Rudrean and Aelira figured out how to efficiently deal with the giant ants and collect them.
They merely needed to use two spells.
Below, on the open ground created by them after burning the surroundings, one kilometer away from the nest, Rudrean took his position at the center.
Taking a deep breath, he executed a spell as a complex magic circle expanded beneath him, increasing to a range of 100 meters in radius.
'This range seems good.'
In the next moment, a dome expanded with Rudrean as the center, rotating slowly.
One more layer of the dome expanded, then another, and then another.
A total of four layers, two moving clockwise, the other two moving anti-clockwise, with each having ten meters of gap between them.
This was Cinder Halo: Rotational Blaze Ward, a defensive and offensive hybrid spell.
'Darling, I am coming with the first wave. Get ready.'
'Alright.'
Rudrean popped a pill into his mouth, which had amazing effects.
1-star Blazing Heart Pill: For one hour, dealing flame-based damage to a target will absorb the target's mana. If the target is killed, recover 1% to ??% of mana instantly, depending on how much mana the target had before dying.
This pill would keep this spell perpetually active.
SHRRSSS!!
The sound of ants neared.
Aelira was flying with the Super Pyrodrive Wings, kiting the ants towards Rudrean.
The ants couldn't fly, and when they were a hundred meters away from Rudrean, Aelira took off, hiding herself.
The ants switched their targets to Rudrean and rushed towards him while shooting their attacks.
The shards entered the Cinder Halo, but the moment they hit the first layer of the dome, which was spinning the fastest and was designed to block projectiles, those shards dispersed, breaking down due to destructive force and heat.
Then those first five ants rushed in, but Rudrean let them enter through the first layer, as he didn't want them to melt away by hitting the first layer.
The ants then hit the second layer blockage, which triggered flame blades like a vegetable cutting machine, and tore them into pieces with high-temperature condensed plasma blades.
Rudrean then threw their body pieces up into the sky using low-temperature flame whips under his control, and there, Aelira stored those pieces in her storage ring.
More ants arrived as they rushed towards Rudrean with mad fury.
Aelira had dropped a 2-star spell, Helios Cataclysm, right on their surface nest and annihilated it.
Helios Cataclysm was like a pillar of plasma beam hitting down continuously. It had the highest consumption among all the 2-star spells, but was also utterly destructive.
It melted the ants entirely, leaving nothing behind, so it wasn't useful here as they needed to collect their exoskeletons.
But what Aelira did triggered their army as they rose from the underground and rushed behind her.
Alas, they were dying in seconds as they entered the Cinder Halo: Rotational Blaze Ward.
Rudrean constantly threw their pieces up, and Aelira collected them.
Ten minutes passed by, but it felt like an hour.
CHRRRRRRII!
A loud cry occurred, and suddenly, all ants froze and turned back.
From afar, two large pairs of eyes briefly glimmered before vanishing.
"Phew... I thought this wouldn't end at all." Rudrean wiped the sweat off his forehead. "But why did they suddenly leave?"
Aelira descended next to him. "I think they gave up seeing how many of them were dying. The leader queen ants must have issued that cry to make them retreat."
"We should also retreat then. I bet we collected way more than we needed."
"Yes, my storage ring is almost full. We collected over 100 tons of those easily."
Each ant weighed roughly 200 to 250 kg, and they easily killed over 500 of those ants in ten minutes.
"Let's do the next one we picked from the guild here." Rudrean grinned. "That will be more challenging since it's a 1-star elite monster."
"I doubt that. The 2-star spells we have are insane, and we can't die easily thanks to Phoenix Flame." Aelira chuckled. "Let's slaughter that beast. We can definitely keep up with it due to our flight spells."
Next Target: 1-star Dark Reaper Tiger.
This had the highest reward among the 1-star quests because this monster was quite fast and expert in assassination and escape.
All monsters at 1-star and above had a core in their bodies, and they were useful in many places, so Dark Reaper Tiger's cores were constantly in demand.
As Rudrean and Aelira went to find the Dark Reaper Tiger, the trio following them had dumbfounded expressions as they stood in a daze atop a tree branch, covered in bushes.
"W-what the fuck was that?"
"What kind of spell was that big barrier with four layers?"
"He wasn't running out of mana, too. It must have high consumption."
The trio looked at each other.
"So they are not fucking small fries as we thought."
"It's too early to say that. That boy's 2-star spell is both defensive and offensive, but it's stationary. He is no threat to us as long as we disable that girl first."
"Yeah, she had a giant beam-like spell. From the aura, I could tell it can instantly melt us alongside our 1-star armors…"
"We kill the girl first and get her dress. I'll wear it and deal with that boy. That dress is a 2-star outfit and flame-based. It must have high resistance to fire, so that boy's dome spell will be useless."
"That's a perfect strategy. Let's do it. They picked the Dark Reaper Tiger, and it won't be easy to hunt it. When they are busy, we'll swoop in and kill the girl first."
…
Thirty minutes later…
Rudrean and Aelira finally found the Dark Reaper Tiger.
They didn't want to alert it, so they didn't descend yet.
"Let's try the Absolute Plasma Spear first. It's a target-locking spell and insanely fast, so it might just get the job done from here," Aelira said while executing the spell as a two-meter-long plasma spear came out of a magic circle in front of her palm.
"Yeah, that might just work. Go max power, max speed." Rudrean nodded. "And use the explosion form of this spell. It might work in preventing its escape into the shadows."
The trio was watching them.
"The tiger is surrounded by shadows. That attack isn't hitting it."
Swoosh!
The spear vanished.
A moment later, BOOM!
The place where the tiger was situated exploded.
As the dust settled, Aelira and Rudrean's eyes lit up.
Meanwhile, the trio looked on in a daze as the dead tiger's body lay there in pieces, with a shining black-purple core sitting on a piece of burnt meat.
"That's another freaking 2-star spell!"
"No, it's death. That spell… if they shoot it at us, we'd die instantly, no chance to escape or dodge that with what we have."
"I'm going back."
"Me too."
"Yeah, screw this. The risk of death is too high against them."
"Tsk. Who are these two? Their stats are weaker than those of 1-star Adventurers, but they have such powerful spells? That's the opposite of the other rich and influential people."
After all, it was easy to increase stats as one merely needed resources, but spells required much more than that. It needed aptitude, talent, and most importantly, hard work and practice.
Seeing 2-star spells mastered in bulk by those two young kids reduced the morale of the trio quite a lot.