Volume 1 Chapter 6: Part 4: Expedition

The person who says these harsh words is none other than Joseph. His expression is cold and callus,

"And you guys call yourself knights? How can you all be beaten by such simple opponents? Did your training get thrown out the window? Such a disgrace."

The amount of damage the trainees received was not small. Some are badly injured and scratched up.

Joseph wouldn't be this angry if the same outcome came from fighting orcs. But it didn't come from them. All of these injuries came from a pack of wolves. They're one of the weakest demons out there.

Trainees should be able to deal with them with no problem. Or so Joseph had thought.

How can Joseph accept such an outcome like this?! The better question he's asking himself now is what will happen when they fight with the orcs?

That didn't need to be answered. The mock battle alone is enough to allow him to figure out what'll happen.

"How dare you call us pathetic?! It's because you guys didn't even step in to help us! How can you tell us to fight something we didn't even know was coming?!"

The person who shouts this out is a noble trainee. He can't stand it. While the trainees fought with the wolves, the knights just looked at them!

They just stood there and watched them get attacked. And the wolves didn't try to get close to the knights.

The monsters were only targeting them!

"Yeah! You guys should've jumped in! We could've gotten out of there safely if you guys helped!" As the noble shouted out, it caused a ripple effect.

More trainees start to voice out their thoughts! It's mostly the noble trainees who kept calling out this injustice.

"Shut up." A pressuring and callus voice comes out of Joseph's mouth. Just those two words alone cause the trainee's mouth to clam up. Their expressions turn pale, and sweat drips down from their heads.

"It seems you fools still don't understand the premise of the mission. Even after so many hints and this conflict, you guys still think this mission is some sort of picnic." Joseph shakes his head in disgust.

"Well, I'll lay it down for your thick skulls. The purpose of this expedition is to help you guys gain experience. Of course, we won't be helping you fools." Joseph couldn't believe he had to spell it out for them.

"Then what happens if we die to those wolves?!" There's a hint of smugness in the trainee's voice. That's because he knows it. If he died, his family would not let the knight order go for this.

"Then you die." Contrary to his thoughts, Joseph's voice is flat as he says this. If the trainees actually died from the wolves, he didn't need to care about it.

"How dare you! I'm from a count household!" The nobles shout out in disgust and rejection, each shouting out the noble house they're from. They can't stand being treated as some second-rate person.

But what he got is a sword to the throat!

"Do you really think we care whether or not you're from noble lineage?" Joseph pushes his sword closer to the trainee's throat as he continues,

"I don't care whether or not you're a commoner or a noble. In here, you're nothing more than a trainee.

Get it through your skull. You don't seem to get it. Not bringing your weapons or even preparing at all. I've been watching you guys.

You guys weren't doing anything at all. You just stood there and watched your comrades fight."

Joseph's voice grew colder and colder with every word that came out of his mouth. The nobles only stood in the back of the ones who were fighting.

"..." Hearing this, the noble trainees don't know what to say. What's more, they got glares from the commoners.

"Don't you dare complain about this when you've done nothing? If you guys die: then it's because you fools deserve it."

The nobles gulp, hearing his words. Now they realize the severity of the situation.

"But what about that hero?! Did you see him standing there? He was watching and not doing anything either!" The person who shouts this out is Gregory.

As he watched in the back, he saw Onyx standing there, not moving a single muscle. It was only at the last minute that he took action.

"Yeah! He was just sitting out and watching us fight!

"How can he be called a hero?!"

"He should be punished!"

Seeing how others agree with him, Gregory makes a vicious smile. This is what you get for embarrassing me.

Gregory thought he won.

"Silence!" Joseph shouts again, "Did you guys really think hero Onyx was sitting out because he was scared? I told him to sit out.

Unlike you amateurs, he already has experience fighting. He also understands the dangers that lie in the forest. How many of you guys can actually survive out here all alone?! Because the only one who can is him and him alone."

Comparing them to Onyx, the latter can easily beat them all. He understood the wilderness isn't a game and was cautious the entire time. When Onyx chased after Irene, Joseph knew he didn't need to do anything.

"..." Hearing his words, the shout instantly shuts up again.

"Just yesterday alone was enough to show you guys are nothing more than naive children." Joseph continues to lecture the trainees, making it clear to them.

...

While that happened, Onyx was examining the wolves. He felt something off when the beasts attacked their group.

Teacher said beasts who fought with humans before will rarely attack them again.

And seeing how many scars the leader had, the wolf pack had a lot of experience fighting. So why did it choose to attack us?

As Onyx looks through the corpses of the wolves, he notices something wrong.

Strange. Why are the bodies so thin? A majority of the wolf corpses are skinny. Too skinny.

With a pack like this, they should be able to kill off any animal in their way. So how can they be so starved?

Thinking this: only one thought came into Onyx's mind as he examined the corpses. This whole scene feels so familiar to him.

"Onyx, I took out all the demon crystals." Irene walks over to Onyx with a bag in her hands. Onyx taught her how to take the demon crystals out of the corpses. But then she notices the tensed expression on his face, "What's wrong?"

Realizing the expression on his face, Onyx gives a smile, "No, it's nothing. I was taking out the demon crystal, and I broke it by accident."

He shows a broken crystal in his hand.

Irene puts her hand on her hips and lectures him," Onyx, you got to be more careful with them!"

"Yeah, I know. And you shouldn't be the one to say that to me." Onyx shrugs his shoulders. The moment Irene called out to him, he jolted and broke the crystal in his hand.

But that's the best excuse that came to him.

He knows the best thing to do right now is to keep his mouth shut about this information.

I'll tell Joseph about this later.

As Onyx and Irene return to the group, he sees the priest casting their healing magic onto the injured trainees.

"You guys don't need to cast healing magic onto them. Let them suck it up and bear the pain." Joseph tsk at the trainees.

They should bear this humiliating pain.

But the grand priest shakes his head, "We can't let them fight with all these wounds. They need to have a better body to deal with the orcs."

"Tsk. You priests are too soft."

As the trainees are treated, the two higher-ups notice Onyx and Irene return with the demon crystals.

"Hero Irene, look at those wounds! Let me take care of them!" The grand priest walks over and shouts out in worry. Irene wants to say she's alright. But the blinding white light surrounds her.

The wounds on her arm and face disappear as if nothing happened.

"Thank you."

"You don't need to mention it. I'm going to heal the other injured then." The grand priest says this and leaves to deal with the others.

"Ahh." Irene pouts as she watches the grand priest leave.

"Hmm? What's wrong?"

"I was going to ask him to treat your wounds first." Onyx is covered in patches of blood.

"You don't have to worry about me. The blood is only from the wolves." The wolves couldn't reach Onyx at all. He just kept slicing them like butter.

"Are you sure?" Irene is a little skeptical.

"Mmhmm, I'm sure. But I am a little thirsty. Can you go get me water?" Onyx says with a wry smile.

"Alright." Irene quickly dashes away. Seeing this, Onyx can only sigh at her. He turns to Joseph, "I need to talk to you about something."

"Alright. We can talk at night." Seeing Onyx's serious expression, Joseph realizes there is something wrong.

...

Once everybody was healed, they began to travel again. But this time is different. The trainees are cautious of their surroundings.

They're treading through the forest slower, but they have their weapons up and scan their surroundings more.

The deeper they went in, the more monsters they faced. But they dealt with it accordingly. It's way more organized compared to the confusion with the wolves.

At night, the trainees became more cooperative when deciding on the night watch. The first one still went with Onyx, Joseph, and Irene.

"So what's the problem, hero Onyx?" Seeing that Irene's falling asleep again, Joseph asks him. Onyx begins to recall everything about the corpses.

Joseph makes a dark expression as he mulls, "That would make a lot of sense of why they attacked us." Joseph was in the same boat as Onyx when he saw the large group attack them.

Their group was much larger than the wolves. Even if the wolves killed everybody in the group, the wolves would have lost a lot in the process.

It's not worth it. But if the wolves were starved for food, that would make a lot of sense on why they attacked them.

"But that's what makes it weird. The forest has so many beasts and wild animals. So how could the wolves starve?" With how abundant the forest is in resources, it was impossible for the wolves to be starving.

That's true. None of what Onyx said was something Joseph disagreed with. Even he felt this was odd. But then he asks him,

"Did you tell anybody else about this?"

Onyx shakes his head, "No. I thought it would cause problems for the group." Who knows how the group would react when they found out about this?

"Smart move. For now, let's just keep it on a down low. I'll tell the other knights to be wary of their surroundings too."

"Understood, sir."

...

"When do we make our move?" While the trainees rested; afar on top of a cliff, two people looked down onto their group.

"We don't need to make our move yet." The leader says as he continues to watch Onyx and Joseph.

"Come on. We can just attack these fools right now. Only two of them are awake." If they attack Onyx and Joseph right now with all their members, then it would be an instant kill.

But the leader smacks the guy on the head, "Do you know who's with the hero right now? That's the vice-captain of the knight order! It's a losing battle for us."

"Then what do we do then?" If they can't beat Joseph, why bother coming here at all?

"Patience. They'll be going deeper into the forest. Once they go in, the forest will be denser, making it hard to see. There, will split them up.

We can make our move then." The leader spoke with a vicious smile. He continues, "Go to our camp and tell the others that we'll be making our move tomorrow."

The follower nods and quickly dashes off. The leader continues to monitor from afar.

What's taking him so long? It has been an hour since the guy left. He goes back to the camp, wondering what happened there.

But when he arrives, his face turns wide.

"Why is something like that doing here?!" Before he could say anything else, his head went flying off. His surprised and despaired expression was plastered on his head.

"Raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwwwrrr" What was left of the outcome was the thundering sound of roars.

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