms who was injured all over. This was Reyne Miren. Almost all the guards in town had been summoned because of her.

All because the elder’s daughter had gone missing.

Kirsten glanced at the nearby gigantic ravenous wolf – the Hell Melgash.

“She actually wanted to fight this S rank magical beast all by herself. Of course she’d become like this…”
“And then she fainted, leaving this monster for us to deal with? Hah, I really don’t know what to do with her. I really do hate her after all…”

Indeed, just as Reyne hated Mirabelle, Mirabelle also loathed Reyne. Reyne was making trouble for her and Kirsten. However, it was also thanks to Reyne that they had a chance to escape. To give a hint, Reyne Miren’s father had made a promise to them.

“Now then, Kirsten, you should take her back to the village first…”
“Mirabelle, could it be that you intend to defeat this magical beast?”
“Ahh…”

Mirabelle nodded. She did have such an intention. The quest for hunting the Hell Melgash had just appeared after she finished hunting ordinary Melgashes. Mirabelle’s current sidequest was to hunt a Hell Melgash.

“No! It’s too dangerous. What will we do if you also become injured?”
“It’s fine, no need to worry about me. I have my own way of dealing with it…”
“It would be best for you to escape with me while it’s blinded…”

Kirsten still didn’t give up on trying to convince Mirabelle.

“I have a reason for having to defeat it no matter what. If I want to surpass her…”

Mirabelle gritted her teeth as she recalled someone that she didn’t want to yet again.

“Who is that person?”

Kirsten paid this close attention since she heard about someone else from Mirabelle’s words just now. Mirabelle turned to look at her before tightly clenching onto her bow.

“Someone that I really hate!” Mirabelle exclaimed as she immediately started running towards the forest.

This side was capable of reaching the highest place at this lake.

Mirabelle wanted to take advantage of the Hell Melgash while it was blind and weakened to the point of having less than half of its HP left. There wouldn’t be a better time to kill it!!

If she wanted to kill it, now was the only time to do so,

One explosive arrow would do an average of 500 damage. No, if Mirabelle was the one using the explosive arrow, the attack power might be even lower.

Anyways, Mirabelle had prepared approximately ten explosive arrows. She made them last night with the blue maple paper gained from the tree demons. The explosive arrows had improved attack strength now. Even Mirabelle was able to use the explosive arrows to 75% of their potential.

If she landed ten or so explosive arrows directly against the Hell Melgash’s weak spots, then she would be able to kill the S rank magical beast, as it had only about 5000 HP left.

Mirabelle ran to the highest hill by the lakeside. She hurriedly notched her arrow –

“Inject mana, and shoot…”

Mirabelle mentally recalled these steps as she treated her bow like a rifle’s sight scope. Her target was the magical beast’s head.

As she released her hand, the arrow shot directly towards the Hell Melgash’s head.