025

I can’t be that lost. I mean I followed a fairly simple path till here and the only reason I’m even feeling lost is because I turned off [Stone Skin] to use [Sprint] when I felt this girl’s presence.

I also took random turns and just tried to keep the general path when I was running towards her because I didn’t want to run into any beasts that could’ve slowed me down. Now I see that it turned into a disadvantage as I have no straight path to follow.

Still we walked through the broken trees that I broke when I rushed to her.

We decide to a little go further and rest a little. Her leg was hurt very badly and she was even bleeding.

“You don’t have any healing pills? I’ll pay you back for it…”

“I’m sorry, I don’t have any.”

I answer. Really, I should really carry around some healing medicine at least. This was a spontaneous training session that somehow turned into a hunting trip, so I didn’t bother to keep any or honestly, even buy any medicine.

Add on the fact that I couldn’t use the storage crystals so I didn’t really bother looking for consumables to carry around. I really should.

She didn’t look too disappointed though, she took out a small cloth from her crystal and tried to wrap her feet. Her hands couldn’t really do so well, her hands lack any strength to properly wrap them so I help her out.

With a firm grip, this should help to stop the bleeding at least. Since she might have some difficulty walking around, so with a little resistance from her, I eventually made her agree to being carried on my back.

She doesn’t talk much but we still talk a little. Her name is Silvia. She just became a hunter a few days ago, she had a party at first, but she left them after an ‘incident’ of some sorts, she didn’t want to talk about it so I didn’t ask further.

I tried to see marks of my running while keeping an eye out for those creatures. It is getting harder to avoid them. I didn’t actually know where I was going, so I decided to understand the group’s location.

I started moving towards the areas where there were fewer groups, I was going with the logic that fewer groups meant that I was getting out of their territory.

Oh how wrong I was.

…

Not far from Grant’s location, the commander’s troupe was having fair share of their own troubles.

“There shouldn’t be this many this close to town. What is happening?”

Said one of the soldiers while swinging his sword.

“I don’t know man, these things just don’t end. I know its mating season and all, but still, aren’t there too many of them somehow?”

Replied the man standing not too far from him. He had just finished off one by flinging a fireball at it.

“I guess we’ll find out.”

Said the previous one as his sword ended the life of another troll. These soldiers weren’t having much trouble with the troll evident by the fact that the commander hadn’t even taken action throughout the way.

All she did was stand at the back while slowly observing her team handle the enemies. It was one way she was judging them, scoring them on their actions, their movements and their overall performance.

It hadn’t been that long ever since she took the spot of the head of the outpost near East Green, so she still wasn’t familiar with the place and the people there.

Although she wasn’t familiar, her juniors were of her. She had made sure they did. She had to make quiet an example of one on her first day just to make sure that everyone knew what kind of person they were dealing with.

She didn’t really fancy the position that much, if anyone of her juniors decided to file a complaint against her for her actions, she wouldn’t mind one bit, and on the contrary, she might even appreciate it.

She was thoroughly disappointed by the skill of the people here, if it weren’t for the almost non-existent amount of danger near this gate, the outpost would’ve already been run over a long time ago.

The only competent man she seemed to recall after coming here was the man who came along the merchant, Aagon.

‘I think his name was Kyle.’

His team wasn’t bad either, he would work great if he was working near the North Gate or even the West Gate, it was a shame really, that a man like him was wasting his talents here.

If it weren’t for her personal reasons for coming here, she wouldn’t have bothered to take up position in the safest outpost there is. The kingdom right beyond the outpost was the Shining Sun Kingdom.

Ice Garden had a very good relation with Shining Sun, their Prince being very fond of the Ice Princess. So the only problem with being close to East Green would be the occasional monster swarm and nothing else.

Even this, this measly Troll swarm that was noticed just by chance was nothing more than an inconvenience to her.

‘No matter the size of the nest, they’re nothing more than pests.’

So she couldn’t help but stand at the back, just looking onto the boring and sleep inducing fight of the soldiers.

One thing did manage to catch her interest though. The footsteps.

She has been studying them quite keenly as they slowly moved through here. She noticed that the person was moving in quite an interesting pattern.

She and her team were following the scout that had spotted the troll’s group and so them knowing where to go, actually made their journey quite linear, but this person, his footsteps seemed to just randomly change directions, she was disappointed the first time as this meant that this person’s and their destination weren’t the same.

But soon enough, after a few groups of trolls later they would move back in. Despite the path they were taking, they looked to be moving in the same general direction. She was curious at this.

“Reporting Commander! There are smaller groups of dead Ice trolls around us up north as well as south from our path.”

Her hunch was correct, this person was looking for smaller groups to hunt intentionally. And avoiding the larger groups by choice.

This means that they have a skill that can be used to track the location of monsters, at least the quantity of them. Plus, judging by the footsteps, this person seemed to be hunting alone, so he was also familiar with the lands.

Her curiosity was growing by the second. She knew, if she kept on her track, she was bound to meet him.

…

In East Green, near the east gate, a group of four soldiers on horseback were standing guard with the spears in their hands. These tall imposing men kept anyone from moving out of the gate.

Their sheer presence stopping anyone from even coming closer to the gate, forget leaving it.

They did as the commander had told them to do, stop everyone from leaving. They were asked several times by multiple people about why they were doing this, but all of them kept their mouths shut other than the simple statement of ‘Commander’s Orders.’

Currently only four of them were near the gate as one had gone to inform the Union of their actions.

That place was another kind of a mess as the Guard who was standing in front of Lara having just explained the situation to her.

Let’s just say her expression wasn’t very good.

“I can’t believe this… it has to be the worst possible time for this to happen…”

The Guard was surprised hearing her say this.

“Why would that be, if I may ask?”

Lara told him straight.

“The reports from the scouting team just came in this morning. A swarm is expected on the south gate as early as this evening, and from what I’ve been hearing from the reports it is at least three times bigger than the previous one two years ago. I don’t understand how a swarm this big goes unnoticed by the scouts for such a long time. If we manage to make it out of this mess, I’ll hand those incompetent fools over to the Union Leader!”

“Three times!!?”

Ignoring the rant at the end, the Guard was certainly taken aback by the sudden information as he was one of the people present during the previous swarm, if it weren’t for the commander of the outpost himself coming to the protection of East Green, this town may have been overrun by now.

Now that he looked around, he noticed there weren’t any people around him, only a few green card holders and the non-combat union staff, only a handful ones as well, no senior volunteer could be seen and the door leading to the Hunter’s Union room was left wide open with no one inside.

“As you can see, all the volunteers, even non-hunters above the Green card stage have been sent to guard the south part of town.”

The Guard knew that he couldn’t expect any help from the Union when he came here, but he would’ve never thought that the situation to be so bad.

Now that he was properly thinking back, there were very few people on the streets, this in itself should’ve been an obvious enough clue, but maybe the urgency of his situation made him ignore it completely.

“W-what are we to do then, Lady Lara?”

He asked feeling completely stumped by this news.

“Just keep two of your men on the East Gate, the remaining men and we will try to handle the situation in the south. Let us hope there is enough power on your side to handle that problem.”

The Guard nodded and did as told. He could only hope for his commander and his men to succeed.

…

“How the hell did we end up here..?”

I couldn’t help but say looking at the scenery in front of my eyes.

It was a huge cave. The entrance itself was more than ten metres wide and almost four metres tall.

Even with the sun shining above my head, I still had difficulty looking a few metres ahead in it.

I was certain that I followed the most obvious path with the troll’s population going further and further down, by this logic I should’ve reached the edge of the forest, not in the middle of it.

“I don’t feel too good about this, let’s leave.”

Said Silvia on my back. I nodded, it didn’t feel right. My [Awareness] was also behaving weird about this. There was something deep in this cave that my skill was warning me about, I instinctively knew that it was something incredibly bad as it didn’t react this way to the Silver wolf or even the Brawler, and those things almost killed me.

I slowly inched away from the shade I was hiding in. Thankfully we weren’t stupid enough to get near it.

That thing had yet to sense us.

Or so I thought.

I had only taken a few steps or so, then,

KAAAAA!!!!

An ear piercing scream reverberated through the area. I dropped to my knees as I covered my ears. The sound lasted for maybe a few seconds, during which I couldn’t even move my body.

Even after the sound had faded, I could still feel it ringing in my ears. I tried to check Silvia’s condition, but she lost consciousness. I tried calling out to her, but sadly, I doubted that she could hear me. I couldn’t hear my own voice through the ringing.

And as if things couldn’t get any worse. My [Awareness] picked on something and I had to immediately get up barely keeping myself straight without falling over.

There in the distance, through the thick dead trunks and trees, I saw them. In the tens and hundreds with more coming from the back. The scream was some sort of signal that brought these monsters together.

If I think correctly then this means inside the cave there is a more dangerous version of the trolls. A boss of some type, like the purple furred rabbit.

Even the boss monster of the rabbits was dangerous, just what kind of a monster was inside this cave.

Since I didn’t want to find out, I ran away from the cave and the group started running towards me. I had difficulty running but I didn’t activate [Sprint] just yet, if I tripped because of the dizziness, it won’t be pretty.

I also had the responsibility of another human on me. I couldn’t just forget about her, so tightening my grip around her frail thighs, I ran.

After a minute or so, the ringing slowed down a little and I felt a lot better. My running had stabilized as well, I was ready to activate [Sprint].

As I gave my back to the creatures, a sudden thought popped up in my head.

“Is running the only thing I’m good at?”

It came like a bolt of lightning striking me on the head.

I mean, that is all I’ve been doing ever since I came here. I ran from the monster on the first day, then the rabbits, then the leopard, then the dino-shark, then the Ice Brawler, and now this.

I don’t know why, but this sudden realization stirred something within me.

‘If I keep running away from everything that could endanger me, then how am I supposed to become stronger?’

Something changed within me. A strange warm feeling rose up from my abdomen, spreading across my body. I could feel it in my body, it was my QI, reacting my emotions on its own.

My mind which I thought was pretty much immune to such feelings became moved by it, if only ever so slightly.

‘Looking at their numbers, even though there’s many of them, I can probably defeat them.’

The feeling in my abdomen grew warmer and stronger.

‘No, I can’t. There’s still the worse monster waiting inside the cave, I can’t let that thing get the chance to come out and attack.’

I retorted to myself.

‘But that is only if I take too much time, I can probably take this many on if I just activate my [Stone Skin]. Their attacks are too weak to even leave a scratch on my body, with my 100+ DEF stat and the skill, I’ll have enough defence to take them on.’

Having somehow convinced myself of my crazy idea. I increased my speed a little, stopping near some thicker trees, I looked back.

“A few more seconds I guess.”

I sat Silvia down with the support of one of the trees. I can’t fight with her on my back. I also can’t run while carrying her, or else I wouldn’t have to cancel [Stone Skin] every time I needed [Sprint].

After laying her down and apologizing to her for leaving her like this, I focused my attention back towards the trolls who were only about a hundred metres behind me.

I can’t let them come any closer than this.

Getting myself into position, I activated [Quick Dash] aiming myself straight at the troll in my line of sight.

As my body bolted forward with the speed of a speeding bullet, just before coming in contact with the troll, I activated [Stone Skin], with the weight of about a quarter tonne, I rammed my stone body onto the troll.

[150 EXP gained.]

Its body flew into tiny bits as the other trolls, quite a few of them were now covered in the creature’s blood including me. But fortunately for me, I couldn’t feel the corrosion of the blood on me because of [Stone Skin], but sadly the trolls weren’t so lucky.

As the ones in the front struggled, I made quick work of them.

With over five bodies around me even before a minute had passed, the Qi flowed through my body like a raging river, filling me up fighting energy I never knew I had.

“COME ON!!”