Infinite Mana - Chapter 171: A Real Aura User (Thank you for your support, Shadow Storm!) (Patreon)

Sieghart’s remaining sleepiness disappeared almost instantly.

That sound had not been an ordinary irritation. The animal sounded genuinely panicked, producing the desperate noises of something frightened enough to continue struggling despite exhaustion. Sieghart turned toward the outer edge of the grove and activated Enhanced Smell. Morning air immediately separated into countless recognizable scents flowing between the trees.

Wet soil, tree bark, grass, leaves, small mammals, insects, his carriage, and eventually the unmistakable smell of a horse reached him from somewhere beyond the grove. Another scent accompanied it.

Blood.

Not enough to suggest something had been completely torn apart, but enough that Sieghart stopped treating the situation like an annoying interruption. He activated Magic Vision next, scanning between the trunks for abnormal mana. Dense vegetation blocked direct observation, though several weak disturbances appeared beyond the grove near the road.

The horse whinnied again, followed by branches snapping somewhere ahead. Whatever frightened it had apparently prevented the animal from simply running away from the area.

“A trapped leg, damaged wagon, injured rider, bandits, monsters, or something equally determined to ruin the quiet morning I was supposed to have.”

Sieghart looked back toward his concealed carriage. He could ignore the situation, return inside, and continue sleeping until his body recovered properly. Whatever happened beyond the grove was not automatically his responsibility simply because he happened to hear it. That was exactly how people accidentally collected endless problems.

Unfortunately, a panicking horse combined with the smell of blood suggested someone might genuinely need assistance. Ignoring that possibility because he disliked being interrupted would bother Sieghart more than investigating.

There was also the practical argument. Injured travelers might possess useful information, bandits could carry valuables, and an unfamiliar monster could provide another opportunity to improve his combat skills. Sieghart sighed while activating Phantom Image across his body. The illusion restored the appearance of his fifteen-year-old traveling identity before he moved away from the carriage.

His apparent body grew slightly taller while his crimson hair, blond-tipped fringe, and green eyes remained unchanged. His dark traveling coat and reinforced clothing completed the identity anyone nearby would see. Whatever waited beyond the grove, he did not intend to return and discover that somebody else had conveniently stolen his belongings.

Sieghart moved between the trees, keeping Impulse prepared while Enhanced Smell followed the increasingly strong mixture of horse, disturbed soil, crushed vegetation, and blood.

The animal cried again somewhere ahead. This time another noise followed it. Something heavy dragged across the ground through the brush, producing a rough scraping sound that immediately separated itself from the frantic movements of the horse.

Sieghart stopped.

“That definitely wasn’t the horse, unless horses around here become several times heavier whenever nobody is looking at them.”

He gathered Wind Magic around his body and continued more carefully. Every step became quieter while Magic Vision searched ahead for movement between the dense trees. The blood scent grew stronger near the final line of vegetation separating the grove from the road. Sieghart could now hear the horse breathing rapidly between desperate bursts of movement.

Wood rattled violently somewhere ahead. Then something cracked with enough force that several birds fled from the nearby trees. The sound resembled part of a wagon breaking under pressure.

The horse screamed again. A second heavy impact followed. Whatever had happened while he rested, the quiet morning he had planned was already gone, and something outside had apparently decided to replace it with another problem.

More Blood reached him through Enhanced Smell strongly enough that Sieghart straightened immediately. It was much heavier than before, mixed with the unmistakable scent of a frightened animal sweating heavily somewhere nearby.

The horse screamed once more. Then it abruptly stopped. Sieghart remained motionless, listening.

A different sound eventually replaced the previous panic. The animal had not become completely silent, but the noises were much weaker now, little more than strained breaths and occasional low whimpers.

Sieghart narrowed his eyes while his mind assembled several unpleasant possibilities. An animal that had been panicking loudly and then suddenly became quiet after the smell of blood intensified usually did not indicate an improving situation. He could imagine several explanations without seeing anything. Predators might have attacked a wagon, bandits might have injured the horse to prevent escape, or an accident might have left travelers trapped somewhere beyond the grove.

None of those possibilities automatically made them his responsibility. Sieghart reminded himself of that several times. He had left Lunar Arc partly because he wanted freedom from constantly becoming involved in other people’s problems. Traveling independently would become meaningless if every distressed stranger immediately transformed into another mission.

At the same time, there were limits to what Sieghart could comfortably ignore. Hearing something unpleasant was different from recognizing that somebody might be getting hurt nearby and deliberately choosing not to investigate. He had never wanted to become a hero. That title sounded inconvenient.

Heroes were expected to sacrifice themselves, forgive people who deserved punching, and apparently possess enough free time to solve everybody else’s problems before handling their own lives. Sieghart definitely lacked that much patience.

However, there was also a considerable distance between being heroic and becoming the kind of person capable of listening to someone suffer nearby while hiding because getting involved seemed inconvenient. He sighed. 

“I’m checking what happened. That does not mean I’m volunteering for whatever stupid problem is waiting outside these trees.”

The engine answered with a low mechanical rhythm instead of agreeing with him. Sieghart carefully reversed between the tree trunks, following the same path he had used when hiding the vehicle earlier. Driving the carriage directly toward the road felt safer than walking. His supplies remained with him, and if the situation turned genuinely troublesome, he could leave without returning through the grove first.

The blood smell strengthened with every meter.

Sieghart activated Magic Vision before reaching the field, scanning through gaps between trees whenever the road became visible. Several human figures appeared around something large near the roadside.

He counted quickly. Six people standing. Two others sitting or kneeling. One horse lying down. Sieghart’s expression hardened. The carriage rolled out from the grove and crossed the abandoned field until its wheels reached the road again. Whatever uncertainty remained disappeared once nothing blocked his view.

A merchant wagon stood sideways near the road, one wheel partially inside a shallow ditch. Several crates had already been pulled from the cargo compartment and broken open across the surrounding grass.

Six men surrounded the wagon. None looked remotely interested in helping. The horse responsible for waking Sieghart lay several meters ahead of the vehicle. Deep cuts crossed both rear legs, and blood had soaked the grass beneath them while the animal trembled weakly.

It was still alive. Barely comfortable, certainly.

An elderly couple sat beside the wagon beneath the supervision of two robbers. The old man had blood running from a cut above one eyebrow, while the woman held one shaking hand against his shoulder.

Neither appeared seriously wounded yet. The scene stopped feeling abstract after that. Sieghart’s hands tightened slightly around the steering wheel. For one uncomfortable moment, he remembered another farm, another elderly couple, and the feeling of arriving after there was absolutely nothing left he could do about either of them.

The resemblance was superficial. These people were strangers, the wagon was intact, and nobody had destroyed an entire farm with magic. His mind did not particularly care. Sieghart slowly exhaled.

“Of course it had to be an old couple.”

One robber noticed the approaching carriage first. His confusion was almost amusing as he looked toward the moving vehicle, searched automatically for nonexistent horses, and then noticed Sieghart sitting behind the controls.

The others followed his gaze. Conversations stopped immediately. Sieghart slowed until the carriage remained roughly thirty meters away. He had absolutely no intention of driving expensive machinery directly between armed strangers before understanding what they could actually do.

The apparent leader stood near the rear of the merchant wagon. He was a broad man somewhere in his thirties, wearing layered brown leather armor reinforced with dark metal plates across his chest and forearms. Unlike the others, he carried only one weapon. A heavy single-edged sword rested against his shoulder, almost too large for an ordinary person to handle comfortably with one hand.

His black hair had been cut short around the sides, while an old scar crossed his jaw and disappeared beneath a rough beard. Nothing about his expression suggested surprise lasting longer than necessary. The leader examined Sieghart first, then the unusual carriage behind him. His eyes lingered there much longer than they had on the apparently fifteen-year-old driver.

Expensive vehicle. Young owner. No guards. Sieghart almost watched the calculation happen. The leader turned his head slightly toward three of the men without saying anything. The gesture was small, but all three immediately understood and started moving toward Sieghart.

Apparently, the leader had decided the strange carriage was simply another valuable object that had conveniently delivered itself to their robbery. Sieghart activated Magic Vision fully.

The first three approaching men possessed almost nothing interesting. Their bodies carried ordinary traces of ambient mana, but there were no developed spell structures or anything suggesting meaningful magical training. Sieghart extended the observation toward the remaining two robbers near the elderly couple. The result was similar. They carried weapons and probably knew how to fight ordinary travelers, but magically they were unimpressive.

Five weak opponents. Then he studied the leader. Magic Vision initially showed surprisingly little. That itself became the clue. There was no active mana reinforcement flowing across the man’s muscles, no spell surrounding his weapon, and no magical structure strengthening his body despite the confidence with which he carried that enormous sword.

Sieghart knew that pattern well.

The energy involved was not mana. Magic Vision could not reveal Aura directly the way it exposed magical currents, but Sieghart had learned that Aura users long enough to recognize everything surrounding it. The leader’s stance was too relaxed for the weapon’s weight. His breathing remained controlled, every movement economical, and the ground compressed slightly beneath his boots whenever his weight shifted.

Sieghart could also feel something subtler now that he focused upon the man. It was not magical pressure, but a dense physical presence produced by vital energy concentrated throughout a trained body.

An Aura user.

Sieghart’s attention sharpened immediately. Not merely somebody who had awakened Aura either. The density suggested experience. Possibly quite a lot of it.

Sieghart had encountered powerful Aura users before, naturally. He had been born into a family practically obsessed with them, and several people throughout his childhood considered magic inferior precisely because Aura dominated close combat so completely.

The problem was that he had rarely gotten a proper chance to fight one seriously.

The Orc King had used corrupted power closer to Aura reinforcement, but that monster had been an entirely different problem involving ridiculous size, poison resistance, rage, and enough strength to kick Sieghart through a tree.

This man was human. For the first time since leaving Seraphina, Sieghart felt genuine excitement that had absolutely nothing to do with books, dungeon cores, or runic machinery. Then he noticed the bleeding horse again.

Right. This was still a robbery. Excitement could wait until the civilians were no longer positioned beside five armed idiots. The three approaching robbers spread apart as they moved toward the carriage. One carried a spear, another held a curved sword, while the third had a short axe in each hand.

The swordsman raised his weapon casually while stopping perhaps ten meters away. His smile suggested he expected Sieghart’s apparent age to make whatever followed considerably easier.

“Get down slowly, kid, and leave the carriage where it is. If you cooperate, you can keep your clothes and walk away without unnecessary injuries.”

The sentence was almost reasonable by bandit standards.

Sieghart looked past him toward the leader instead.