One Last System

"... but for some reason..." I left my words to hang in the air.

A multitude of reasons came and went through my mind.

And then, my face darkened.

"For some reason, I can sense someone dangerously strong approaching," I finished my sentence even though in the context of what I said before, it made no sense whatsoever.

"What?" Mia tensed up as soon as she heard the news.

She wasn't all that weaker than me. Especially when one was to count on her special ability that we still didn't know much about, she might very likely already be stronger than me.

Not in terms of pure firepower she could produce, in that regard, I still outclassed her by quite a lot. But when factoring in that electrical power of hers and how it was somehow capable of dissolving mana it came into contact with...

'No, no matter how strong she got already, I'm not yet ready to let her fight. Not until I make sure she can hold her own against the strongest beings on the continent,' I decided, dropping the idea that, for but a moment, appeared in my mind.

"He is still far," I said, grabbing Mia by her waist before moving her off to the side so that I could stand up. The next moment, I was already out of the bed, holding my mana ready to infuse it into my mage's tower at any second.

'Damn,' I then thought as I casually walked out of the shed and looked in the direction I could sense the powerful person coming from. 'I really wish I had my spear with me right now.'

Most of my strength came from my mage's tower and all the tactical-mage-associated skills that came with it. Yet, the bulk of my physical power still came from all the cultivation levels I grew.

And in simple words, I was missing the feeling of having a trusty weapon in my hand. A weapon, that allowed me to pull out yet another ace card from my sleeve.

"Haaa...." I released a long breath. I then moved my chin up, as if I wanted to look at the skies. And then, I closed my eyes.

I couldn't see whoever was approaching anyway. The only reason why I got to notice his presence was my mana sense and the way in which mana started to behave around me in a weird yet strangely familiar way.

But soon, that one element of reality changed as a human silhouette appeared on the horizon.

"Are we going to fight him?" Mia asked, leisurely coming out of the shed as well.

Despite the worrying news that I passed right as we were in the middle of making out, there was no hurry to my movements. And from that alone, Mia somehow managed to keep herself calm, taking her time to fix her clothes before coming out.

'It's like she's more worried about letting a random person see too much of her skin than fighting with someone even I might have to take seriously,' I thought, unable to hold a small smirk from appearing on my lips.

"What?" Mia asked, throwing me a weirded-out look. "I never took you for a battle-junky..." she then muttered under her nose. And before I would even have a shot at countering her words, she averted her face to the side.

"I'm sorry, I was just thinking how adorable you are," I quickly explained, leaning forward to steal a glance at the girl's face...

Only to realize that Mia was actually trying to hold back a smirk!

"Thank you for the compliment," she then replied, turning her face back into my field of view, not holding her smile back anymore.

"Not a problem," I said with a sigh, letting her have this one up on me. "Not a problem at all," I then repeated in a lower voice, turning my eyes back in the direction of the potential danger.

The person in the distance was approaching slowly... but it never stopped its movement. It never bothered to stand down and take a moment to gauge the situation. Instead, whoever it was, continued to approach as if he owned the place and no being in the area could ever challenge his or her authority.

And soon enough, he came close enough for my eyes to see the details of his presence.

It was... an average-looking man. He was donning robes that wouldn't make him easily noticeable within the crowd. His face was young as if he barely passed by the barrier of his twenties... although, in a world of cultivation, this detail held much lesser meaning than it would in a world where one's strength wouldn't allow them to preserve their youthfulness.

All in all, he appeared to be the most ordinary person out there, just like thousands of others I randomly passed by while walking through the streets of any given city.

And yet...

And yet, there was something weird with how the man moved. A sense of overbearing confidence that was so deeply ingrained into his steps, into his posture, that he would instantly draw the attention of anyone unlucky enough to cast their sights upon him.

The man approached the hut, proving that it was his destination since the very beginning. And then...

He stood, looking at the two of us with a confused expression on his face. He then leaned his head over his shoulder and asked,

"Who the fuck are you, guys?"

I squinted my eyes, still holding my mana on the reins.

Since it wasn't certain that this man here was to cause trouble, there was no point in springing him to action by unleashing the potential of my own power.

Especially with how the young man himself didn't bother to raise his guard either.

"Seein how you are the one approaching us, I believe I should be the one asking this," I said, crossing my arms on my chest while raising my left eyebrow.

The man looked directly into my eyes as if to sound the situation off. And I took the challenge, accepting the duel of stares while waiting to see how he would react.

The man's face tensed up a little... Only for him to heave a sigh as he shook his head.

"I don't have any business with you, guys," he then said, spreading his arms to the sides as if to show he held no weapons in them.

A futile gesture in a world of cultivators for whom their hands could be their greatest armament.

"And yet, you are still here," I countered, raising my eyebrow even further.

In the end, he was the one bothering us, not the other way around. And in this world of the strong eating the weak, it would be unbecoming of me to just give way to whatever he wanted to achieve here.

After all, going easy would be akin to acknowledging his superiority. And that alone would either mean that I acknowledged myself being weaker than him, thus proving I could read the strength he so heavily attempted to hide...

Or simply inviting him to attack by not playing the situation out like someone confident in their ability would.

"I have a business with the man who owns this shack," the man then revealed after staring at my face for a moment.

"And so do I," I replied, not giving the man even an inch.

Yet, right as the air was about to turn tense...

I spread my arms open and shook my shoulders before pointing my hand at the ruined part of the shack.

"But it just so happened that outside of a random corpse, there was no one else inside. So, hoping that the pathfinder would come back, we took the liberty to make the most of what's left of his shack."

Mia silently listened up to our conversation while standing behind my back. But as soon as I finished my last sentence, she stepped past me with an extremely annoyed look on her face.

"And we were right in the middle of getting to the good part before someone just had to play the role of a third wheel and come to bother us!"

The girl spat out her words like the nastiest bitch in the hood only to then raise her eyebrows in a threatening expression.

"And in case you still don't get the hint, fuck off so we can go back to fucking, you fuck!"