Isekai Journey Of The Magic Archer

[Eon's POV: ]

Rein was excited and the minotaur was genuinely strong.

-Boooooooom!

It was strong on its own but the little intelligence it possessed made it an illusion that can learn like some artificial intelligence.

It was an illusion for sure but this thing was unique. The headmaster sure was an amazing person to make something like this.

'Now I want the core and that magic circle even more.'

-Swiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiish…!

-Boooooooooooooom!

It was an undeniably robust creature. Its muscles were harder than the normal mental ores.

The weapon he was holding, though as an illusion, was an old divine artifact. One made with adamantium no less.

It must have been a labyrinth guardian. And the headmaster is strong enough to defeat a real creature like that alone.

'That means he has the real version of this axe. Damn… should get it when I have the chance.'

-Booooooooom!

"Hahahahaha!"

-Swish! Swish! Swish!

She was having fun attacking the same area of its body. But that bastard creature wasn't going to take it for long. Soon, it will-

"Mhooooooooooo!!"

-Ooooooooooong.

"Tsk. It used the fortress skill." She was disappointed that she can't hinder the creature normally like we were doing for the last hour.

It sure endured her attacks better than I expected. But now that the creature had received that much damage on one part of its body, it was naturally going to try and rest or heal it.

Minotaurs have a high natural regeneration rate. It would have healed if we left it inside that strange fortified barrier it summoned but sadly for him, we were expecting this situation from the moment I marked his leg with that green marking arrow.

'Headmaster made the test to show one's power, our power most probably, but there sure isn't much to this whole raid at all.'

Different from an actual minotaur raid we just had to first make the giant thing fall to the ground, stick it to the ground for a while, destroy some of its very crucial inner muscles in the time it was on the ground, and at the end, deal the final blow to finish the thing.

If this creature was real, we would have had to take countless things into account. A minotaur was smart and a master of instincts too, after all. It wasn't some wild creature that roamed their area and killed everything in sight.

'Actually, different from the usual beliefs and stories about these creatures, minotaurs are some of the most caring parents and beings that chose partners only once in their lifetime.

They have natural high intelligence and that's the very reason they were and are guardians of some of the very important places.'

Their senses are some of the sharpest and they could tell the location, strength, and danger level of anything and anyone even better than Zuroro's heroic senses.

They aren't actually always mad, not at least when they are doing their work.

Even taking this one, for example, the creature had perceived the two of us from a long distance away.

It is a mere illusion and the headmaster tried making it as close to the real being as he knew.

He did a great job actually. And that's why the illusion minotaur first stopped and looked at us, judged us, and only when it thought, not actually thought-thought but as he was programmed, that we were weak and it could easily defeat us, it started its attack.

A real minotaur would never actually attack us outright if we ever encounter one. It would sense that however strong it was, if the two of us were together, there was no way for it to defeat us.

They didn't enjoy fights that would be disadvantages for them, and they didn't back off from a fight they had already engaged in.

They prioritized the protection of their assigned goal or their family or the things they cherished and had collected.

In some circumstances, it would even let you pass through the guarded zone without a fight but if, by some fate-forsaken chance, they were actually dragged into a fight, they wouldn't stop until they were either dead or had killed everything that was part of the battle.

They knew their racial fault and that's why they avoided clashing with anyone and lived in empty places.

They were cute creatures from my darling's perspective, and from mine, they were beings that deserved respect.

Not this illusion though. It was poor in many ways.

"Now? We take a break?" She asked while brandishing her scythe and clearing the blood on her blade. She sure had done a number on that thing.

Both of us were stronger than in the past and we had perfected many combined attacks.

It was practically easier with all our pre-planned raid strategy but still, she was ferocious.

She had grown a lot, a by a lot I mean a freaking lot, in these past few years.

She already had physical strength transcending her stats but after she bonded with that ancient artifact EFMW, which she named Nept when its 'Ego' was born, she had a burst of new growth.

She also got that shadow clone skill from Hiraani's treasury and two more from past years so she was even more amazing now.

'And I naturally helped her however I can.'

Her growth was my growth and our growth was the growth of every person closely connected to the two of us.

All in all, she was strong now, and so was I.

It was a fun time and a time will come when we reveal our new, amazing, and unbelievable status windows but that thing aside…

"Nope. Let's finish this quickly." I smiled at her and looked at the creature with red eyes and thick black-brown fur.

It was strong but even with her frenzied attacks at a single marked point, those relentless grinding slashes and magic attacks, and the attacks from her clones, had only managed to make a deep scar on that place.

Its body was strong and we were using a lot of stamina just dodging his attacks.

The area around us had turned into a hell plain already.

The endless grasslands were gone and countless deep craters, deep cracks made from the strong attacks of his weapon were deadly, the area was dead now, but the creature was still only recovering from a single potentially bad wound.

That just showed we weren't yet strong enough to go up against things like this dude. Still, this one wasn't real and was going to enter the second phase of this battle.

'Lucy.'

[[ *It's finished, master.* ]]

"Good. Huu…"

Taking a deep breath and nodding at her, I took a step forward and watched the creature standing inside the yellow fortified barrier that resembled a small fortress.

It huffed with that same steamy breathing, his eyes still red with anger and a continuous ripple flowed through his bulging muscles.

It had used some of its strength and the result was the devastation of the land around us.

That was probably the boring part of this battle that had ended quickly, but now, I knew after I break that skill he was using, the creature was going to use the unique power of purple-ranked creatures and above and summon his own domain.

That would be the start of the main battle so… sorry for this filler-like chapter to those poor readers.

Still, to make things worthwhile…

I took a deep breath, pulled back my bowstring, looked at the creature with my third eye, and went into my mind tower.

There, picking up the newly created book that looked like a simple notebook, I opened it, and an arrow materialized on my bowstring.

The arrow would seem strange, from the other's perspective of course.

Rein had seen this strange blue arrow that had unique mechanical lines all over it.

It was different from a simple materialized magic spell and one of the specialties that I developed in these recent years.

It was only possible because I had my Lucy so I can instantly decipher a skill and create a single-use magic arrow that could cancel that skill.

I can only do this thanks to the question ability and the new [Process cancelation] ability Lucy gained two and a half years ago.

She was amazing but as the limitations went, I could usually only create this certain skill destruction arrow once a day. And from how much we had tested it in the last years, from what I concluded, this ability can very well destroy any and all skills up to (Purple) ranked skills.

'I want to test it against beings of (Black) and (White) rank too but it would probably be a while till we encounter another demon and Zoe was still not strong enough to actually be on the level of a divine creature.'

Well, I had this, and for today, this much should be enough.

So, I looked at the creature, found the weakest spot in the impeccable skill structure, and slowly released the arrow.

-Swiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiish…!

-Khachh!

-Ccccrack…!

The arrow flew towards the barrier skill, collided with the barrier that resembled a giant fortress… it was actually huge, lol. And then the arrow vanished after painting the yellow barrier in blue.

It was a quick process but then, the barrier crumbled down like a fallen piece of mirror glass.

It must have been astonishing for the dear spectators and even our 'good' headmaster but for the minotaur, it was nothing less than a curse of mockery.

I just destroyed one of the most cherished skills he must have relied on and had thought was indestructible.

It wasn't something any creature of his caliber would enjoy so, as his nature of rage went, the creature was now literary burning with anger.

There was a fire on its dark body, its horns were growing and burning with fire, the steam coming out of his body was whiter and denser… and the area around it was starting to change.

"Yes~! We can finish early thanks to you darling. Umhaaa~."

She kissed my cheeks as we saw the terrain before us change.

The battle would be interesting now, so…

"Let's get started, dum dum."

Wiping the unique sensation from my cheeks, we started the second phase and the actual fight of the end.