Arcane Sniper [Matan’s Shooter]

Despite being 440 meters away, his swollen expression was vividly etched in his eyes.

“’Eagle’s Eye’ skill has improved, but aren’t I seeing this far because of my synchronization rate at 100%?” Leeha mused, quickly reloading his Kentucky musket while maintaining his kneeled position.

He had been worried about adjusting to the new weapon, given its different length and weight from Black Bass, but there was no issue at all.

‘Hand-eye Coordination,’

This minute stat increase had provided enough support for him to skillfully handle the newly introduced musket.

-“Anyway, it’s a test, right? Ah, there. Great- okay! Test starting. Distance 450m, please check the sound.”

-“Don’t worry.”

Failure opportunities for the frozen ostrich quest were allowed up to four times.

Leeha could have immediately tried it in practice, but decided to proceed with utmost caution.

‘The size is huge, so we won’t fail that easily…’

The size of the frozen ostrich was much larger than that of an ostrich in reality.

Although a real ostrich is considerably big, this one was easily twice the size, rendering the perceived difficulty of hitting it rather low.

However, considering its size, the frozen ostrich, a chicken-hearted coward, would dissolve into ice particles and disappear into ambient snow at the slightest threat, wouldn’t it?

‘I just need to aim without getting caught. If I succeed in this test, the quest will be a piece of cake.’

Click, Leeha pulled the trigger.

Bang! As soon as the duller, more muted sound of gunpowder exploding compared to that of Black Bass, he saw Blaugrunn’s barrier shattering into pieces.

Blaugrunn: “The sound almost arrived with the image. If I move any further, the sound will arrive faster, wouldn’t it?”

Leeha: “Okay, at full skill level the distance is 440m, and without skill it’s 210m! Let’s hunt some frozen ostriches!”

The test was completely finished now.

Leeha began to hunt for ostriches with Blaugrunn, releasing his locked joint skill.

He’d already been informed about the ostrich’s habitat by Odowbe and the Ice Walrus paleos.

If finding the monster was easy and killing it was easy too, wouldn’t time be the only issue in collecting a hundred?

‘It moves fast but it’s large so it won’t be hard to hit. Perhaps I could attend the third wave in three days.’

Leeha started charting out a strict schedule for the next three days, combining plans for after the quest clearance.

After clearing the frozen ostrich quest in about half a day, it would take a day more to acquire the lens and get Bottleneck to make a scope out of it.

That takes about two and a half days in total.

‘Is the variable the Black Bass? It’s been nearly 3 weeks, would they be able to find it in time?’

Thinking of the Black Bass gave him a headache.

Hadn’t he left Black Bass with the bonobo paleos to get it enhanced? The problem was, the chances of it getting damaged or even destroyed and exactly when it would be ready, right now it was just in the analysis stage.

Unless all enhancements were completed swiftly, Leeha didn’t expect any significant changes in Black Bass itself.

‘Well, at least if they can locate Black Bass right after the analysis, we should be okay. If there’s no Black Bass, even with a finished scope won’t mean anything…

But what if he could utilize Black Bass in the third wave?

Even if the enhancement happened to fail, he could still test with the scope and then hand it back to be re-enhanced later, right?

‘Hmm, that seems to be the best scenario.’

While he was not counting his chickens before they were hatched, Leeha was ready to take a shot at drinking up a bowl of soup!

‘Great! Now, let’s start with ostriches!’

Leeha and Blaugrunn marched towards the frozen ostrich’s habitat with a satisfying smile spread across his face.

Until now, he hadn’t realized.

The most important aspect when dealing with frozen ostriches wasn’t the ice property, but rather the ostrich’s property.

“Mr. Ha, to that side, please.”

“Sure, I’ve got it. Lower your body.”

Despite everything covered in glistening white snow and ice, both Leeha and Blaugrunn were capable of spotting the frozen ostriches.

Because of the snowstorm that whirled up at their feet as they raced fast across the ground.

“Do you think you can get it from this distance?””He can’t run forever. We need to observe first. How long and where he stops. If he is looking for food, there will be a definite pattern.”

“You really seem like a sniper at times.”

“A sniper, ‘at times’? I always am one!”

As Leeha and Blaugrunn sparred down low, an Arctic Ostrich came to a halt. The pair, who had been closely watching, followed suit.

‘Although I can hit it while it’s running due to the size, it’s better when it’s stationary. From here, the current stop point is about a 600m x 4… maybe 150m. Should I approach closer?’

The maximum distance to load a bullet faster than the gunshot is 440m.

It’s obvious that closer the distance, the higher the success rate of a shot.

Although it was barren with almost nothing, there certainly is a landmark object to remember the terrain. Leeha recorded the location around the lofty point where the ice ostrich stood in his mind.

The ice ostrich pecked the ground with its long neck.

It was looking for food.

“I’ll go closer, Blaugrunn, you stay here.”

“Aren’t you coming?”

“Considerably fewer numbers are better for covert operation.”

With that said, Leeha started to move subtly and covertly.

Blaugrunn grumbled, “I guess I am invisible and unneeded,” but there was no need for him in the sniping, so there was no point in taking him along.

‘Perfect. Now, don’t move. Just wait a little bit longer.’

Suddenly, as Leeha was stalking his first target of 100 ice ostriches’ hunt, he felt that the body of the ostrich standing far away twitched and got rigid.

Although he couldn’t use the skill called “Eagle’s Eye” because it was in the cooldown phase, he was sure something suspicious was going on.

‘What’s going on?

Leeha immediately halted.

The ice ostrich did not move but kept its neck rigidly straight. It remained still for 3 minutes, 5 minutes, 7 minutes…

The current distance was 530m.

Leeha, who had quickly moved 70m closer in rapid stalking pace, still needed to close the distance a bit more for sniping.

‘Why is this happening? Is this part of its pattern too?’

But there should be no sudden cease.

The three ice ostriches previously failed did not stop and only ran.

However, the ostriches did not think about moving even after waiting for a long time.

Leeha eventually thought it was a new pattern of the monster and decided to move again. As soon as he was about to move, keeping down low, he took ‘one more step with his elbow’.

“Urgh?”

‘Rush, rush, rush’

The ice ostrich created a snowstorm and started to run.

In the opposite direction of where Leeha was coming.

When the snowstorm becomes smoke, and the figure of the ostrich is fully covered, Leeha, with a dumbfounded face, had no choice but to stand up.

“……Why? Why did it suddenly run away?”

“What were you doing? Why didn’t you shoot?”

“No, I wasn’t going to shoot yet… I was measuring the distance, and then it suddenly ran away. Please use a spell, Blaugrunn,” Leeha said, grabbed Blaugrunn’s shoulder after scratching his head.

“What kind of spell?”

“Do you know anything about detection magic? Like creating a map?”

Running all over the vast land known as the ostrich’s ‘habitat’ would be a waste of time.

One must utilize the nearby resources to the fullest.

“It’s a bit of a unique spell that I can’t use. I’d be interested in learning it from you.”

“Um… I thought you had it since you’re a dragon…”

“But I can perform basic detection. Let me try.”

Blaugrunn started casting immediately.

If you knew how to do it, you’d just do it. Ge-ge was pretending he didn’t know, but somehow, Leeha felt a tiny bit betrayed.

Swoosh…!Soon after, Blaugrunn opened his eyes and pinpointed a direction.

“This way, about 1.3 kilometers.”

“Whaaaat?! You know the exact distance?! That’s amazing! Why didn’t you use this skill before!”

“You never asked me to.”

Blaugrunn shrugged nonchalantly, causing Leeha to nod in astonishment.

Dragons were proactive AI NPCs, but to maintain balance between dragon knights and other job classes, they didn’t usually act unless specifically asked or under exceptional circumstances.

Only users who quickly understood the dragon’s capabilities and had the tact and knowledge to demand what they wanted could fully utilize a given dragon.

So, after about thirty minutes of walking in the direction Blaugrunn detected…

Despite moving at a considerable speed, the Frosty Ostrich was nowhere to be seen.

“It’s not coming out? Did it move somewhere?”

“Hmm, I’ll run another scan. It should be easier to trace with mana previously detected.”

Blaugrunn cast the detection magic again, then he looked puzzled.

“Well, the direction is right.”

“But what about the distance?”

“About 1.3 kilometers…

“What? The distance is still the same!”

“It seems to have stopped now. We need to move quickly.”

Blaugrunn, looking bemused, flew ahead of Leeha.

Shwapapa-papapapa-!

In the wake of his flight, the snow on the ground wafted back into the air. Leeha felt an odd sense of unease watching the hurried Blaugrunn.

“Moreover, I am running while you’re just flying!”

Pak! Pak! Pak! Pak!

After a strenuous journey through the snow, Leeha finally caught up with Blaugrunn who was standing still, his face distorted in bewilderment.

“What’s wrong? What happened?”

“It’s… again 1.3 kilometers.”

“Huh? What? You mean it’s still 1.3 kilometers from here?”

“Yes.”

Leeha peered in the direction Blaugrunn pointed to but didn’t see anything.

The cooldown of the Eagle’s Eye skill wasn’t over yet, moreover, due to the Frosty Ostrich’s color matching with the snow, they could barely notice it at long distances.

‘At least running shows the snowstorm…

For some reason, Leeha felt a sense of dread.

“Let’s teleport. Not too close, just about 500-600 meters.”

“Understood.”

Blaugrunn looked slightly annoyed, but he complied with Leeha by promptly casting Mass Teleport.

Shwoooosh o]———-!

The teleport distance was about 500 meters.

The moment the distance of 1.3 kilometers shrunk to 800 meters, a peculiar shriek, intertwined with the wind, came hurtling towards them.

Mixed in the choking cry of the ostrich was the sound of something fracturing, which traveled eerily into their ears.

Blaugrunn cocked his head.

“Hmm? Its mana has disappeared.” However, Leeha couldn’t even respond.

The dragon wouldn’t know without a system alert, but Leeha’s quest log clearly stated why.

“Damn! I was afraid this might happen!”

“What?”

Leeha looked as if he had been struck with a hammer. His foreboding premonition had come true.

[One Frosty Ostrich has self-destructed.]

“They noticed us! At a distance exceeding 1.3 kilometers!”

There was no other explanation for this.

Either they had been watched or noticed!

The ostrich had set their detection radius as a boundary; whenever they approached, it moved further away, and this repeated. This could only be possible due to its unusually keen senses.

Once the ‘border’ it had set suddenly narrowed, the creature must have felt threatened and self-destructed.