Elina pouted and then asked “Where am I going to put these? I don’t have enough spaces in my extra-dimensional bag.” He swiftly turned two uncommon pieces of leather into a pure-white backpack that could fit the cat-girl, and handed to her.

Michael muttered “Okay, fine~, maybe after I carry you to level-ten and you can evolve into a sexy angelic kitten, you’ll change your mind. Anyway, I feel like there’s some more gear around here somewhere…”

As he gazed around the area, he heard a high-pitched ringing, coming from underneath a large pile of frozen wolf fragments. A gigantic sword was floating above his body, as he bent down and reached underneath the carnage, grabbing ahold of a silver gauntlet and pulling it out.

When he tried to ‘Scan’ it, he was given a vague and obvious description, so Elina quickly ran over to him and attempted to use her ability a few times before her skill-level rose. She yelled “This-this is actually an Epic Divine Artifact!?” before hyperventilating and nearly fainting.

He snickered and placed his right hand on her shoulder, while staring into her adorable golden eyes and telling her “Relax~, it’s just a level-ten Epic, hehe~. Don’t worry, if we find some more Bosses today, you’ll probably get one too.” Then he read the ‘Scan’ details and said “Holy fucking shit-cunt! Wow, what is with this ridiculous difference between Rare and Epic? Well, no wonder it was five times more expensive at the vendor…”

“Aegis of the Heretical Nephilim: Increases wearer’s Strength, Endurance, and Vitality by six points; increases Agility and Charisma by three points. Raises Defense Rating by forty points. Wearer receives twenty-percent more healing from Light Element spells. The shield’s strength is dependent on the Aura stat. Counts as a left-hand shield, gauntlet, bracer, and upper-arm guard. Soulbound to Michael and cannot be used by anyone else. Epic Quality, requires level-ten to wield.”

The backpack-wearing Priestess breathed deeply and attempted to calm herself down a bit, before she watched him place the beautiful, silver gauntlet on his left hand. Even though it appeared to be made out of thick platinum, the piece of armor was actually nearly weightless.

Once Michael’s fingers were all the way inside, a pitch black symbol of a serpentine-dragon devouring its own tail appeared on the back of the hand. Then he felt as if his left forearm was being struck by lightning momentarily, before illusory glowing-white chains slithered up his upper-arm.

They wrapped around his bicep, tricep and shoulder until the whole arm was completely covered in armor. It didn’t burn, but in such a hot environment, having warm metal coating his skin felt terrible.

He complained “You would think that Epic gear would come with an air-conditioning mode… Well, maybe Darkness shit would be cold?” Then, as if it were responding to his desires, the armor cooled down rapidly and settled at a comfortable temperature.

Michael concentrated on his chest armor and then underwear, and realized that it all had a decent amount of heat-control. After hearing the cat-girl giggling at his surprised expression, he reached out with his right hand and placed his palm on her left breast.

Elina started laughing louder, as he muttered “You knew about this the whole fucking time… I always wondered how you managed to keep from sweating to death with these gigantic heaters on your chest.”

She asked “How long are you planning on fondling me? It’s not that I don’t like the way it feels, but we should probably keep going… I mean, hunting magical-beasts.”

However, before he was willing to leave, Michael sent out his wisp-form and flew around through the area for a few minutes and made sure that there was no more ‘loot’ laying around. He complained “It’d be nice if they just deposited the shit directly into your inventory, but I guess that wouldn’t really work if you didn’t have enough space.”

Right when he was about to leave, Inari jumped off of his shoulder and sniffed around for a few seconds. Elina complained “It’s still hot, even if my robe is cooling me down slightly, so can you please stop playing with my breasts?”

He pulled his hand away and then watched the little fox start darting off to the west. Michael casted his ‘Stat-Boost’ on the Priestess and himself, before he began walking leisurely after the kit.

Once his mana regenerated, he re-applied ‘Angelic Grace’ and ‘Lightening’ early, which kept him from having to experiencing the horrible pain of growing wings again. Each one of his steps felt twice as heavy as normal, even with the ten-percent reduction.

That was the effect of having twenty-three Strength, Vitality, and Endurance, while only possessing nine Agility. His body was literally more than six-hundred pounds, but since his ability to carry that weight had increased so dramatically, he didn’t have any trouble walking.

Even with all of that running around and dodging, he found that his Stamina hadn’t dropped that much. On the other hand, Elina was panting loudly, while struggling to catch up to his relatively quick walking speed.

Michael telekinetically lowered his gigantic sword in front of her, “Sit down on it, I’ll carry you. Oh, and don’t worry about getting cut by the blade, cause it only works when I want it to.”

He was able to lift her entire body into the air, but it did cost a small amount of mana to maintain, so it was easier to just hold onto the hilt with his right hand. Elina sighed loudly, as she laid down on the surprisingly cool Arcane Siegeblade, then asked “Do you have anything to drink and eat? I’m starving and so thirsty that I might actually die…”

A green-apple appeared in his gauntlet-covered hand, and was immediately filled with mana, before levitating towards the starving cat-girl. She grabbed it and started eating, while still laying on her stomach and holding onto the giant sword tightly.

Eventually, Michael managed to catch up with Inari, just before she finally killed a gigantic ‘Demonic Boar, Level-13, Rank-F.’ They made it in time to gain the experience from that monstrous pig.

However, it wasn’t just a single beast, but a whole horde of them that were stampeding by; whether they were running away from something or charging towards somewhere, it was impossible to tell with just a glance. After all, the creature’s were all ‘Chaotic’ so it was relatively difficult to determine their agenda: if they even had one.

Michael said “Damn it, if I just had some fucking AoE spells… Oh well, I guess it’s time to find out how hard my OP-ness has gotten.” Then he tilted his sword upwards, and used his left hand to catch the sliding Priestess, before placing her feet-first onto the ground.

Rather than boars, the monstrous creatures appeared more like rhinoceroses, covered with black fur, which had long and thick, alligator-like tails. Inari was only able to hurt them, after she used her ‘Expansion’ spell to the maximum, combined with devouring vines.

Once she tore out and devoured a mana-core, she had to quickly jump off of the corpse, before it was devoured by the other demonic-beasts. All of them were roaring and growling, while seemingly running in random directions within a fairly large clearing.

All the trees and foliage that had once been there, were completely crushed by the herd, and they were constantly fighting against each-other. However, Michael could see that on the outskirts of the three acre field, there were packs of bright-green wolves, large white-furred Elite tigers, and even a few earth-dragons that were casually picking off the furry-rhinos at random.

At the very center of the clearing, there was a massive, twisted and seemingly dead grey tree. Occasionally, vibrant and gigantic red apples would start growing from the branches, and then the branches would move, launching the mysterious fruit into the chaotic maelstrom of boars.

When a few of the pigs would devour it, they would each divide, like a cell, into two magical-beasts of the same rank and level as the original. When Michael witnessed that strange scene by abusing his wisp, he muttered “Okay~ then… I’m just gonna pretend like I didn’t see that.”