My Magic Has No Upper Limit

The squad traveled down a road that wound through an oak forest. Sunlight filtered through the golden canopy, scattering dappled light on the ground. All was quiet.

"Oaks are my favorite trees."

Valles gently stroked the rough bark, his gaze tinged with nostalgia.

"The village where I grew up had a lot of oaks planted right beside it."

"You Elves aren’t as touchy as women, are you?"

Gray said, "So you probably won’t get mad if I ask how old you are, right?"

Valles looked young enough, but everyone knew the deal when it came to Elves.

As the recognized longest-living race on the Candia Continent, some branches of Elves could even live for several thousand years.

Sometimes an Elf that looked like a child might actually be over a hundred years old.

"I’m only twenty-four."

Perhaps the pleasant surroundings had put Valles in a good mood, as he didn’t retort to Gray’s snide remark.

Valles reached out and caught a leaf as it drifted slowly down.

The leaf had mostly turned yellow, but a trace of emerald green remained at its center.

He held it up to the sky. Sunlight penetrated the leaf, revealing a clear network of veins that looked almost like blood vessels.

"What is... life like for an Elf?" Zelir asked.

"It’s nothing special. Pretty much the same as the life of a regular human villager."

Valles tucked the fallen leaf into his clothes. "It’s just more ancient, and more isolated from the rest of the world."

"There are no towns nearby, no other villages. Decades, even centuries, might pass without a single outsider visiting."

"Sometimes, I’d climb a hillside and gaze into the distance, and I’d feel like a butterfly trapped in pine resin."

"The world slowly solidifies around you. No matter how much you struggle, it’s useless. You can only watch as you slowly become a self-contained piece of amber."

"That’s actually quite poetic..."

Gray imagined the scene Valles described. "But I could never stand a life like that. What would even be the point of living?"

Valles didn’t say anything more, just shook his head gently.

Soon, the four of them emerged from the forest path.

The view ahead opened up abruptly, and they saw their destination—the village in the distance.

Dozens of houses built from logs and thatch were scattered about, surrounded by golden wheat fields. The whole village looked peaceful and serene.

However, as they drew a little closer, that atmosphere vanished.

The sounds of suppressed weeping and various angry, chaotic arguments drifted from the village.

The wooden main gate had been brutally smashed open, its broken hinges hanging limply.

Huge hoofprints were pressed deep into the muddy ground, with blood spattered beside them.

On the walls of several houses near the perimeter, they could see gashes violently hacked open by a Giant Axe.

A group of villagers was gathered in an open area, their expressions filled with grief. Most of them were injured.

Zelir and Valles exchanged a look. They had a bad feeling.

’Something has already happened.’

"What are we going to do?"

A man with a turban wrapped around his head said in a hoarse voice, "Merry and Wei’Er have been taken... We have to rescue them, and quickly!"

"How? You go rescue them? You think you can win?"

"Those damn Demons... they’re arrogant enough to come right to our door and kidnap people!"

"What about the request we posted? Hasn’t any Adventurer taken it yet?"

"We can’t wait any longer! Let’s go to town for help right now!"

"There might not be enough time... By then, the Minotaurs will definitely be back in their lair."

The various arguments mingled together, making the atmosphere even more chaotic.

"BANG BANG..."

Marcus forcefully banged on the wall of a nearby wooden house, drawing everyone’s attention. The noisy discussion came to an abrupt halt.

"This is Oak Village, right? We’re the Adventurer Squad that accepted the request to eliminate the Minotaur tribe," Marcus announced in a clear voice.

The villagers all turned their heads. After a moment of silence, their pent-up anxiety seemed to find an outlet, and they all surged forward.

"It’s the Adventurers!"

"Thank heavens, you’re finally here."

"We were just about to go to town for emergency reinforcements!"

The crowd automatically parted, and a middle-aged man with a worried face hurried forward, grabbing Marcus’s hand.

"I am Barov, the Village Chief of Oak Village."

"What happened here?" Marcus asked.

Village Chief Barov sighed and quickly explained what had happened.

Just before the Marcus Squad arrived, the Minotaurs that had been lurking on the village’s edge for a long time finally lost their patience and launched an all-out attack.

Although the villagers fought back with all their might, they were no match for the horde of Minotaurs.

Several villagers were seriously injured, but worst of all, the Minotaurs had abducted five people from Oak Village.

Two males and three females.

The males were teenage boys, while the females were adult women in their twenties.

’To think something like this happened...’

Marcus’s brow furrowed. "How long ago did the attack happen?"

"Less than an hour ago."

"How many Minotaurs were in the attacking party?"

"Six in total! Every single one was as burly as a bear!" a villager shouted in reply.

"Adventurers!"

The grief on Village Chief Barov’s face could no longer be hidden. He suddenly dropped to his knees with a THUD.

"This isn’t just about exterminating Demons anymore! I... On behalf of the entire village, I beg you, please, you must bring the captured villagers back safely!"

His voice cracked with sobs. "My son is one of them. If he dies, I... I really..."

"Alright, alright, get up." Marcus hurriedly helped Village Chief Barov to his feet.

"We can scrape together another twenty Gold Coins as a reward for rescuing the villagers!" Barov promised, gritting his teeth.

"Do you have a map? Which direction did the Minotaurs go?" Marcus asked.

"Yes, yes!"

Hearing this, a Hunter in the crowd with a bandaged leg immediately limped into his house.

A moment later, he returned, still limping, with a map in his hand.

Its contents were drawn in great detail, making the terrain of the area very easy to understand at a glance.

"Adventurers, please look. Our village is here. After they took our people, the Minotaurs went west."

The Hunter’s finger moved across the map.

The members of the Adventurer Squad all gathered around to look at the map.

West of Oak Village was still a continuous forest, but beyond the forest, there was a river. Crossing the river meant entering another territory.

"Do you know where the Minotaurs’ lair is?" Gray asked.

"Not exactly... but it’s definitely not in the western forest."

The Hunter said with certainty, "I’ve been hunting in this area for many years. I’ve never found any trace of a Minotaur lair."

"So, you’re saying that for the Minotaurs to get back to their lair, they have to cross that river?" Zelir asked.

"That’s right." The Hunter nodded.

Gray estimated the distance on the map.

The distance from Oak Village to the river would take at least two or three hours to cover, even at full speed. And it hadn’t even been an hour since the attack.

Besides, the Minotaurs were dragging five villagers along with them, so their travel speed was bound to be even slower.

After getting a grasp of the basic situation, Marcus spoke up.

"Let us discuss this first."

The group stepped aside.

"How are we supposed to rescue them? This is tricky," Valles said bluntly.

"They can’t have gotten far. Why not just charge them head-on and kill them all?" Gray asked, confused.

"We can catch up to them, and we can kill them all, but what about the hostages?"

Valles shot Gray a look. "Minotaurs aren’t like goblins. They have brains."

"There are six of them. We can’t kill them all instantly. What if we give them even a moment to react, and they turn around and threaten us with the hostages?"

"Are Minotaurs that smart?" Gray asked, surprised.

"They’re practically close relatives of Beastmen. They’ve even developed a more precise language among themselves. What do you think?"

"The biggest problem is... we don’t even know if the captured villagers are still alive," Marcus sighed.

"They should still be alive."

Zelir spoke up.

"The Minotaurs attacked the village because they’re looking for food to store for the winter. If the people are dead, they’ll rot and start to stink quickly. They won’t be edible for long."

"Besides, Valles, you said Minotaurs are smarter than other Demons. They might even use the humans they capture as slaves."

"There are indeed stories like that..." Valles nodded slightly.

It was just that the humans captured by Demons and forced into slavery usually met a very miserable end.

They’d have no dignity, for sure. They’d be half-naked and starving all day, beaten at a moment’s notice, and subjected to all sorts of dehumanizing abuses.

Then, when food became scarce, they’d be killed and eaten.

In short, the rest of their lives were pretty much planned out.

The discussion suddenly hit a dead end.

Even the most elusive Assassin couldn’t possibly take down six Minotaurs at once.

A thought surfaced in everyone’s mind.

"What if... we just tell the Village Chief that we can go after them, but we can’t guarantee the villagers’ safety."

It was Valles who finally broke the silence.

"If the Minotaurs really decide to use the villagers’ lives to threaten us, we’ll have no choice but to..."

He trailed off, falling silent.

Although Marcus didn’t want to give such a response either, he had no other choice.

"Alright..."

"Wait..."

Zelir stopped Marcus before he could relay the message to the Village Chief. He thought for a moment, then spoke.

"I have an idea. It might work."

...

While the group was conferring, Village Chief Barov had been pacing anxiously nearby.

’Sigh!’

’If only I were a powerful Adventurer myself! I would have killed all those Minotaurs the moment they attacked!’

"Village Chief!"

The Adventurer Squad finished their discussion, and Gray’s voice rang out. "Do you have any horses in the village?"

"Yes, yes, we do!"

Hearing that the Adventurers were preparing to set out, Village Chief Barov answered quickly while commanding the villagers, "Quick, go get four of them!"

Fortunately, the village stables hadn’t been attacked by the Minotaurs.