Chapter 203: Mantis’s Evolution (2)- The baron’s wraith
The mantis materialized on Theo’s lap, and when everyone saw it, there was silence for a few seconds.
"It has grown bigger again?" The baron asked while looking at the mantis, which was looking at Theo as if waiting for why he had taken it out.
Ithira looked at the mantis as if it were her first time. There was astonishment on her face when Theo saw her gasp while looking at it.
"It has small plants growing all over it, and are these insects this big?" she asked in curiosity.
It was only Rhys who was not surprised because he was the one who observed all of Theo’s forest battles.
Theo saw the mantis move from his palm to his thigh before starting to lick and clean its forelegs.
The baron looked at everything it did with focus until the mantis also started staring at them.
Theo wasn’t fazed by the atmosphere, but while Elias’s face was straight, sweat could be seen moving down it even though the windows were open all the way.
"Bram is still in his runesmithing training, Theo. The tutor says he has potential." The baron spoke without breaking eye contact with the mantis.
"I am glad to hear that, Father. He was working hard for it before too, and it’s also what he likes to do, so it’s good."
"Hm." The baron only nodded before breaking the eye contact with the mantis and moving his face toward the window.
After about 10 minutes, they finally reached the outskirts of the boar’s territory. For the whole journey, Ithira kept on pestering Theo about the mantis. It almost felt like she was obsessed with it now, which, while sounding good, Theo didn’t like.
They all moved forward inside the forest, where Elias was in the lead, Theo after him with the mantis sitting on his shoulder.
Then there was the baron and the two knights at his side moving together behind.
"There is a level 6 boar nearby, young master," Elias stated right away, and the baron was going to tell them to pick something easier when he saw Theo’s grin.
"Let’s go."
Ithira looked at him and came close to the baron only to whisper in his ear, "He is exactly like you, Aldric." She spoke in a whisper, yet Theo looked back.
’Did she just call my father by his name?’ Theo thought before he moved his face ahead, surprise on it.
He didn’t want them to know that he had heard them. But it was definitely weird, just as much as his mother knowing Elias, but it turned out just fine.
When they traveled through the big grassy land, the baron started to get irritated by all the grass touching his body.
"Rhys," he spoke, and Rhys slowly got out his sword, briskly moved forward, and came before Theo and Elias before casually moving his sword in a slash.
There was no sound, no impact, nothing seemed to happen. It was so nostalgic that Theo’s face had that childish nostalgia on it.
Then it all came down. Each grass strand a few meters forward fell down, and only the ones that were about a few inches above the ground were left.
Theo saw a slight slash mark on the old barks of the trees. It was not strong enough to take them down, but it still left scars all over.
The baron nodded with a ’Hm’ in satisfaction, moving forward with no grass to touch him.
Theo could almost feel like the baron was acting a little spoiled, but in the end, he was the BARON, so whatever he wanted happened.
Rhys kept slashing when the grass came near enough, and soon enough, Elias told him that the boar territory was near.
"Sir Knight, please stop. If you keep doing that, you may cut the boar too by mistake." Theo joked, and Rhys looked back at the baron, who nodded with a smile.
"Father, would you like to see me fight with the boar, or the mantis fighting with it, or we both fighting together against it?" Theo asked with a confident smile.
Ithira almost leapt out when she heard him say they would fight together.
"You have enough protection right now, so just fight together with your beast, Theo. But you should know that I have seen many, many people try to train for it only to get tired and stop. There are only a very, very few individuals who fight with their beasts."
Theo looked at him and nodded at that comment. "I use a plan to defeat it, Father. It may not look too clean, but it will work," he said and bid farewell.
"He’s different. Why didn’t you let me see him before, Aldric?" Ithira spoke again in astonishment.
"Idiot, it was you who went on that irritating mission for so many years. You’re the one who wasn’t there. All for that black sigil, what do you even do with it now? Planning on making a new Baron family?" The baron snarked while shaking his head in disappointment, and Ithira just chuckled awkwardly.
Rhys looked at their interaction with sleepy eyes before he moved toward Theo again, who was standing at the edge of the territory, observing the boar.
Soon, the ape materialized and quickly moved up the tree without making any noise. Everyone felt impressed by that. The apes were very hard to give orders to because of their unruly personality.
Theo looked at the boar sitting in the middle of the territory, trying to dig its tusk deep in the ground for fun.
Before Theo came and ruined that fun by entering the clearing slowly.
The baron looked at that, and his face went serious. His instincts to protect his dear son kicked in, but he bottled them up. His son didn’t need him, at least not yet.
It was not until Theo banged his foot on the ground to finally get its attention.
’I will finish this quickly and show him what really is on the agenda today,’ Theo thought. He was feeling good today, and it may have been because of the +5 stat increase in every stat after the breakthrough.
SQUEAKKKK.
The boar gave a defensive roar, only to let its arrogance get the better of it and move forward.
Theo looked at the tusks and its eyes. Those were the keys to defeating it.
The boar only went in one direction, and it could be predicted by its gaze.
On the other hand, its tusks were the only thing that had an ability.
There was a passive of a ’tough skin’ ability, but usually, wild boars weren’t intelligent enough to get that skill high enough to work.
If it were, Theo would have been in a lot more trouble.
The boar started running fast toward Theo, and that was when the baron clenched his fists in light panic. He trusted his son, but to let him fight with such high-level monsters at the age of nine just felt ridiculous.
There was a light pain in his eyes, but nobody knew why it was.
Theo, with his sword out, at the right time stepped to the side and smacked the blunt side on the boar’s head before making a few more steps back.
"What?" The baron looked at Theo and moved a little forward before being stopped by Rhys so as not to let the boar detect him.
"How is he so precise, even his footwork. Just how much have you been training him, Rhys? I told you, ONLY LIGHT TRAINING."
The last part was laced with a threatening tone, and that was when Rhys shook his head.
’The precision of the attacks came from practicing attacking the slime cores in their forest. Young master worked hard for months to finally be able to hit the slime cores with one or two attempts.... And the footsteps, it was not my doing either." Rhys spoke with slightly sleepy eyes and dared not yawn, which was right in the way.
He continued, "After my training, he trained hard for hours every day; it’s his daily routine...."
The baron listened while his eyes were stuck on Theo, who had smacked the shit out of the boar’s head about three times now.
His eyes focused only to move past the camouflage of the mantis, who was traveling at the back of the boar.
It went closer and closer until the baron saw eye contact with the mantis before the mantis slowly dug its foreleg into the eye.
The boar squeaked and started thrashing everywhere when the mantis jumped and landed on Theo’s shoulder.
With the sword precisely positioned in the middle, Theo moved it forward at the right time when the boar was busy thinking that the thing that attacked it was still there.
PUCHI.
Theo made the sword enter through the big hole of the boar’s socket. He made it move up toward the brain, and when it slightly punctured it,
It was then that he got the message, and the boar fell down.
Theo smiled and looked at the baron to see if he was smiling or not.
Only to freeze — the baron was in a grumpy mood now, and when they made eye contact, he made a hand sign for him to come forward.
’... Did I do something wrong?’ Theo thought, with sweat moving down his face.
It seemed he was in for a thrashing without even knowing the reason.