As Avaln finished his analysis, he heard a soft cough coming from his left, further inside the cave.

The girl who didn’t stab him while completely defenseless was sleeping, but from there his eyes could catch her pale complexion and difficult breathing, as sweat ran down the sides of her delicate face.

He could imagine her falling asleep from exhaustion while staring in his direction, trying to decide if to trust him or not. Luckily for both of them, she had passed out.

Avaln stood and quickly found a place to sit in front of her, bringing the spear with him just in case, realizing his strength was greatly restored and his wounds had almost disappeared. Without preambles, he began drawing the same rune he used last time with the demon boar, as he also examined with his seventh sense her current state.

Identifying her exact injuries was impossible with its use only, but by reading where her essence flow seemed perturbed, he could catch sight of her most serious ones. After a few breaths, he surmised her state was only slightly better than his after fighting the demon boar. However, he couldn’t tell the time that passed since she received them.

A grimace surfaced in his expression, as the memory of last night crossed his mind. Avaln used the entire essence of a demon boar to heal himself, and now the endeavor in front of him required just a bit less than that. His meager essence just wasn’t enough.

An idea took form in his mind then, as he skimmed through his comprehended knowledge.

He guessed the girl had a Nascent Essence stage two refinement level, so if he used his own strength to try to cure her it wouldn’t be of much use, yet if he added his to hers, that would change things.

Avaln also found himself much more comfortable drawing that rune. Last night his consciousness hung by a thread as his fears and hopes mixed into a mist of sorts, so his work probably was quite hasty and poor, which directly affected the rune’s efficacy. Yet right there his hands moved with the ease of someone who had practiced those gestures hundreds of times.

One reason was because the connection between his mind and body was greatly enhanced by his advanced essence circulation, while the other was because of the time he spent inside the Tower of Babylon comprehending that discipline. Thanks to that, his understanding of his own abilities allowed him to trace a plan of action.

Being surrounded by demon boars could possibly not be a bad thing. In fact, it could be the perfect opportunity. But to make sure of that, he needed to save that girl. She was his only source of information right now, and could become a great ally in front of the perils they faced.

He wrote two different runes. The same one he used before a little over her chest, meant to regenerate, and a different one over his, meant to transfer. The work was slow, as carving the runes in the air required him to focus his essence on his fingertips with enough strength for them to last until he finished them. He also needed to split his mind in two to work on the rune over his own chest at the same time, which was a strange and new experience for him.

He poured his essence on them, and soon sensed how hers began to circulate faster, flowing to her wounds, same as his own but through the runes, which flashed with a grey light.

Half a stick of incense later, she opened her eyes. Her first emotion at seeing him so close was shock, then fear, then panic, then she took action and jumped away from her seat.

“Seems like you feel better already.” Avaln commented as a drop of sweat ran down his forehead.

Upon hearing him, the girl examined herself and found that many of her injuries were far better than before, and had stopped bleeding. They weren’t completely healed, but such an improvement made her direct a reevaluating glance to Avaln.

From surprise, to doubt, to realization. He watched the chain, quite amused.

All the while, the girl kept reforming her thoughts.

His appearance was frightening, but his voice was quite soothing and not only had he kept his word, but also did so while she was completely defenseless. She felt a rock sinking in her gut when her memories of last night appeared in her mind. How she treated him even though he was only seeking refuge…

“T-Thanks.” She bowed finally, embarrassed.

Avaln sent her a grin. “Does that mean you are not going to stab me?”

The girl quickly gestured the possibility away, flustered. “I-I wouldn’t dare! Mister has been too kind to me already!”

Mister. He thought to himself, as he caressed his beard a bit, entertaining a thought. Then, he invited her to sit with a hand, as pain bloomed in her expression, along with a fatigue which he could relate to.

She did as told, and once they were at the same level, Avaln sent her a gentle smile. “What’s your name?”

She received the smile with one of her own, a bit embarrassed. “Rei. Rei of Gale.”

He nodded. “Are we near Gale? Actually, where exactly are we?”

“Mister doesn’t know?” Her surprise was evident.

“I became a bit lost.”

“We are in the Demon Boar Mountain range.” She explained with an obvious tone, then blushed when realizing it, as she didn’t want to insinuate Avaln was ignorant. He noticed it, but didn’t say anything because, sadly, it was the truth. “Gale is about three days away from here… although I’m lost as well. A companion of mine had a map, but…”

A different kind of pain surfaced in her delicate face, and the vision of the corpses he found last night flashed in his mind.

He dismissed the idea of telling her right now. It wasn’t the time.

“Let’s tackle our problems one by one then.” He locked eyes to distract her from her gloomy thoughts. “Food. Do you have any food?”

To his surprise, she nodded, and pointed at a satchel behind the rock covering the now extinguished fire. Avaln surmised the wood she used was a kind which didn’t emit much smoke nor was hard to burn, for under normal circumstances one would not be able (and shouldn’t) light a fire inside a cave. At least not as deep as they were.

Next, he asked with a glance, and at her nod he approached the satchel and made a quick summary of what was in there. “Are these mushrooms edible?”

She nodded once again. “My uncle knows a lot about the forest, so I learnt a bit too. I don’t know them all but I’m pretty sure those are alright. I ate a couple a few days ago.”

Inside there were a bunch of mushrooms, a few apples which had seen better days, and some herbs he couldn’t recognize. He shook his head to himself. In just a few breaths, he’d been made aware of how utterly ignorant and unprepared he was, and even if the current situation wasn’t of his choice, he still made a mental note of visiting a library to get some useful knowledge.

“What about water?” He asked then.

“There is a stream not far from here. Mister might have seen it.” She replied. Avaln skimmed through the different points of interest in his mind, and quickly set on one of them, nodding to himself.

Disbelief dawned on him then.

Right now, that sixteen year old girl was more prepared than he was. And in fact, Rei was also stronger than him.

Such a thought brought him back to his original purpose.

And so, he made a suggestion to Rei. They could share the food she had, and in exchange he would finish healing her and they could cooperate to rest in turns before finding their way to Gale. Avaln didn’t tell her he also needed time to comprehend the knowledge he had extracted from the book, for it would only confuse her.

Besides, he knew such a secret couldn’t be easily revealed to anyone. In fact, he doubted he’d ever meet someone he trusted enough for that.

He knew what he had to do, and when she nodded and gave her thanks for his assistance, he suppressed a sense of joy. Rei seemed like an honest, humble and capable young girl, and the fact she had been forced to such a state was only due to the circumstances. In fact, being able to survive in the middle of the Demon Boar Mountain range was incredible given her refinement level.

He couldn’t ask for better help.

Avaln knew little about the place they were in, and even if he already suspected where he was, given the presence of demon boars, having Rei to answer his questions allowed him to have a better understanding of what was happening.

It seemed that two months ago the barrier surrounding the Demon Boar Mountain range had begun to weaken for some unknown reason. The barrier had existed unperturbed for three hundred years, and not many in Gale knew why it was there originally. In fact many thought it was a reserved training area belonging to the Greenleaf guild, as they knew they had access to it.

However, because of its deterioration, some demon boars began to wander near Gale, causing many deaths among the unaware villagers, and even though they sent a quest to the Greenleaf guild to take care of the matter, a month passed with no answer from them...

So Rei and a group of youngsters decided to take matters into their own hands, believing inside the barrier just laid a training ground where they could gain strength and protect the village themselves. Their cause was good, but they greatly underestimated how tough demon boars could be.

In their first hunt, one of the group was injured, and the beast, seeing itself outnumbered, ran away. Later on they found another one which they were able to kill, but when the strongest of them, a youth named Gorg, tried to refine its essence, his eyes bulged out and died after spitting a mouthful of blood.

Avaln inferred he had suffered a backlash. Demon boars had a strength equivalent to a Nascent Essence third stage adventurer, so if the one attempting to refine their essence had a lower refinement level than that, it meant they were trying to absorb way more than their bodies could handle, aside from trying to refine a demonic essence that is known for being quite corrosive… which is why aptitude and a secret art to refine essence was so important.

That was one of the main reasons why he didn’t try to refine the essence of the demon boar he killed last night.

Her tale finished half a stick of incense later, when she narrated how her group was ambushed during the night by a pack of demon boars. It was a massacre. Dan, the name she mentioned when Avaln entered the cave, was the reason she was alive as the youth faced the demon boars following them on purpose to give her a chance to escape.

She stopped her tears from flowing, which showed Avaln she had already cried a lot before he arrived.

They had been more prepared than he was…

But not enough.