Leo walked out of the tower with disappointment. He had spent almost an hour but didn't find anything useful for him.
The issue for him was that he couldn't buy any magic-related products without going to the upper floors. But once he did that, they would ask him to show that he was qualified to go there. He apparently had to be a noble to even look at the products there.
He obviously couldn't show that so he decided to just leave. This was the reason why he could never buy any products related to magic. After failing to do that, he decided he couldn't do anything useful in the city anymore. It was time to leave.
A major reason why he wanted to leave had to do with the number of 4th Circle and 5th Circle Mages in the city. All of them would be able to detect any small magic fluctuations happening in the city.
Now that Leo was in the Peak-Stage of the 3rd Star, he was planning on breaking through to the next level. To help him, he had the Radiant Apple that he had obtained in the Valkyr's Forest. He had saved it for so long for this reason. He could use it to easily break through to the 4th Star if what he heard about it was correct.
He already knew where to go for the time being. He wanted to find a place that he could use to break through without being interrupted. That meant he had to find a place that was isolated from both Magical Beasts and humans alike.
He knew two places like that. One was Eldridge. After what happened to it, it would be completely deserted. And because it was a city, the Magical Beasts wouldn't be able to enter it either. But he didn't want to go somewhere that would influence his emotions that much. It would be very unhelpful if he was trying to break through.
The alternative was to go to the Stronghold he had rescued Marcus from. It was the place that he had torched down several months ago. If he had burned it down, only ruins would be left of it. The villagers definitely had no interest in being anywhere near that place.
He decided to go there until the blood moon. He could train there for as long as he wanted. If the blood moon didn't affect the compass, he would stay there to train.
He walked out of the gate from the city and into the path outside. He remembered the route from his previous journey very well so he just had to follow it. The only difference was that he had to keep up with the pace of the caravan the previous time.
If he was going by himself, then he was faster than horses too. The reason was that he wasn't planning on traveling on the ground.
The minute he left the city gates, he slowly lifted himself into the air. He gained height until he was at the same height as the city gates. He looked in the direction that he wanted to go and shot himself in that direction.
A blur shot through the skies over the forest toward the direction of the village. The people on the ground looked at the blur with eyes full of envy. Some had gazes of admiration. All of them wanted to be as strong as the blur themselves.
On a horse, he was able to get to Eldridge from the stronghold in around 10 hours. But it took him only 4 hours to get there by himself. He passed the village with so much speed that the people living there thought it was just a bird. No one had observed that keenly.
He landed on the same entrance that he had escaped out of.
It was the most damaged part of the entire stronghold. The entire entrance had collapsed into itself, blocking off entry into the stronghold from there. He looked around at the barren ground. The fire had spread to the garden as well. He was surprised that it hadn't spread into a forest fire.
He walked down the walkway to the blocked-off entrance. He pointed his hand at it and shot a series of Shadow Blades that sliced through the debris. He walked forward and pushed a wave of magic forward. It pushed the pieces of debris into the stronghold, giving him a narrow point of entry.
He walked in while covering himself in a Shadow Barrier to shield himself from any debris falling down. If he pushed part of the debris forward, he knew that the unsupported ceiling could collapse on him.
He quickly walked past the unstable entrance and took a few steps inside. Just as he properly got inside the place, the entrance collapsed into itself, closing off his exit. He wasn't worried at all since he could create the exit at any time.
He also knew that there was another exit somewhere, along with access to the floor above where he would be able to directly fly out. He walked deep into the stronghold, trying to find places that weren't as destroyed by the fire.
It was very dark inside, but he didn't need the light to see with his incredible perception. He walked to the room where he had killed the nobles. He saw that there were still remnants of his manslaughter.
All the corpses along with their dimensional rings were still in the same location. Leo was very surprised when he saw this. He thought that the family would try to find the people once they found that they were missing. Clearly, they had either ignored the disappearances or are still looking for them.
He knew it wouldn't be a problem for him unless the person who got into the fray was the Marquis himself. Based on what he understood, a person had to at least be a certain power level to be a noble.
For Marquises, the minimum power level would be the 5th Circle. A powerhouse at that level would be able to level him to the ground in a few seconds. Of course, his breaking through would change that.
It would go from a few seconds to a dozen seconds. But the change was that Leo would be able to hide from 5th Circle Mages. With Valkyr's Deception, he could fool anyone an entire level above him. So he would be able to trick Early-Stage 5th Circle Mages as a 4th Star Mage.
He walked past the bodies to the area where they used to store the slaves. There wasn't any trace of living people in the stronghold, but he could still see the remnants of what used to happen. He could see the blood splatters on the cell walls as he walked past them.
He finally got to an area where he could sit without worrying about space. He had a huge open room where he could fit two of his current rooms. He took out a chair from his dimensional ring and set it on the ground.
He was completely prepared for the trip with the furniture from his old house. He sat on the chair and got ready to start.
