Li led Azhar and the wyrm to their first target: a gathering of giant spiders. They skittered across a massive clearing in the forest, their tawny and hairy black bodies crawling across the carcass of a deer they had slain. Their sickle-like fangs sliced into the deer, tearing off chunks of meat and bone. 

There were only three of them, and if there were more, Li would have reconsidered using them as a target. Giant spiders were tough creatures, and these were, judging from their banded red legs, jumping variants. Jumping giant spiders were, unlike regular spiders, active hunters, choosing to hunt down their prey with relentless speed and powerful pounces instead of waiting in a large web.

As a result, they tended to cooperate on hunts, though afterwards they dispersed to live independent and individual lives. They about half the size of a man – comparable in size to the wyrm – and three of them taking down a particularly large deer was not out of the norm. 

"Whenever you're ready," said Li. He hid behind a tree at the edge of a clearing, and Azhar stood behind another tree in front of him. The wyrm clung at Li's feet, but her back was arched and her fangs bared, sensing imminent danger.

"I was waitin' for your order," said Azhar as he flashed an eager smile, his single good arm clutching the dagger to his chest. "But if you're tellin' me to go whenever, then I'm off. Ain't no use wastin' time."

Azhar leaped out the tree's cover with a yell, causing the three spiders to freeze, the hairs on their body stiffening as they sensed incoming and hostile vibrations. The spiders rotated arounds, their beady eyes zoning in on Azhar.

Li looked down at the wyrm. She looked out longingly to the fight. He patted her back and said, "Go. Kill them all."

The wyrm growled in happiness before she lurched out, her four feet crashing on the forest floor as she joined Azhar's charge.

Li watched from after, ready to cast a spell to heal or help the wyrm, but not Azhar. Of course, if the hinterlander was going to straight up die, he would prevent that from happening.

But anything short of death was up to the ranger to deal with. He also did not withhold help to be overly harsh, though being strict was a part of it. The wyrm just could not handle those spiders on her own, and so she would need Li's help while Azhar could reasonably stand his ground. 

Li worried about the wyrm, knowing she was facing a massive amount of danger right now, but he also knew that she would not grow properly unless she fought to her fullest extent. 

The fight lasted almost an hour.

Azhar used everything in his arsenal. He used ranger class buffs to speed himself up, increase his accuracy, deal critical hits on the spiders' eyes and legs, and dodge incoming hits. He used his spiritual shamanism to empower himself with agility and strength. In a way, it was a similar strategy to his fight with Launcelot.

To effectively wield his melee weapon, Azhar had to use [Bowman's Stand], and that made him extra fragile. The result was that he had to fight while dancing and darting around to never get hit even once for a single wound could prove fatal. 

Li predicted that though the fight would be hard not so much because Azhar would rack up wounds and scars, but because the moment his concentration faltered and he took one hit, things would get exponentially harder. 

One hit would make him slower, throw off his breathing, and poison him to make things even worse. One hit might be all the spiders needed to catch him and tear him apart. 

But Azhar had not played by Li's predictions.

By the hour's end, Azhar stood victorious, a wreck of a man littered with bite marks, cuts, and bruises everywhere. The cuts on his body were lined with protruding purple veins engorged with venom, and it was only because he had preemptively chugged several elixirs beforehand that he managed to survive. 

This was not the body of a man who would have fought with agility and only with himself in mind. 

The wyrm chowed down on a spider's carcass beside Azhar. She also had wounds on her body, but none too serious, not to mention the fact that she proved resistant to the spider venom. 

Li came into the clearing, and Azhar beamed a smile at him.

"How'd I do?" said Azhar in between heavy breaths, each of his exhalations spurting out blood from open and flowing wounds.

"Good," was all Li said as he waved his hand, healing all of Azhar's wounds. Li knelt down by the wyrm, patting her head as it bobbed up and down, cracking spider exoskeleton to get at the white flesh within. "Consider that a token of appreciation that you took all those hits for her."

"Don't mention it, hah." Azhar watched in wonder as the dozens of wounds etched into his body faded away, the split skin repairing, the venom-blackened veins fading. "All part of yer trainin' anyhows. Gettin' me to watch her while I gotta watch myself – real good way to get my awareness up. She's a hell of a fighter, too, can't wait to see what kinda fierceness she's gonna pack when she's grown up."

"I see." Li had not intended for Azhar to cover for the wyrm. He was going to watch the wyrm's back to let Azhar focus on himself, but the ranger had take up much more of a burden than Li had ever intended him to. 

Azhar collapsed onto his knees as he sucked in a recovering breath, sitting on the bloody and crumpled grass around him.

In this world, healing did not equate to recovering mental fatigue. This was why when individuals fell unconscious, perfectly healing their bodies did not awaken them. Azhar right now fell not because his body could not support him, but because he had expended too much mana and mental strain in keeping himself alive in the fight.

"That's the end of our training for today," said Li. 

Azhar gave a curious glance to Li. "That it?"

Li nodded. He stopped controlling his Shadowfly, and it popped and faded into nothingness over a trio of rootbeasts that lay rooted in the ground twenty minutes away.

"You've earned some rest for now, and so has she." Li tapped the wyrm's back, letting her know it was time to go. She started to scarf down on the spider corpses even faster, wanting to get as many bites in as possible before she had to leave. Her wounds were beginning to close up as she processed the spider flesh. "Once she's done eating, we head back."

______________

On the way back, Li walked a little slowly on the main road, letting Azhar catch up with dragging and tired feet. Li himself carried a sleeping wyrm in his arms. She had overeaten and tuckered herself out with the fighting.

"Gods, you're strong as an ox to carry her so easily like that," said Azhar. "And you don't look it, either. You're as skinny as a stick, but then again, you ain't exactly human."

"How long do you intend to keep that a secret?" said Li, for he knew that if Jeanne nor Sylvie suspected him, then Azhar had not told them. 

Azhar scratched his head and shrugged." I dunno', probably never. Figure it ain't important cuause' you don't make a big fuss about it, and it ain't really a big deal for me."

"What was the adventurer's creed again? To kill all threats to humanity when you see it? Wouldn't I count?"

"Seems like you're helpin' us out. Besides, if we all followed that creed, then there wouldn't be a single hinterlander in our ranks considerin' we raise dragonkin and worship wild animal spirits that western folk would consider savage man-eating monsters. Besides, what I'm more interested in is how she's gonna turn out."

Azhar pointed to the wyrm, and Li asked, "In what way?"

"Ya see, I told ya before, but dragonkin form bonds stronger than anythin' else with their parents. When they grow, they naturally try and mimic their parents, and it ain't like a human boy trynna' act tough like his pa. Dragonkin'll physically change to match their caretakers. 

Among my kind, it ain't rare to see a few dragonkin riders with mounts that can take up human forms."

"And that doesn't interfere with a master to pet relationship any?" questioned Li. "It's one thing to order a beast around, it's another to treat something that looks like a person like an animal."

"Yeah, it is," said Azhar. "That's the reason why ya gotta let dragonkin hunt alone most of the time, let em' retain that draconic wildness that keeps em' from changin' too much. Else it'll be mighty hard to keep em' as beasts of burden, especially cause' if the dragonkin's changed enough to take a human form, then it probably has a bond so strong with their caretaker that the relationship ain't master to pet no more.

Hell, in a few old myths we got, there are riders that straight married their dragonkin, though nowadays dragonkin in the west don't got enough much magical potential to become fully human."

Azhar tapped his head. "The more magic somethin' has, the smarter it probably is. Most wyrms in the west these days are dumb as bricks, been that way for a couple of generations, so they might be able to take up a human shell, but they ain't ever gonna' learn how to be human. Kinda sad, really, ya got these semi-human, semi-monsters that don't belong nowhere."

"I see where you're going with this. She's different," commented Li in understanding as he looked at the wyrm in his arms. She undoubtedly had an exceptional amount of magical power and, consequently, intelligence from her mother. 

"Yeah, just lookin' at her mother, how damn strong and smart she was, you know for a fact that this kid here has the kinda potential you ain't gonna see for hundreds of years." Azhar paused, giving Li a questioning look. "Meanin' she's got all the potential in the world to change. I dunno' what she's gonna end up like with you as her bonded, and I don't know how you consider morality and all, but if you wanna' use her to fight, then you might consider weanin' her off your presence."

Li thought for a few seconds, each of his steps helping him focus.

"I have no need to raise a tool," said Li simply. 

"Got it," said Azhar, immediately respecting Li's decision. "Then hells, I feel kinda' useless. All my knowledge is in raisin' a mount, not…," Azhar searched for the right word as he looked at the wyrm. "I dunno, at this point, she might as well be a daughter."

"Your knowledge is still useful. There is precious little to read on dragonkin, so what general information you have, you should still pass it on to me. Consider that, along with your blood, sweat, and tears, to be payment for my help."

"Gotch. I, uh, appreciate this," said Azhar with a thankful nod. The ranger was not the type to express his thanks outwardly, so Li knew even this probably took a significant amount of effort from him.

"Old Thane's agreed to let you sleep a few days in the cottage, so clean yourself up and prepare for training in the morning."

Azhar's eyes widened. "In the morning?"

Li cast a backwards glance at Azhar's dead arm. "I don't suppose you have anything better to do with your time?"

Azhar gave a defeated shrug. "Ya got a point. Anyways, what am I gonna' train then? I ain't even learned this [Scattershot] skill yet."

"You'll have to get in a few more battles first, but there's tomorrow evening for that," said Li. "The training tomorrow morning isn't related to that. It's going to be improving your hand to hand combat."

"Not skills and spells, but combat? Like, pure punchin' and all that? I ain't got no use for that huntin' monsters."

"No, but if you make a living fighting - an inherently chaotic job - it's an inevitability that you're not just going to be fighting monsters. Case in point: your miserable defeat against Launcelot. You didn't plan on fighting him, did you? It just happened. Better to be prepared, especially because you tend to make impulsive decisions."

Azhar made a fist in enthusiasm. "Alright, I hear ya. Then what am I gonna learn? Sylv always talked about how easterners like ya can split mountains with palm strikes and chops and the like. Gonna teach me some of that?"

"I won't be teaching you, and besides, I don't know anything about that stuff." 

Azhar raised a brow. "Huh? Then who?"

"It'll be Old Thane. He said he won't try to kill you, so you shouldn't worry too much."