120 Affection?

The female drake had just pounced towards Ozul when the blade suddenly slashed in its direction.

Although others could not see it, the drake was able to notice the blade, but it couldn't do anything in midair. She realized that it meant her death, so without anyone realizing it, she shot a worried glance at a particular direction before her head was cut off.

In the surrounding people's eyes, all they could see was the drake jumping at Ozul and then dropped headless on the ground a little behind him.

The male drake looked at Ozul with eyes filled with hatred before pouncing in his direction.

The mages stood rooted on the ground, in shock of what had transpired in a couple of seconds. Still on the adrenaline rush, they did not have time to calm down before they were forced out of their thoughts by the loud growl of the other drake.

They turned their heads to see that it rushed towards Ozul, intending to hack him into pieces.

In contrast, Ozul stood nonchalantly in his place. His face looked as if he did not see the male drake rushing towards him.

Some of the slow-minded mercenaries still could not accept that it was him that had decapitated the beast in the blink of an eye. They thought even now he was not moving from his place just because he was too afraid to move.

However, the next scene almost caused all of their eyes to fall out of their socket. 

The male drake was only a few meters away from Ozul when he took a long leap, determined to kill him. Nevertheless, just when the male drake had jumped towards him, another flash of black blinked by. 

The beast, which was supposed to be pouncing on him, only passed by Ozul as it landed on the ground.

The male drake did not look at Ozul, but at his partner, the female drake's corpse, before a splash of blood sprang from his neck and he fell to the ground.

Ozul looked at this scene with a stoic face, but he was confused inside his mind. His ability to sense emotions had made him aware of what most felt during death.

In the case of the beasts, there was always fear and resentment when they were about to die. However, the emotions that he felt from the male drake just now were that of sadness!

When Ozul turned around to look at the male drake, he saw that even in his final moments, the beast looked at his partner's corpse with his gaze filled with affection.

Now, this would not have been a big deal to him, but the scene suddenly reminded him of the time when he first came into this world of light.

The day he was born, his mother took her last breaths. But even in death, she looked at him with affection rather than the fear of dying or any sort of resentment.

This thought made Ozul sympathize with the now-dead beasts. However, sympathy did not mean that he felt bad for killing them. 

He had not learned to feel bad for harming others. It was just that he felt something stir inside him when he was reminded of his mother because of the male drake's love for his partner.

But that also brought a sense of foreboding—telling him if he were to accept those feelings, he would only regret it later.

Ozul shook his head out of his thoughts and keenly looked at the beasts on the ground before shifting his attention to Raven and Blaze, who stood in the distance.

"What are you waiting for? Come here," said Ozul before the duo started running towards him.

Far off in the distance, Rufus had been intensely analyzing everything since Ozul had stepped in the battle.

When Ozul had killed the female drake, he also only saw the blade blink in its place before the head of the beast fell to the ground. And that was precisely why he had prepared an augmentation spell to improve his sight beforehand.

So when the male dragon pounced on Ozul, though blurred, Rufus saw the pitch-black blade slash at the beast's neck before going back to its place.

"What type of spell is it? No... What type of magic arts is it?! There were no mana fluctuations at all!" Rufus knew that Ozul was strong enough so that he could defend against the drakes, but he was still unaware of what type of magic he used.

'Sigh... This kid is becoming even more of a mystery now. What will I even report to his Majesty? That I could only see the kid use some black matter as his attack? And...? Nothing! I don't know anything about him!' Rufus raged inside his mind.

Rufus was usually a calm and collective person. He considered himself to be a smart man, and not being able to understand a kid of the new generation was making him frustrated.

'The only thing I can report to his Majesty is that he likes to sleep. But that's it! I have no useful information about him. If only he had expressed his emotions a bit more, then it wouldn't have been difficult to know what type of person he was from inside.' Rufus contemplated inside his mind.

He didn't really want to face the emperor's wrath when the only peculiar information Rufus had about the kid was that he used some black stuff and liked to sleep.

"Urgh.. I can't do anything about it either. His actions are always unpredictable. Tch! Why are kids these days so cold!" Rufus clicked his tongue at his helpless situation.

His subordinates behind him all had confused expressions on their faces. They had never seen their leader behave like this, so they were all surprised a little.

Back at the scene, the mercenaries had finally started to come out of their surprise.

Hanry hurriedly rushed to the back to check on Clara. Meanwhile, Clive and Barry came up near the beasts' corpses to confirm if they were really dead.

All of the mercenaries were in shock. They could not believe their eyes when they witnessed the scene of Ozul killing the drakes.

In their eyes, Ozul was just a pretty-faced young master who had gotten here using his parent's money. They were also not at fault for thinking as such since Ozul exuded no mana at all.

So the events that had just occurred caused them to question if their eyes were playing a joke on them.

"F*ck! How can that bastard be so strong!?"

"Freaking idiot! Lower your voice, will ya? Or do you wanna die?!"

. . .

Some of the mercenaries passed comments. Even Barry looked at this scene with astonishment visible in his eyes.

Because he had first thought Ozul only to be an insect compared to him, but now that insect had proved to be more useful than him! Hate slowly started forming inside him as he glared at Ozul.

Orsella and Tephi were also there. Since both were rank 6 mages, they had been attacking the male drake, so they knew how difficult it was to hit them.

"I told you that we should stay as far away as we can from that guy. He always gives me the creeps," Tephi said to Orsella, a little wary of Ozul after realizing his strength. 

By her side, Orsella nodded her head. Before she was curious about this man, but this new development had forced her to come to her mind. She did not want to endanger the people under her just because of her curiosity.

Just like them, all the other mercenaries were surprised as well. But unlike them, Clive did not take so long to digest the events. 

He had already expected Ozul to be strong, so the impact wasn't that big on him compared to the rest.