A few hundred meters away from them, the bandit woman's face also turned pale. However, remembering that her husband had a grade three weapon, she was a bit relieved. However, in the next moment, her expression froze.
Shua!
After closing in on him, Max raised his blazing fist and punched out with all his strength. The one-eyed bandit felt a horrifying sensation wash over him and hurriedly thrust his spear at him.
BOOM!!!
A loud explosion sounded as his spear and Max's blazing fist collided. Everything in more than a dozen meters from the center of the explosion was annihilated, the trees, the rocks, and the ground; nothing was left intact.
Arghh~~
Right after the explosion, a shrill and pained scream resounded in the area, and the half-burnt body of the one-eyed bandit flew back, crashing into trees after trees. After falling to the ground, he struggled for a few moments before dying.
Cough! Cough!
Amidst the cloud of dust at the center of the explosion, Max spat out some blood and coughed a few times.
"As expected, [Calidus Brachium] is several times stronger when cast using three-star Mana." He muttered with a happy smile on his face and slowly walked out from the cloud of dust.
When his fist collided with the spear, Max felt a strong pressure that caused his blood flow to become chaotic. However, when [Calidus Brachium] exploded, the spear developed a crack on it, and its power weakened dramatically, and the one-eyed bandit had to bear the brunt of his attack head-on.
"He… he died?" The bandit woman mumbled in disbelief.
"Don't worry. I'll send you to accompany him soon." Max's cold voice sounded in her ears. Hearing this, she shivered.
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She immediately turned around and ran away. However, she was enraged and saddened by her husband's death. There was nothing she could do, and could only think of her own survival now.
"Hehe, do you think you can escape from me?" Max laughed and stored the spear and one-eyed bandit's body before chasing after her.
In just a few seconds, he caught up with her and started casting [Death Rain] to finish her off, but suddenly system's voice sounded in his mind.
[Host, since you are going to kill her, why not use her to get more Lust points?]
"Mm?" Max paused for a second and couldn't help but glance at the woman escaping. She was indeed a beauty, and he could certainly do it.
However, he shook his head and coldly said, "No, and I don't want you to suggest this to me ever again, understand?" Although he needed a large number of LPs, he wasn't a rapist and had his morals.
[Understood, host."] The system replied in a somewhat helpless voice.
Max then ignored it and quickly conjured a few dozen fire arrows and shot them toward her.
However, before they could even reach ten meters away from her, her speed suddenly shot up as she sped into the woods, vanishing from his sight.
After seeing that she wasn't able to escape from him and he had caught up to her and was about to kill her, she had lost every hope of survival. However, when he suddenly paused for a moment, she immediately took out a grade three escaping talisman and crushed it.
Max watched her disappear into the woods and sighed helplessly. He would have tried to chase after her, but all of his three-star Mana had been used up when casting [Calidus Brachium], and his two-star Mana wasn't able to boost his speed enough and was also almost empty.
Moreover, his mission had already been completed after killing most of the one-star bandits and the one-eyed bandit leader.
He then went to the place where the merchant group had been ambushed. After arriving there, he noticed that the merchant trio had already escaped from the earth barrier along with their carriage.
Therefore, he started to gather the spatial bags of the bandits he had killed, including the ones that had already died when clashing against the merchant group.
After that, he glanced at the corpses of the people who were with the merchant group and thought, 'Well, you guys are already dead. It's better that I take whatever you have instead of others.' He then gathered their bags too.
"Hmm, a total of 1600 Mana stones. Not bad." Max nodded in satisfaction. The number of Mana stones he had received after killing the bandits was almost double the reward amount he would have received previously on the completion of the mission. Moreover, this was without counting in the bandit leader's wealth and the grade three earth elemental spear.
After scavenging their corpses, he returned to the sun feather city, and seeing that there was still some time before it was night, he directly went to the city lord's mansion to report the success of his mission.
"Oh, you are already back." The petite woman was a little surprised to see him return so soon. It had been only a few hours since she left him in front of the one-eyed bandits' hideout.
Then a smile appeared on her face, and thought, 'He must have realized that this mission wasn't something he could do alone.' Thinking this, she nodded. At least this guy had some self-awareness and opened her tiny mouth to speak when Max interrupted her.
"Is Elder still available?" He asked. Since it was already late in the evening, he wasn't sure if she was still 'on duty' or not.
"Elder? Yes, she is." The petite woman instinctively answered. However, she was displeased that he didn't let her say what she wanted.
"Okay. I'm going to meet her then." Max nodded and walked inside the mansion.
The petite woman stomped in anger and followed after him. It was her duty to lead anyone that wanted to meet the Elder, but this guy had walked inside on his own. However, she didn't say anything because she could feel that his mood wasn't good right now.
…
"You are already back. Didn't I say you won't be..." Seeing Max enter the room, the Elder chuckled with an amused expression.
"Yeah. I've completed the mission." Max said, not letting her finish.
"Completed?" The Elder and the petite woman looked at him as if he was joking.
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Seeing their expressions, Max waved his hand half-burnt body of the bandit leader fell to the ground. As for his spatial bag, he had already taken it.
"You really killed him?" The Elder was astonished as she looked at the corpse on the ground and then at Max.
After seeing that Max was so confident about completing this mission, although she was also a bit hopeful, she had never thought that he would be able to come back with the bandit leader's corpse in such a short time and without any visible injury whatsoever.
The petite woman was also stunned. She had never thought that this handsome and harmless-looking youth was strong enough to kill a bandit who had a grade three weapon in his possession.
"It seems I've underestimated you." The Elder gave him a deep glance before taking out a spatial bag. "Here, this is your promised reward."
"Thank you, Elder." Max took it, and after checking that there were 5000 Mana stones, he emptied them into his inventory and returned the empty bag to her.
Just as Max was about to turn around and walk out, the Elder said, "If you don't mind, can you show the grade three weapon you got from him."
"Hm?" Max paused and frowned.
"Don't worry. I won't take it from you. I only want to see what kind of weapon it is." She smiled and explained.
"Okay." Max nodded, and took out a seven-foot-long, pale golden-colored spear, and threw it toward her.
The Elder caught the spear and started examining it.
"Hm? It's damaged." She immediately noticed the small crack on it. 'It must be because it was a damaged weapon that he could kill him so easily.' She thought.
The possibility of Max damaging it during the fight never appeared in her mind since she knew that even an average low-tier grade three weapon wasn't something that a two-star or even an average three-star mage could damage, and this spear was among the stronger weapons among low-tier grade three weapons.
Seeing her examining, Max asked, "Elder, what is the approximate value of this spear?"
"It's a low-tier grade three elemental earth spear, and its value should be at fifteen thousand Mana stones. Unfortunately, it's damaged and can be sold for half the price." The Elder explained.
She wasn't surprised that he wanted to sell it. From the condition of the bandit leader's corpse, she could see that he was an elemental fire mage, and this spear was an earth elemental one.
Max became happy when he heard he could sell it for fifteen thousand Mana stones. However, after hearing the last part, his happiness died down, and he cursed in his mind, 'Why did I have to damage it?'