And so, a month passed.

Alary only wished she could say it’d been in the blink of an eye.

“Squad leader! We won’t be able to hold out much longer!” Cried Harold, from beyond the yellow barrier, pushing a demon boar away with a bash of his towershield, allowing Gallathorn to finish it, while Garry guarded his other flank.

She nodded, then turned her gaze towards Alice, standing beside her. “Our turn.”

It definitely hadn’t been in the blink of an eye.

The plan was simple to explain: Alary’s team was to thin the number of demon boars blocking their path outside, while Alice was in charge of fixing the external barrier surrounding the entire mountain range, as was hers the duty of modifying the one protecting them, in order to allow a demon boar’s corpse to get past without being fulminated by a lightning strike.

All the while, Alary and Alice would also take turns to get rid of the remaining bodies: the first was in charge of using her sword to transfer their essence out, as well as creating a wind current to get rid of the smoke made by the latter, as a result of burning their corpses as efficiently as possible.

They had water, and albeit their diet would become a bit monotonous, they also had food… as long as they could actually get them inside.

Alary felt relieved to know her trust in her friend’s talents wasn’t misguided, seeing as it only took Alice three days to alter the almost a thousand years old spell…

“How?” She asked her once they had received the good news, and were all seated around a bonfire.

“To be honest, as soon as you told me your idea I also thought of a series of commands that may make it possible.” Alice answered, glancing furtively at Gallathorn, who was the one cooking the meat. “Are you sure he knows what he’s doing?”

Alary nodded, and gestured for her to continue.

“The difficult part came when deciding where to introduce the command. Luckily, a thousand years is not long enough for a casting language to change. At least not drastically. They did have some interesting ways to link phenomena and summarize them, enough to make me wonder why we don’t use them anymore. For example… “

Alary cocked her head to the side, and snored as if asleep.

“Alright! To the point then.” Said Alice then, repressing a sigh of disappointment. Sometimes she missed a mind inquisitive enough for her to throw ideas in. “Once I found the place where to insert my command, it was a matter of which one to use. I had to think quite carefully about what’s the main difference between a demonic being that’s alive, and another that’s dead. And that difference had to be simple, easily caught by the barrier’s detection spell, and common to all cases where demonic essence had to enter the temple. We don’t want a beast wandering in because I neglected some possibility after all. Can you guess the answer I arrived at?”

Alary, seated in front of her, refuged her hands between her thighs and lowered her gaze, thinking. “If the essence was returning to the world or not?” She shook her head before Alice had the chance to say anything. “No, that would not only take too long to detect, it could also be the consequence of some other reason… “

Alice missed having some tea to sip from.

“What about… if the demonic essence is near another kind of essence?” Alary shook her head again, and separated her legs slightly to free one hand and bring it to her chin. “No, that would be too complex to cast, even on its own. It could also be quite misleading.”

A few breaths passed, and the sound of fire licking and grease burning quickly filled the silence between them.

“Do you give up?” Alice asked, lifting an eyebrow.

Another breath of silence flew by, only broken by Gallathorn reprimanding Harold for adding too much salt.

“C’mon, it’s not that hard. In fact, your two ideas were exactly the ones I went through when I faced this exact same dilemma.” Alice added, and rested her face on her intertwined hands, her fingers forming a hanging bridge of sorts, then cocked her head to the side, smiling. “You could be such an amazing spellcaster with that sharp mind of yours.”

Alary giggled. “But then, who would cover your ass while you cast?”

“Excuse me? I’m perfectly capable of covering my own, beautifully shaped ass, thank you very much.” She replied, crossing her arms beneath her chest, feigning indignation. “Now, think a bit harder. What’s the one thing all dragged corpses would have if they were to enter the barrier?”

This time, there was no silence.

“Keep your hands to yourself for fuck’s sake! Do you want the meat to taste like salt?”

“I-I’m just trying to help…”

“Not everything needs to have your handprint, handsy leecher!”

“W-What?! I would never…!”

Alary opened her eyes in surprise, as an idea formed in her mind. “Soul imprint?”

Alice touched her nose with a finger, two times. “Exactly. I guess you remembered how I warned you to not let Garry be the one to bring the demon boar in. You were the one who killed it after all.”

Her friend nodded. “Now I get it.” She placed her hand between her thighs once again. “You made it so no demonic essence without the soul imprint of someone near could get past the barrier. Clever.”

A soul imprint was quite easy to find through the use of one’s seventh sense or a detection spell, and it was also unique for every being. If Alary had to describe it, leaving a soul imprint was like when a beast marks its territory with its scent. Also, a soul imprint acted as both, an anchor to keep the essence from returning to the world, and a hook from which the adventurer could pull from in order to refine it.

Although there were other reasons for a soul imprint to exist in another being, both of them carried a sort of power the one bearing it couldn’t escape from, hence ensuring no demonic essence could enter the temple without someone else’s consent. Clever couldn’t begin to describe it… yet overly complimenting her friend could have some unbearable consequences on her personality, so Alary refrained from saying anything else.

Alice made a slight bow. “Nothing much.”

If something had to be said, that would be that no one in the team thought there could be any more obstacles to their mission. Not back then.

“Squad leader! It’s ready.”

Alary nodded, and turned to look at the rest of her subordinates, their spirits high before the chance of eating boar meat, but more than anything, the pleasant feeling of knowing they wouldn’t starve during the month they had ahead.

Even Garry was smiling like a fat kid viewing his favorite dish.

“Aly… are you sure it’s edible?” Whispered Alice.

Alary shrugged. “It should. The demonic essence won’t be harmful to us as long as we don’t eat a whole boar each, in a day. Besides, it’s not like we are refining it.”

“That’s not what I mean…”

She followed her friend’s gaze, only to find Gallathorn at the end of it, and finally repressed a smile.

“Don’t worry. He has his good qualities.” As the squad leader, she had to admit it.

It had been a year since Gallathorn joined her party.

As the son of an acquaintance of her father, and personally introduced by him, she wasn’t able to refuse. Needless to say, the man didn’t cause a good first impression on her, and even though she got to know him better with time, she was aware that if she had been given a choice, she would have still refused, as his behaviour was cowardly, envious like a hungry rat, and also had this kind of strange obsession with her.

However, she had to recognize his good points as well. His foundations were good, for starters. Despite being almost thirty years old, he was at the Tempered Essence second stage, which put his attitude above average, and his skills with a spear were quite good, especially to work as a team. He knew where to be and when to be, when to strike to finish an enemy off, or when to replace a teammate.

So, even though she wanted to transfer him to another party, she didn’t have good, solid reasons to do so. Not any which would convince her father, at least.

Yet, despite it all, she had to grant it to him… he was a great cook.

“Gallathorn, this meat is so tender... I could actually kiss you.” Alice complimented, her cheek rounding out.

“Miss Dothein… you can’t be serious…” He answered, a rosy color painting his face.

The spellcaster hit her knee with feigned frustration. “Damn, you got me.” Then, after a brief pause to finish her mouthful, added, “I am impressed though.”

Gallathorn shook his head, and went back to grilling the rest of the meat.

“I can’t believe you kept the condiments on your person.” Garry commented then, making everyone recall how they had to abandon their campsite and provisions when the demon boars appeared.

Alary took a bite, deep in thought.

“Well, remember when we had to hide inside The Hartvens family tomb for a week?” Gallathorn asked, as his hands deftly turned the meat around, hanging over their improvised fire.

“Oh yeah, the Lich. Gloomy stuff.” Harold recalled, between bites. None of them had any tableware, so they could only skewer the meat with their knives and be careful to clean them afterwards.

“I found out then that even in the most depressing place, good food can keep your spirits up. So I always try to keep some basic condiments on me just in case.”

A few breaths full of thought and reflection passed, albeit for very different reasons.

Alary nodded to herself, agreeing in silence.

“That’s deep.” Said Garry, and then took a bite.

“I can’t believe you can cook, and say good things too! Tonight has been full of surprises.” Commented Alice, shaking her head in disbelief. Then, she directed her green gaze upwards, frowning. “Or I think it’s night. With the whole cave situation, I don’t know anymore.”

A pair of scarlet eyes also looked up, yet not at the rock, not exactly. Alary’s thoughts were quite beyond that place, and wandered through the different information she had about their current problems and how to best solve them.

An important hurdle had been resolved, and now she was sure they would be able to survive a month and still have enough energy left to return home… yet there were a few unknown factors she couldn’t elucidate, not with what she knew so far.

How come the temple was abandoned to such a state?

What was the cause for the barrier’s “drop in essence density”?

And most importantly...

Why did the demon boars’ behavior change so drastically?

It was almost like they were following orders…

Alary nodded once again. Gallathorn was right: good food could keep one’s spirit’s up. And she felt they were going to need it.

And indeed. They did.

At first, their days went by with no change nor any expected development. Albeit Gallathorn would voice complaints from time to time, they already knew the demon boars weren’t behaving as one would think, hence they didn’t find it strange that despite thinning their numbers, more seemed to be waiting inside the only narrow passageway outside.

However…

They did expect that after a month of constantly killing them, they would eventually retreat.

“How many have we felled so far?” Harold asked, panting from exhaustion as his mace found mark and caved in a beast’s skull. “... a thousand?”

“I… I don’t know. But my spear won’t last much longer…” Gallathorn replied, retracting his weapon from the jaw of a now inert demon boar, and examining it with a glance. They had killed the least, as their weapons needed a kind of maintenance they couldn’t perform down there. Much less when their equipment was still back at the camp.

Their problems began a week ago, after Alice announced she’d be making the final adjustments, which included the transfer of Essence from the barrier protecting the temple, to the one outside.

“How strong will the temple’s be when you are finished?” Alary asked back then.

Alice’s features grimaced. “Not as strong as I hoped. If it’s just one creature there shouldn’t be a problem… but many targets will make the barrier prioritize paralyzing them rather than killing them. If such a thing occurs, the ‘patch’ I’ve put in place will eventually fail due to the Essence being constantly drained, bringing down the whole barrier again.”

“Well… that’s still quite better than having nothing at all.” Remarked Garry.

Harold, however, shook his head. “True, but not the problem we actually face. Squad leader, Miss Dothein… What do you think of the demon boars’ behavior?”

Both of them nodded, not surprised by his question. Harold was a veteran adventurer with much more experience than them, so it wasn’t strange for him to also notice something unusual. They looked at each other for an instant, then Alary answered, “To be succinct, there is a certain pattern in their movements. The kind you’d see in an army.”

“Aly and I arrived at the conclusion that there has to be something, or someone, giving them orders. Otherwise, I don’t see how a creature known to prioritize the species rather than the individual, would throw almost a thousand of their kin at a temple that by all instincts should be impenetrable.” Added Alice, her arms crossed and her green gaze lost somewhere on the other side of the cave, as her seventh sense scanned what was happening outside. “However, their movements are simple too. There is an order, but also a lack of… tactics. Whatever is controlling them can’t be too smart.”

It was Harold’s turn to nod. “I think so too. From the very first moment we stepped into their territory, it’s been almost as if they were hunting us down…”

“At the Temple’s cave entrance… that squealing we heard…” Garry commented out loud.

Harold nodded once again. “It was a call to arms.”

“A call to arms? From pigs?” Asked Gallathorn in disbelief.

“Hard to believe, but given what’s happened so far, it’s not impossible.” Said Alary, then looked at Harold. “What’s on your mind?”

The veteran ran his gauntlet-cladded hand over his face, his thoughts taking shape, his will bracing itself. “I doubt either of you haven’t considered it already, but what would happen if the one commanding them were to realize the Temple’s barrier… has weakened?”