Life Hunter 22 ''What A Real Trade Is''

Arima pondered in front of the church for a bit "I need to take the egg and also I can't kill the Pope, so I can't destroy the building like last time, what a shame" He said helplessly.

"I think that destroying the place is not something people would have the idea to do first" Night said.

Arima shrugged "I'll take the egg tonight, like that I can use 'Sicarius umbra' to its full potential"

"Well then, we'll wait" Night said.

Then, the two waited for the night. Arima used his magic and became a shadow, he easily intruded in the church. Night had to wait outside.

Inside, Arima swiftly explored every room. But still didn't find any egg, he just saw many believers living here, with just a few personal belongings and that's all. Arima also realized something else on these people.

"I feel extremely uncomfortable, those believers, they are strange. If Elia was here to see them, then maybe she would only be able to see one never-changing color" He said

While he was thinking of that, he tried to open a quite big door but when he tried, his hand was repulsed by a magic field.

Arima was surprised. He took a second look at the door more carefully. He saw some runes on it. He was lucky because this door also possessed a detection function, but it didn't work because Arima was still in his shadow form.

Arima began to think of how going through without alerting anyone. He didn't know if teleporting inside would alert someone or not. He could at least suppose that there was a high chance for the egg to be in there. He could destroy the barrier quickly then take the egg in the same way but if the egg was not there and he came to be detected, it could troublesome.

Arima didn't take too much time, he decided to look at the rest of the church before trying to break this barrier. If he can't find the egg then that means it's in this room or not in the church. In that case, Arima would directly ask the Pope.

After ten minutes, Arima explored the entirety of the building and found nothing as expected. He spotted the room of the Pope but he didn't find any dragon egg.

"Well, no choice" Arima came back to the previous door "[Dimensional gradus]" Arima used his magic end teleported on the other side. Apparently, nothing was activated and Arima sighed in relief.

"…f.u.c.k" But when he looked at what was inside, he cursed. Inside was a blue egg two meters tall and one meter large, unfortunately, it was placed in the center of a magic circle drawn on the ground. If the egg is moved then it will alert the one who drew this.

"Wait, I don't need to be sneaky now that I think about it, the egg is in front of me now" Arima suddenly realized. He didn't wait and directly destroyed the circle with his aura and stored the egg, of course, he checked if it was the real one before.

"[Atlantis]" Arima teleported just after into the Pope's room, but when he appeared there, he didn't spot the Pope and the room was empty. Now, Arima didn't care about people finding him, he used a detection magic that encompa.s.sed the whole church, but he still didn't find the one he was looking for.

Arima frowned and at that moment, he felt a presence behind him and immediately activated 'Wild spark' to get away. He looked where he was before, a man wearing a gray robe, was standing there with a white light shrouding his hand.

The latter smiled strangely "Who are you? Why did you take the dragon's sp.a.w.n?" He asked

Arima smiled too "Well because it would be troublesome if I had to fight that guy to destroy your country"

The Pope's expression turned ugly "Do you think that an insect like you can destroy the Holy City!?"

"You're the insect here" Arima uttered coldly. He slowly took out Karma and released his aura.

The Pope harrumphed and his whole body became shrouded in a dazing light. He waved his hand and countless rays of light attacked Arima, the latter sent lightning to clash with the light and rushed to the Pope and swung Karma, the Pope formed a sword made of light and clashed with Karma. The aftermaths of the attack broke every furniture in the room and the walls began to crumble. Arima and the Pope exchanged one blow after another until the roof fell on them.

Arima just used his aura to clear away the rumbles and so did the Pope.

"[Ira]" Arima called his gun and pointed at the Pope "[Fulgur]" Like with his rifle, the handgun began to emit a black light. He shot at the Pope, a black beam erupted from the muzzle and aimed the Pope's chest, the latter used a displacement magic to avoid, the bullet pa.s.sed through the wall behind him, pierced all the walls of the church until it stopped a hundred meters away.

The Pope didn't have time to think about what just happened when Arima fired one more time at him and swung Karma in the same moment. He blocked the bullet with a light shield and met Arima's sword head on, but what surprised was that Karma pa.s.sed through his light sword and struck his chest. He was sent flying and crashed in another section of the church. He regained his stability and stood up the fastest possible.

He looked at his injury and laughed "I don't know why, but it seems that you're not trying to kill me" He said "But now, I won't let you even have the thought of holding back against me" The white light shrouding him changed into a dazzling golden one.

"(It's him who gave that stone to the Emperor?)" Arima instantly realized and he also noticed that the aura of the Pope was mixed with something else "So that's the power of a Pope" Arima grinned and said.

"So, are we doing it or not?" Night appeared at his side and said

Arima laughed "[Resonance]" The two chanted together and fused. When they finished their resonance, the Pope now looked younger and had golden hair.

"I'll show you the power of my G.o.d!" The Pope shouted and the whole church began to shake and the surroundings lit up. He conjured two golden suns in the sky.

Arima looked at those two suns "(It is said that a Pope can use the power of the G.o.d in which he believes. That's some power he has there)" He thought

"[Tenebris dominium] (Darkness domain)" Arima chanted and everything around him darkened, no light pa.s.sed through the area, the light from the two suns, the moon or the stars in the sky, couldn't illuminate him. Only the red and silver color of his eyes could be seen in a zone of absolute darkness.

"[Infinitae tenebrae]" Arima chanted

The same phenomenon occurred in the sky above him, two zones of darkness appeared. But if one turned around those zones, they would realize they were circular. The same as the Pope, Arima conjured two spheres in the sky made of absolute darkness.

Arima and the Pope both waved their hands and the four globes clashed with one another. Each globe pushed the other like they wanted to win.

Someone would think that the two sides were of equal strength, but the Pope's expression fell. He saw that the brightness of the suns he created was gradually fading. And he was right, it only took a minute for the two suns to be consumed by darkness. When that happened, the spheres exploded and turned the whole area in a mile radius into absolute darkness.

Even the Pope felt scared by his darkened surroundings, he tried to conjure some light but each time he did, it was immediately overtaken by darkness. Then he felt a shiver down his spine, he slowly raised his head and looked in front of him. Just a few meters away from him, a pair of red eyes was staring at him. In that instant, he had the impression that he became extremely weak and fell on his knees.

Arima approached him, he grabbed the head of the Pope "Don't you know? Light and Darkness are two very special magic. Light can reveal and destroy everything and Darkness can hide and absorb everything" He said in an emotionless voice "I won't kill you but" Arima grinned strangely and his eyes glowed in an unnatural light "[Vita venari]" He chanted and the Pope's body lost all of his strength and fainted.

Just after that, the darkness dispersed. Arima was standing in the ruins of the half-destroyed church. He was in a daze for a moment, then he looked at hand.

"Why did I do that?" He said out loud, in a strange tone.

Night released the resonance by himself and reappeared at Arima's side and cast a confused look at Arima "What was that?" He asked

Arima clenched his hand "I don't know, I acted without thinking" He said "'Vita venari'… 'Life hunt', huh?" He mumbled.

"What was that magic?" Night inquired

"No idea, but, when I used it, I noticed that my physical ability raised to the level nine and my mana pool expanded a bit" Arima said after checking his abilities.

Night was shocked, he rushed to the Pope and checked his condition "This guy, he doesn't have any mana anymore and his body became weak" His eyes widened "You just stole his life force" He said "That's not impossible to destroy the life force of someone but how did you take it as your own?" He asked Arima.

The latter shrugged "I don't know, don't look at me like that" He said "We'll think about that later" He said and walked to the unconscious Pope and woke him up "Let me show you what a real trade is" He took his most 'gentle smile' "Hey, where is your treasury? I already know the Emperor's but I'm sure you have your own, right?" And said to the Pope.

The now powerless man screamed "It's underground in the middle of the church! There's a hatch under the carpet!"

Arima smiled "Thanks, go sleep now" he said and knocked out the Pope.

Night's mouth twitched "Don't tell me that's why you did all of this…" He said

"Nah, of course not, it's just a secondary reward" Arima innocently said and rushed to the treasury.

Night sighed and followed. After that, Arima stored all the contents of the treasury, he found a ma.s.sive amount of money, enchanted crystals, ores, and metals which included mithril and adamant.i.te, but he also found something that made him extremely happy.

"That's…" Arima looked big rock in front of him "This guy had almost a unit of orichalc.u.m"

In this world, orichalc.u.m is a metal that can make evolve and upgrade another one to an extreme level. For example, if a certain metal can withstand a ton normally, with orichalc.u.m, it could withstand twenty tons. But its greatest value was its magic-negation properties.

"I'll coat my weapons with it later, particularly my bullets" Arima smiled

After that, Arima destroyed the church and headed to the castle, of course, to plunder the treasury. He one more time gained a lot of different things but nothing like orichalc.u.m.

"How much gold did you get in the end?" Night asked

Arima laughed like a greedy old man "In terms of pure money, almost a thousand shining golds"

"You won't give it to the Alliance or the Kingdom?"

"Eh? What are you talking about?" Arima said in a confused voice.

"I thought that maybe you would do that, you don't look like the money-loving type" Night said.

"Listen, money doesn't make you happy, but you can be even happier when you have it"

"Your true thoughts are?" Night said

Arima looked at him and paused "…It feels good to have more money than others, particularly when you took it from bad people" He said too honestly.

"I don't even know anymore if you're joking or not" Night sighed.

"Well, forget about that, money could help one day. Anyway, by the end of this week, the Kingdom should be able to absorb the Empire, our job is over" He said "Our next destination is the Republic and their continent"

"Already? You're too active" Night complained.

"What? Don't tell me you're not curious about a bigger continent with more beasts and monsters?" Arima smiled and said.

Night stared at him "…Probably because of you" He retorted.

Arima chuckled and left the capital with Night, carrying the Pope in his storage.