"Then here's my first question. How long do these B-Rank Labyrinths usually take to clear?" Leo asked.
"It depends on how many floors it has and how fast you're willing to progress, but it normally takes about a week or so if you rest 4 to 6 hours a day."
Leo nodded, and he continued to ask, "If I do this mission for the Adventurers' Guild, what are the chances of me being qualified to be promoted to a B-Rank Adventurer?"
Aaron chuckled and said, "Your recent performance is already enough to qualify you for a promotion. If you complete this mission, I will request for a direct promotion for you to become a B-Rank Adventurer. How does that sound?"
"That sounds great! Thank you!" Leo said in an excited voice, as it appears that he will be promoted much quicker than he'd anticipated.
The food arrived at the table shortly after and they began eating.
An hour later, Aaron paid the bill and said, "Here is my contact information. Call me if you have any questions between now and the mission. I will give you the location of the Labyrinth the day before the mission."
"Alright. Thank you for the dinner, by the way."
"No problem. Have a good night." Aaron gave him a polite bow before walking away and disappearing into the crowd.
"Let's go back home." Leo said to Lia, who silently nodded.
Once they returned to the hotel, Lia entered the bed and laid there while staring at him.
"I get it. Mana Drain, right?" Leo said with a bittersweet smile and he approached the bed.
He began absorbing her mana shortly after.
Meanwhile, inside a secluded basement somewhere in the City of Tethoris, Aaron stood before four individuals, three men and one woman.
"I have successfully convinced the target into joining the Labyrinth mission. It's up to all of you now to finish the rest. My involvement in this is done here." Aaron said to these four figures.
"You'll be done when we say you are, Aaron." One of them said in a cold voice.
"I only agreed to this because I owed the Scarlet Family a favor. That favor has been paid just now. Now if you'll excuse me, I have other work that needs to be done." Aaron left the basement and disappeared somewhere.
Once Aaron left, these four people continued their conversation.
"I will brief us about our mission again. The target is Leon. He's a C-Rank Adventurer who showed up suddenly a few months ago. According to Aaron and several people, he's as strong as an A-Rank Adventurer, but that won't matter to us as long as we do our job correctly."
"Remember, we cannot kill him. Our client, the Scarlet Family, stressed that we have to capture him alive."
"I doubt he's really as strong as an A-Rank Adventurer. I heard he's being sponsored by Camille Light. She's probably spoiling him with all sorts of powerful artifacts, hence his unnatural strength. Without his artifacts, he will be useless."
This group proceeded to spend the rest of the night planning their real mission.
The following day, Leo woke up early and said to Lia, "I'm going to practice my magic in the Wilderness. You don't have to follow me. I can go by myself."
"No, I will go with you." Lia said as she got off the bed.
Sometime later, they left the city and went to where D-Rank monsters were roaming.
Leo proceeded to summon the Devourer of Gods and allowed it to consume every monster they encountered.
Lia was still fearful of the Devourer of Gods at first, but she eventually got used to it.
The Devourer of Gods grew rapidly in the beginning, but it began to slow down after eating about 20 monsters.
"Looks like it's about time you feed it something stronger." Lilith said as she hugged Leo from behind while embracing his neck with her arms.
Ever since she regained the ability to touch him, she would stick to him like how a koala sticks to a tree.
Leo tried to push her away many times, but Lilith was incredibly persistent. Eventually, Leo gave up and decided to ignore it.
Sometime later, they went to hunt C-Rank monsters, and sure enough, the Devourer of Gods started growing rapidly again.
By the end of the day, the Devourer of Gods' size was akin to that of two adult humans standing beside each other.
"Can this thing transform? It's a slime, so it would make sense if it could." Leo asked Lilith.
"Yes, the Devourer of Gods can transform into the entities it consumes, and it can even use their powers, including magic."
"Seriously?! This magic is more ridiculous than I thought!"
"Well, it is my family's heirloom." Lilith chuckled.
"Speaking of vampires, how rare are they? I have been in this world for several months now, but I have yet to encounter a vampire, and you don't count."
"Because most of the vampires in this world are located in the Dark Continent. You will rarely find any vampires in this part of the world."
"The Dark Continent? Where is that?"
"This world consists of 4 major continents— the Magic Continent and the Golden Continent, where most of the humans in this world reside. Then we have the Forgotten Continent, a place the humans abandoned after it was overrun by powerful monsters. Last but not least, we have the Dark Continent, which is occupied by the vampires."
"By the way, we're currently in the Magic Continent, where magic is the most common. The Golden Continent prefers swordsmanship, but that is not to say they're not good with magic because they have more than half of the most powerful magic users in the world over there."
"Anyways, vampires are a rare occurrence here so you don't really need to be too worried about them." Lilith explained.
"Is that so… What a pity. I kind of want to meet another vampire." He sighed.