Unlimited Power 02 - The Ranger's Domain

                      In the end, Ryan decided to talk alone with Zoe. Although he was doing something that will be beneficial to her and the people on the base, Ryan was also aware that he could be causing some problems to her future. That was why he thought of some countermeasures.

                      Zoe was training with her Blazing Crossbow is one of the many training rooms alone. Fortunately, she was using fake bolts. Otherwise, her attacks would have destroyed the targets and the walls. When Ryan suddenly appeared in the run, Zoe smile because Ryan was the person who helped her reunite with her father, after all. However, she frowned when she saw the serious expression on his face.

"What is wrong, big brother?" Zoe asked.

"I am not…" Ryan sighed. "Whatever… we need to talk about something serious."

"Did something happen?" Zoe asked while she was approaching.

"No, but something will happen," Ryan said and then took a deep breath before sitting down and resting his back against the ground. "For several reasons, I decided to give you a gift, Zoe. The number one reason is that that gift is going to help you, the second reason is that that will make an important member of this place. The third reason is because you will be able to save many lives with it… and the last reason is that I don't want to become an important member of this place."

"What gift?" Zoe asked. "Why don't you want to be a member of this group? Many people here care about, and Arthur is here too."

"So, you know him, huh," Ryan said.

"I play with him now and then," Zoe said. 

"Well, how I can say this…" Ryan sighed again. "I have my goals, Zoe, and I can't let myself be bound by some situations. In the future, I will return to this place less and less often. I want to reach my goal no matter what… but as you said, Arthur is here, and I want to make sure that this place will be safe enough for him. With the gift, you will be able to keep this place safe. However, I won't lie and say that this is just for the sake of everyone, I am also doing this to avoid getting involved in a mess, and I even might involve you in something troublesome. This gift is that valuable."

"You talk like my dad… when he is about to give me bad news," Zoe said with her head down.

"Let's just say this will help you but also cause some problems," Ryan said. "I will try to decrease the chances of such problems happening by fighting away from here, but I can't promise that I will succeed."

"But you will do your best?" Zoe asked.

"I guess so…" Ryan scratched the back of his head. "Anyway, I am going to teach you a certain spell… this spell will save many lives and will also heal your legs."

"Really?" Zoe asked, surprised. "Not even big sis, Alissa can heal my legs."

"Big sis…" Ryan frowned. "Regardless, you have to promise that you won't tell anyone that I taught you this. If someone asks, you will have to say that you obtained when you defeated a certain monster."

"I have to lie?" Zoe frowned. "But that is bad."

"There are two types of lies, the first type hurt others, but there is another type that doesn't hurt anyone," Ryan said. "This is the second type, and we are doing this to protect you and me. To avoid problems, you will have to change your fighting style a little bit. You will fight by using monsters."

"I can't do that," Zoe said.

"I will teach you," Ryan said. "However, you will keep training with crossbows or bows. That way, if something happens, you will be able to surprise some troublesome individuals. Do we have a deal?"

"Okay… big bro helped me before, now is my turn to help you," Zoe said with her eyes filled of determination.

"… Thanks, you saved me from a lot of trouble," Ryan said and then patted Zoe's head.

                      In the end, Ryan used Teacher's support and turned Zoe into his student. It took him a few hours and a lot of mana, but eventually, Zoe learned Full-Heal and Summon Giant Bee. She had a lot of mana, but not enough to use Full-Heal, but Mark decided to lent her some magic items that will increase her mana. Ryan also made sure to warn Mark about his intentions, he trusted Zoe since she was a good kid, but he didn't trust Mark. So, he had to be quite persuasive about his warning. If you mess up…  well, you won't have another chance to mess up in the future. That was what Ryan said.

                      When Ryan left the base, it was already dark, and he managed to follow his path with his head clear since he found a pretty good solution to a certain problem. However, soon some worries began to bother him… Ryan recalled the conversation he had with Mark before going to talk with Zoe.

"Ryan, did you notice that the number of dragons decreased considerably?" Mark asked. "The number of dragons on the coast and across the country is pretty small considering the number of dragons that destroyed our country eighty days ago."

"… I pondered about that several times," Ryan frowned. "Do you know something about that?"

"Thanks to you and Alissa, we found some explanations for that," Mark said. "Some dragons notice the advantage of fusing their bodies with of the humans, and many people like Alissa are being born daily. As for another explanation, it seems that many bosses of the dungeons are hunting dragons to strengthen themselves. Some are even using the weapons being dropped by the dragons."

                      Ryan felt a headache when he recalled that… many people like Alissa are being born every day. It was only obvious that something like that was bound to happen since dragons can't use dungeons normally, and for some reason, Ryan felt like those people didn't have the problems that Alissa and Orgar had to deal with.