"That monster huh…" If it was the past, the ogre and the rumors surrounding that cave would have easily slipped out of his mind after being revived but having met the creature for himself Vorgarag could only say it left him a deep impression.
"Yeah" Ed replied simply as he waited for Vorgarag to come up with an answer. The latter was currently thinking about his near-death experience with the beast and about the brief talk he had with Ed thereafter.
"What do we need to do?" Those thoughts lead him nowhere however and Vorgarag thus decided that he was lacking sufficient information to make such an important decision.
"We just need to get lots of blood" Ed replied while attempting to convey the amount of blood they would need to get through gestures. A larger amount was definitely preferable.
Alchemy was a field that required both experience and knowledge, Ed had neither. To get the knowledge he would have to make experiments and to get the experience he would have to see those experiments bear fruit. That ultimately meant that a single pint of blood would be nowhere near enough.
"B- Blood?" Vorgarag said his expression somewhat paling. Though he had expected that they would have to face the beast rather than find some secret ingredient it hoarded, Vorgarag was still both stunned and unwilling.
"Maybe I sho- Wait…" Ed was going to suggest going alone and beating the crap out of Blurak a couple of times but as he continued to recall his fights with the big oaf he realized that there was a second option.
"We can negotiate with him" Ed's words caused question marks to form all around Vorgarag, what could a monster want?
Blurak was simple-minded, he could think of nothing but one thing… food. Would Blurak be against giving them some blood if they offered say… two whole boars?
The most likely answer was no as there was also always the chance that the simple Blurak would see it as an opportunity to exploit them for food. That meant Ed might need to beat the ogre up and show it its place but the odds of success were still much higher than casually heading over to beat him up every now and then.
Plus, by doing the latter it was entirely possible for the orcs to do it without needing his presence which was really key. Of course, Ed didn't think Blurak wouldn't get the crazy idea of eating the food-bearing orcs or simply not giving up any of its blood without his presence but in that case, he would just need to beat it up again.
'Huh, beating others is pretty effective' It wasn't like the ogre could report him to a higher power, right? The dungeon wasn't the police or anything.
'Well, it did interfere when Blurak tried to kill me' Ed remembered with a frown. While the dungeon had more or less promised to stay out of his way, Ed couldn't say for sure that it wouldn't interfere when Ed would be weakening one of its bosses.
"What are we using?" Vorgarag asked snapping Ed out of his thoughts.
"Food, a couple of boars will do" Dakgu who was now in charge of the farm wouldn't be able to keep up with the demands of the ogre with the farm's current size but Ed could only leave acquiesce for this first trial.
"I see, that makes sense" Vorgarag nodded and said. He could still remember that the ogre wanted to eat him specifically, It wasn't simply trying to kill him.
The two, having come across a good solution, decided to go with it. They both headed towards the boar farm and asked Dakgu for three boars. Ed felt the need to show some sincerity.
After that, the two left towards the settlement's gates where Ed got to admire the lively atmosphere of the orcs out at the time. The settlement was grand and the homes were comfortable, many of the orcs were glad to have moved.
'I need to hurry up my plans' Ed's current speed was insufficient. He couldn't guarantee he had the power to save most of these orcs. He had a hidden wish of filling the entire dawn settlement with orcs, to return it to its former glory.
At the current pace, the settlement would be simply overrun by the humans and the burly aged walls of the settlement would finally crumble under the might of humanity.
"Vorgarag, you can stay here" Ed decided to go alone. Vorgarag would slow him down for two reasons. One, he was slower than him, and two, he would have to protect him. Vorgarag was still not up to speed with his own body and Ed hadn't seen him try to cast a single spell. Vorgarag was not combat-ready.
Hearing this, Vorgarag stopped walking propped his chin with one hand deep in thought. In nothing but a moment later, Vorgarag replied.
"Ok, I'll stay" Surprisingly, or perhaps unsurprisingly, Vorgarag didn't actually oppose this idea. To Vorgarag, going there would be for nothing more than curiosity. His presence would not be in any way necessary.
Vorgarag, therefore, started to turn back but Ed placed a hand on his shoulder stopping him in place. Vorgarag's eyes widened slightly before turning into a bitter smile.
"You really got quite strong huh?" Vorgarag was especially bitter because after being transferred to the body of Herewaruk, he had lost his lean and toned muscles. Not that he would be able to resist Ed's strength in that body either.
"I've got a task for you" Since Vorgarag was staying behind and he was running out of time, Ed decided to delegate some more tasks. He said he was willing to follow him himself so why should Ed give him a break?
Vorgarag simply looked at Ed signaling him to continue and Ed thus spoke up and informed him of the wall of ice and where it was located.
"You want me to melt that?" Vorgarag said while feeling that the task was a bit impossible. Based on Ed's description even his own fist only left a shallow hole.
"You just have to create a fire array, we have plenty of crystals" They had in fact almost picked the cavern clean. The cavern would more likely than not never easily recover from it either.
"Fine, just leave it to me" Vorgarag said and declared. Knowing what was in there, Vorgarag benefitted just as much by uncovering it.
Ed was thus able to head on to try and beat u- negotiate with the stubborn Blurak. After killing some boars and storing them in his inventory, He sped through the forest using his exquisite mana manipulation skills. The level of the skill was already at level 8 which meant it was just one step away from reaching the next step, advancement.
'But it feels like I'm missing something' Ed had noticed that there were two ways for skills to level up. One was through actual combat and or practice and the other was through knowledge. Mana manipulation was a mix of both.
Ed suspected this was mainly because of the system since improving normally required more than repeated usage. But since he had the system, it was for mana manipulation to have a sort of metaphorical ceiling. Even the system didn't seem to have any intention of helping him as he felt the truth of mana manipulation escape him.
"My knowledge is lacking…" Ed muttered through gritted teeth before jumping into the air with the power of the wind and attempting to control his limbs in midair through other blasts of powers.
He continued to do a series of complicated twists and turns while heading over to Blurak in hopes of getting even an inch closer to the ceiling that eluded him.
Each blast of wind, air, water, or even earth provided him with a deeper understanding of the elements even if by nothing but a smidgen.
After nearly an hour of this exercise, Ed emerged out of the darkness of the forest canopy and was directly in front of a mountain with a cavern. Outside were herbs glowing with a faint green light.
'I made it' Ed thought with a hint of glee. Blurak had as a boss done completely nothing for him. He felt happy to have found some use for him as well as be given an opportunity to pay him back for his wanton attacks.
Ed didn't continue to admire the atmosphere, he directly rushed into the cavern while preserving and renewing his lost mana thanks to the mana rich environment. Though many of the crystals had been taken away and the amount had lowered, the place had to have been rich in mana in the first place to generate so many crystals.
Ed, therefore, lost nothing by renewing his mana supply in the process of traveling down the winding cavern tunnel clustered with multi-colored crystals. The blinding lights of the elements were however nowhere near as catching as the snores of the voracious ogre.
'Blurak should seek medical attention' Ed joked inwardly as he finally slowed down his gait. The tunnel opened up to the large boss room that held nothing but the belly up ogre and the far out of place rock.
The loud snores of the ogre however paused before being replaced by a lazy groan. Blurak tried to lift its large body off the floor having awoken from its nap.
"Huh?" Blurak turned to look at who its visitor was and became confused, what did the champion want with him?
"Blurak, I've come to bargain" Ed told the ogre who simply scratched its head with even more puzzlement.