On the street outside the barrier, nine Quals wandered aimlessly.
Nine—not an approximation, but an exact count.
"After I shocked you awake—uh, I an woke you up—I threw out my longsword to create a flash. That precise magic attack of yours already killed one. Otherwise, we'd be facing ten right now."
After hearing Shane's explanation of the situation, Frieren realized things had beco troubleso.
She glanced at the nine Quals roaming the surrounding streets, constantly searching for their traces, and fell into thought.
"When I killed one just now, I heard sothing like glass shattering."
"Glass?"
"Mm. They should all be puppet clones."
At the ntion of clones, Shane imdiately thought of the First-Class Mage Exam location—the "Ruined King's Tomb"—where Frieren and the others had encountered the "Water Mirror Demon," a creature capable of creating perfect copies.
Those replicas could flawlessly reproduce the original's abilities and combat skills.
If these puppet clones here could do the sa…
Then it ant these Quals might also possess strength from over seventy years ago?
In that case, with Frieren's current strength, defeating them shouldn't be a problem. The only concern was how to prevent her from being surrounded and overwheld.
Suddenly, he recalled a term he often used while gaming—"kiting."
"Frieren, have you ever played Eagle Catches Chicks?" Shane asked.
"Huh?"
"It's a ga human children love. One person plays the mother hen at the front, leading a line of chicks behind her as they run around. The eagle waits for the right mont to grab the last chick in line, one by one, until they're all caught."
"...Lure and isolate? Not a bad idea."
As expected of her—she understood imdiately.
Soon, the two observed and mapped out the positions of all nine Quals, using the layout of the streets and city to plan their "kiting" route.
Based on the marked positions, Shane devised the most efficient pulling path—just like a main tank drawing aggro in a ga.
"Alright. We'll follow the numbering and start by killing Number 1."
He took out the new equipnt he had obtained before entering the dungeon.
Ten kunai shuriken. Ten refined iron pellets.
Using these ranged weapons for harassnt, combined with Goddess's Barrier, he estimated a fifty percent success rate.
…
They began to act according to plan.
Frieren first suppressed her mana completely, not letting even a trace leak out.
She stayed in place, waiting for the right mont.
Shane put away Goddess's Barrier, stepped out of the house, and slowly circled to the street corner.
Ahead of him was one of them—"Qual Number 9," searching for intruders.
To be honest, as a famous Great Demon under the Demon King's army—and the strongest magic user among demons—Qual's combat power was unquestionable.
Even Frieren, an elf mage who had lived for over a thousand years, admitted that in terms of magical mastery, Qual might even surpass her.
Facing such a powerful enemy, Shane was like an ant before a human.
The reason he dared to act as the one pulling aggro wasn't blind arrogance—it ca from Frieren's earlier diagnosis.
When he had first tried ditating and failed to sense any mana flow, Frieren had stated that he had absolutely no mana. None at all.
In this world, mages relied heavily on mana detection.
Especially in combat, skilled or mana-rich mages kept mana detection active at all tis, gradually forming the habit of perceiving the world through mana.
For monsters like demons, who had lived for centuries or even millennia, that habit was even more ingrained.
A human with zero mana… probably didn't even register in their perception.
Shane thought to himself.
Sure enough, he reached his designated position without any obstruction, not even needing his backup escape plan.
Lying flat on a rooftop, he took out a kunai from his pocket and aid at "Qual Number 9" below.
It was ti for them to pay for their arrogance.
Whoosh—
The kunai flew out. At the sa ti, Shane activated Goddess's Barrier to conceal himself.
Qual Number 9 was struck. He imdiately realized an enemy was nearby, let out a roar, and began searching the area.
His roar alerted the other eight Quals, who started moving toward his location.
Among them, "Qual Number 1," due to his position, lagged behind the main group—exactly as planned—falling into Frieren's attack range.
Bang—
A magic beam shot out without hesitation.
Short, compressed magic, like a bullet, struck "Qual Number 1" squarely in the head. His grotesque skull lted instantly, vanishing in a single blow.
Shane silently praised the shot.
Because of the distance, the remaining Quals didn't even realize what had happened. They only saw their companion die.
Naturally, they failed to detect the hidden Frieren.
Shane quietly moved to another direction, beginning the hunt for "Qual Number 2."
…
After more than three hours of guerrilla warfare—
All nine Quals had been "assassinated."
Looking at the single iron pellet left in his hand, Shane let out a long sigh of relief. If they hadn't finished them off, he would've run out of ranged weapons.
Frieren looked at him and smiled faintly.
"Shane, you did very well."
That expression of gentle approval made Shane feel like he was looking at his grandmother praising her grandson.
That feeling… was not good.
"Don't randomly upgrade your seniority like that, young lady!"
At that mont, the entire Gostan City suddenly began to collapse, breaking apart like shattered glass and raining down.
Shane reacted instantly, lunging toward Frieren and deploying Goddess's Barrier around them.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The entire city shattered.
Dust filled the air.
Fragnts littered the ground.
When the collapse finally stopped, Shane saw sothing that shocked him.
They had returned to a place they had seen before—
A crude cave.
A stone chamber of a few dozen square ters. A simple wooden bed. An empty bookshelf. A desk with a feather pen resting on it…
Everything was covered in dust, clearly untouched for a long ti.
The exact sa layout—
The room of the "Mad Sage, Sharl"!!!
However, this ti, the diary was gone. In its place was a torn page from an unknown book.
He focused his mind, and a line of text appeared before his eyes:
[A Page from the Notebook of Sage Ewig]
Status: Incomplete
Attribute: [Nurical Mirroring (Purple/Epic)]: Perfectly replicates the opponent's physical stats during combat. Let your opponent take a look in the mirror.
Evaluation: A magical formula derived from research on the "Water Mirror Demon." At this experintal stage, it can only achieve nurical replication.
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