Modern World Warlock

After Dante and his team were done building their camp, they sat down in front of the fire as the night sky fell upon them.

They didn't know how long their search would take, but they didn't want to spend too long in the wilderness out of fear that the secret organization, Nekxis, would attack the Jade Dragons while they were gone.

For dinner, they had lunch boxes that Sophia packed for them, and the boxes were created by Paige, using technology that prevented the food from spoiling for up to a year.

As Vesnia took a bite of her teriyaki chicken dinner, Dante wondered if cyborgs needed nutrients to survive, considering she had a cybernetic body.

When Vesnia became a cyborg thanks to Megan's efforts, the Azure Rebels spent a week teaching her everything she needed to know about her new body.

The Azure Rebels were the engineers who made all of the androids, so there was hardly anyone as qualified as them. Moreover, having Sami and Lexia share their experiences made the learning process much faster.

While some androids didn't need food, they still needed to recharge their power supply every once in a while, depending on how much energy they used.

However, after Sami, the Hell-Cyborg, requested the Azure Rebels for a way to better taste the food given to her, they upgraded her model with synthetic taste buds, which they then added to the other cyborgs.

Eating good food was meant to be a pleasure for humans, and since Sami felt left out whenever the others shared snacks, she had no other option but to ask for the upgrade.

After the cyborgs received a way to taste their food, the Azure Rebel engineers began working on a second type of upgrade, which consisted of making the cyborgs' bodies actually break down the nutrients from the food they ate, allowing them to recharge their energy by eating instead of going into sleep mode.

Dante listened attentively, unaware that the cyborgs had been going through all that training in the short amount of time that had passed since the battle with Netherius.

When Megan said that she was going to sleep, Dante wondered if they should have a person keeping watch at night.

In his previous world, whenever his party had to camp out for the night, they would take turns guarding the camp from any nightly threats.

In Terra, getting attacked in the middle of the night by monsters or bandits was quite common, so having someone monitoring the area was crucial to their survival.

Nevertheless, Megan explained that it would be quite difficult for a group of people to find their camp at night in the middle of the Siberian tundra forest—and even if they did, the chances that they were criminals were low.

Of course, there were no monsters either. The most dangerous animals they could encounter were polar bears and wolves, which weren't exactly threatening to them.

Happy with her response, Dante and Vesnia went inside the tent with Megan to spend the night and wake up as soon as the sun rose.

The following morning, Dante opened his eyes and found himself in the center of the tent, with Megan hugging his left while Vesnia crushed his right arm.

'My arms are numb…' He thought, trying to quietly slide his arms from under the two women.

When the warlock stepped outside, the sun was slowly rising on the horizon while a couple of arctic foxes ran close to their camp.

The sight of the quiet, snowy forest gave him a brief sense of peace, which prompted the foxes to approach the warlock with curiosity.

By the time Megan and Vesnia exited the tent, they found Dante sitting on the snow, petting five small white and gray foxes that were lounging around him.

Megan scoffed with a chuckle and took a picture with her phone, saying that Sophia was going to love it. Meanwhile, Vesnia looked at the creatures with interest.

'S-so cute!' The cyborg thought.

As Vesnia approached the foxes, one of them noticed her and ran up to her arms to be petted, making her smile with such an innocent and bright grin that both Megan and Dante were surprised to see it.

After the trio ate breakfast and shared some of their food with the cute foxes, they began jumping around and slightly pulling Dante by his pants.

"Hmm? I think he wants me to follow…" Dante commented.

"What the-? Are they that smart?" Megan pondered aloud, but it was hard to deny it when the foxes acted in such an unnatural way.

Once they quickly stowed away the tent inside the capsule, they decided to follow the five foxes, taking them to the top of a small hill overlooking large, snowy areas.

The layer of snow was deep but soft, covering all the way up to their shins, while the foxes had to jump to be seen by the group.

"Where do you think they are taking us?" Vesnia asked as they kept walking.

"I'm not sure, but the mana in that direction seems even more pure than the mana out here…" Dante replied.

"So, these foxes can sense mana?" Megan interjected with another question.

"I think all animals can somewhat perceive it. That's how their instincts tell them where to go and where not to go…" Dante continued, and his explanation made sense to Megan.

Humans were aware that animals could sense something that they themselves couldn't perceive. Some dogs could even feel an earthquake before it hit, and there were people who believed that cats could see ghosts.

Considering all the magical stuff she had experienced up to that point, Dante's explanation seemed utterly factual.

As they continued following the little foxes, they entered a snowy forest where the tall pine trees obstructed their view. Thankfully, the dense flora only covered a small part of their track.

After walking for five hours since early morning, the trio found themselves in front of a lake that was frozen solid, and right in the center of the ice, a small wooden shack that didn't seem to belong there.