The fog thickened as we ventured deeper into the heart of the forest. The air felt heavy, saturated with a magical static that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Rem walked beside me, her flail trailing slightly over the moss, producing a rhythmic clinking that marked our progress.
"The silence is absolute," Rem murmured, her eyes glowing with an unnatural intensity. "The forest has stopped breathing."
"Because something else is taking up its space," I replied, adjusting my vision.
The mana flow lines we had been following like thin threads were widening now. They turned into dark arteries converging toward a circular clearing surrounded by dead trees. In the center, shadows seemed to take on a life of their own, twisting as if under immense pressure.
"There," I pointed to the center of the clearing.
A dull growl, a vibration I felt in my bones more than my ears, broke the air. From the epicenter of the dark stain, a figure emerged. It was three times larger than the previous Ulgarms. Its eyes weren't simple red dots; they were pits of liquid malice dripping onto the ground, withering the vegetation on contact.
"The shaman," Rem stepped forward, her weapon's chain tightening. "Rem will handle it. Stay back, Subaru-kun."
"It's too fast for a direct attack, Rem. Look at its hind legs. They're charging mana."
Before I could finish the sentence, the beast vanished. It was a blur of pure speed that surpassed my visual processing capacity. Rem swung her flail toward the place where the monster had been a millisecond ago, but found only air.
A blue notification flickered in the center of my vision, translucent and urgent.
> [Warning: Target speed exceeds your current reaction capacity.]> [Soul Essence accumulated: 120]
I climbed my teeth. Cold sweat slid down my forehead as I watched Rem spin around, desperately searching for the lead Ulgarm's position. The beast was toying with her, moving in the blind spots of her perception, preparing for the finishing blow.
"System," I thought, the mental command sent with the precision of an execution command. "Authority Shop. Access Tier 2."
The interface deployed in milliseconds, bathing my retina in an electric blue glow.
> [RECURSIVE ADAPTATION ACTIVE]> [Failure Analysis: Insufficient reaction speed for current target.]> [Proposal: Immediate purchase of Advanced Combat Perception.]
I accepted without hesitation.
> [Skill Acquired: Advanced Combat Perception (Passive)]> [Effect: Synaptic synchronization at 200%. The world fragments into predictable data vectors.]
A stream of cold, purely logical information poured into my brain. It wasn't pain, but an expansion of my senses. The world didn't stop, but it became predictable. The threads of the forest, Rem's movements, and the monster's mana trail became a real-time data map.
"Rem, to your right, 45 degrees up!" I shouted.
She reacted without hesitation. She didn't ask how I knew. She simply turned and blocked the pounce of the beast descending from a treetop with the handle of her weapon. The impact produced a shockwave that swept the fog away.
"Subaru-kun!" she exclaimed, her feet sinking into the mud from the pressure.
"Don't lose the rhythm. It's going to jump again toward the shadow of the fallen tree. Cut the exit vector!"
I moved to the opposite flank. My new skill showed me the beast's "anchor points." The lead Ulgarm needed to touch the ground to redistribute its mana before each jump.
"Now, Rem! The center of the clearing!"
Rem let out a roar of effort. Her eyes turned white as a horn of pale light emerged from her forehead. The power of her mana doubled in an instant. She threw the flail not at the beast, but at the exact spot where my calculations indicated the monster would land.
The sound of the impact was like two mountains colliding. The flail shattered the creature's ribs, driving it into the ground and creating a crater of black earth. The lead Ulgarm let out a soul-shattering howl before the force of the chain silenced it forever.
Silence returned to the forest, but this time it was a silence of relief. The malevolence saturating the air began to dissipate like smoke under rain.
I walked toward Rem, who stood over the corpse, her breathing heavy and her horn slowly fading. She turned to me, and for the first time, I didn't see suspicion in her eyes. There was a deep curiosity, mixed with something bordering on respect.
"You saw things Rem could not see," she said, her voice soft but firm. "Subaru-kun is no ordinary apprentice."
"I just know how to read the patterns, Rem," I replied, trying to ignore the mental exhaustion that was beginning to take its toll. "In my world, if you don't understand the logic of what's in front of you, you're dead."
"Logic," she repeated the word, as if tasting its flavor. "It is a cold word for such an attentive man."
I approached and tentatively placed a hand on her shoulder, feeling the coolness of her skin through the fabric of her maid uniform.
"Logic keeps us alive," I said sincerely. "But being attentive is what makes it worth surviving. Let's head back to the mansion. Petra is waiting."
Rem nodded slowly. For a moment, her hand covered mine on her shoulder, a brief gesture that said more than any mission report.
"Yes," she murmured. "Let's go home."
A new system window emerged in front of me, far more imposing than the previous ones.
> [CRISIS NEUTRALIZED: THE SHADOW HUNTER!]> [Target: Lead Ulgarm (Shaman) - ELIMINATED]> [Rank S Reward: 500 Soul Essence + Unique Title: 'Tactical Hunter']> [Title Bonus: +10% Lethality against Mabeasts / +5% Initial Respect from Knights.]> [Milestone Reached: Trust Bond (Rem - Level 1)]
I felt a pang of heat coursing through my muscle fibers. My body felt denser, more anchored to reality. The System was "patching" the combat damage, optimizing my structure for the next threat.
I smiled to myself. The code of this world was complex, but in the end, all systems have an access key. And I had just found the first one.