Seeing the information for "Shrink Art."
Nolan's eyes shook; a maximum Agility increase of 100 points was no small boost.
One must realize!
His current Agility was only 113 points. Using this skill would essentially double his Agility. Even in the later stages, a 100-point increase would remain a significant buff.
The only drawback was that it could only be used twice a day.
A mental-type class, "Wizard"?
This was his first time hearing of such a class; Nolan only remembered a class called "Witch."
"Shrink Art!"
Nolan looked at the humanoid monster across from him, which was using its speed advantage to constantly pull away, and gave a low shout.
Thump!
Nolan felt his heart give a violent leap, followed by his entire body rapidly shrinking until his size was reduced by half.
At the same time!
A sense of lightness he had never felt before surged through his entire body.
Nolan looked at his halved body with some surprise. The iron sword in his hand, in particular, had clearly become much larger, making it slightly uncomfortable to grip with his current size.
However, the impact wasn't significant.
Sensing his own state, aside from the body shrinking and the massive increase in speed, none of his other stats were affected.
He briefly adjusted to the discomfort.
Nolan looked up again at the stunned humanoid monster and grinned. "Continue."
Whoosh!
Nolan took a step, and his body instantly turned into a white afterimage, rushing out at extreme speed.
"Ah-li!"
The humanoid monster clearly hadn't expected Nolan to be able to use such power as well. It let out a shriek and turned to flee.
Before this, Nolan really wouldn't have been able to catch up given the speed the opponent had shown, but now, the humanoid monster no longer held the speed advantage.
Combined with the power of the "Forest Crossing" magic item, the distance between the two rapidly closed!
"You can't run away."
Nolan's cold voice rang out as he raised and swung the iron sword in his hand. "Four-Light Consecutive Slash!"
Puff! Puff! Puff! Puff!
Four blossoms of blood bloomed from the humanoid monster's limbs.
!
The fleeing humanoid monster let out a scream of agony, its body falling uncontrollably from mid-air and slamming hard into the broken branches and rotting leaves below.
Nolan deactivated "Shrink Art," his body returning to normal size, and walked up to the humanoid monster with his iron sword in hand.
He watched the opponent calmly. "Can we talk now?"
Meanwhile.
The insectoid monsters that had been summoned were nearly all wiped out by the ten Flame Archangels and the Archangels of Observation.
His experience points saw another wave of growth.
[Experience Bar: 8762/10000]
Compared to the increase in experience, what Nolan cared about more was that the power of the curse within his body had grown another notch.
Because he had killed quite a few insectoid monsters this time, the growth in curse power was far more obvious than when he had killed the two Manticores last time.
"How about a chat?"
Nolan made his expression look kind as he spoke to the humanoid monster.
He was becoming increasingly curious about the situation here.
"Curse... monster!"
"Kill... kill me!"
The humanoid monster's bloodshot green eyes looked at Nolan with resentment, and it hissed in a raspy voice.
Facing a humanoid monster that was emotionally agitated, lacked logic in its speech, and might even have an unstable mental state, Nolan couldn't help but frown.
Connecting the few words that occasionally popped out of its mouth...
This mysterious demi-human before him likely didn't resent or feel hostility toward humans, but rather toward the curse power on him and Renners.
Even if he guessed this, it didn't seem to be of much use.
If communication was impossible, then it was meaningless.
Should he kill it?
The thought flashed through Nolan's mind, but he felt it would be a pity.
Perhaps only this mysterious demi-human knew the situation deep within this swamp. Most importantly, it was capable of communication; that was what mattered most.
Nolan's gaze shifted as he suddenly thought of something.
"A few years ago, a demi-human just like you left this swamp and entered the region where we humans live," Nolan said.
A ripple appeared in the humanoid monster's resentful gaze, its distorted expression froze, and a sudden surge of vitality seemed to be injected into its deathly aura.
"It's Pasha!"
"It must be Pasha!!"
The humanoid monster struggled to stand, looking at Nolan with agitation. Since its limbs had been slashed, it could only twist its body awkwardly.
Nolan's expression relaxed. He took out a Regeneration Potion and poured it over the other's limbs. "It seems we can talk now."
As the injuries healed...
The humanoid monster quickly scrambled up from the ground and rushed in front of Nolan. "Where is Pasha? Is he safe?
How is he now?"
As it spoke...
Tears shimmered in the humanoid monster's green eyes.
"Don't be so excited yet. Before I answer your questions, could you first answer my confusion, this—"
Well, what race are you?" Nolan asked.
"Gnome!"
The humanoid monster spoke quickly, immediately followed by, "Forest Gnome, Dugan Basilisk!"
Gnome?
Nolan was startled and took a serious look at the other. This was quite a rare race, and with its height, it really did match the Gnomes of legend.
Moreover, it was a Forest Gnome, which was even rarer among Gnomes. No wonder its skin color was similar to tree bark. These Gnomes were said to have elven blood.
As for whether that was true or false, it remained unknown.
It wasn't his fault for not recognizing the race immediately; the current appearance of this Forest Gnome was similar to a savage among humans.
The reason he hadn't completely treated it as a monster was because it could speak.
"Dugan Basilisk? That's your name?" Nolan repeated, feeling the name was somewhat odd.
"Yes, yes!"
The bloodshot veins in Dugan's eyes receded slightly, and his hair-covered cheeks twitched as he spoke quickly and without reservation. "Basilisk is my ability. All warriors in the tribe choose a powerful monster to complete a magic ritual."
"Those who succeed can place the monster's name after their own."
Basilisk clearly referred to the creature Basilisk!
"Tribe... Tribe!"
"Dead!"
"They're all dead! Where is Pasha? Where is he!"
When Dugan mentioned the word 'tribe,' his body shook, and he began to mutter to himself again. The mental state that had just stabilized became frantic once more.
Bang!
With a muffled thud, Nolan swung his hand and delivered a palm strike to the back of Dugan's neck, knocking him unconscious onto the ground.
"What a headache, but at least communication is possible now."
Nolan looked at the unconscious Dugan, rubbed his temples, and thought to himself, "The general outline of things is starting to clear up."
He looked up.
He watched the Flame Archangels flying back one by one after finishing off the insectoid monsters.
"Spread out and attack all monsters in the forest. If you encounter creatures similar to him, bring them back or return."
Nolan issued the command to the ten Flame Archangels.
After all, these were summoned from scrolls and were nowhere near as convenient as angels he summoned himself, which could be controlled directly with his consciousness.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
One by one, the Flame Archangels flew off into the surrounding woods in all directions.
Soon.
Experience information began to refresh on the panel, but most of the experience points were only around ten or so.
This forest couldn't compare to the Tob Forest; naturally, there wouldn't be many high-level monsters.
Night fell.
The burning firewood made a crackling sound.
Nolan sat by the campfire, holding the "Orb of Death." Using his Mana Infusion ability, he was drawing out a portion of his own mana and injecting it into the Orb of Death.
With his current mana capacity, making a Tier 3 scroll was no problem, but it wasn't enough if he wanted to make a Tier 4 scroll.
The mana cost for making Tier 4 to 6 scrolls doubled, requiring 10 points of mana.
The Tier 2 "Mana Accumulation" cost 10 points.
The Tier 4 "Angel Summoning" cost 20 points.
In other words, making a "Tier 4 Angel Summoning" scroll required 40 points of mana, and that was without even calculating the mana cost for "Tier 4 Papermaking Art."
"Pasha!!"
An excited scream rang out from beside the campfire as the unconscious Dugan suddenly sat up.