Karthas is a small town of little significance aside from the westward road into the Darkwall Mountains and the Graveyard of Karthas that is the largest graveyard within the Holy Empire. Buried there are all of the soldiers that have died fighting against the Darklands, if their bodies were recovered. The trace amounts of demonic taint that the soldiers have acquired during their forays into the Darklands has like tainted the graveyard itself into a demonic nest. This causes the dead to rise which while providing a training ground for many of the Holy Empire’s forces requires constant attention and cleansing to prevent it from festering and growing just as the locations tainted directly by demonic blood do. Aside from the forces of the Church of the Holy One, another unknown individual is known to pass through the town when the Graveyard is close to needing a cleansing.

Lykou

Another three days have passed and tonight will be the new moon. I’ll have to take a test on my ability to hunt but between the magic Kylana has been teaching me and my practice fighting with Kythia I should be fine.

I sit up to see Analais was about to wake me from the meditation I use as a substitute for sleep. He smiles before pulling out a piece of leather handing it to me without a word.

I look at it, or more specifically the chaotic and haphazard squiggling lines that cover one side. I look back at Analais in confusion until he points at a spot and says, “we are here.”

It’s a map, but of what? There are too many lines for them to be the streams in these woods. Perhaps, game trails? I smile as I squint slightly to try to read something that looks like writing. I find a spot that I think is the word bear, but I’m not sure. Still, there are a lot of game trails and that’ll make it easy when combined with sparsely used Detect Life spells.

“Thank you” I whisper as Alana seems to still be asleep.

He nods and then I pocket the rough map before going outside. As Kylana had told me would be yesterday, there are a few of the young males from Naliya's class waiting along with several other ‘adults’. Most of which I do not know the names of but there are four I do, Kylana, Kythia, Ragnor and Holia.

I move and sit near the other prospective hunters before Kylana finally begins to speak as the light of the rising sun begins to touch the small village.

“The Rite of the Dark Moon, is the first test that you must pass to be recognized as a hunter and thus an adult member of the pack. The pack can be attacked at any time and even on nights like the one that will come once the sun sleeps anew, we must eat.

Before the next dawn you are to return with a bear’s corpse, there are plenty of them in the woods if you leave the area the hunters patrol. Go.”

“I object to one of the participants. He is. . .” begins Ragnor before Kylana cuts him off.

“If he is inadequate then he can simply fail like anyone else.”

“And if he dishonorably . . .”

“The ability to provide food when the pack is at its weakest is the purpose of the test. Food is food, regardless of where it comes from.”

Ragnor nor anyone else says anything after that. After this moment of silence, Kylana waves us towards the forest and I smile as I begin to run out towards one of the locations that Analais wrote bear. This could technically be cheating but like Kylana just said food is food.

One of the boys that is always following Ragnan's lead follows me into the woods but the others scatter. Is this going to be an attempt for Ragnan to get rid of me? It would make sense for this to be an attempt but at the same time I doubt that he could come up with such a sneaky plan. Like his father he seems to prideful to try and remove me anywhere except in front of others so as to display his own dominance over me.

Luckily, I seem to have spent more time in the woods that him and rather quickly lose him as I head towards what I assume is one of the caves with a bear in it according to Analais’s map, smiling as I think of how I should take down a bear. A sneak attack with some well-placed arrows from a tree and a bit of magic to finish it off as I keep out of its reach should do the trick.

A few minutes after I am sure that my unwanted follower has lost me I slow down to a walk and confirm my destination on the map. It should only be a few more minutes to the west, close enough for me to check if there really is a bear there through magic.

I whisper a strange incantation that seems to almost echo off of nothing while wrapping my mana around my left hand as Kylana taught. Just as the last syllable leaves my lips I snap my fingers but no sound is made, instead a wave of energy ripples outwards and I close my eyes. The world goes dark for an instant as I see my surroundings from above through the mana ripple, various dim lights in the shapes of plants surround me but there are a few that are much brighter if not larger than the trees and grass. A few rabbits to my right, a small group of deer a few minutes behind me, but none of that draws my focus.

In a small area a few thousand feet in front of me is something twice the size of a human, that should be a bear but I am not sure as I have never sensed a bear through the spell before. It is however strong and large enough to be one. Another light catches my attention as it is even stronger than the bear but it is not moving. I think it might be a collection of multiple creatures but I can't be sure since it is on the edge of my magicial sight. Should I check on it before taking out the bear? No, the bear is more important and whatever the second thing is, it is not going anywhere. The short few seconds of magical sight end but it was worth the mana it cost me.

It takes me a few minutes to reach where I saw the bear through Detect Living, and unsurprisingly the bear is not in fact there anymore. It did however leave a fairly clear trail behind as it walked off, and I know which direction to follow since I got to see a few seconds of its movement while my magic was active.

I nock an arrow before following the trail and it is not long before I see my prey. Larger than I expected it to be, the bear is almost the size of the dire bear in that cave with lighter brown fur. Grizzly? I am not sure where that name came from but the bear may give me some trouble. At least I am downwind and so it does not yet know that I am here. It may not even care if it did as I doubt there is much around that it would consider a threat to itself. I glance around for a moment and find the thickest tree. The one that will take the bear the longest to knock down and spend a minute climbing it.

While I am doing so the bear is eating some shrub that I would need to be closer to in order to identify. Once on a branch I think will keep me out of the bear’s immediate reach I nock the arrow that I had to return to the quiver in order to climb the tree and draw it all the way back. My arms tremble slightly as the bow is a bit too large and stiff for me to use its full power but I manage to hold it steady for a few seconds as I take aim.

A strange sensation washes over me as I focus on aiming, details that I shouldn’t be noticing are entering my mind and I adjust the arrow slightly to account for them. Somehow, I know the exact distance, the arrow drop from gravity and how the bear is shifting about as it breathes and eats. The only other time I can remember this happening is when I felt threatened by that small bear’s charge. I loose the arrow before I lose this sensation where I know that the arrow will land true. The twang of the bowstring is followed by a sharp pain as it smacks against my exposed forearm but I just smile and draw another arrow.

My second arrow is nocked before the first lands and the bear cries out in pain as it passes between two of the ribs and punctures a lung. The bear looks around in a panic and those few seconds allow me to draw another arrow though the strange feeling has left me and I know that this second shot will not be so accurate. The bear notices me and roars in anger at the pain I have forced upon it. It charges at me or more specifically the tree upon which I am crouched in and I loose another arrow, this one aimed at the head.

The arrow flies true, but not as true as the first, striking the top of the head but I know there is no way that it pierced through the skull. I need a shot through the eye or to piece the other lung to kill it, neither of which will be an easy. Or maybe down the neck if I luck out and sever an artery or the windpipe. No, the head is in the way, I am too high off the ground to get that type of shot in.

A third arrow is nocked and I shift my footing to brace for the impact of the bear. The tree shakes and tips over slightly but I remain where I am. I draw the arrow as the bear staggers from the recoil of its failed charge and loose it into its back. A bone keeps it from any vital organs but it will cause some bleeding and speed up the death that a punctured lung is already going to cause. I just have to keep inflicting damage while staying out of reach. The bear stands up on its hind legs and slams into the tree, shifting it a bit more as I nock a fourth arrow.

I grin, there is an opening at a vital spot when it rears back for that slam. I draw the arrow and wait through another slam on the tree so I can time it just right to hit the neck. Another twang of the bowstring and sting on my left forearm sends an arrow into the neck of the bear and I grin at the steady stream of blood flowing down the arrow. This is just what I needed.

I start the incantation to another spell that I found in Kylana’s books, one that she didn’t teach me but has a lot of potential in just such a situation. A simple cantrip that thins the blood, meant to be used when slaughtering farm animals, Bleed. A tiny red ball of light fills my right hand as my mana shifts and I pour far more than the required amount of mana into the spell.

Then I simply drop the created object and it dissipates as it falls to the bear. Most of the energy is wasted as it is meant to be delivered via touch but enough of it does stick around long enough to touch the bear. My grin widens as the stream of blood off of the arrow in its neck runs faster. Now all I have to do is wait. The spell will keep clots from forming and the bears own movements and fear make its heart beat faster and faster until a large pool of blood forms beneath it, seeping into the dirt as the bear gets weaker and weaker.

Soon it collapses onto the ground, passed out from the blood loss. I wait another minute for it to stop breathing before I climb down from the thick oak tree. Necromancy is the best. I draw a dagger and begin to cut away the right paw. There is no way that I can drag the whole bear back to the village but a few trophies should be enough proof. I think a paw and a few teeth should be enough.

Before I begin though I hear the voice of a female I recognize behind me, “stop.” This may be the answer to my inability to draw a ton of bear meat back, or something very bad.

I turn to see that it is Naliya and ask, “why? Do I not need to bring back a trophy to show as proof?”

“I saw enough of your battle and will vouch for you kill. I’ll see to it that you get the credit for this and take care of the corpse. Go and keep hunting” she says and tosses me a bundle of arrows tied together with a piece of leather.

I catch it and add them to my quiver with a smile. She has treated me well, I can probably trust her. I didn’t think that we would be watched during the trial though it does make sense. How come I did not notice her when I cast Detect Life though? She probably came when she heard the sounds of combat and was outside of its range earlier; that or some sort of nondetection magic.