One month has passed.

  Icarus had arrived at the bridge between the shattered lands and the central continent of Temploria.

  Facing bandits and monsters on the road became much harder after focusing on only casting the spells given to him in the book by the Elf mage Ria.

  However, the concept and effectiveness quickly became easy to understand.

  A lethal bullet formed with minimal mana, unnamed in the book except for a simple "force blast" for encanters, but Icarus much preferred referring to it as 'magic missle'

  That being said, it was not flawless. The relatively low mana cost meant that the spell was quite hard to target effectively, coming with the caveat of needing to aim for an entire second before firing.

  Hence, the other portion of the spell is a greater mana shield.

  This is simply an improved, more mana-cost-effective defensive spell that is also very easy to cast at the same time as offensive spells and acts as an unbreakable bubble as long as the caster has enough mana to supply it. The downside of this is that the stronger the attack is that hits the shield, the more mana is consumed.

  However, since 'magic missile' is such a low-cost spell, the benefit of being able to shield yourself during the 'aiming' portion of the spell outweighs using ordinary defensive spells, which are difficult to layer onto oneself and shatter easily, as well as being extremely difficult to cast simultaneously with other spells.

  As for the types of magics involved, rather then the typical elemental types of water, earth, fire, air, light or dark, these spells both are derived from a type of magic discovered soon before the books invention, force magic, this magic is simply explained as 'pulling' or 'pushing' and can also be combined for these types of spells.

  Also in the book were several strange folk magic spells, like the ability to freeze something in space for a short amount of time or the ability to aim a spell at a target effectively. Stranger spells, like an automatic soup-making spell, existed, which made Icarus curious if spells even needed to be based on elements to function.

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  Icarus sighed in relief as he looked out at the bridge. His clothes were dirty and patched in several places with plant fiber; he had fashioned these patches with a combination of magic and skills he had picked up in his slave days.

  Icarus was about to set out when he heard the familiar sound of leaves being crushed underfoot behind him.

  He sighed again, this time in disappointment.

  "You guys just couldn't leave me alone until I left your territory, huh?"

  Turning around, he saw a lone man wearing a brown cloak, a triangular crest with a deer's skull within it sat on his chest.

  "You are a very lucky man, Icarus."

  Icarus shuddered and took a step back.

  "The Shadow whatchamacalit that hired me could not pay the full price I would have liked, so I'm only here to issue a warning, or I suppose more of a... message."

  The man lifted his foot and appeared in front of Icarus before his eyes could register movement.

  "You will be hunted wherever you go, until the leader is avenged; you should not rest through the night ever again."

  Icarus winced at the mention of the leader. He hoped they were falsely informed about Lyra's condition and that she still lived; it was unclear whether they had found her body or if she was just missing and presumed dead.

  "Their leader is a good friend of mine, I'd really like to clear up this misunder-"

  A blow to his stomachade him fall to a knee.

  "Shut up. I won't suffer the speech of a mutt like you for free, either pay or don't talk, and you'll live to see tomorrow."

  Icarus grit his teeth in a mix of pain and anger, but instinctively held his tongue as the gap in physical ability seemed to be a little too much for him to have hope of winning a fight.

  Even compared to the difference between him and Ingel when they first met, this man was far more difficult.

  The man spat to the side in apparent disgust and disappeared without saying another word.

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  A while later, Icarus had managed to cross the bridge and was on his way on the first road he found when he saw a caravan travelling, being towed by several oxen without any guards or others on the outside.

  Just one man stood and looked upon Icarus with familiar squinted eyes.

  He let out a laugh, and Icarus instantly pulled his staff from his back.

  "Well, well, well, seems you are destined for misfortune!"

  Green scales sprouted from the man's neck, face, and upper body, and he grew into the form of a great green dragon.

  "I met you once in that cursed place. I don't know how you escaped or what you did, but it won't happen again, I promise you that."

  It was Herbert, the man Icarus had assumed to be a slave trader, who was, in fact, a green dragon, the one who had started all this.

  Icarus's lip twitched at the sight of him, and his eyes flashed in anger.

  "Where o where is that delightful shadow girl you were with!? I wanted to enjoy her!"

  Icarus scowled, "disgusting filth!"

  "Haha! Is that any way to talk to your superior?! You should be begging for a quick death on your knees!"

  "There is no more to say."

  Icarus pointed his staff at the dragon, and from his shoulder a sight that froze the dragon with fear appeared.

  "G-golden draconoid?"

  With a roar, his statement was drowned out, and for the first time in a month, Icarus put around thirty percent of his mana into a single attack.

  The landscape in front of him was obliterated by the enlarged magic missile, which was far superior to any other spell he could cast when he used it with large amounts of mana.

  He put his staff back in his spatial pocket, given to him on the dragon continent. And took a last look at the damage from the attack.

  With a line that stretched for well over a kilometer of destruction ahead of him, it was safe to say there was no need to check what had happened to the green dragon.

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