Chapter 3: First Circle

A huge chunk of Reif's mana gathered inside his spiritual world where his soul is located. The mana then encircled around Reif's soul before they twist and turn to form a magic circle

Since this is the first magic circle that Reif made after gaining a new body, the process wasn't that hard

His body has a lot of mana already unlike other people that need to cultivate for some time first just to have the minimum mana required

The creation of the first magic circle is also the most basic circle for all mages and with Reif's skills, this was as easy as breathing

The thing that most people need to spend weeks or even months was accomplished by Reif in just a matter of minutes

The mana he gathered calmed down thanks to his excellent control and the creation of his magic circle succeeded

From now on, Reif became a proper magician again. With the help of a magic circle, this body although weak would have a bit of fighting power already

Reif quickly opened his eyes and starts stretching his body to measure its limits

This body originally has good quality but it was ruined by long-term starvation. It was really a pity, not to mention, the former Rhash has poor control over the poisonous energy his body has

The poison might not be harming the body due to his special mutated constitution but the aura of the poison was too prominent

It was like Rhash is advertising to the world that he is poisoned. Thus, Reif needs to circulate his mana to his whole body so that no poisonous aura will leak out from him

"Hmm, with my poisonous blood, I have another advantage" Reif thought to himself before he turned his head on the side

A 1.5-meter tall monkey with brown hair entered Reif's sight. The monkey has a pair of glaring red eyes that were filled with desire for violence

Reif recognizes this magic beast as a savage monkey. This race was extremely bloodthirsty and unlike most monkey races, they are mostly always alone since they would start a fight even with the ones that are of the same species as them

"In the past, this kind of weak monkey wouldn't even dare look at me" Reif muttered to himself and he was surprised that his body doesn't even fear the monkey although this was a dangerous situation for the former host

The former Rhash really has a low EQ, he doesn't even know what fear is anymore. Well, this just benefited the new Reif

Reif's indifferent eyes stared at the savage monkey that is running towards him. This monkey is quite powerful. Base on its aura, it was a Rank 2 Magic Beast, equivalent to mages with 2 magic circles

Even then, Reif is unafraid. The more magic circle a mage has, the stronger they would be but their skills would also vary. It was not too rare for a lower leveled mage to defeat someone with a higher level than them

"[Haste!]"

"[Harden!]"

Reif instantly casts two spells at the same time. The first one increases his speed and the second one increases the durability and hardness of the chains in his wrists

He just let the savage monkey get close to him and when the distance is right, Reif swung his left arm and the chains went to slap the monkey

Seeing that, the monkey issued a low growl while protecting its body with its arm

The chains were already hard to begin with yet Reif even casts magic on it. The impact cracked some of the monkey's bones and some of his flesh bursts apart

Savage monkey doesn't have a particularly strong defense and with the timing of Reif's attack, he instantly injured an arm of his enemy

If Reif's body is not malnourished and has greater strength, it was even possible that the monkey would be thrown far away from him

The pain in the monkey's left arm made it furious. Its savage red eyes stared at Reif with madness. However, it still wasn't able to recover when Reif already swung his right arm

Chains once again flew in the air and collided with the monkey's body. Just like the first one, the chains cracked the monkey's bones and damage some of its flesh

The smell of blood wafted in the air along with the painful scream of the monkey

Despite only injuring the monkey twice, Reif can already feel his arms aching. His body is in such a weakened condition and seeing the monkey charging at him again, he decided to run

[Haste] was still active and Reif uses it for this moment. For the chains to injure the monkey, it naturally required arm strength from his weakened body

Reif cannot continuously burst out with that kind of power if he doesn't want his arm to be pushed to the limits and get damaged

With the speed boost provided by his magic, Reif managed to keep some distance between him and the monkey

However, the monkey doesn't only have its body to attack. Seeing that it can't catch up to Reif, the monkey gathered mana in front of its mouth and fired it towards the small human that injured him

The magic missile flew in the air and approached Reif at a speed faster than the monkey

Reif didn't dare meet that attack head-on. His eyes scanned his surroundings and when the magic missile is close to him, he ducked and he barely manages to dodge

The missile continued in its way and pierces through several trees before it used up all of its power and dissipated

If Reif was hit by the missile, it would not be the trees that would have gaping holes in them

Reif was about to attack the monkey again before his peripheral vision caught a small shadow that pounced on him

He was still fighting the monkey yet another enemy already appeared. Even then, Reif wasn't afraid in the slightest. In fact, no emotion can be seen in his face at all

Reif placed his arms behind him and casts two magic spells at the same time again

"[Grease!]"

"[Wind Gusts!]"

Grease is a magic that adds an oily substance to the target. In this case, Reif uses Grease the magic in his feet. It reduces the friction between his feet and the ground

As for Reif's hands, gusts of green winds appeared on it that propelled his body forward at a fast speed

With [Grease] reducing friction and [Wind Gusts] to move his body, Reif successfully dodged the sudden attack from that shadow

It turns out that his second enemy was a devil rabbit. It was another violent magic beast just like the savage monkey and it has a sharp horn on its forehead

The two magic beasts bared their fangs at Reif as they continued trying to get close to him. As much as possible, Reif will avoid close combat since his body is still fragile

Thus, Reif decided to use one of his advantages today so that he can also gauge its strength

Reif placed his thumb in between his teeth and bite hard on it to the point that he injured himself as blood drips down his finger

With the help of mana, Reif controlled the droplets of blood and he uses it as a weapon against the magic beasts

"[Fog!]"

The droplets of blood suddenly burst and turned into two sets of bloody fog. One fog targeted the devil rabbit while the other targeted the savage monkey

Both of Reif's opponents were hit by the bloody fog and they instantly writhed in pain

The magic beasts gasp for air as they tried to resist the poison that Reif's blood contained

However, the level of poison was not something that these weak magic beasts can withstand

Tears gathered around their eyes while their mouths start to release some foamy substance

In less than a minute, the struggle of the two magic beasts ended as their lives were taken away by the poison

Reif breathed heavily. The situation might have been always been under his control but his body is still really lacking. Just the fight alone consumed all of his stamina and he sat down on the ground first to catch his breath while reflecting on the fight he just had

Reif didn't imagine that he would have a time wherein his main weapon would be poison. He knows a lot of poison magic but he doesn't really focus on it before

But now, with a body filled with poison, Reif will make sure that it would be one of his greatest weapon along with his personal magic in the past

After catching some breath, Reif stood up again and walks towards the corpses. He can still feel poisonous energy being emitted by the corpses and Reif instinctively placed his hand above them

A bloody mist suddenly escapes the corpses of the magic beasts and it entered Reif's palm

Seems like not only can Reif use poison, he can even absorb or reabsorb the poison he already uses

This mutated [Nature Vessel] is really a good thing to have!

Reif is sure that in this world, magic beasts corpses would also be valuable. But if the corpse was poisoned, their value will lower a lot since the people that need to use them has to remove the poison first

But since Reif can extract the poison he uses, things would be easier. Too bad that with his current capability, he doesn't plan on entering society yet

"[Sharpen!]" Reif casts another magic in his hand and uses it to penetrate the head of the dead rabbit

When Reif retracted his hand, a small beast core can be seen in his palm. All magic beasts have beasts core inside their body. It was mostly located in the brain and beasts cores are resources that mages constantly needs

Reif ignored the bloody and gory mess that he had made and went to the second corpse to retrieved its beast core. Even if he doesn't use them now, he would still be able to sell them in the future. It's not bad to start saving up now

Reif then ignored the dead monkey and only took the corpse of the rabbit before escaping the area

The smell of blood will surely attract more forest predators and Reif can't stay long in there

Reif found a cave and he immediately walks towards it. The cave only has a bit more than ten square meters of space but that was already enough for a small child like Reif

Inside the cave was a single snake that instantly shot its body like an arrow. To finish this soon as possible, Reif only flicked a single drop of his blood to the snake's mouth and its body soon spasmed in pain

Reif's blood poison was quite powerful and Rank 1 or 2 magic beasts can be easily killed by it

Reif cast aside the snake corpse first and placed the rabbit corpse in the ground to find some firewood

He planned on cooking the rabbit already even though he was already full because of all the mushrooms he had eaten

Reif knows of a method that will increase his metabolism. To make sure that his body will be able to function as good as well-fed people, he needs to intake a lot of nutritious foods

The way Reif skinned the dead rabbit was so skillful as he already did this kind of thing a lot of times already

Reif's body only needs to get used to his skills but even then, that will require time

While Reif is inside this forest, he planned in nursing his body back to perfect health while also making sure that his body's instinct and reflex will be honed

This forest is a perfect stage for him. His new body needs to taste a lot of blood. Only then would it become the body of a great battle mage!