The encounter with the other adventurer party had gone poorly, and Mash was waiting for Red to give them the reason for why. Jill and Luke were similarly giving Red some inquisitive glances. She could only take so much, and eventually Red sighed, seeming to pull the words out as she did so.

“It’s because she was a Goldenwood elf. “

Her voice quivered with poorly hidden disgust, and her hands clenched into fists. Her eye grew a bit distant too. The response told him a whole lot of nothing though, and he replied sarcastically.

“Of course, Goldenwood elves, that tells me absolutely nothing.”

His words were a little harsh, but he didn’t like how she seemed to have ruined their meeting for no reason. Red’s shoulders fell at the words, but Mash didn’t back down. Though he did give her a more apologetic look. Honestly, any reason would be good enough, and he was just mad because he felt completely left out of the situation. Jill rested her hand on Red’s shoulder and that seemed to convince her to say more.

“Goldenwood elves are purists. Any mixed race is seen as filthy, and they are extremely hostile to half-elves of their own race. My family experienced a lot of crap because of them.”

Now, Mash felt a little bad about pressuring her to explain. He guessed that their dislike had been Safa’s fault and that Red’s mother or father was Goldenwood elf. He trusted Red, but there was still something that confused him. Why had Safa disliked him as well?

“How did she know? Is that why she hated me too?”

Red nodded her head.

“Yeah, my mother told me they have an inherent skill that lets them identify a person’s race. She probably saw half-monster or something.”

The way she spoke surprised Mash. She rarely made references to her family, outside of judging them as a whole. This was the first he heard of her mother. The information was shocking too. He knew that different races had access to different classes, but inherent skills were something he didn’t know about. He wondered if beastmen also had some, but Luke shook his head in the negative as Mash looked at him. Even without a word being spoken, he must’ve understood the direction that Mash’s mind headed.

Considering what Red said, Mash tried to guess what a skill like that would actually reveal about him. If it worked like how he imagined, Safa had probably seen him as an abomination of many races, and he had no idea how that would present him to her. However, after hearing Red’s thoughts, He didn’t really care how Safa had perceived him. They talked a little more about the group and how the rest of them had seemed. Mash gave them his estimations of their relative strength.

He hadn’t thought that any of them was at a higher level than he was. They seemed strong when he considered the average adventurer, but he was confident that they were weaker than any one of them. In fact, he was fairly confident that just Mash or Jill could handle the group without much trouble. He told them as much, and the trip went by quickly.

Quickly was relative here and it had actually taken them almost three days of constant travel to arrive at the desert’s boundary. They found it though, and Mash was glad to see that the entire world wasn’t a desert. The distance to this boundary wasn’t that large though, and more people should’ve been able to make it this far.

It was an odd sight though, as the desert seemed to get cut off by a wide river. On the other side of the water, he could make out another piece of land and saw oddly blue trees, They were tall each of them seeming to reach into the clouds above. It made that distant land seem all the more impressive, and Mash was eager to get out of the desert. Even from a distance, he could tell that the weather would be better too. Plus, it just seemed more exciting than an empty desert. Though he guessed that it wasn’t completely empty.

The sled moved towards the river. The sand limited his speed, but he managed to make it faster by giving the imitations of Priscilla some more energy. He was surprised when the first wooden snake collided with a barrier of some sort. It had been invisible, and it seemed to ripple at the collision. It didn’t break, instead, it released some energy back towards the wood and broke the snakes into pieces. The sight was somewhat awe-inspiring, as it seemed like the very space seemed to quiver from the impact.

Mash was surprised to realize that he couldn’t sense the barrier within his domain and assumed that this had been what stopped most people. Instantly, he wondered if Jill could teleport them across, but she spoke before he could ask anything.

“Can’t teleport through it.”

Nobody even had to prompt her, though it should have been obvious that she would have checked. It would probably be an instinctive response for her to check. Red scooped out a large portion of the sand beneath the barrier, but it didn’t do anything to stop it. Mash grinned, excited to try and break through the barrier.

“Can I try and break it? Or does that sound like a bad idea?”

“Sounds good to me.”

Jill sounded like she found the situation amusing and teleported a distance away afterward. She waved to him, giving him an encouraging thumbs-up.

“Why not, Luke should be able to heal you.”

Red walked towards Jill, her voice trailing her as she moved. Luke nodded and followed Red, leaving Mash alone in front of the barrier. That was fine to Mash, as he was hoping to test his magic against the wall. Reaching a hand towards the barrier, Mash tested his anti-magic first. It was the most obvious solution and was surprised to feel it remain unaffected. Whatever the barrier was, it didn’t seem to be made of mana. The anti-magic of the demons worked by dissolving the mana around him, and this barrier was obviously not a mana construct. Thankfully, there was no rebound from the attempt.

If he couldn’t break through it with anti-magic, he could always rely on raw power. He began entering his dragon form. It was unmatched in terms of raw power and he was confident in overpowering a barrier like this. As the transformation finished, he started creating lightning around his hands. It was as if he were preparing for one of the wide-area attacks, he had used earlier, but he kept the power tightly in his hands. Lightning lanced from his fingertips and the rest of his arms, bouncing along the ground.

Maintaining his control on his magic, he pushed his hands into the barrier. The draconic claws managed to pierce the barrier, but it didn’t break from that alone. The rebound from the barrier came surging up his arms and shaking his bones. At the same moment, he released the lightning against the barrier. Light exploded outwards, cracks forming along the barrier as he continued to push energy into it. The cracks stretched far lancing through the entire barrier. He bet that even those on the other side would see the cracks. It looked like he was breaking the very sky itself.

The rebound became stronger, and he saw his scales crack, and felt his bones break. Lightning and blood streamed from the cracks, but he continued to push against the barrier. The pain wasn’t as bad as the worms from earlier, and he persevered. The barrier began to break apart, but that only made it use more energy in retaliation. Clenching his teeth tightly, he focused entirely on destroying the barrier. It snapped, shattering like a million pieces of glass. The lightning he had been pushing in front of him, flashed brightly as it fired into the distance. It split apart into a branching tree of light as it extended into the sky.

Mash slumped to the ground looking at the cracks in his hands. Blood was seeping through them, giving his black scales a red outline. Hesitating a little, Mash released the transformation, surprised to realize that he hadn’t needed to activate hunt. Well, it wouldn’t have worked for this situation either way. A moment later Jill appeared beside him, Luke appearing beside her. He immediately began healing Mash.

“You do know that we can help with things like that. Even if you have the most raw power, it’s not like we're weak. Well, Jill is a little weak but still.”

He didn’t really sound all that bothered, but Mash realized that he was right. Instinctively, Mash took it as his job to handle things involving power, but there was no reason for him to do it by himself. As he thought about why he had done it by himself, he realized that it was a matter of pride. Probably an effect of one of his transformations. He had realized that some of his forms had affected his emotions. His pride was something that had grown stronger, and he needed to make sure to remember that fact.

Sending the mental message to Priscilla, he hoped that she would understand what he wanted. She was an inherently prideful being and would have different standards than him. Even if she tried to understand what he wanted, he didn’t think that Priscilla was the best choice for watching over him.

She was getting good at knowing when to be sarcastic and when to give him important information. He sighed, making sure that she knew that it was because of her antics. Mash wondered if she was picking up too many human tendencies and wondered if that was a good thing or a bad thing. She didn’t’ seem to mind, so he let the matter be for now.

Mash looked to see Red finally arriving. Jill hadn’t teleported her, and it looked like she was ready to give them an earful. Mash looked around and saw that he had formed a small crater around himself. The sand had been pushed about, piling around where he had been standing. It had even happened on the other side of the barrier. Mash couldn’t help but start laughing.

Despite the damage he had done to his hands, it had been fun. Simply overpowering something that way was much more enjoyable than the slow investigation of the previous dungeon. The worms were annoying, and he needed to figure out how to get around their magic, but this was a lot easier. All he did was release his power freely, only needing to make it strong. The simplicity let him forget any of his more complex thoughts and just focus on a single task.

Luke began healing him, and Mash felt the bones in his arms fix themselves. It was a warm feeling. Despite the movements of his bones, he felt no pain. He was glad that Luke continued down the healing path, as his arms were completely restoring themselves.

“Aargh!”

Luke shouted the words as he released Mash’s arms. Simultaneously Mash noticed foreign mana appearing on his skin. Letters of some kind seared themselves on his body. It didn’t stop his domain though, and he could trace a connection into the distance. He only managed to raise a hand and point, as an arrow approached him. It entered his domain, and Mash instinctively tried to form a wooden shield to defend himself. Nothing happened though, and Jill had to catch the arrow to stop it from striking his chest. Mash tried to transform, finding that it wasn’t working either. The weird text that appeared on his skin stopped him from doing so.

His light show had obviously attracted the wrong kind of attention. His friends understood immediately and moved to block Mash from where the arrows had come. The fact that no more letters were appearing on the others probably meant that they couldn’t target multiple people with it. Still, being able to stop someone’s magic so completely had to be a high-level skill. This was a bad situation, but Mash couldn’t help but smile as he realized that they had chosen him.