Astartes of the Bear School

Chapter 1349 1321. Recalling Responsibility
The old hunter's face, which was usually calm and indifferent, suddenly froze for a moment, but soon returned to normal.

But his eyes revealed a look of reminiscence that is unique to old people.

"Um, yes," he mumbled vaguely, but without much hesitation, "I'm Henrik, Ms. Maria."

Looking at Maria's dazed and unreal expression, Henrik smiled indifferently.

Even seeing a person who had died many years ago appear in the same youthful appearance would seem unreal.

Not to mention Maria herself who put herself in their shoes.

"It's been decades since you died. Isn't it normal for me to be like this?"

"Normal." The female hunter murmured in a low voice, as if convincing herself at the same time, "Yes, this is normal."

She was trying to convince herself, but this unrealistic feeling still haunted her.

After all, from her perspective, she had just spent the burning night that destroyed Old Yharnam with Lan and Adeline.

Henrik and his friends had just met them on the way to refuge, and he was young and immature at that time.

But in the blink of an eye, the young man had become the man in front of him who was considered to be "very old" among the hunters.

And just by looking at me without hostility, I feel a sense of danger like a knife against my skin.

Anyone who has such an experience will inevitably feel that it is unreal.

But at the same time, Maria's somewhat absent-minded eyes glanced at Henryk for a moment.

The expression of this cold and dangerous old hunter was as complicated as Maria's.

Regret, joy, gratitude and relief.

Seeing the eyes of the old Yharnam hunter, who should have always been as cold as a weapon, Maria seemed to understand something through time.

"You ever liked me, Henrik?"

Subconsciously, Maria asked.

But the moment she opened her mouth, she realized her abruptness and rudeness, and opened her mouth to say something to make amends.

But the old hunter himself just smiled and didn't seem to care at all.

He took his khaki hat, patted the dust off his body, and spoke in a free and easy manner.

"You are Ms. Maria, a beautiful and powerful hunter, and a student of the [First Hunter], maybe you didn't know that? In the past, most young hunters always regarded you as an ideal object of admiration."

"I am no exception."

When people get older, they talk about their love affairs or embarrassing moments when they were young with a unique nonchalance.

As a hunter, Henrik's feeling of "looking down on things" is even more obvious.

Everything was in the past, and the feelings and aspirations had become a picture in his memory. He still remembered it, but he no longer had any sense of involvement.

compare to
Henrik turned his head to look at Viola, who was telling a story to her two daughters, and Gascoigne, who was standing silently on the side.

These things are what he cares about most now.

Maria also sensed Henrik's indifference and relief, and she felt herself gradually relaxing.

"I really don't know. Those young hunters would admire me."

For some reason, Maria felt relieved, and her tone became more relaxed as she spoke.

"So what about your friend? His name is Mark? After so much time, are you still on good terms?"

"Mark." Speaking of his old friend, Henrik paused for a moment, then quickly returned to normal. "He's dead."

"Just a little while ago tonight, it turned into a wild beast, and was hunted by Lan En and I."

"."

The relaxation on Maria's face from the previous moment was gone.

The long night and the blood moon overhead brought the cruel reality back to everyone's heart.

The female hunter who was born into a blood noble family pursed her lips, hung the blood collection bottle strap on her body, and looked at the path that Henrik had pointed out and that Lan En had taken.

If the stranger really took this road to go to the place he wanted to go, then there is no doubt that I am also responsible for it.

The relaxed and nostalgic atmosphere disappeared, leaving only heaviness.

Maria's leather boots made crisp sounds on the stone floor as she walked towards the open side door of the chapel.

Before entering, Maria paused one last time.

She lowered her head and didn't turn around.

"So, your friend, Mark, did he pass away peacefully?"

"He died very quickly." Henrik did not stand up or turn his head, but answered in a low voice. "After that night, he became very afraid of fire. The two of us took advantage of this and made his death very quick."

Maria pursed her lips and nodded, saying nothing more, and walked into the small door. She compared her memory with that of the building, which still had some traces of the past but had changed over time.

After a series of twists and turns, she finally found the familiar road. The road leading to the hunter workshop established by her teacher, the [First Hunter] Geman in the past.

Maria walked in, but the familiar scene in her memory had already become dilapidated due to lack of care.

But now, the blood noble who has become a hunter does not like to indulge in nostalgic thoughts like her fellow tribesmen far away in Cainhurst.

She is more pragmatic and responsible. She feels she has an obligation to do her part.

Walking into the chapel-like workshop, in the empty room, there was only a tear mark that had not yet closed and appeared in mid-air.

Without hesitation, Maria walked straight in.
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"Your ability to recover is getting weaker and weaker, Geman."

In a dazzlingly fast sword duel, Lan's left leg suddenly kicked German's broken right leg wooden prosthesis, and he spun around the moment he lost his balance.

There was a loud bang!
The force of the spinning kick is enough to break a huge rock! The hardness of Smaug's leg armor doubles the lethality.

After being kicked, German's chest deformed violently, almost visibly, as if the ribs supporting the chest cavity no longer existed.

The old hunter spun around, bouncing on the ground several times like a skipping stone on the water, before finally crashing into the roots of the big tree where he had been resting.

At this moment, the originally quiet and beautiful white sea of ​​flowers had been ravaged into a state of ravines and trenches under the moonlight due to the fight between the two people.

Gehman's [Acceleration Technique] even allows him to plow a hideous ditch on the ground just by swinging his weapon to his side and running.

Lan's air blade increased his attack range several times.

With his current swordsmanship attainments and basic physical fitness, the airflow blades he releases at will are already much stronger than Ashina Isshin himself.

Without using any specific techniques and just swinging it casually, his Airflow Blade is already similar to the [Dragon Flash] that required some skills to activate.

The grass, trees, soil and rocks were chopped into pieces by this sharp air blade.

The old hunter skipped stones on the ground, and every time they landed, they would stir up a large amount of gravel and dirt.

A black spot of soil was 'dug' out from the white sea of ​​flowers.

Finally, it hit the root of the tree, and the wood burst into dense thorns due to external compression.

The chest of the old hunter, which had been kicked into a pulp, was now recovering at a speed that could be noticed by the naked eye. His clothes, which had remained unchanged throughout the injury, now even returned to their original shape only after his flesh recovered.

But Lan En was not unscathed.

He touched the back of his neck with the glove with dragon scales attached.

When he put it in front of his eyes again, his palm was already bright red, and his back inside the armor felt like it was being slowly washed by liquid.

This was a choice he made in a split-second confrontation after he confirmed that the opponent's sickle was made of only steel and no strange blood.

He was wounded in the back of his neck, but dodged a headshot and chopped off the old hunter's hand in the process.

Although Gorman's [Funeral Blade] could not break through Smaug's defense, Lann's speed was definitely not on the same level as Gorman's.

He specifically attacked the head and neck area without any armor, and he almost succeeded in using the sickle to harvest Lan's head several times.

The demon hunter has an impenetrable heavy armor, but his speed is relatively slow, and his head and neck are exposed.

Although the old hunter cannot penetrate the armor, he is fast enough and has not taken the usual fatal damage seriously so far.

All in all, the situation is actually in German's favor.

But now.
"Is the support He gives you enough, old man?"

The sword of the Lady of the Lake spun in Lan En's hand, creating a gorgeous knife flower. The young man paced calmly and asked.

His face was a little pale now, which was due to the characteristics of the witcher's body system as it was absorbing the potion and enduring the toxicity.

Under the combined effects of the [Belisarius Furnace] and the [Advanced Swallow], the wound that almost cut through the flesh to the cervical vertebrae at the back of the neck was healing rapidly.

The high temperature generated by the intense biological activity at the wound even made a 'hissing' sound in the air.

[Advanced Thunder] makes the already strengthened muscles even more powerful.

The improved reaction brought by [Advanced Blizzard] was the guarantee that although Lan En's body could not keep up in several confrontations, his nerve reaction was not left behind by Gehman's speed.

Standing up from the dent made by the impact on the roots of the big tree, German still looked as if he didn't care about any injuries or pain.

It makes people wonder whether he is still a human being?
Or is it that beneath that human skin, there is only a body that has been filled with power and controlled by the superior?

"You want to know the answer, so why don't you 'open your eyes' and see for yourself, dear child?"

The old man spoke calmly in a turbid voice.

'Open your eyes.' Lan En understood what he meant.

He wanted to open his [Clairvoyance].

(End of this chapter)