Ten Thousand Credits Reward, Temporary Bodyguard
Athena was dumbstruck.
The five Shadowwind Wolves that had nearly killed her were just wiped out by Xalen in seconds?!
Was this a joke?!
Was she seeing things?
Or was she so exhausted that she was hallucinating?
But the next moment, her gaze fell on the dozens of other wolf carcasses scattered around, and a jolt of clarity hit her.
An absurd, impossible thought surfaced in her mind.
Could all of these Shadowwind Wolf corpses be Xalen’s doing?
The thought left her frozen on the spot.
Xalen, on the other hand, paid Athena no mind.
He was too busy excitedly field-dressing the fresh batch of Shadowwind Wolves.
This squad of five was the biggest group he’d encountered during his stakeout.
Xalen got to work without hesitation, cutting them open and extracting the Gene Crystals from inside.
As for the bodies, they’d stay right there to sweeten the bait pile.
Watching this, Athena was absolutely floored.
What she was seeing confirmed her wild guess.
All these Shadowwind Wolves really were Xalen's kills?
He killed twenty Shadowwind Wolves all by himself?!
Suddenly, Athena thought about Xalen’s score.
Twenty kills wasn’t just passing—it was easily a high score.
If Xalen took down the Alpha Wolf too, he’d probably get first place in the entire graduation trial!
Her thoughts then drifted to the bet between Xalen and Rick.
Looking at it now, Xalen had obviously been hiding his true strength all along!
But here was the thing: hadn't he awakened a lizard gene?
So where the heck was this crazy power coming from?
Athena stared at Xalen's handsome profile, utterly lost.
Finally, Xalen wiped his hands clean and stood up with a satisfied smile.
Turning to Athena, the smile on his face widened. “Athena, you alright?”
“Thanks to you, I scored quite a bit just now.”
“Um... Xalen, how did you do that? How are you this strong?”
Athena snapped back to her senses, her face alight with burning curiosity.
She couldn’t figure it out. How had Xalen gotten so terrifyingly strong?
Had he leveled up?
But even with a level up, no one should be able to one-shot Shadowwind Wolves like that.
Unless... Xalen had somehow already broken through to Awakened Master rank.
But that would be even more ridiculous.
So what on earth was going on?!
“Heh, guess.”
Xalen didn’t give a straight answer, offering only a mysterious smile.
While he was ready to show off some power, he still planned to keep the Tyrant Dragon Gene a secret.
Because this “one-of-a-kind” gene type was completely new to him, too.
What if some top-tier experts out there had methods to steal genes? That would be a disaster.
So, until he had enough power to protect himself, Xalen wasn’t going to reveal the Tyrant Dragon Gene.
As for whoever got curious about his power spike? Let them guess.
Thinking this, Xalen winked at Athena.
Athena blushed slightly and looked away.
“Fine, don’t tell me if you don’t want to. Anyway, thank you for saving my life.”
She didn’t press the issue.
It was common knowledge that a Gene Soldier’s exact details were somewhat taboo to ask about.
Some abilities and talents weren't meant to be broadcast publicly.
Keeping them confidential was perfectly normal.
Hearing her words, Xalen teased, “Athena, I saved your life. So how are you gonna repay me?”
Athena immediately rolled her eyes.
“Xalen, please don’t tell me you’re expecting me to repay you with my hand in marriage?”
“That would be ideal.”
Xalen grinned.
Back in the past, facing a goddess-level beauty like Athena, he would have been a nervous, insecure wreck.
But now? Not a chance.
In this world, strength was the ultimate source of confidence.
As he saw it, he was now worthy of any woman.
Athena paused, then gave Xalen a long, appraising look.
She finally noticed the change in him.
The confidence radiating from within—that was something the old Xalen completely lacked.
She had to admit, this new version of Xalen had a special charm to him.
But she wasn’t about to swoon that easily. “Tch, dream on.”
“The most I’ll do is pay you some money as a reward.”
“Money works too,” Xalen said, perking up immediately.
Seeing his suddenly money-hungry expression, Athena couldn’t help but chuckle in exasperation.
But this actually worked perfectly for her.
She followed up quickly: “Xalen, how about this: I’ll give you ten thousand credits. But the condition is, you keep protecting me for another day. What do you say?”
Huh?
This time, it was Xalen’s turn to be surprised.
He looked at Athena quizzically.
So, Athena wasn’t just trying to thank him; she was looking to hire a bodyguard on the spot.
The reason was simple. Although the five wolves were dead, her situation was still precarious.
After all, she was currently in a severely weakened state.
In this condition, even bumping into a single stray Shadowwind Wolf would be extremely dangerous for her.
So, she was taking this chance to hire Xalen as a temporary protector.
Catching on, Xalen smiled. “No problem.”
Ten thousand credits wasn’t chump change. Protecting Athena for a bit was worth it.
But then, Xalen laid out his own condition.
“Athena, I’m not leaving this spot for now. If you’re hiring me, you’ll have to stick around here with me.”
Athena nodded without any objection.
For her, as long as Xalen provided protection, it didn’t matter where they were.
Plus, she was actually quite curious to see what exactly Xalen was doing here.
So, Athena copied Xalen and climbed up into the big tree to hide.
While resting and recovering her strength, she observed Xalen’s operation. It didn’t take long for the realization to dawn on her.
“He’s... actively luring the Shadowwind Wolves straight to him!!”
She now understood why Xalen had piled up so many wolf corpses here: to bait more Shadowwind Wolves into coming.
Watching Xalen methodically slaughter every new wolf that showed up, the full picture became crystal clear.
But this only deepened her shock!
Everyone else went to great lengths to avoid Shadowwind Wolves, but Xalen was deliberately drawing them in!
From the looks of it, he didn’t even seem scared of attracting a whole pack!
Just what kind of monstrous power was this?!
And what kind of insane confidence did it take?
Was this Xalen even the same person she used to know?
A powerful, intense curiosity about Xalen bloomed inside her.
Xalen paid no attention to Athena’s lingering gaze. He just casually cleaned up the kills and hopped back into his tree.
This time, they waited for half an hour without any new wolves showing up.
So, he simply took out a Gene Crystal and started absorbing it.
His core objective hadn’t changed.
He had to use the time during the trial to level up as much as possible and gain stronger Localized Beastification abilities.
But just then, a new human figure appeared down below.
Xalen didn’t care much at first, but when he saw what the person was doing, he immediately let out a cold yell.
“Stop right there!”
…