The party remained as silent as possible as they moved through the woods. In fact, it was Kyle who was the one who ended up being the noisiest drawing confused glances from the others since he had shown himself to be more powerful and skilled than they were. They had expected that he had been sent first because he was just as capable as they were at moving swiftly and silently through the forest but at the moment it seemed that only the first part of that was true. However, it wasn’t long before his superior Stats started to rear their heads again as the others started flagging.

“Alright we should take a short break,” Kyle said as soon as Fi pointed this out to him and came to a halt much to the obvious relief of the others. He cursed inwardly as he realised that he could’ve led the whole party into a fight while they were exhausted which definitely wouldn’t have gone well. “Fi can you go and scout ahead?”

“Sure,” Fi replied. Even though she had been flying above them the whole time she was actually even less tired that Kyle, so the little Companion was perfectly happy to keep scouting while the others took a well-deserved rest.

Carly all but collapsed to the ground as Fi flew off and pulled out a vial filled with a greenish liquid.

“Don’t drink that Stamina Potion yet,” Kyle said as soon as he noticed. “Potions, especially low-quality ones like that one can make it harder for you to regenerate whatever pool the potion is supposed to restore until the potion leaves your system if you use too many. We’re better off just waiting for your Stamina to regenerate naturally.”

“Are you sure?” she asked. “We are on a time limit.”

“Which may have passed before I even set out,” Kyle pointed out. “As much as I hate to say it. Our client’s son is already responsible for the death of one Adventurer. Let’s not risk our lives any more than absolutely necessary.”

“If you’re sure,” Carly said as she put the potion back into the small pouch that she kept all of her potions in. “I hope that he is alive though.”

“I agree,” Kyle nodded. “No one deserves to be eaten by monsters. But I do believe that he should be punished for his foolishness which might not even happen if his rich father gets his way.”

“Do you really think that the Adventurer’s Guild will let that happen?” Laurence asked with a surprised look on his face.

“Well, we won’t find out if he’s already dead,” Kyle pointed out. “But it sort of depends on how rich his father actually is.”

“I just don’t think that the Guild would let that happen,” Laurence responded angrily, and Kyle nodded in agreement.

“I don’t want to believe that either,” he agreed. “But the fact of the matter is that the Adventurer’s Guild can’t afford to lose large parts of its financial support and still keep providing all of the services to us that it does.”

Laurence growled angrily but nodded in understanding. He knew that the Guild actually lost quite a lot of money providing things like trainers and emergency supplies to Adventurers like him and the rest of his party.

“Don’t worry Laurence,” Kyle said. “I will do everything that I can to make sure that our charge will get punished accordingly if we bring him back alive. Even if I have to call in a favour.”

Kyle wasn’t really sure how much pull he actually had with the Guild thanks to his status as Nemesis’ Champion. But he knew that the goddess would approve of his actions at the very least which could only be to his advantage if he wanted to grow strong enough to avenge his parents one day.

“Do you really think that you have that much influence?” Laurence asked carefully. He had already realised that there was a lot more to Kyle than the young man was letting on.

“I honestly don’t know,” Kyle replied. “But I know that I need to try.”

Laurence’s frown deepened at Kyle’s words but before he could continue his line of questioning Fi dropped in from above and interrupted him.

“Kyle, I spotted some things up ahead that you need to see,” Fi gasped as she hovered in front of her partner’s face.

“Alright, can we move out now everyone?” Kyle asked immediately as he felt the waves of worry flowing off his companion.

“Yeah, I’m ready now,” Carly nodded as she clambered to her feet. “Even if I wasn’t your companion seems to be too worried for us to keep sitting around.”

Fervah nodded in agreement and after a moment of slight hesitation Laurence did too. He still wanted to continue his conversation with Kyle. But he knew that the Emergency Quest was too important for him to slow them down any more than they already had been by them having to stop and rest.

From the way that Fi was acting Kyle decided that moving silently was currently more important than moving quickly and the group made their way slowly through the treeline in the direction that Fi was leading them. As they crept along Fi started to point out gashes on the trunks of certain trees. These weren’t actually what she wanted Kyle and the others to see but she knew that they were probably marking the territory of some more powerful Variant of the Daggerleg Spiders that they had been fighting earlier. It was hard to be certain since she hadn’t seen whatever was making the marks herself, but Fi was fairly sure that whatever was making them were a Variant called Daggerleg Slashers. Daggerleg Slashers were a Variant that specialised in close combat and had developed longer front legs that had a longer more bladed claw on the end as well as tougher armour.

Fi finally came to a halt in front of a large web that was easily big enough to hold a human which wasn’t really anything unusual in a forest full of giant spiders. What was unusual however was the colour of the webbing which glowed with an ethereal blue glow that Kyle and the others instantly recognised.

“Well shit,” Kyle muttered before reaching down to pick up a stick that he swung at the webbing. As he had expected the stick was unable to damage the web but what he hadn’t been expecting was what happened next. Several strands of webbing wrapped around the stick and snatched it out of Kyle’s hand causing him to stumble backwards in surprise.

“What the hell could make something like this?” Fervah hissed as Kyle recovered from his surprise.

“I’m not sure,” Fi replied. “But whatever it is it can use some form of magic and is some sort of Variant of Daggerleg Spider.”

That last part was pretty obvious since that was what they had been fighting all along but Fi felt that it was important to point it out. While there were Variants of Daggerleg Spider that could use basic magic attacks they weren’t able to create something like this which was a bad sign. If they were dealing with a Variant that had never been recorded by the Adventurer’s Guild before then Kyle fully understood Fi’s worry. Sending rookies like them on an Emergency Quest was dangerous enough without bringing a new Variant into the mix.

The Adventurer’s Guild was usually careful to send an experienced Party to fight a newly discovered Variant so that they could record as many of its capabilities as possible. Kyle remained hopeful that there were more Adventurers on the way but with how short-handed the Guild was at the moment because of the war with the Empire it was unlikely and even if backup did arrive chances were that they wouldn’t be much more experienced than Kyle and the others were.

“Well we should keep moving anyway,” Laurence pointed out. “just keep an eye out for more of these.”

“Keep an eye out for anything that glows blue,” Carly added. “Except for Kyle’s eyes of course.”

They all snorted in amusement before continuing onwards on full alert. They had to be even more careful now that they knew that there was something new in the area and Kyle told Fi to stay close just in case which lowered their ability to detect an ambush before it happened but decreased the likelihood of her getting attacked while she was on her own.

Kyle could’ve sworn that the forest hadn’t been as large as this before, but he didn’t notice any signs of it turning into a Zone other than the increased number of monsters infesting it. However, that didn’t mean that a Zone wasn’t in the midst of forming. In fact, Kyle was certain that this was what was happening.

Suddenly Fervah came to a halt and crouched down like she had noticed something. Kyle frowned at this as he had expected Fi to pipe up if she had detected any monsters nearby but the young archer silently raised a hand to point at a nearby tree which had a fresh looking gash in its trunk that was still leaking sap.

“Whatever did that is nearby,” Kyle said as quietly as he could, and the others nodded silently in agreement.

Once again, they started creeping forward and they all strained their senses for anything that seemed out of place in this strangely silent forest. However as everyone had expected it was Fi who reacted to something first, tightening her coils slightly around Kyle’s neck.

“Careful there’s a group of ten monsters up ahead,” she told Kyle telepathically as he came to a sudden halt. “They’re all considerably larger than the Spiders that you fought before.”

“Do you see anything that looks like an ambush?” Kyle sent back as he held up a hand before any of the others could speak.

“No,” Fi replied. “I think it’s just the Slashers.”

“Alright,” Kyle nodded causing the others to frown as they finally realised that he was telepathically communicating with Fi and they knew that there was only one reason that they would be doing that. “Let’s get ready for a fight then.”

Since they were going to be in much more of a pitched battle against tougher enemies Kyle and Fi had decided to split the enchantments that they were going to cast before the fight started but before that they had to let the others know what they were going to be walking into. It was right now that Kyle wished that he had been taught the special form of sign language that was used by Adventurers but unfortunately he hadn’t so Fi flitted up to each of the others and whispered quietly in their ear while Kyle kept an eye out in case the spiders started heading this way.

As soon as Fi was done letting everyone know what was going on everyone started preparing for battle. Fervah and Laurence both pulled a potion out of their satchels and drank them. Kyle wasn’t sure what these specific potions were but there were a massive variety of potions that could temporarily increase Stats. He just hoped that they had more than one of these potions since Fi hadn’t spotted whatever it was that had made the strange glowing webs that she had shown them earlier and they would probably need them when they encountered it.

Carly cast the same regeneration increasing spell that she had cast on Kyle and Laurence earlier making Kyle smile as the cool sensation washed over his body easing the minor aches that had slowly been building up over their journey through the forest.

Next, Fi cast Physical Defence Enchantment on his Jacket as well as Flame Enchantment on his spiked chain using her Shared Spells Ability. They had decided that splitting the Enchantments between them would be the most useful and they had chosen Flame Enchantment over Minor Soul Syphon because the latter provided no increase to the damage that Kyle could deal to an enemy and didn’t last as long. Kyle resented the idea that he wouldn’t be getting any Soul Stones from this fight but he knew that increasing his ability to deal damage was more important.

And finally, Kyle cast his Minor Frost Enchantment and Minor Frost Enchantment on his remaining two chains which he wrapped around his hands. Kyle doubted that his particular weapon would deal much damage on the more heavily armoured Daggerleg Slashers, so he was going to be relying on his Unarmed Combat Skills, spiked chain, and magic to deal damage. Once he had finished preparing himself, he turned to Laurence and cast his Minor Vampiric Enchantment on the other young man’s weapon which started crackling with the familiar red lightning. Making eye contact with Laurence who was looking at him in surprise he nodded firmly letting him know that he was going to be relying on him to act as the Tank in this fight.

Laurence’s lips thinned slightly before he nodded back, and the two young men slowly stood up took deep breaths and charged on the direction of the monsters before the other three could react. Fi blinked but shot after the boys as quickly as she could but Carly and Fervah stared after them in surprise then gasped in horror as the monsters finally revealed themselves.

All of the massive spiders except for one stood about as high as Kyle’s chest but the final one was within a couple of inches of his own height. Unlike the other Spiders that they had fought so far, the fangs of these Slashers were much smaller which made sense because they had lost their venomous bite when they had become Slashers. But that was the only thing about them that was smaller. Even their multiple beady eyes were larger than the ones that their weaker cousins had. Each of the spiders was covered in brownish chitin and patches of wiry looking hair that would provide much better protection from attacks. Each of the Slashers also had the long front limbs that were tipped with blade-like claws that were their namesake and upon seeing how sharp they looked Kyle suddenly found himself very thankful that Fi had cast a Minor Physical Defence Enchantment on his Jacket.

As soon as Fi saw the monsters that were charging towards Kyle and Laurence she examined them with her Scan Ability and Kyle that the nine smaller monsters were all Level 8 but the final one was Level 10 and was in fact something called a Bladelegs Spider not a Daggerleg Slasher like its smaller companions which almost made him trip over in surprise but he quickly recovered and placed both of his hands together as he started to cast an Overcharged Mana Dart spell. Thrusting his hands forwards he sent the cluster of darts which had grown to a similar size to the Mana Bolts that he could cast hurtling towards the monsters.

The glowing blue projectiles smashed into the oncoming swarm of spiders causing some of them to shriek in pain as holes were blasted in their armoured exoskeletons and one of them even lost a pair of eyes under the sudden attack.

Laurence took advantage of the chaos that Kyle’s attack had caused by activating two Skills. The first increased his running speed over a short distance and then he activated the second and shot forwards once again with his curved blade held in front of him and slammed into the spider that had lost the use of two of its eyes.

Laurence’s blade dug deep into the spider causing it to shriek again as one of its legs simply collapsed under the onslaught but swung its bladed foreleg down at its attacker who let go of his sword when he discovered that it was stuck in the monster’s body.

Meanwhile Fervah and Carly had added their own projectiles at the monster as they attempted to overwhelm the now unarmed Laurence who cursed loudly as he leapt backwards to avoid their attacks.

Fi cast Shadow Grasp on the largest monster in the hopes of slowing it down but the murky substance barely lasted a couple of seconds before giving way to the monster’s power. With a loud hiss the companion showered it with as many spells as she could but none of her attacks seemed to do much damage to the hulking creature which lashed out at Kyle who had charged into the fray.

With a snarl of rage Kyle activated his Mana Enhancement spell and used the sudden surge of speed and strength to dodge the monsters attack and then slam his fist into it. Since his Intelligence had increased by a considerable amount recently Mana Enhancement now provided him with an extra 3 points to his Strength, Dexterity and Agility instead of the 1 that it had previously. However, as it turned out neither this nor the lightning crackling around the chain that he had wrapped around his fist were enough to deal any real damage to the hulking Slasher which ignored the attack and slashed at Kyle once more with one of its scythe-like front limbs.

Kyle threw himself into a Dodge Roll and then decided to change tactics and fire a Light Arrow back at the monster, but this didn’t seem to do any more than his enhanced punch had. It was however more than enough to ensure that the giant Bladelegs was completely focussed on him instead of Laurence who had somehow managed to retrieve his blade from the now deceased Spider that he had left in embedded in. the spider in question as currently riddled with arrows and had several holes where Kyle was guessing Carly had hit it with her Mana Bolt spell which was even more powerful than his own thanks to the combination of her high Intelligence Stat which might even be higher than his own and her staff which enhanced her magical attacks slightly.

Kyle continued to pummel the giant Slasher with a combination of kicks, punches and magic while Fi bombarded it from above but even after another two of the Slashers that Laurence was fighting with the support of his two party members he had barely even managed to injure it slightly. Inf act the only thing that had done any noticeable damage had been his flaming spiked chain which he had used to strike at the monster’s more vulnerable joints and eyes while he dodged the its attacks but the Enchantment had guttered out about a minute ago so he decided to see how effective his Mental Energy attacks were on it.

As expected, the monster hissed in pain when he activated his Pain Spike Skill but unfortunately this mostly seemed to be due to the surprise of the attack. Cursing again Kyle glanced at Laurence who was obviously beginning to flag even as he drew his blade across the snarling face of one of his opponents. Kyle really didn’t want to do what he was planning but he knew that this was probably the only real chance that they had left. Fi’s eyes widened as Kyle explained his plan but try as she might, she couldn’t come up with a better one than he had.

Suddenly all of the monsters screamed in pain at once as Kyle activated his trump card which was of course his Suppression Aura. Kyle knew that he couldn’t keep using this Skill for more than a few seconds which was why Fi was currently flying over to Fervah and Carly who were watching the monsters in surprise. As soon as Fi was close enough she shouted at the two stunned women to give her a Mana restoration and a Stamina restoration potion.

While his partner was doing this Kyle sent his spiked chain into one of the eyes of the giant spider that he was fighting before it could recover from the shock of being caught inside his aura. Then he activated his Entangling Coils Skill causing the chain that had been wrapped around his right hand to instead wrap around several of the monster’s legs then leapt onto its face.

As he did this he quickly moved his awareness over to the final chain around his left hand and started manipulating it instead of the spiked chain as he grabbed the base of the spike and ripped it out of the monster’s eye before slamming it back in again as hard as he could as the chain that he was now manipulating quickly tangled itself even more around the spider’s legs and the other chain. In theory this should make it all but impossible for the monster to break free and attack him even after he was forced to stop using his Suppression Aura.

Laurence was still somewhat bewildered by what was happening since all of the monsters that he had been fighting had suddenly stopped attacking him and started simply writhing like they were in incredible pain. However it was pretty obvious who was causing this to happen since not only was Laurence fully aware that none of his party members had a Skill or spell that could do something like this but their strange new companion had also started glowing with a strange blue light.

Laurence decided that he really needed to have a talk with Kyle about who and what he was. He had come to the conclusion that he could trust Kyle to fight alongside them but other than that the young man was a complete mystery. Laurence had of course been told that Kyle was an Aethereal Human but since Fervah had decided to trust him he wasn’t going to ask about that. Kyle’s Class was also something of a mystery to Laurence, but he had to admit that it was powerful. He was also confused at Kyle’s ability to use both light and dark based magics as well as his Enchantment magic as he should only be able to use one of those at his current Class Tier.

But as the brown-haired young man continued to slam the spike on the end of one of his strange weapons into the face of the powerful monster that he was fighting Laurence decided that now wasn’t the best time to ask him. Instead he decided that he would finish off as many of the now almost helpless monsters that he could before Kyle ran out of whatever t was that he was using to fuel this ability.

Every single blow that Kyle dealt with the spike caused an unpleasantly greasy liquid to squirt out of the mess that was now that giant Bladelegs’ face. The monster was still struggling against the chains that bound it and it had managed to strike him several times with its powerful front limbs but luckily his jacket and vest had turned the worst of the blow so he only had a couple of shallow lacerations decorating his back and leaving his shirt sticky with blood.

A few seconds later his SP and MP reached the point where he would fall unconscious if he drained them any further and cancelled his Suppression Aura. As he felt the strain leave his body it was all that he could do not to sigh in relief then he took a tighter grip on the end of his spike and drove it deep into the monster’s face again just in time for one of its bladed forelegs to slam into his left shoulder causing him to scream in pain as the end of the claw jutted from the wound.

With a snarl Kyle let go of the spike to take a better grip on the spider with his uninjured arm before he fell off and screamed again as the spider pulled its leg out of the gaping hole in his shoulder. As the spider’s limb ripped free of the gaping wound that it had created in his shoulder, he felt the soothing sensation of Carly’s healing magic wash over him and close the wound just enough that he shouldn’t pass out from blood loss until he had at least killed the Bladelegs Spider that had injured him so badly.

Fi cried out in shock when she saw what had happened to Kyle while she had been collecting the potions that he had requested and increase her speed to its absolute maximum. As soon as she was close enough she told him that she had the potions that he had been waiting for and summoned one of them from her Inventory without the cork that usually sealed it and quickly poured first that one then the second down his throat when he tipped his head back as she came to a halt above him narrowly avoiding being hit by one of the monster’s flailing limbs as she did so.

Feeling power enter his limbs once again Kyle raised his injured arm snarling again as he felt the wound open up again and cast first Mana Bolt, then Light Arrow and then Mana Darts with the last of his mana before dropping to the ground alongside the now very dead Bladelegs which had a crater in its head large enough to fit Kyle’s own head in as he finally passed out due to the combination of exhaustion, pain and blood loss.