Dago's sharp gaze swept over, and the two of them felt a howling cold wind whip around them.
Seeing Serena supporting Old Marico, Dago dispelled the deep blue halo in his eyes and walked towards them.
Dago asked Old Marico with concern, "Are you injured? Is it serious?"
He noticed the bloodstains on Old Marico's robe and his pale face.
Old Marico forced himself to say, "I was ambushed by that heavily injured Black Robe Wizard. I'm fine, I won't die."
Dago thought for a moment, then squatted down and carried Old Marico on his back.
Old Marico hesitated for a moment, but finally lay on Dago's back and said with a complex expression, "Thank you, Dago, I'm a burden."
Dago shook his head upon hearing this and comforted him, "Go back and rest, don't think too much."
He gestured for Serena to follow him, and together they went to the frozen Black Robe Wizard to collect the spoils.
These Black Robe Wizards were getting poorer and poorer, with only a few low-level magic stones.
Old Marico's weight was naturally no burden to Dago, and soon they walked back to the clearing of the Treehouse Stronghold.
Dago looked back at the gate behind him, only to see Serena clenching her teeth and leaning on the wooden pillar of the gate, seemingly enduring some kind of pain.
He gently leaned Old Marico, who was on his back, against a wooden stump in the clearing, then ran back to check on Serena, pulling up the hem of her robe a little.
Beneath her robe, her small, snow-white feet were visible, with her ankle swollen like a steamed bun.
His rough action instantly made Serena's face flush, and she lowered her head, not daring to look at Dago.
Dago frowned and said seriously, "Why didn't you say anything when you were injured? Is it very impressive to endure it?"
Serena bit her lip, not saying a word, looking very much like a child being scolded.
Dago squatted down and used the Ice Crystal Technique to condense a fist-sized ice block and applied it.
"I have healing spells, Lord Dago, you don't need to do this," Serena whispered, her voice like a mosquito.
After a short while, the swelling in her ankle subsided considerably, and Dago stood up to help Serena walk to the clearing.
Dago noticed that Serena's figure was quite well-endowed.
Although Dago was a gentleman, there was always some unavoidable physical contact.
Normally, it was completely hidden by the loose, baggy apprentice robe.
Ever since Dago had helped her up, Serena had kept her face flushed and her head down, shy like a rabbit being handled.
In today's great battle in the forest, all three sustained injuries of varying degrees...
Sitting around the campfire, Serena continued to cast healing spells for Old Marico, whose injuries were the most severe.
Dago's white hand, meanwhile, was covered with several corrosive energies, constantly trying to erode and corrupt his flesh...
Fortunately, however, ice elements could block and consume the corrosive energy.
He circulated the Meditation Technique, continuously releasing the Resonance Art to increase the power of the ice elements to consume the remaining corrosive energy.
As time passed, the setting sun, like a red-hot copper disk, slowly sank into the western forest sea.
Dago's injuries had mostly healed, and he retrieved frozen monster crocodile meat from the treehouse.
He skewered the monster meat with branches and roasted it over the campfire, and also prepared a wooden crutch for Serena.
Serena's mental power was mostly consumed healing Old Marico's injuries, and her own sprained ankle had not received much healing, still making movement difficult.
When he handed the wooden crutch to Serena, she was almost moved to tears.
Dago had no time for her thoughts and began his ancestral craft, barbecue.
Although Dago's roasted meat was not as good as Old Marico's, the raw ingredients were excellent, and the fragrant monster meat made all three of them continuously drool.
Before long, the three of them began to devour the food, especially Old Marico, whose face became much rosier after eating the monster meat.
Just as the three of them were enjoying their meal, the sound of an uninvited guest's footsteps echoed from the gate of the Treehouse Stronghold.
Dago instantly became alert, the deep blue halo in his eyes already circulating, blue ice spheres gathering, and the cold wind gusting, making the campfire sway erratically.
He roared, "Who's there?"
The person outside the gate was also startled by his voice and quickly shouted nervously, "A Wizard from Aynak Wizarding Academy."
Dago walked out, holding an ice sphere in his white hand, and saw a middle-aged Wizard with a tattered robe and a terrified expression, whose chest was indeed imprinted with the Academy's silk thread emblem.
He dispelled the Ice Crystal Technique and instead released the Detection Art; if anything went wrong, he would be met with a barrage of Air Bullets like a storm.
The middle-aged Wizard from the Academy, seeing that Dago also wore the Academy's robe, breathed a sigh of relief and smiled kindly at Dago, saying tiredly, "I saw smoke coming from this stronghold nearby and wanted to come and rest for a while."
Dago nodded, remaining vigilant, and led the two of them to the clearing.
Serena and Old Marico had already climbed to a higher point in the stronghold, looking at Dago with questioning expressions.
"He's one of us," Dago said to the two puzzled individuals.
Only then did they lower their guard and come down to join Dago, after which the four began a new round of roasting meat and questioning.
The middle-aged Wizard tore at the roasted meat like a starving ghost reborn.
Dago stared at him and asked, "Where did you come from? Why do you look so miserable?"
The middle-aged Wizard paused with the roasted meat, recalling some terrifying scene, and murmured, "It's all over, the front-line fortress has fallen, and large numbers of Black Robe Wizards have rushed in and started a massacre."
"Everywhere there are collapsed and burning wooden houses, ground blasted apart by magic, and the alleys are filled with the charred or frost-frozen corpses of Wizards."
"I narrowly escaped and have been running towards the Academy for three or four days without eating. Those Dark Blood Council devils will be here soon, and we will all die."
By the end of his speech, he was trembling all over and started crying uncontrollably.
Dago watched his crying with a solemn expression, feeling something was amiss. The Black Robe Wizards wouldn't let a Wizard on the verge of starvation keep escaping.
He took out the purple Mental Potion he had acquired last time, drank it all, and combined it with the Meditation Technique to quickly restore his mental power.
If he wasn't mistaken, this was a fishing expedition, fishing for rats like them in the forest.
Just as he was thinking this, the wooden fence on the outskirts of the stronghold was suddenly hit by a ball of dark green energy. The energy licked at the wood, drilling in like a persistent ulcer.
The wooden fence collapsed like rotten, soaked wood, and the rising sawdust was mixed with a pungent stench of decay.
This familiar smell was corrosive energy; Dago's injury was due to it.
"Enemy attack, retreat quickly!" Dago roared.
Then he flung an Air Bullet towards the collapsing direction, buying time for the three injured individuals to withdraw.
A Black Robe Wizard stood silently on the outskirts of the stronghold, a basketball-sized dark green energy sphere condensing in front of his spinal staff.
This dark green energy sphere rapidly flew towards Dago, piercing through the Air Bullet Dago had casually fired...
It created an air blast in mid-air, and the remaining half-sized sphere continued to fly.
Dago's protective ring no longer had energy and could not stop the dark green energy sphere's advance.
He raised his white arm, and the ice elements covering it quickly condensed into a ferocious giant ice claw, reaching out to grasp the energy sphere.
The dark green energy sphere was firmly gripped in the palm of the giant ice claw. The ice patterns on the surface of the giant claw instantly lit up, locking the energy sphere tightly within its palm.
The two energies collided violently, and the energy sphere continuously corroded the ice armor, emitting a sizzling sound.
Dago increased his mental power output to the Resonance Art, and the ice patterns on his arm armor glowed with a dazzling blue light.
He rotated his wrist, the knuckles of the giant ice claw made crisp "clack clack" sounds, and his five fingers slowly tightened, the ice patterns piercing into the energy mass with the movement.
The originally twisted and swirling dark energy sphere suddenly froze, followed by a crisp sound like shattering glass from within—spiderweb-like ice patterns appeared on its surface.
Those ice patterns spread at an alarming speed, freezing the entire energy mass into a black ice crystal.
"Shatter," Dago uttered a single word, and the ice arm armor clenched fiercely, causing the black ice crystal to explode.
At this moment, a soft "tsk" sound came from the Black Robe Wizard's mouth.
It was an ugly, short-haired man with pale, bloodless skin covered in dark red tattoos.
He looked at Dago with a very surprised expression, smiling like a corpse that had been dead for a long time.
He said hoarsely, "What a good Academy Wizard, he should make excellent blood food."