Devoured Eccentric

"Alright. Show me everything you know." Nero instantly formed glowing orange discs in the air, emanating an assertive force on its surroundings, like an overlord in control.

'She has to have some kind of trump card that she knows, and I'll make her tell me.' From the start, Nero wasn't after learning her moves, he had Nova who was infinitely better for that. No, he was after some secret or technique of sorts she knew. Even if she looked middle-aged, Nero knew she was older than a normal granny, there was no way she hadn't found something he didn't know.

Frankly, he felt like he knew nothing about this world, there were simply too many possibilities and factors to account for.

He highly doubted that Madison would show her trump to him so easily, so he had a bait planned for her.

"You do know that I know your secret right? Let me see how good you are, I could help you improve" Nero looked on as horror filled Madison's eyes.

She was sure he was the devil himself.

How? She questioned herself. She hadn't used it when she was sparring or showing off her moves, so how did he know? Moreover, he could help her improve? Madison understood how talented Nero was, she felt she could believe him. She just had to show him right?

After a while of contemplation, she came to a conclusion.

'If he can actually help me improve then I could become an unrivalled hunter, I don't have anything to lose anyway.' Those were her thoughts.

"Move a few meters back then" she gestured with her hand.

Then, unsheathed her blade. Cracks were spreading from a hole in the stick near where she held the scythe.

"Arorus" The last thing she said before a circuit of sorts made of mana appeared on the blade itself.

With a single swing, a Wind Blade, much stronger compared to what Nero made, appeared.

Its motion was swift, fast and unending. The Blade wedged past a thick oak tree, completely unhindered, as a large wound appeared on the side of the tree.

'What the Hell?' Nero was amused, he didn't understand how with a simple circuit on the blade, there was such a major change to a meagre swipe of the blade.

'Run Analysis' Nero told Nova with a sharp and precise command.

The Wind blade, after travelling around 5 meters, quickly dissipated.

After the single swipe, the mana made circuit started to dwindle out, turning dark into nothingness.

'Circuit analysed, instant casting commands are available with a thought.'

'I don't need her anymore' Nero did not understand how everything happened but he had everything he needed to try it himself, all he needed now was information.

"Where did obtain this piece of inheritance?" Nero pointed a mana disc at Madison like he knew exactly what he'd just witnessed.

"I-Inheritance?" Madison didn't understand, she explained to him how she thought that the discarded burnt manual she learnt it from was simply a rare technique left behind by the Ancient Nations in some burnt down ruins east of Nehoole Kingdom.

She figured important people like the King have a plethora of such techniques, like the way he moved so fast and elegantly on his cloud.

Her thoughts were brought to Nero's past, how could this kid know of her ancient techniques, perhaps he was a secret descendant of a great Noble?

"Of Course! What do you know of this inheritance and where is the manual?" Nero had already bluffed to the point of no return, might as well farm more information out of her. He still didn't understand how that circuit changed mana for through her weapon.

He was putting up a commanding voice like he knew something but underneath, inquisition only rose.

"The manual is not anymore with me, I got chased by an elusive Rhino, the peak of rank 2. Had a lot on me so I had to throw my bag away. All I know of the technique is that it uses an inscription, it was explained like they were some kind of pre-made command that refined mana followed. Whenever I failed to make the inscription, something weird would occur, like the wind blade turning around to kill me or even an explosion on the blade.

"I know there are more inscription techniques because I once purposely left out a detail and the wind blade travelled up into the air and looped downwards to the ground like it was missing a function to keep it stable."

'That makes no sense, how does mana act like a piece of code that can change itself?'

'What's weirder is that we didn't know about it from the king, the way she talks about such a technique means that strong powers should have more of them, why did the king not have one?' Nova added. 'Or does he have one?'

'We'll think about that later but right now we need to deal with Madison.'

'I Know! We can just run away from her like we know something, she'll be confused but at least we won't be stuck trying to help her.' Nova, in her own time, had been going through movies in her mind. Whenever the main character found something suspicious or something that linked back to evil, they'd run to them. It was the nature of these people that made them try to stop evil.

Nova just used the fact that they ran away, leaving the side characters full of confusion.

Here, however, both the main character and side character would be left in confusion.

'Alright then, I got what I wanted from her anyway. Nova put up a shocked face slowly.' Nero wanted to make it seem as genuine as possible, his own confusion had to be concealed and he needed a way out of this situation.

"Wh-what? What is it?" Madison thought she had made Nero realise something shocking, her inquisition got the best of her and so she questioned him.

BOOM

Nero shot up high into the air, two footholds were left dug into the ground.

'F.u.c.k this, I'm out of here'

Nero had many plans, he didn't wanna go straight back to Pinnacle, it was time for exploration.

With a simple thought, he made a slanted mana plate made of adapt mana, pushed off it towards North with great force, breaking it, then made a surfboard with a cloud underneath it.

He could now glide at high speeds, no longer having to wave past trees.

Moving at more than 40 miles per hour, in no more than a few minutes, he could see signs of civilisation.

'Confirmed: Goosewal Village, home to Aldin.'

'Let's give Papi & Mami a visit, shall we?' Nero grinned viciously, he wanted to get payback from them, that's what Aldin wanted.