Chapter 10

Eva Lemuria-14 years old

After my little show of strength in the guild, I decided to go towards the gate out of the city. The guild is placed about right in between the castle and the city entrance so it takes about the same amount of time for me to reach outside the city as it would walk towards the castle. The gate is busy with merchants and commoners coming in and out of the gate with a constant flow. There are actually very few adventures going thought. It makes me wonder what all those adventures in the guild do all day considering they were just sitting around. I hope there are at least some adventures out in the forest doing something.

I leave the city gate and look in the direction of the forest and realize it will take at least half an hour for me to reach the edge of the forest. I walk up to a merchant's caravan and ask if I can just ride on through the forest before hopping off. The merchant agrees and I sit on the edge of his cart and wait till we reach the forest. I notice that others have asked for rides as well, but the merchants only agree if it's not too excessive and the people look trustworthy.

As were riding along the road I notice only a few adventures walking along the side of the road. It saddens me to see so many women following along these groups with their heads down. It takes only half the time to reach the forest and I hop off the cart and walk straight into the forest without being noticed at all from the merchants.

I keep walking around looking for my prey. I know that earth wolves like to stay underground so I need to look for a burrow in the ground. I need to avoid the areas where other beast territories are or else ill just run into unnecessary trouble. I wander around for another twenty minutes before I find a hole in the ground. I see claw marks on the edge of the hole and I know that it belongs to the wolves, but just in case I hide in a tree for a while till I see a group of brown wolves crawl into the hole while dragging a sun deer behind them. It's a beast that has white fur and horns that all glow a little making them look like sunlight. There are about five wolves that have returned and I'm not sure how many are outside or in the burrow. Either way, I know five will be enough for the request so I decided to make my move now.

I hop down from the tree and sneak my way towards the burrow. I look at the entrance and don't see any wolves right here so I manifest a flame on my left hand while holding my halberd to my right in a ready stance. I point my left hand at the borrow and release as many flames as I can into the hole. I used about one-third of my mana before the wolves started pouring out of the burrow. They all looked pissed and most had singed fur. About fourteen wolves had come running out of the burrow. Some still had black flames burning them so they ran around trying to put them out. Other wolves immediately noticed me and charged towards me to begin circling me.

One of the more burned wolves seemed like it didn't seem to keep any of the calm the others had because of the burns and it charged right for me. Its speed couldn't even compare towards Shadows speed. Without infusing any mana or elements in my halberd I grip it with both hands before swinging the ax side right at the wolf with a horizontal slash. The wolf is cut right through its middle but is only held together because it had just barely entered my reach. Blood flies towards some of the wolves circling me and they pause.

Two more wolves charge at me from two directions so I stab the spear ended of my halberd into the skull of one before kicking the other with a lightning infused foot. I didn't infuse too much mana but it's enough to shock the wolf paralyzing it. When it falls to the ground I pull out my halberd before swinging it down on the wolf’s neck. That's three out of fourteen.

This time four wolves charge towards me from all directions. I grip my halberd and infuse lighting to the scythe blade. My lighting mana forms a full scythe and I swing it in a full circle cutting all four wolves down at once and two of the other wolves that were still circling. Five of the Wolves are instantly dead while the last one rolled out of the way in at the last second but he did lose a paw. The wolf immediately tries to get up and run, but the trees start falling around us. I seem to have accidentally cut a few trees in my attack earlier. The wolf’s torso is crushed under a tree to I jump on top of the tree and stab my halberd in the wolf’s head before looking around to see the five wolves that are still burning are now charging at me with a mad look in their eyes.

They all madly charge at me with their mouths showing their teeth. I’ll admit even I'm a little freaked out to see five flaming wolves charge at me without a care for themselves. I quickly hop back from the tree and infuse a flame edge on my halberd before swinging it above the fallen tree just in time to blow away two of the wolves while the other three had gone to the sides to take a bite out of me. I stab my halberd into the tree stump before pointing both my palms towards the two wolves at my sides and releasing two black lightning bolts at the wolves. Both the wolves eat the lightning bolts through their open mouths and their dead bodies drop to the ground convulsing. I then sense danger behind me so I grab my dagger infusing a flame edge before turning to the side dodging a wolf trying to bite my head. I swipe up with my dagger and the wolf is split in two with charred organs flying up. I realize that I made a mistake and the wolf has grazed my arm leaving shallow cuts on my right shoulder. I grab my halberd while I hop over the fallen tree to see the two wolves I blew away earlier are slowly buying to death so I quickly stab my halberd in each of their heads to finish them off.

I take a seat on the fallen tree and look around while I catch my breath. Then it hits me and I puke a little. This is the first time I've ever killed anything and it had definitely been a brutal fight. I first tried to fight without my mana because I'm trying to test my strength. I was able to kill some wolves without mana but it took a bit of strength to cut through them. My lightning was able to kill the wolves easily and my flames definitely blew them away.

My reviewing was interrupted by some barking in the burrow. I then realized that those were probably just pups in there and that I had just killed all their family. I don't want to kill anymore today, but Shadow has already taught me of what I'm am supposed to do. The burrow is too small and dangerous for me to go into so I form a condensed ball of flames and throw it right into the burrow. The ground shakes and the borrow entrance has a burst of black flames come out before crumbling. Hopefully, the wolves that were all still in there died in the blast so they don't have to suffocate.

I then cut the tails of all the wolves I killed as proof of the subjection. Most of the time a tail is considered proof of subjugation of normal beast. For a mana beast, the tail is supposed to be taken and the heart is supposed to be cut out as well. A mana beast has a mana heart just like humans, except when they die their hearts crystallize for some reason. Since every wolf here is just a normal beast I just collect their tails in a bag.

I finish collecting everything and begin walking out of the forest. Luckily I make it out as easily as I made it in. I'm now in the open plains walking back towards the city. I could have followed along the road again and ended up back at the entrance, but I decided to walk alone along the plains till the city wall and then follow the wall till the entrance.

As I'm walking along the plains I feel the ground shake underneath me. I instantly take a battle stances and look around me. The plains are completely empty with no one in sight. Out of nowhere, the ground beneath me crumbles away And my instincts kick in as I stab my halberd down. My halberd does not pierce anything like I thought instead it hits the hardened stone that's covering a large brown wolf. I use the wolf as a jumping board to propel myself outside of the hole. I look back towards the hole and see 4 earth wolves and a larger wolf. This new wolf has the same brown color as the earth wolves except it also has hard stones growing over its body creating a plated armor. I realize that it's a mana beast that was originally a normal earth wolf. I guess it used its mana to create a tunnel to sneak up on me.

Jagged stone spike burst from the ground trying to impale me, but I jump out of the way. I throw a bolt of black lightning at one of the earth wolves finishing it in a one hit kill. I decided to eliminate the normal earth wolves before focusing on the mana beast. The spikes that had burst from the ground explode creating shrapnel that I dodge or knock away with my halberd. Some of the shrapnel embeds in my armor, but it doesn't go deep enough to do any damage because of my armors enchantments. I take my knife infusing it with lighting before I throw it. It becomes a black streak that flies right into the eye of one of the earth wolves killing it. I charge towards the other two but a rough wall of rock forms between us and I can only jump towards it and jump backward as I avoid a swipe of the mana beast. Mid-air I form plenty of flames on my halberds scythe before swinging a flame wave at the wolf. A sea of flames forms around us but besides a few scorch marks on the mana beasts stone plates, it's unharmed. I then blast flames from the bottom of my feet bursting upward I go over the mana beast and land next to one of the dead earth wolves where I grab my dagger to re-sheath it. Then I dash towards the earth wolves that are still alive. I level my halberds spear tip and run lighting along the entire halberd. Arcs of lightning from all around me and my halberd as I share towards them. Before I reach them I thrust my spear forward and all the arcs of lightning blast towards the wolves incinerating parts of their bodies. Black sparks run along what's left of their bodies. I can now completely focus on the mana beast which is charging towards me with an enraged look.

I stab my halberd infused with lightning towards the mana beasts eye only for it to be knocked away by the paw of the beast. I follow the motion and swing my halberd in a circular motion before slashing a lightning infused ax head at the mana beasts outstretched paw. I'm able to cut off its limb so it only has a nub bleeding all over the ground. It roars and becomes maddened because of the pain of losing a limb. I take this chance it roars to draw my dagger while infusing it with flames and throw it into its mouth. It stabs in the mouth of the beast and the beast instinctively closes its mouth only for a burst of black flames to burst from its lips and teeth. The beast falls over rolling around while using it's remaining foreleg to claw at its mouth. I take this opportunity to infuse a large amount of lightning mana in my halberd before bringing it up and then swinging it down on the mana beasts neck. It cuts through its neck and its other foreleg.

I collapse on the ground exhausted. I probably only have about ten percent of my mana left. I start to think of how this happened and why. I guess the wolves most have been a second group that went out hunting and they came back to their borrow only to find my aftermath. They must have picked up my scent and came after me. This mission only had a small chance of there being any mana beasts which is why it is only a 7th tier mission. I don't know what tier this mana beast is but it showed me that I do need to keep adventuring like this. I barely have any injuries but I used far too much mana fighting. I feel as if I made a breakthrough even though I did poorly today. I've decided that I will collect the reward for the mission and then find out what tier this mana beast is before taking a test for the same tier as it.

I get up and collect all the tails before opening the mana beasts jaws to retrieve my dagger. With my dagger in hand, I began opening the mana beasts chest to retrieve its heart. After digging around for a while I find it. The heart is completely made out of a brown crystal. It looks like it will break by me just dropping it on the ground, but I can tell its much harder than it looks. I throw it in the bag with the tails before shouldering it on my left while my halberd is shouldered on my right. I began walking back towards the city before stopping. I turn around to infuse the last bits of mana I can in my halberd then swing a flame wave at the bodies burning them. I walk away as my black flames are burning away the bodies and hopefully any trace of me being here. I don't want to be tracked for revenge again so soon. With that, I make my way towards the city wall and then follow it to the first open gate.