Hitman with a Badass System

The pair of red glow soon diminished into darkness. But Michael was sure something stared at them from above. He looked around and began to hear a continuous clicking noise followed by soft growls.

"Stay close to me," Michael said to Sabrina as she moved closer to him and watched his back.

"Where are you bastard?" Michael mumbled, activating his X-ray vision.

His thermal vision swept across the area around them until he saw a silhouette of what looked like a ten feet bear jumping from one wall to another.

Despite its size, the creature showed the agility of a trained parkour expert.

On top of its size and agility, the creature also possessed the ability to turn invisible. Fortunately, unlike Sabrina, Michael had a thermal vision to detect the creature.

"A Core Strengthening stage creature," Michael mumbled under his breath. Since he bought the ability to detect the relative cultivation stage of the creatures in Shadow Realm, Michael was able to see how powerful the creature was.

Although it was one stage lower than him, its size and agility made up for its weakness in the cultivation stage.

As Michael followed the creature's movements, Sabrina saw a blue dot on Michael's chest. Michael already noticed the creature taking aim at him, but before he could react, Sabrina pushed him aside out of the blue laser line.

It felt like the predator was hunting him. The clicking noise, the invisibility, and the laser line made the creature extremely similar to the predator.

Boom!

Michael felt a hot wave of air brushing past him when Sabrina pushed him. Then, at that exact moment, he heard an explosion behind him and turned back to see a green hot liquid eroding the ground beneath.

There was no doubt in Sabrina's mind that if the green goo had hit them, they would have melted to the bones.

Michael could hear the sizzling sound coming from the ground along with the hot wave.

"This is why you need a shield," Michael mumbled. Recently he had been getting into so many close combat fights without involving spells. During these fights, the responsive shield would not activate and protect him from the blows because it only protects him from spells and attacks formed using energies.

Michael may have reached 98% mastery in Serpent Maga but having no shield to defend himself was still a weakness as far as he was concerned.

"Where is it? Can you see it?" Sabrina asked as she moved with her back against Michael's back.

They moved in a circle while Michael tracked the beast, who kept jumping around second after second.

He couldn't make out its full figure, but it vaguely resembled a wolf the size of a ten feet bear. Since he was using thermal vision to see the creature's heat signature, he couldn't make out the creature's other features, such as skin color, number of teeth, or whether it had fur or not.

"Ignitia," Michael quickly raised his sword, firing a bolt of lightning at the creature.

His lightning bolt traveled at the speed of a lightning flash yet the creature was able to escape being hit by the bolt by jumping to the wall on the other side.

Its speed stunned Michael,

"Did you hit it?" Sabrina asked,

"It escaped,"

"Can you see it?" she was surprised,

"If you can't see it with your eyes, see it with your other senses. Close your eyes and listen," Michael whispered to Sabrina and she closed her eyes without any hesitation. She trusted him completely.

Michael didn't lie to her though. He trained his senses to paint a mental map using his other senses back on earth and could still do it. However, he had no need to use that ability because he possessed the X-ray vision to track the beast.

However, Michael asked Sabrina to close her eyes because he wanted to cast the Death range and boost his power quickly. Since the arena was already dark, no one could see the place getting darker.

The moment Michael felt his full power bubbling inside him waiting to be unleashed, Michael raised both his arms, shooting two dark lightning bolts out of his hands towards the beast.

"GRRRRRRHHHH!"

The beast jumped, trying to evade but this time, Michael's lightning bolts were faster than the beast. The beast immediately let out an ear-piercing roar in pain. One lightning bolt went through its shoulder and the other went grazing its skin.

Michael quickly turned off his thermal vision to see luminescent blue blood trails on the wall. The blood trail was leading them further into the path before him. The blood was the first colorful thing he had seen in the shadow realm so far. Until now, everything else looked black and white.

"You hit it," Sabrina was a quick study. Hence, she could vaguely track the beast's movements when she closed her eyes and focused on the surroundings. After the beast roared, Sabrina abruptly opened her eyes to see the blood trail.

If the beast dashed at him after being hit, Michael would have felt relieved. However, now he was concerned. The creature seemed to possess intelligence. Thus, it ran away instead of dumbly lunging at Michael.

"Let's go. But be careful and don't drop your guard," Michael said and continued his journey into the narrow straight pathway.

After walking for a few minutes, the blood trail disappeared, and everything became normal. Nonetheless, both of them stayed silent, focusing their senses.

While cautiously making his way forward, Micheal noticed the engravings in the wall beside him starting to form shapes of figures once again. Seeing the figures on the wall, Michael deviated from his path and approached the wall as Sabrina followed him behind.

"I have no idea what you're looking at," Sabrina sighed,

"I like these engraving designs. I am thinking about getting them for my new mansion," Michael lied but there was a little bit of truth to his answer,

"New mansion?" Sabrina tilted her head,

"Hmm," Michael nodded,

Building a new home for him in River town had been his plan for a long time. Unfortunately, because of the guardians guild, the dark lord, the prophecy, and everything, Michael didn't have time to plan his new home. 

However, after Gaya and Michael's engagement, they both decided to start building a new home in River town. Michael could easily afford a large piece of land in Royal land and if he asked, the king would probably give Michael a land for free as having a 5-star alchemist in their kingdom would boost its value to the next level.

Instead of building his home in the wealthiest kingdom in Elon or living in Baron Totonk's mansion, Michael planned to build a castle for him in River town, which is a part of Kingdom Bradford.

"What about Baron Totonk's mansion? As a king, shouldn't you live there?" Sabrina asked Michael while he was trying to make sense of the engravings.

At that moment, Michael saw the lion with wings once again. It was standing on an elevated platform and looking at the thousands of people on the ground who seemed to be worshiping the lion.

There were several figures standing behind the lion including a few pointy ears beings,

"Elves," Michael immediately recognized them due to their iconic pointy ears. In addition to the elves, he also saw dwarves, orcs, beastmen, and several dragons flying above them.

Even the crowd on the ground consisted of all races, not only humans.

"That's a mansion. What I want is a castle," his words surprised Sabrina. 

After hearing that he wants a castle, she couldn't help raising her brows,

"You want a castle?"

However, after thinking of his status, it made sense to Sabrina,

"Well, you are a king after all. It makes sense for you to rule Bradford living in a castle,"

Sabrina stepped closer to Michael, joining him in watching the wall,

"I am only going to live there, not rule,"  Michael calmly said without even turning his gaze away from the wall,

"Huh?' Sabrina was taken aback by surprise,

"What do you mean?"

"I am not interested in being a king. Sect Leader Claire and the Elders can rule the kingdom better than me," 

Sabrina was speechless as Michael continued,

"I like the way some kingdoms in the Southern continent are ruled. Rather than being ruled by one man or woman, they are ruled by several, each responsible for developing one aspect of the kingdom,"

"How could you throw away the kingship after everything you did to get it?" Sabrina creased her brows,

"I am not going to throw away Sabrina. I'll be the king, except I won't sit on the throne all day and rule the kingdom myself," Michael nonchalantly said and moved along the wall to see more figures and scenes in the wall,

The portion of the wall before him contained a scene where Michael noticed several dragons flying around a majestic castle surrounded by a forest.

He searched for the lion with wings but didn't find the beast. Instead, he saw a lady with dragon wings floating near the castle along with a little girl.

Michael took a few steps to the right to see countless dragons breathing fire down on human soldiers and the one who led the dragons was the lady with wings Michael had seen before.

"If you are serious about building a castle, I know a dwarf who's a 5-star architect. He owes me a favor. I can lend him to you,"

"Really?" Michael turned his head towards Sabrina,

"Yes"

"Then I won't say no to that. Where do I find him?"

Sabrina shook her head with a smile,

"I'll bring him to you. Just tell me, where can I find you?"

Sabrina sounded so sure about getting out of the Shadow realm alive because she was confident with Ghost by her side, she could survive anything.

"After this, if we survive, you can find me in the Sunrise sect,"

Michael turned his gaze back to the wall. He continued to walk along the wall looking at the engravings of the war between dragons and humans, until the engravings changed, showing Michael a giant hydra.

Just looking at the size of the four-headed hydra and recalling the pair of eyes staring at him from the abyss in the Stormville mountain, Michael felt a chill running through his spine.

Michael slowly moved his gaze down from the hydra to see a man carrying a sword and a battle ax in each hand standing before the hydra. But, unfortunately, Michael could only see his behind, not his face.

"DON!"