The situation wasn’t good. Jack was low on clarity. Actually, there were about thirty wolves. Even with full clarity, that was too much to take without any preparations. Magic or not. He ran to the side, hoping the wolves would not be interested in his. That wasn’t the case.

One wolf jumped at him from the left. He used his spear, trying to kill it. The spear pierced the wolf, but not deep enough to kill. Another wolf attacked from the right side. He hit it with the blunt side of his spear. Pain. Another wolf bit his left leg. He thrust his spear, but the wolf let go and retreated in time. Another wolf jumped at him. ‘Shit.’ And another one from the opposite direction. His arm was bitten. He ran. He searched for an opportunity. A place to hide, or escape, or.. He was going to die.

He ran. He tossed boulders at wolves, but he either missed, or broke a few bones at best. He was bitten. Jack cast the minor strength spell, but the difference was minimal. The wolves could attack more aggressively, but they didn’t want to risk their lives. Jack knew he would not be able to outrun them. He cast minor recovery spell, he was low on clarity, but he still had some.

Vitality

543/565

Stamina

256/340

Clarity

121/590

He stopped. There were two old, big trees. He would have a bit of cover. Not much, but always something. The wolf jumped, he grabbed it and used its momentum to throw the wolf.

Ding… You have new skill – Wrestling lv. 1

‘That’s not helping.’ He cast magic. It was hard, but he forced himself. Another wolf charged, Jack thrust his spear.

Ding… You have killed lv. 14 Wolf

His calf was bitten in the meantime. He elbowed some wolf. Kicked another one. His economy of movement skill conserved his stamina, but he was more and more injured. His fur clothes were being ripped apart, giving only a bit of protection.

He saw her. Aleena. She was looking at him from the distance. He was delighted. Together, they stood a chance. He wanted to shout for help, but… She turned around, and ran away. His heart dropped, and then, he was furious. He slashed at a wolf, he kicked another one.

Jack wanted to kill Aleena, or at least, prove her wrong. He would survive. He wasn’t going to die. He had forgotten the pain. Jack killed another wolf, they were a bit wary of him. A wolf jumped at him. He just wanted to ignore the wounds and kill, but the wolf aimed for his throat. Jack dodged, another wolf shredded his flesh, but he needed to defend his vital organs. Cold sweat purred over his skin. He wouldn’t survive like this. He knew he had to be smart.

Wolves were attacking, retreating, and biting him to death. He was fighting back, and casting. Suddenly, he felt fear. He was going to die for sure. The wolves backed away. Right. The spell. He managed to finally create the fear rune on the ground below. He fell on the snow. His intelligence raised considerably from the time he was forced to create the spell manually, and he had the dedicated spell for creating runes within the soil now.

Ding… Your Economy of Movement skill has reached lv. 43

Ding… Your Pain Tolerance skill has reached lv. 22

Ding… Your Pain Tolerance skill has reached lv. 23

Jack checked over his bars.

Vitality

218/565

Stamina

126/340

Clarity

57/590

He wanted to cast the minor recovery spell, but his brain refused to listen. He was bleeding. The snow around him melted from his hot blood. He was afraid his own blood would damage the fear spell rune. A wolf tried to attack him, but hesitated as soon as it stepped inside the spell’s effect, and then it ran away from Jack. The spell’s effect was working on him too. He had learned how to overcome it, but this time, he wasn’t even able to think. He fell asleep, full of the fear, surrounded by the wolves.

Jack woke up. He felt weak. After he opened his eyes, he saw a bit bloodied snow. A dozen meters below him. Jack groaned.

“Don’t move too much, and try not to fall off.” Lillie’s voice reassured him.

“You have saved me.”

“You saved yourself. Well, I have healed you, but I’m too weak to defeat dozens of wolves.” Jack looked around. He was hanging from a tree branch, with a face toward the ground. He moved, as he wanted to at least sit on the branch. Lillie was sitting near him. Jack was surprised to see Stanley.

“How about him?”

“I found him in a similar situation to you. He seemed to kill more wolves, though. And he was still conscious when I pulled him up.” She continued. “I thought when I found you, it had been a very bad idea to split, but I don’t know now.”

“Why?”

She sighed. “That 4th tier would kill us all, while now, at least you and Stanley are alive.”

“What about the rest?” Jack asked. It was still hard for him to think. He checked his bars.

Vitality

328/565

Stamina

93/180

Clarity

98/590

‘Great.’ She thought sarcastically. “How long have I been asleep?”

“Not long. Maybe half an hour. I don’t know anything about Aleena and Patrick.”

“Didn’t you see what happened to Patrick when you split?”

She frowned. “Well, the wolves went after him, as he was slower, but they quickly returned to chase me. It was like they lost him.”

‘I suppose he really has some skills.’ Jack didn’t ask about Aleena. The memory of her betrayal was like a dream to Jack. A short dream behind the fog. He even thought for a moment it wasn’t real, but he knew better.

“I have lost the wolves by jumping up a tree. They tried to wait until I would be forced to climb down, but when they saw how I can jump between trees, they gave up.” Lillie continued. He was happy she was okay, but he wasn’t that much interested how she escaped. Jack still remembered his near death experience, and wanted to concentrate on the current situation.

Jack looked over his body. He didn’t want to use clarity for the spell. There were scabs on his hands, and legs. They were hurting. His fur clothes were ripped and he was cold, at least in a part from the lack of proper clothes. Coupled with dizziness, he easily deducted it was from the blood loss. They had to return to the base.

Stanley was unconscious. Lillie woke him up, by slapping his face. Meanwhile, Jack thought about using trees’ branches as a route, but he dismissed the idea. He was too heavy to jump from a branch to a branch. Jack was also anemic now, so he was weaker than normal. Only Lillie with her air mana could jump like that.

He checked his status. His endurance cap was lower than normal, though the fraction of endurance to the cap was the same as before. ‘Interesting. I have the same strength, though I feel weak. If I didn’t have the status, I would think my strength is lower.’

“Stanley, are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” He said, visibly dazed. “How about Jack?”

“I have treated his wounds, but he isn’t okay.” Lillie answered. “How about you?”

“I said I’m fine. I have recovered a bit of clarity. Not enough for a fight, but hopefully, enough to avoid wolves’ packs.” Stanley said.

“Let’s go, then.” Lillie commanded. She helped them climb down, by holding them by a hand and lowering it. She just jumped down, using air mana to temporary lower her mass. They ran through the forest. Lillie and Stanley were using their detection methods, so the group could avoid wolves packs. Jack was the slowest, as he needed breaks. He could sprint as fast as before, but he easily tired in his current situation. Stanley even offered to carry him. Jack agreed. He felt a bit useless, but they needed to move fast.

“There is a wolf pack in the south-west. We need to go a bit in the northern direction to avoid them.” Stanley said. “Wait. I think the wolves are fighting a human.”

Lillie grimaced. “You know we can’t help anybody in our current state. You can’t even be even sure it is a human.”

Jack sighed. “I could cast the light detection spell, though it might bring wolves to us.”

“Use it in the air. Whoever they fighting, I bet the wolves aren’t looking at the sky.” Lillie said.

Jack started casting. His clarity was low, but it recovered a bit. He often pushed himself to this point in his trainings, so he was able to cast relatively without trouble. A trail of light went toward the sky, above the wolves. Jack saw the fight. He also saw the person fighting with wolves, and he regretted he had cast the spell.

“It’s Aleena.”

“Shit. We need to rescue her. Any plan?” Lillie cursed.

There was a momentary silence. Jack ended it.

“No.”

“Come on. Speak only about constructive things.” Lillie complained.

“No.” Jack said once again with a sigh. “Let’s not rescue her.” Lillie and Stanley both glanced at Jack with a surprise in their eyes. He continued.

“The wolves you rescued me from, Aleena was there. She saw I was losing, and she left me.” Jack said bitterly. Lillie looked conflicted. Stanley nodded. “Fine. Let’s leave.” Stanley continued after he cast his detection spell once again. “She found us out. She is asking for help. I can detect a help word, probably out of fire mana. My water mana cannot get there.”

“Let’s go.” Jack said, pointing his head in the opposite direction. Stanley went there, caring Jack. Lillie took a moment to think it over, and ran after them. Jack didn’t know whether Stanley had thought the same as him before, or maybe Jack had convinced him. After all, it was a part of Stanley’s plan. Jack had to admit, the revenge was feeling good. His body felt cold, but he felt a hot ball of fire in his chest, filing it, and even making it hard to breath from the emotions. He never thought of himself as that kind of man, but he was feeling good about the revenge, despise his wounds and anemia.

The three of them walked through the snowy plain. The frontier was visible, and they could expect some help, should they be attacked. Jack already had regrets. The revenge was good at first, but he had probably killed Aleena. The fire in his chest was gone, there was only tight, heavy feeling, weighting him down. Regrets.

Would the military learn about it? He didn’t want to be sent to the black guard. Stanley agreed with him, so… ‘Stanley is more knowledgeable. He isn’t panicking. It will be alright. Probably.’ He had left Aleena to die. What Lillie thought about it? He felt terrible. The anemia was making it even worse.

He didn’t want to kill her. Jack wanted a revenge, to leave her when he would be needed. He wanted her to stop trying to kill them and be so arrogant. She was dead now. Probably. Jack thought, would it be better, if she was still alive? How would he talk to her? He didn’t know whether it would be better or worse.

There was also Patrick. Jack didn’t know if he was still alive, but he assumed so. Hoped so. Should he tell him what happened? How would he react? This was all a mess. He wanted to turn back time and decide differently. Would that help? They had been wounded and tired, not in a state to fight wolf pack, but they hadn’t even tried.

Soldiers on the walls were giving them a pitying look. They were three members out of five, and Jack was even carried, due to his wounds. The team crossed through a tunnel under the frontier. The tunnel was maintained by soldiers capable of earth magic, making it possible to close it during a monster attack.

There were military emergency healers on standby, but Jack couldn’t be healed more by magic. He needed a blood transfusion, or a rest. They went to their house.

“Hello. What took you so long?” Patrick was sitting in the main room. He was fine, there wasn’t any mark of injury on him. Jack was surprised. He expected Patrick to be alive and return, but he thought Patrick would return with another team, or maybe after some time.

“How it is possible you were faster than us?” Lillie asked the obvious question. Patrick didn’t have a detection spell, he couldn’t evade the wolf packs like they had evaded.

Patrick shook his shoulders. “Maybe you were slow.” He looked at Jack. The meaning was obvious. Stanley placed Jack on the bed, and went to lay down on his own. They all wanted to have a few hours of sleep to recover their clarity after hours of spell casting.

“Patrick, how did you escape from the 4th tier wolf?” Lillie asked. Jack also wanted to know. That was interesting, and distracted him from his current problems.

“It’s just a trick. Nothing interesting.” He said dismissively.

“Patrick. Such trick could save our lives, especially if it’s easy.” Stanley said sternly.

Patrick groaned. “It’s not easy. I mean, only I can do it. It’s… family’s heirloom. A magic tool. Nothing interesting.”

It was interesting. Jack was sure Patrick was from the countryside. It was unusual for a peasant’s child to have a magic tool. It was either a fortuitous encounter, or Patrick’s ancestors were some kind of nobles, or maybe retired hunters. The possibilities were quite a few. He was too tired to think.

“What about Aleena? Is she dead?” Patrick asked, the question was a bit indifferent. Jack didn’t know what to say.

“We don’t know.” Stanley started. “We split up. She was chased by wolves, so… we don’t know.” Jack went to sleep.

Jack was woken up by the creaking doors. He looked up. Aleena was standing there. She had bloodied clothes. Her armor was damaged. Her left arm was unnaturally white. A bit below her shoulder, her left arm had a huge wound, like someone tried to bite the arm off. ‘Or is that a scab?’ It was dark in the room, Jack couldn’t see clearly, but he could see her face. Tired and calm. It was eerie. So calm, like he hadn’t tried to kill her. Like it was a dream. ‘Is it a dream?” Jack couldn’t tell. Maybe it was.

Aleena took a step forward, and swayed from side to side. Her legs were shivering. Jack was afraid. He was lying in his bed, anemic, full of regrets. She was standing there. Calm. He thought her furious, mad with anger. He felt her presence was unnatural, like she shouldn’t be here.

“Aleena.” Stanley said. “I’m glad you survived.” She looked at him, tired, resigned. “We were wounded. We couldn’t help you.” This was true, but Stanley voice… was mocking. Jack understood, this was part of the plan, but he envied Stanley’s bravery.

“I understand,” she replied simply. “I would have done the same in your position. It’s the best that everyone survived.” Aleena walked to her bed, and lay down.

‘That’s it? So simple?’ Jack thought, but quickly understood it wasn’t the end of his problems. “Can I go to sleep? Is she going to kill me in my spell?” He thought he may be forced to stay vigilant all night. The current situation had a good side, though. He wouldn’t be arrested for the murder. The black guard was once again something far, and unimportant in his life, rather than a place he might be forced to go. Jack decided to just go to sleep, as he doubted Aleena would directly kill him in his sleep.