Giles is defending himself like crazy, he has taken a few cuts but it doesn't look like any are serious. The soldiers are pressing him so that he can't attack them. A few steps away I target the three soldiers on Giles' right.

"Shining Slash!"

The slash of light sent out by my sword cuts the three soldiers in half at the waist. This frees up Giles to stab one of the soldiers on his left, thirteen left. Just then a scream draws everyone's attention to Sidran, Koko is standing on his horse behind him, and the tip of her short sword is sticking out of his chest.

All eyes are on Koko, even the soldiers have stopped to look at her, she raises her free hand in the air. With a flick of her wrist she is suddenly holding three knives, her arms snaps down, and each knife finds the eye of a soldier. Three more down, only ten left, two to one odds isn't that bad.

Giles impales one, Rachel brains another, I cut down two, and Emelia's arrow takes another. Now there are only five left, realizing they are outmatched they try to turn and run. None of them make it more than a few steps before we cut them down.

Now that the enemies are dead I check on my comrades, Koko is cleaning her sword and doesn't have a scratch on her. Rachel is tending to Giles' wounds, I sometimes wonder if he lets himself get hurt just to have her heal him. When I turn to check on Emelia I see her on her knees puking.

I walk over and take a knee next to her, I hold her hair back with one hand and pat her back with the other. I simply comfort her without saying anything and wait for her tears and retching to come to an end. It takes a little over ten minutes but I don't mind, and I don't try to rush her.

She finally sits up and gives me a wan smile, she looks horrible though, with tears stains and snot trails down her face. I pull a towel out of my inventory and offer it to her. She mumbles thanks as she takes it and starts wiping her face.

"It's okay, I hated it too."

Emelia says "You don't think I'm weak and a burden?"

"No! Absolutely not! You did your share, without you we would have been a lot worse off."

Emelia says "I leveled up." and gives me a sad smile.

To my relief Rachel comes over and gives me a look telling me to get lost. I pat Emelia on the head and escape, Rachel will be much better able to take care of it. As I walk away I notice Giles is looting the dead soldiers.

"What are you doing that for?"

Giles says "No point in just leaving it here. Besides, I don't know what your plan is but some of it may come in handy."

Koko says "Horses."

I take a quick look around to see what she means, only the captain's and Giles' horses are in sight. The others must have run off during the commotion. Great, that is going to slow us down a lot.

"They ran off? Maybe, we can chase them down."

Emelia says "No need. I can get them to come back."

"You can? Really? That would be awesome!"

Emelia starts whistling, it is a soothing melody, and after a few minutes the four horses return and walk up to her. She takes an apple out of her inventory and splits it between the four of them.

"That was awesome Emelia! Is that a tamer ability?"

Emelia says "Yes it is. And everyone, please just call me Emmy."

"Alright, Emmy. Now let's get mounted up and put some distance between us and any more forces. We can talk more when we camp for the night."

As everyone starts getting ready I notice Giles is mounting the captain's horse instead of his own. The captain's horse is a war horse, it shouldn't let anyone but his rider near him. Yet it is accepting Giles, once we are moving and headed north I ride up alongside Giles.

"How is it that the war horse is allowing you to ride it?"

Giles says "I'm a lancer, my abilities work better with a mount that is trained to fight."

"So you have an ability that allows you to tame a mount?"

Giles says "Not like Emelia, I can only bond with a single mount, and it has to be within my level range to work. And I can't use a monster as a mount like Marcadus."

"How did that happen anyway? I know you were stronger than Marcadus before."

Giles says "I'm not sure, he went off for some special training and when he came back his class had evolved."

"Went off? I thought no one had left the training camp until we went out hunting the beastman?"

Giles says "As far as I know only Marcadus did."

"That is weird!"

Giles says "Yeah, just one of the many things that doesn't add up."

"Yeah, I feel we have been blind to a lot of things."

We ride on in silence after that, we continue north for hours winding our way through the woods. The roads would be faster but I am sure by now there are more troops after us. I drop back next to Koko to ask her for some help.

"Koko, can one of your ninja skills obscure our tracks or something like that?"

She thinks for a minute and then nods, she makes several strange hand signs and shortly a strange mist appears behind the horses. She glances at it for a minute then looks back at me and smiles. That makes me feel better, having more troops track us down is one of my biggest worries.

A few hours later as the sun starts to set I start looking for a good place to set up camp. After a few minutes of looking Koko rides up next to me and points off to our left. Not having any better ideas I turn in the direction she indicated.

Minutes later I hear the sound of water, just how sharp are her senses to have heard that from back there? We ride into a small clearing alongside a stream, this place looks like a decent camp site. We all dismount and start setting up camp without having to discuss it.

Emelia takes care of the horses while I get a fire going, Koko catches several fish from the stream with her bare hands, while Rachel and Giles set up tents and bedrolls. Once the chores are done and the fish are cooking everyone gathers around the fire and looks at me.

Koko says "Plan?"

Rachel says "Yes, is there a plan?"

"A rough one I'll admit. We head to the northern border, cross it and head east through monster territory until we reach the empire."

Giles says "That's it?"

"I said it was a rough one!"

Suddenly Koko stands up and draws her sword, just then we all hear a twig snap in the woods. Everyone jumps up with weapons in hand and starts scanning the trees. Unfortunately after sitting around the fire our night vision is shot and we can't see anything.

Koko says "Light."

"Let there be light!"

A bright ball of light forms above my head at my command, in the sudden light I can see the biggest bear I have ever seen. It is at least six foot at the shoulder and maybe fifteen feet long, it has six legs and looks to have scales instead of fur. It stands still blinking in the sudden light and swinging its head back and forth sniffing.

Emelia says "It's a fang bear, very dangerous!"

Giles says "How do you know that?"

Emelia says "I read every description on mana beasts I could find in the library."

"Can we chase it away?"

Emelia says "No, if it decides we are food then we fight to the death."

Just then the thing lets out a low growl that I can feel in my chest and rears up with the front third of its body. Now it is about ten feet tall and I can see the massive claws it has on its front paws. It lets loose a roar and charges towards us.