Rogue Villain-Chapter 238: Monster

Tararat looked at Ackster’s left hand, holding his right hand, and then at the stump of wriggling flesh as he sheathed his sword.

"Satisfied?"

"Yup. Thanks. You can be on your way now, quitter."

Tararat sighed.

"You’re so strange. Couldn’t you have cut it off on your own?"

"Don’t have a sword that’s sharp enough."

"Why even cut it off in the first place?"

"I’m trying something."

"And people call me eccentric."

"What? You’re like the most normal person I’ve met in years."

"For some reason, that doesn’t give me any comfort."

"By the way, you don’t happen to have any extremely potent poison on you?"

"...No."

"Fine."

"But I’ve heard that there’s a Hydra somewhere south of here."

"A Hydra?"

"Or was it west?" 𝚏𝕣𝐞𝗲𝐰𝕖𝐛𝐧𝕠𝕧𝚎𝚕.𝐜𝚘𝗺

Tararat rubbed his chin while tilting his head to the side as he thought. He shrugged without reaching a conclusion.

"Eh, I’m sure you will find it if you want to."

Leaving those words behind, Tararat stopped entertaining Ackster as he jumped on his wyvern and flew away before Ackster could say anything.

’A Hydra does sound nice, but fuck...How am I supposed to find it just like that?’

Ackster sighed and looked at his wrist. Since Tararat was strong enough, Ackster used him to see if his bones would regrow after being cut or separated from his body. He even flooded his severed wrist with his mountainous life force to try and help it.

But all that happened was the wound closing up in a matter of seconds. Ackster sighed in disappointment.

’Still not there, I see.’

Ackster paused and touched his nub as he felt something.

’Aha!’

The pieces of bone were growing longer. It was at a snail-like pace, but it was still proof of something happening. Ackster stored his hand in his Inventory for safe-keeping while he tested out his skeletal regenerative abilities.

He could probably reattach his hand now if he cleared out the closed-up wound tissue since he had confirmed he could regenerate a missing limb. But he wanted to find out how long it took.

With one hand and another on the way, Ackster picked up Mara’s trail and started following it. He still hadn’t gotten his magic resistance skills, and, more importantly, he had sent Mio with Mara to keep the slime safe from what he had thought would be a battle of disastrous proportions.

The battle hadn’t been so excessive, but Ackster would rather be safe than sorry when taking care of Mio. It was a relief that Mara was so scared of him that she wouldn’t dare to do anything to Mio.

With Ackster’s superior abilities both in speed and stamina, but also his senses, he quickly caught up with the fleeing dragonling mage, who was startled out of her wits when she sensed someone rapidly close in on her. But she sighed in relief when she noticed it was Ackster and not Tararat.

As soon as Mio was safe, they instantly picked up where they had left off. Mara hadn’t used much of her mana while fleeing, so she was ready to sling spells at once.

Although, for some reason, she got a weird feeling in her gut upon seeing Ackster’s nub. He waved off any worry he saw in her expression before urging her to continue preparing her spells. Mara wasn’t in a position to disobey, even if the thought that Ackster had sacrificed a hand for her sake distracted her.

Mara knew how capable Ackster was when it came to healing himself. But the fact that his hand hadn’t recovered was proof that he wasn’t invincible despite being able to recover from the brink of death after washing his skeleton clean of any fleshly tissue.

Mara’s thoughts continued while slinging spells of worrying might straight at Ackster. Their journey through the Land of Dragons also continued as Ackster wanted to find more things to fight, kill, and eat.

Ordinary volcanoes couldn’t train his Pyro Resistance further. But they could weaken his body and make it more susceptible to Mara’s magic. They were also places rich in mana that were perfect for Mara to grow stronger. Many of the volcanoes they encountered were also protected by beasts and monsters she would have been unable to defeat on her own. Even if she could, it wouldn’t take long before another one, two, three, or ten beasts came for the volcano.

Together, Ackster and Mara grew stronger. But Ackster could feel his growth stalling. And he needed something new to stimulate his progress.

"There you are, you slippery bastard!"

"Ah, you have excellent timing, Wilma."

Ackster opened his eyes and looked at the descending hot air balloon. It truly was perfect timing. He had just learned a couple of useful resistance skills. So, it was time to ditch Mara and head to his next target.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. It’s time to fulfill your end of the bargain."

Wilma gestured for him to come up since she couldn’t get closer to the volcano without compromising the balloon.

Ackster left the lava and put on a set of simple clothes while the burn scars on his body faded.

"I will await your return."

Ackster looked at Mara with surprise.

"Uh. You don’t need to. You’ve fulfilled your purpose."

Mara bowed without saying anything.

"Okay..."

Ackster wondered if he should kill her to get rid of what seemed to be something troublesome but eventually decided against it. Mara didn’t seem like she would cause him trouble. If anything, she had completely submitted to him. With how helpful she had been in training, Ackster also felt he owed her her life. So, he just left the bowing Mara and jumped up to the hot air balloon.

"I see you’ve had fun while you’ve been missing."

"Missing? Haven’t you been tracking me?"

"Figure of speech. Besides, it’s getting more and more difficult pinpointing your area."

"Really?"

Ackster was a little happy at that. It was proof he was starting to exceed the Guild’s capacities.

Wilma finally looked away from Mara and turned her gaze to Ackster.

"...What the fuck have you been doing, you monster?"