Chapter 27: Chapter 24: Sarah The Phantom

High up above the ground, looking up into the sky. Filled with stars and a cold night breeze caresses his cheeks. Alun reflects on his every action up until this point. 

When they first arrived, most of them were depressed and in a state of despair. 

After all, they were in an unfamiliar place. Another world, to be precise. 

“A spatial quake, huh?” He mumbled to himself. 

Alum wasn’t sure how to perceive those words other than the truth. What else could explain this strange phenomenon? 

“You think a spatial quake brought the ruins to this world?” 

“Oh? I was just mumbling to myself… huh?” Alum replied. 

Alum turned his head to where the voice was and saw someone unfamiliar. 

She had long red hair and blue eyes and looked around his age. Unsure as to why she talked to him, he raised his guard. 

“....” 

“Aww… c’mon, I’m not scary, you know?” Said the girl while tilting her head.

She then walked closer, leaned on the railing the same way Alum did, and stared into the moonlit forest below them. 

“....” 

And after some time in silence, she introduced herself. 

“My name is Sarah. What’s yours?” 

Asking in a friendly way while softly smiling, she waited for him to reply. 

“Alum.” he gave her a short reply.

“I see. Nice to meet you… and goodbye.” 

Her eyes had turned cold as she smoothly pulled out a sword from the sheath and pointed it at him. 

Alum was pretty calm despite the situation, and observed her a little longer. 

(Does she really plan on killing me?) 

Sarah launched at him with swift footwork as she enhanced her strength. 

Alum sidestepped it, and another swing would come his way. This time he defected it with a mana blade. Sarah used the momentum of the deflection to kick Alum with her leg infused with ice. 

Alum dodged it in time and kicked her other leg, making her airborne.

Using the momentum, she spun around and stretched her limbs, trying to reach him with her blade. 

And she managed to scratch his cheek. 

Alum jumped back, trying to distance himself, creating more ice blades to cover for him while he cleansed the wound. 

Of course, he didn’t enjoy that distance for very long as she jumped in the air and closed the distance as soon as he finished cleansing the wound. 

She had destroyed his ice blades with relative ease and forced Alum to pull out the Depth cutter. 

Which may not have been the best idea since it looks like his opponent got more serious. 

He could feel more mana leaking out of her, and she got even more ferocious with her attacks. 

Every one of her attacks was now infused with wind magic, causing him to get knocked back with every hit. 

Alum was getting pretty annoyed at this point and used [Mana Burst]. Which surged his highly condensed mana to his blade and infused it with electro plasma. 

Sarah was surprised and tried stepping away, but Alum managed to cut through her blade in a swift motion.

Sarah looked at her cleanly cut sword and started to awkwardly laugh while scratching her head.

“Ahaha… sorry for testing you… but that sword was pretty expensive….” 

Alum tucked away Depth cutter and gave her a cold stare. 

“... Then use it wisely.”

“Aww… here, I thought you’d be kind and… well, more awkward.” 

Raising his eyebrow, he gave her a strained look. 

“Well, I guess rumors are rumors.” 

“....” 

Alum felt a little awkward since that was certainly true to some degree… at least when he was with Ame. 

“So… why were you testing me in the first place?” 

”Ahaha… well, we heard that you were a D-rank and wanted to find out if you had what it took to be a part of the expedition.”

It made sense since the requirement was that the party had to be C-ranked, and in most cases, every party member is the same rank as the party rank. 

But Alum thought there would have been other methods to find out if he was good enough.

”… There is another reason, isn’t it?” Alum asked in a cold tone. 

Sarah would awkwardly turn away and dryly laugh. 

”Ahaha… we wouldn’t want to put our lives in danger, and since you are a wanderer, I figure you don't know this, but… there is a big gap between D-ranks and C-ranks.”

Looking at her, he replied with suspicion.

”… is that so?”

Alum did know some of this but had assumed it was linear regarding ranking. So he didn’t know there were disparities between ranks that seemed close. 

”Yes, in fact, S-rank and A-rank have the highest disparity. While A and B mostly come down to experience, the same goes for E and D.” 

”I see… thank you for informing me.”

When Alum thanked her, her eyes sparkled, and she would enthusiastically smile.  

”No worries, it’s a duty of a senior to guide their juniors!”

”….”

”Still… you have pretty high firepower, don't you? At least way beyond your rank. And you have an idea of how a fight should flow, albeit a little rough around the edges.”

”… I’ll keep that in mind.” 

It may not make much sense from an outside perspective since it looked like Sarah had lost. But that wasn’t the case at all. She was testing him and could have easily killed him if she wanted to. 

The fact that Alum didn’t sense that she was near him until she revealed herself was a dead giveaway of her proficient mana control. 

But… he did feel a little guilty about chopping off her sword. She said it was expensive…. 

“.... Your sword, how much?” 

“Oh? Well, around 200k Lech.” 

… 200k Lech was very expensive. For context, he received 20k a month from the military, which was around the average income for new recruits. And him just chopping off a sword worth 200k worth of money….

“... I’ll pay you back.” 

It was a lot of money, but he could afford to pay it off since the reward money he got from the quest and the cult incident was pretty significant. 

But in all honesty… he wanted to save it to buy a house. 

Seeing that Alum had a conflicted look on his face, Sarah just laughed and pulled out her divine weapon. 

“Look, don't worry about it,” she said. 

“But….” 

“It’s fine. It was a spare, and well… I prefer to use this baby, but the mana required to materialize it is pretty high. Anyways, where did you get that sword? It’s not a divine weapon, is it?” 

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Sarah looked at him excitedly as she thought of having the smith that made that sword make one for her too. A blade that could withstand that level of mana and heat from that lightning infusion intrigued her. 

Alum, on the other hand, wasn’t sure how to explain it, it wasn’t like Rigeld had told him to keep it a secret, but it was quite a complex engineered sword with very special circumstances. 

Of course, Alum had requested it and would pay one day, but Rigeld told him it was a gift. And although Alum planned to pay him back one day. He wasn’t sure what the worth of the sword actually was, but it was probably a lot of money. 

“... It was a gift.” 

Hearing this, Sarah sighed and pouted a little as she sensed he didn’t want to talk about it. 

“I see~ too bad, and I wanted one too.” 

Alum felt a little awkward and tried to change the subject. 

“Anyways, did I pass the test?” 

“Hmm? Why, of course! And with flying colors! Oh! Let me formally introduce myself. My name is Sarah Einana. A-ranked and a member of Phantom Dusk.” 

(... What the…? That is one ominous name.) 

“Hey! I saw that expression! It’s not ominous! Okay, maaay~be a little since we met each other while being chased by phantoms in our childhood….” 

“... I’m surprised you aren’t traumatized.” 

“I AM!” 

Sarah huffed and turned away while crossing her arms. 

She then glanced at him.

“Well, aren’t you introducing yourself as well?” 

“I assume you know of me already.” 

“I do, but… you know?”

“... Alum Miller, D-rank and a temporary member of Night Ouen.”

“... You don’t talk a lot, do you?” 

“I get that a lot. Anyhow, we’re in the same group?” 

“Oh? Yes? My party took this job although I wanted to be on the raid team… but they said, “Oh, we don’t want to babysit you in that chaotic environment,” and so on.” 

(So… she’s a battle freak…?) 

As he thought that, Sarah glared at him. 

“It’s not like I can read your mind. But… everyone that met me thinks so.” 

“So you’re aware….” 

Sarah had a displeased look and shuddered due to the cold winds. 

“Anyways, it’s getting chilly. Why don’t we go back inside?” 

She turned her back to him. She started to walk, and he followed… until she turned around and charged at him with her divine weapon that was infused with fire. 

Of course, he didn’t get caught off guard since he figured something like this could happen and had trapped her inside [Abbysal Depth], which wasn’t enough to stop her. 

Cutting through his barrier, she stopped and sulked, putting away her weapon. 

“... You really do pass with flying colors….” 

While sulking, she headed inside before him, leaving Alum alone on the deck. 

(I guess she really hates to lose.) 

—::::—

Walking inside back into the lounge where her party and the members of Night Ouen were. The first one to greet her was Lyn. 

A girl with green hair and eyes and a lifelong friend of hers. 

“Welcome back.” 

Hearing this, Turen turned around and had a massive grin on his face.

“Oh? Welcome back, Sarah.” 

He was also a childhood friend, and it was irritating that he was all smug. 

“... Yeah.” 

“So, how did it go? He was impressive, right?” Turen said with a grin.

“... Seriously, how did you guys even find him?” 

Keelen, who sat beside Lyn and had a confused look on his face due to Sarah’s words.

“What do you mean?” Keelen asked. 

Turen, Nuli, and Jua had the same expression as well. Only Jan seemed to understand what she meant. He never mentioned it, nor did Alum show his more orthodox spells when fighting the lizards. 

They all knew he could use very destructive magic. But when they all fought the giant elemental lizards, Alum only used spells that snared or disrupted their movements. 

Jan, on the other, had witnessed a ray of lightning that melted the opponent's armor just by being close to it. 

“No… seriously, his firepower is so high that we might all just blow up if he loses control….” 

The members of Night Ouen turned their heads to the side as if to avoid any confrontations. 

Sarah glared and them and then continued. 

“Well, I don’t think we have to worry since he had excellent control… but the mana density was something else.” 

Dalen, who has been quiet so far, spoke. 

“What do you mean by that?” 

“... I just mean what I said. It literally felt like I was suffocating when he used an infusion spell.”

She looked over at Turen and the rest. 

“Don’t tell me you guys didn’t know.” 

They all weren't sure what she meant… except for Jan. 

He then dryly laughed.

“Haahaa… it should be fine as long as he uses water spells.” 

The members of Night Ouen then realize. 

“Ooh… right, he can use lightning magic too,” Jua said. 

Although they hadn't seen his lightning spells, except for the mixed water and lighting spell, they could imagine what Sarah meant now. 

Nuli then asked if Alum had passed Sarah’s little test. And, of course, he did….

Turen and Nuli looked at each other with big smiles, which irritated Sarah a bit.

(Seriously, this guy got himself a beautiful wife before I could even get a boyfriend? Life is so unfair!) 

Lyn seemed to know what her friend was thinking, though to herself. 

(No, well… you’re part of the blame… you battle maniac.) 

—::::—