Insect Tamer's Ascension

In time, they reached the usual boar territory.

Now with three people traveling together, with one beast surveilling from the trees, one from the sky, one being the protector on the land, and one scouting on the ground,

they all felt a lot safer. Whenever Theo entered the boar's territory in these past months, he always looked for any type of nervous emotions from Clara.

But seeing that she was never nervous or scared of entering the forest that had left her bedridden for almost half a month,

after a bit of conversation about it, it seemed Theo was severely lacking in information. It was not the first time Clara had become so injured. It had happened before, too, when she went to the wolf forest without much experience just to get stronger.

The amount of blood she lost that day was horrifyingly high, and there was an even higher chance of her getting an infection through the wolf bites.

Fortunately, she was not dumb and brought medical-grade potions with her to pour on the bites.

Yet the main point of telling all this to Theo was because she wanted him to always be careful with these beasts.

They were not only dangerous, but things like rabies and even severe conditions were present in this world, too. So, keeping a set of potions and medicines was always a good idea.

That was the reason why Theo's belt today had three extra compartments with many high-grade medicines and potions related to recovery. There were a lot more in the carriage just for safety—a perk of being a noble, there was no shortage of money for stuff like this.

"There is a level 1 boar to the northwest, estimated 5-minute travel, young master," Elias said after getting the information from Chip.

"Good," Theo muttered with a deep breath. They were getting close to today's main objective.

He looked toward the side, not toward something far, but the beast he had on his shoulder.

The mantis was tending to its forelegs as usual. Yet the sheer size it had grown to was insane for just six months.

When before it only came to some of his arm, full palm and fingers, now it was hard for it to even stay on his hand without adjusting further.

While being on his shoulder, the mantis's head now came close to Theo's ear in size, while its broadness had increased too.

It was tough to keep it on the shoulder too when its body was fully covered with moss instead of all eaten up. When the moss scraped on Theo's neck, it created a ticklish sensation.

The mantis's skills were on a better spectrum too. Its metallic strike was closing in on level 4, a feat that took him the whole 6 months.

The regenerative moss was at level 3, which was an improvement that was noteworthy as the percentage improved really slowly.

And lastly, the spore lash skill—the one that came second to all three of them.

It was at level 3 now. The toughness to level it up had increased significantly, and all this time, the one that was the easiest in comparison in terms of leveling was only the metallic strike.

And it was all because it was the easiest to practice, and the mantis now had the habit to do it on its own too after its intelligence increased and settled.

"We're here," Elias spoke, and Clara made the boar tug near Theo a lot more just in case.

"Station the boar and the pup near the edge of the bushes, but don't reveal them. You too, Elias—station the ape such that it can just jump to protect me if need be."

Both Elias and Clara looked at each other before gravely nodding. It was time now.

"Young master, please don—KUGH!" Elias stopped and suppressed his groan to not get caught.

"Go for it, young master. We have your back," Clara stated after smacking Elias on the rib and then offered Theo an elbow tap.

Elias glared at her, yet saw through what she was trying to do. At times like this, there was no place for second thoughts.

Theo nodded at them both and went to the edge of the tall grass before the small clearing started.

'It just started making it…' Theo thought. The boar was using its tusks to plow through the land currently.

Theo saw a slight disadvantage in it. If the clearing was small, then there was less space to move around, obviously.

And being a human with a fragile body, he couldn't just stop the boar from moving, not with his current strength. So he needed some space to move around.

'Get its attention, let it come to me, dodge to see how it goes, cut its face horizontally, and then move to the side. Then repeat.' Theo thought again in his mind, just to be clear on his plan.

It was his very basic plan to tackle the boar with his sword.

After a few minutes of observing its actions, Theo took his first step forward. His mind told him not to, so he hastily kept the other too, finally getting inside the clearing.

The boar at first didn't notice as Theo was still moving really slowly, yet one last step forward, and the boar finally felt his presence.

SQUEAKK

It roared in its own way after being surprised to see a human in its small territory.

A few taps of its front hoof to show that it was not playing—the boar clearly understood that Theo was not going to go away.

Without any further wait, the boar started running with its small legs toward him.

Theo's sword was already out and facing the boar. His gaze went to the sword for a second when he realized something.

The same sword whose weight was felt both by his shoulder and the wrist some time ago was now in his hand without any pressure.

Theo did not know if it was the adrenaline or something else.

But he quickly came back to the world.

When the boar was this close to smacking him with the hoof, Theo instinctively stepped to the side and moved his body with flexibility before he moved his sword ahead.

THWACK!