Within an expansive cottage, a boy with silver hair could be seen as he conversed with an elderly man with brown hair.

The boy was Ezra and the man, as we see, is Fredrick.

"You called?" Ezra said.

He had been practicing his swordsmanship as usual when a recruit came to tell him that Fredrick had beckoned him.

"Yes, it\'s because of this" Frederick said as he pulled out a vial of dark blue liquid and handed it to Ezra, who scrutinized it carefully, before saying…

"It\'s not as good as I would\'ve liked, but it\'ll do" Ezra said and then asked…

"What about the other thing?"

Frederick then pours mana into a rusted ring, and we see a scroll with runes emanating a gold color laying on his hands a moment later.

Ezra simply looked at this and said…

"Gold or Dark-gold?"

To which Frederick answered…

"Gold"

Ezra nodded, before taking the scroll, as well as a magic pen, and starting to scribble a contract.

It was a soul contract, one of Gold-rank.

One should know that items were ranked in the following order: Copper, Bronze, Silver, Gold, Epic-gold, Platinum, Diamond and Legendary.

But we also have those known as mid-ranks, like:

- Gray, an item better than Bronze but not up to Silver.

- Dark-gold, an item better than silver but not up to Gold rank.

- Semi-legendary, an item better than diamond but not up to Legendary rank.

Normally, Ezra would still be planning to get the plant from the treasury, but when he made his latest scheme, he realized that Fredrick\'s original strength was needed.

And that brings us to the current situation.

*Scribble*Scribble*

After five minutes of writing, Ezra handed the contract over to Fredrick after signing it.

"Hmm, seems good enough" Fredrick said.

The contract entailed that in return for curing the curse, Fedrick would pledge his loyalty as Ezra\'s knight and would serve him for as long as he lived, and that the Un-limiting Dew would be his.

It was undoubtedly the worst way to write a contract, and was totally unfair.

Yet, Fredrick signed it right away, baffling Ezra.

But before he could speak, the contract dissipated into particles that attached themselves to their bodies.

Ezra gazed at Fredrick with a questioning look.

"What? My instincts say nothing bad is going to come from the contract, and I trust it"

Ezra facepalmed as he heard such a thing, but didn\'t bother saying anything to change his mind.

After all, such a thing worked in his favor.

"Ok, let\'s do it" Ezra said and Frederick nodded, before taking off his shirt and lying down.

The black part of his stomach region was visible as Fedrick asked…

"How long do I have?"

"Take or leave about ten seconds"

"Good, let\'s begin" Fredrick said, before drinking the potion in one gulp.

The mana freezing potion.

Just like the name implied, the potion freezed mana in the sense that it made it inactive.

Which was why Navarro thought they wanted a high ranking mage dead.

A mage utilized a mana circuit to channel mana, which resulted in spells.

A mage without mana is no more than an ordinary person.

But Fredrick\'s curse absorbed mana to grow, which was why he could only release the aura of an Expert-rank.

It acted like a living organism that fed on mana.

Should he try to go all out, the curse would eat him up in mere seconds.

Ten seconds was how long the potion\'s effect would last.

"Ugh!" Fredrick groaned but pressed on.

The moment Fredrick drank it, Ezra cut the black region in his stomach and we see black substance evaporate rapidly.

Why didn\'t he do this before? Simple. Without his mana frozen, his body would\'ve rapidly healed itself using it and the curse would absorb that mana, thereby making it grow even stronger.

But without mana, the curse was an engine without fuel, and such an engine could only shut down.

The black substance was rapidly evaporating, but not without causing harm to Frederick. As it was drying up, the curse kept heating up his organs.

This actually made it evaporate faster, but equally damaged Fredrick\'s body.

This was what Ezra was here for.

As it damaged his body, Ezra emanated his aura, which was made of mana and attracted the substance in his direction.

Like a child that suddenly saw food at the end of a tunnel and rushed towards it, the black substance tried to latch onto Ezra.

He dodged it at the last moment, with some evaporating in the process. It tried to jump Ezra two more times, having the same result in both.

All these things might seem like a long process, but with everything happening simultaneously, only seven seconds passed.

By the eighth second, Fredrick suddenly veered his body sideways, making the substance fall out of his body and evaporate even faster.

By the ninth second, Ezra expanded his mana, causing the substance to latch onto him even harder.

If at first the black substance was the size of a pie, now it was smaller than a cookie.

The tenth second passed and the mana had begun to flow, but the substance had dregs left.

Seeing this, Frederick used a light spell and scorched the remaining black substance out of existence, but he also scorched his innards to a terrifying degree.

With no strength left, Fredrick fell on his back while Ezra hastily emptied two healing potions on his burnt innards and in his mouth.

\'Come on, get up!\' thought Ezra as he looked at Fredrick\'s body.

Five seconds passed with no response and Ezra was starting to lose hope…when suddenly…BAM!

Ezra found himself impaled in a wall with twelve bones fractured.

\'What the heck?!\' Ezra screamed inwardly as he spurted blood from his eyes and ears.

"Ugh" Ezra groaned as he removed his caved-in body from the wall and fell hopelessly to the ground.

He was only able to survive because he guarded his chest by crossing his arms over each other.

His sight was becoming woozy while lying on the floor, when he heard Fredrick\'s voice.

"Ugh, my head. What happened?"

"Wait, before that, where is- Oh man! What happened here?!" he suddenly exclaimed as I heard his footsteps rush in my direction…and then, everything just went black.

—------------------------

"Ahh!" I screamed as soon as I opened my eyes.

I felt my body hurting in multiple places, when a voice rang out.

"Whew, you\'re awake. How are you feeling?" Fredrick asked.

"Something happened that blasted me into the wall. What was that?" Ezra quickly asked.

He hadn\'t seen what hit him. In fact, he was only able to mount the small defense because his sharpened instincts had sensed danger.

"Haha...that, well, that was me breaking through to the Mid stage of Master-rank"

Ezra\'s eyes widened at the answer, before a devilish smile grew on his face and he said…

"It seems like the plan might proceed even smoother than I hoped"

"That\'s true" Fredrick agreed.

"Good, so when are you leaving?" Ezra asked.

"I\'ll be leaving tomorrow" Fredrick answered.

"Good, and be ready for anything" Ezra warned.

"I will do so" Fredrick replied.

"So how does it feel to be a Master?" Ezra asked.

"Honestly, I\'m still a bit lost. I\'ll have to do some tests to get a feel of my new strength"

"Well then, this trip should prove to be more than enough to do so. And also, I\'ll need to hide your rank from the public eye"

Fredrick nodded and said…

"I\'ve given you a healing potion. Your body should be good to go by dusk"

Ezra nodded.

—---------------------

Meanwhile…

Within a small room was a bald man with an eye patch and a rough black beard reading through some paperwork, when the lights suddenly flickered.

"Well?" the man said without looking up.

No one could be seen in the room, but a voice rang out from the darkness.

? "They\'re said to go on an expedition two weeks from now" the voice answered, before adding…

"So, what are you going to do now?"

"Just that? What about the location?" The man said as he raised his head.

"There isn\'t any information about that"

"Hmm, what about their skills, how good are they?" the man asked, probing for more information.

"That\'s hard to estimate, but what I know is that they\'re all growing and getting stronger. Mad Fist also seems to have advanced his rank, but there\'s no way of knowing exactly how strong he\'s gotten"

"Hmm-"

The man muttered while rubbing his head.

"-this is troublesome"

Different thoughts passed through his head.

\'Those guys were mid-rank before, and now they want to come back. I can\'t have that! And if I leave them alone, there\'s no telling what\'ll happen If they keep growing stronger. But…I can\'t be the only one thinking like this, there\'s got to be others. It seems I\'ll have to work with those moles again\' the man concluded his thoughts as he said…

"Tell the boys to get ready for battle. And call in the moles. We\'ll have to nip this problem in the bud if we want to survive"

"Yes sir" the voice said, before the light flickered again, leaving only the man and the sound of moving pages.

It seemed like just as some Alchemists had thought, the undercurrents were moving, just not in the direction they thought.

As both sides moved to ensure their gains, time moved unceasingly, and before long, two weeks had passed.

It was time for the expedition many were expecting.