Mist ran towards my mother and hugged her legs because she was too small to reach her chest. My mother smiled sweetly and petted her head.
"Hello sweetie." She said, petting her head. "Remember that yesterday I told you I was going to give you a Magic Circle?"
"Yes, yesh! I heard it was shomething shuper cool!" Said Mist.
"Kind of!" Said my mother. "Let's go downstairs, you need to sit down in a clean space without anything around you so you can concentrate better."
, we walked downstairs and reached the first floor, where Mist sat down over a small chair. The entire process was swift as well, my mother simply placed her hand in Mist's chest and then did the same process she did with me several years ago. Mist was slightly scared, but got through it like a champ, albeit slightly tired after.
"Uueggh… I'm tired…" She sighed while feeling sleepy.
"Let's go take a nap for now, Mist." Mary said, gently holding Mist with her arms and bringing her to her bed to take a nap for the rest of the evening.
After we had lunch in here, we quickly decided to move on, saying our goodbyes to Celeste, Mary, and everybody else. It was a nice day to be honest, although it had yet to actually end, I wouldn't mind getting used to live every day, this city in retrospective was rather beautiful, but the dark secrets it had held it back from being ideal.
It was roughly 3 PM when we reached back to the camp, and in there, we decided to take a twenty-minute break, mostly I wanted to take a bath before going out to the forest. After the bath, I quickly gathered with Aquarina, Zack, Shade, and my father.
"Oh, we are going with Uncle Shade?" I wondered.
"Yes, Arafunn should had also come with us but he's already napping below a tree, I can't wake up that old elf." Sighed my father. "So are you ready?" He wondered.
"We have explored the Amazon Forest already; we are more than ready." I said.
"Yeah!" Said Aquarina, feeling slightly excited.
My father laughed a bit as Shade nodded calmly.
"You guys are always so energetic! With kids like these, will we even get bored in our entire lives?" Laughed my father, as he and Shade guided us into the forest.
"You're exaggerating a bit, they won't stay as kids always, children will eventually grow up." Sighed Shade, looking at Aquarina. "I just hope Aquarina grows up to be a good woman, that's all I want."
"You don't have to worry, with you as her father there's no problem." Said my father.
"You're energetic today, aren't you?" Shade pointed out.
"I was going to say the same, papa's pumped up today." I said. "So what are we investigating?"
We suddenly reached deep into the forest, getting in front of a vast lake.
"From what the local huntsmen had told us, they had seen a lot of people wearing black robes gathering around this forest, between the wolf steppes and the black lagoon." Said my father.
"What are those places?" Aquarina wondered.
"The Wolf Steppes is a wide area within the forest where a lot of wolf monsters' dwell, it is infested with thousands I would say, it is a gigantic area that stretches almost until the end of the forest itself, surrounded by trees everywhere." My father said. "It is only about half an hour walk from here. And the Black Lagoon is a big swamp covered in black miasma… it is far away that it is not that dangerous, but they say that dangerous monster's dwell there. Because nobody dares to get into these places, those guys might had gone there to make a hideout, or something. We are just investigating and looking around though, so I don't think we'll find much."
"Still, this sounds quite dangerous, I am surprised mom allowed you to bring us with you." I admitted.
"Hahah, it does sounds dangerous, but I won't be alone in here, Shade is coming with us as well." My father reassured me. "Now let's go."
I would had honestly been worried that we were getting into such a dangerous place without my mother's authorization, but even she agreed to this. Apparently the adults had a big talk about this and decided that "inhibiting" our growth wouldn't be a good thing. I guess people in this world can grow stronger not by just letting time pass, but also by hunting monsters.
It is not the same Leveling power the System has, but it is something similar, fighting monsters naturally enhance physique, and overusing mana and constantly using spells to kill monsters also enhance the strength of spells and can also make a mage conjure their spells even faster as well.
It was already quite obvious since the beginning as my parents were abnormally powerful. Fighting even stronger monsters might give them even more strength, though I have no much idea how this entire thing works.
"Father, how exactly does fighting monsters help us grow stronger aside from just gathering experience in fighting?" I wondered.
"Well, that's kind of a thing that has always been in this world. If a person just does normal exercise, their Physique is never going to get past a certain point, if a person just uses magic and fires spells anywhere, their magic will only develop up until a certain point." Said my father.
"Some ancient mages called this "Progression Walls" and can only be broken by going through "Challenges, Trials, and Tribulations". Hence, fighting a strong opponent. Usually monsters, which infect the world, are a good target for those that want to grow stronger. Not only they provide money in the form of meat and their materials, but also fighting many strong monsters over time slowly increases the speed of development of someone's physique and magic power."
I guess this world perhaps has its own concept of "leveling up"?