Ten seconds, twenty, and then thirty seconds pass without a single disturbance as the scout waits for the beast in the HLZ to react.

The nearly total silence of the forest in this artificial place we were put into gives way to the gently swaying leaves. While the familiar sound should have given me comfort, all I can feel is the wrongness. I was already used to the silence, but the addition of wind at low altitude is new and I don’t know what to make of it.

I don’t let this shake my nerves or distract me.

A minute later, far longer than usual when it comes to these high level beasts, I feel something strange in my perception field. To the side very near the edge of the place something enters. Something indistinct, moving at a slow and steady pace, but feeling the pressure in the roots underground that match exactly with a quadruped of great size and mass, I say:

“Left.” I conjure the same orange light I placed on Max’s invisible army when they attacked us around the disturbance.

Retracting the perception field and I focus only on the scouts and the invisible enemy. The expression of the older one turns into comprehension in only a moment and with a gesture to his partner, they both retreat some ten meters back in barely a moment as its invisibility fades in an attempt to pounce on them.

Before I can say anything, still not taking their eyes from the monster the older scout speaks:

“Level 139 white panther.”

“And its paw matches perfectly in size and shape with the overturned ground.” Replies the other scout.

I can almost hear the frown on the commander’s face.

“The invisibility trick is new, but it wouldn’t explain what has been happening.

“Do you want us to taunt it a little?” Says the older scout.

“Let me think,” Richard asks.

I interrupt him by asking. “Why do you say it wouldn’t explain everything? If people were entering the high-level zone and counting on leaving in time an invisible enemy could catch them by surprise.”

“I checked the protocols from all the other villages. There are exceptions here and there, but none travel alone, and they never fully enter the HLZ, just putting an arm when they want to attract a beast to check its level or something. Even then, one of them always keeps at least a couple steps back.”

Before he can run down the rest of his argument, I interrupt with my assumption of what he is driving at.

“And if the only thing it relied upon was invisibility, he would only be able to get one of the scouts?

“Exactly, so far we have no information about it because with only a single exception all the attacks in the vicinity of the HLZ didn’t leave any evidence behind.”

“Why didn’t you say so before? Who survived and what did you learn?”

“Nothing, he got a dent in his head. He has trouble speaking and he seems to have amnesia. We send 2 potions to accelerate his recovery along with plenty of healing salve, hopefully after the dent in his skull heals he will recover his speech properly and especially his memory. The system has its miracles, but more serious injuries like this take more than just a full health bar to heal from.”

I put my hand on my left side where I was cut almost in half and say:

“I know that very well.”

It takes him a moment, but he says.

“Well, you would know.”

The older scout, intently staring at the beast asks.

“That is all well and good, but we need to make a decision now. Do we need to poke the bear?”

“We do,” Says the Richard. “But I don’t want to risk you guys.”

The younger tracker scout says. “Somebody is eventually gonna have to do it, better sooner rather than later. We have Nash on our side, that is the best backup anyone can hope for.”

“My network in the region is not nearly good enough to really protect you guys, and that is not even taking into account the relative strength of the beast which was way beyond me back at level 100, let alone now that it is nearing level 140,” I say.

The younger scout continues: “I still think doing it now is the safer bet, instead of delaying further.”

“Fine,” Ricard says. “Just be cautious, don’t take absolutely any unnecessary risk.”

After a few minutes, they head in again taking steps forward and splitting apart. Each of them puts their arms in a good fifteen meters to the sides of the Panther. I watch it closely in my perception field waiting for it to jump to one of the sides, but it doesn’t move a millimeter.

They move away than closer to the beast, though after it doesn’t react for a minute they retreat and I volunteer my theory.

“Maybe he can get to a single one of you, but not both. That is why he is not acting. He doesn't want to expose his trump card, but what if we convince him that he can get you both?”

“What do you have in mind?” they reply moving a few more steps away.

I smile widely as I run through my plan with them and they wait for another hour for me to finish up the needed runic infrastructure on the ground and their bodies.

Underneath and over their steel-plated leather armor a thin mesh of roots powers a thin shield that might reduce damage slightly and would open up more options for me to help them.

I feel them breathing deeply before heading in with the roots moving up and down following the movement of their chests. I let it infect me as I sync my own breathing rhythm to theirs. Standing a couple of meters from each other they walk to the left of the beast a good 20 meters away.

And as they get within about a meter of the bright red line on the ground and stop, for the first time in minutes I see the beast move and do so at an unbelievable speed.

Luckily my full attention was on it and a powerful mana shield springs up from the ground in front of the pair.

With speed that belies anything I could dream of even using all my skills and mana infusion, both scouts take a tremendous step back but the beast is still faster and while moving the mana it began to summon, it swipes its paw at them sending a pulse of mana right through the mana shield breaking it and barely slowing down.

“Shit,” I curse. How did it break a 3000 mana point shield in an instant?

They try to head in different directions without even time to turn their backs and properly run, the beast swipes with its other paw and tries to hit at least one of them, but the older scout holds his spear in both hands and strikes the inner part of its arm. The panther growls at failing, if only for a moment. With a broken spear in his hands and wheezing from the blow at his ribs, he tries to gain any distance even as disoriented as he was.

I feel as the mana that the beast is gathering around itself starts to increase again and I try to raise another shield to protect the scouts. That’s all I can do for the moment, delay the beast for an instant and force it to spend more of its mana.

With paws on the ground, the Panther advances even further beyond the line it’s supposed to be its limit, as something faintly tries to pull it back. Something I didn’t notice at first but is now obvious. I look for any signs of pain like the last time when a large pack tried to attack me but find nothing except this faint pull back.

Looking back, I see the older scout rolling on the ground and the younger though more experienced tracker running as fasts as possible, as the panther heads for him next.

With a large leap away from the older scout it chomps on the arm of the tracker.

The mana shield powered by the roots I form on his body, holding barely 20 mana points springs up and even without any help from his own mana disruption skills, the panther chomps through the shield, armor, and roots like they weren’t even there.

I move the roots from the scout’s armor to the head of the beast, hoping they will be of some use as it swings the tracker like a cloth doll. The tracker’s arm barely holds on, and the mana the panther was gathering till now almost depletes as it shoots it to the ground and it reverts its momentum almost 180 degrees in only a single step. Far faster than should be possible.

Newton was very clear, if you are moving very fast forward, you are going to keep moving forward until a force is enacted upon you, and the beast charging at a good hundred kilometers an hour nearly instantly shifting its momentum in the direction of the older scout should be impossible.

Using the momentum of its turn the Panther flings the tracker to its territory as it sprints to finish off the older scout, who is almost 20 meters away from the high-level zone.

I feel the faint pull of the system on the beast getting stronger. I only need to help them hold out a little longer.

The panther, after exerting incredible force and agility, growls again but the sound is muffled and strained as I force the roots in its mouth.

Not being directly connected to the network, I have some trouble with the roots, but with nature mana dispersing from the roots underground I manage to keep the connection, even as the Panther tries to paw it away once on the way to the older scout.

It opens and closes its mouth faster than I thought it possible, trying to chew at the roots and does anything it can think of to get rid of them, but I smile at its inability.

With one last step towards the older scout, it changes posture slightly and heads in to attack him with its paws instead of repeating what I did with the young tracker scout.

A swipe down and the older scout hits the ground in trade for a few more roots gluing to the Panther. With its paw covered in roots, the connection to the roots in the ground is easier and I try to hold it in place.

The panther doesn't like it, though it can simply pull its limbs from the ground with contemptuous ease, ripping the root strands as if they are spider webs.

One last shield springs up, which imperceptibly slows the beast down enough for the older scout to roll himself another 2 meters away from the HLZ with only a scratch in his leather armor to show for it. And as the beast jumps for a final attack, it’s pulled back mid-jump like a rubber band. It growls at the intruder no longer within its grasp, but it turns to rush into its territory instead of letting the system drag it back all the way. I sigh in relief even as the Panther glances at the place where the younger scout should be bleeding out.

I don’t need to read minds, to know what must be passing through its mind. I let a smile escape as the white panther turns its head further and further away from its territory until its gaze locks on the limping scout 30 meters away from the HLZ.

Barely able to stand the tracker relies on the makeshift root splint immobilizing his broken foot while holding his arm as we both try to staunch the blood flow.

Multi-tasks is hard, but it is definitely necessary and very useful in combat.

I hear the scariest and loudest roar of my entire life and I wonder at the fidelity of the sound reproduction from so far away.

With heavy steps that seem almost like a tantrum the Panther sprints away, disappearing from my perception even as I try to follow it.

“Holy shit,” I say. “It used some type of mana attack on the barrier. I didn't know their repertoire was so varied.”

“Later,” says the commander, “do what you can for them.”

Both of the scouts move a good hundred meters back before stopping to assess their injuries. I connect with the remaining roots, tighten a simple garote on the younger scouts arm to prevent him from bleeding out and start to work on a proper splint for his leg. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be making it out of there.

The older scout is in much better shape, though I still need to put pressure on his cuts. Luckily nothing too deep.

They each take out a health potion from their belts and down them before taking healing salve patches and putting them over their wounds. With my help, the patches are firmly, if gently, hold in place as I grow and intertwine the roots with the rough cloth of the healing patches.

After checking that the splint is good enough they move another 500 meters back before stopping just at the edge of the underground root network.

“Don’t worry, in twenty minutes another team will show up. I will leave you with the operators, if you need to speak to me, just call me.” I say.

“Ok.” says the younger scout with the mangled arm with a strained, almost weepy voice as he eyes a second health potion. Their last one, given how precious each one is. I release the garote on his forearm after the patches stoped the external bleeding.

Richard asks me:

“What the hell was that?”

“As I said, some type of skill, it managed to break a shield with 3000 mana in a single swipe and the way it moved was unreal. It wasn't just mana infusing the body and making it faster, it did something to grip the ground and make hairpin turns.”

“Not just that, it seamlessly moved from one to the other, not letting either one escape.” He says.

“We got lucky, against anyone else it would have worked, but I managed to tip the scales ever so slightly in our favor.”

“I wouldn’t call it lucky.” He grits through his teeth with anger in his eyes, though I guess it’s not about anything I said, just the adrenaline of the situation and the injuries from someone under his command.

“You realize we are in deep shit?”

“Ohh, yeah. We have no effective way to combat them, only our ‘defenses’. But I can tell you that they can’t leave for long or a too far away…for now. The system won’t let them.”

“At least we confirmed the situation. Are you certain you can’t monitor the place?”

“No, the area is too large for me to do it alone. I can easily cover thousands of square meters a second, but compared to the thousands of square KILOMETERS I would need to be effective…”

“Shit. Still, we need to come up with something.”

I look at him, fully agreeing in my heart, but what we can do to at least monitor the situation is beyond me.