Chapter 112: Because I Told You To

The two of them stood in front of each other with neither of them talking for a few moments, an awkward silence filled the air. Eventually, Dante looked at Julius expectantly. “Can you tell me what the skill is now?” He asked, more exasperated than anything else.

Julius leaned in close and whispered into Dante’s ear. “The skill is called [Spatial Perception].”

The man leaned back and looked at Julius with an odd look. He didn’t know what was going through the scarred man’s mind, but it didn’t seem like he had expected that answer.

“Perception, not awareness?” He asked Julius for clarification.

Julius nodded. “Why? Is that weird?”

“Yeah. I have only heard of [Spatial Awareness]. It is an evolved skill for people who have some sort of general ranked perception skill and also have a spatial affinity,” Dante explained to him.

“So how is it different?” Julius asked excitedly.

The man looked at him with a baffled expression. “How am I supposed to know? It’s not my skill. I don’t know what kind of skills you evolved it from or combined it with.”

Oh. That makes sense.

“What if I hypothetically combined several skills?” Julius shared with the man. It was all hypothetical of course. He could neither confirm nor deny how accurate his information was. Still, Julius watched as the man got another interested look on his face.

Suddenly the man disappeared and reappeared to the side of Julius with no warning. Julius whipped himself to turn and look at the man who was staring intently at him. Then Dante disappeared again and reappeared back where he was before. This time though Julius thought that he felt something.

Interesting, he thought to himself.

He had a feeling that it wasn’t just sheer speed the man was using. He might be actually teleporting. The man was doing something very similar to what Julius had seen Gabriel do with his [Instantaneous Step]. Julius paid close attention as the man started to teleport frequently around Julius. Never in the same position and always changing the distance and timing.

What is he doing? Is he testing my skill? He asked himself.

He still couldn’t feel the man’s presence with [Spatial Perception] even though he was standing right in front of Julius. It was just an empty void where the man was supposed to be. However, that in itself was a sign. Just like with aura suppressing, sometimes displaying nothing was just as alerting as shining a bright light in a dark room. Now that he knew what to look for, the empty space was more peculiar than what a normal person would feel like.

It took a while for him to get used to it. He even got lost in the moment and forgot about the time. Completely forgetting that Declan was still frozen in place not far away. The man tested out Julius’s skill as if Julius was his personal guinea pig. However, Julius didn’t mind in the least. He was a willing participant and even went as far as to close his eyes to focus fully on the skill.

With his eyes closed and [Savage Dance] activated to its limit with [Empowement of Will] occasionally boosting his focus skill, he concentrated on finding Dante’s new location. He started to get used to it at an unprecedented speed. Whenever he would notice a new void in the space of his skill, he would immediately lock onto Dante.

Furthermore, Julius noticed that the man grinned devilishly the moment Julius started to lock on to him. It was like he knew exactly when Julius noticed him, which was new to Julius. In the past whenever he had been using the skill, nobody had been able to detect him using it on them. Yet, Dante definitely did.

Every time Julius would catch a whiff and zero in on Dante, the man disappeared again. However, it wasn’t only Julius who was improving. He could sense the void that man left every time started to get smaller and more blurry. He was no longer like a spotlight in the middle of the dark. He was a light bug flying around in the backyard of a house. He started to feel another thing on top of it. It was almost as if every time Dante teleported, he could feel the warping of space. It was like space was folding over itself. Still, he couldn’t quite be confident, the teleportation was much too fast for him to catch a good look.

Unfortunately, Dante stopped teleporting around once the two of them stopped making as much progress. He wasn’t exactly smiling, but his eyes were lit up excitedly. From Julius’s perspective, this was the most genuine joy he had seen from the man.

“Who would have thought.” The man mused quietly to himself.

“Pardon?” Julius asked.

“Who would have thought that some snot-nosed Tier 2 was able to help me level up a skill I haven’t increased in many years.”

“Hey, I take offense to that,” Julius complained.

The man ignored his protest. “What level is your perception skill? I don’t sense any Concepts on you, but I assume that the skill is at the precipice or really close to level 20 correct?”

“…” Julius didn’t answer. But it seemed that he didn’t have to because the man just nodded his head as if that had answered his question. He teleported again and Julius was able to sense space distorting again before the man showed up next to him. Dante patted his shoulder like they were best buds. A far cry from how he initially treated him.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

“This is what you are going to do. In two months, I want you to come back here. I will have something for you then.”

“Huh?” Julius gave Dante a disbelieving look.

“You heard me, I’m not going to repeat myself.”

“Why would I do that?” Julius asked defiantly. He wasn’t appreciating the tone of the man’s voice. Dante made it sound as if Julius didn’t have a choice in the matter.

“Because I told you to do so. That’s why. If you don’t I will personally kidnap you and bring you here after I beat you unconscious,” the man leaked out some of his aura to pressure him. Julius felt as if an elephant was sitting on his chest with a bazooka pointed at his forehead. He quickly nodded his head at the man, agreeing that he would be here in two months.

Dante let go of Julius and pretended as if nothing had just happened.