Fortunately no attacks happened during the half day after caravan entered the Dark road and everyone stopped to camp for the night. Guards didn’t care about any risks of wildfire and made as large bonfires as they could to keep the beasts away at night. Unfortunately at some places the trees grew basically at the roadside and the thick forest started right behind those. It seemed as if any kind of light died already few steps away from the road and there was not much space to even create bonfires, at least not as much as the guards wished to see.

Before dark even the Qi masters left the front of caravan and spread out over this two kilometer long camp. Their presence calmed minds of others quite a bit and most merchants and servants even managed to fall asleep.

Nick and the company were in a terrible position. ‘Everyone’ knew of their battle prowess and guards gathered in bigger packs further away without batting an eye, being fully confident in the ability of this small group to protect merchants, servants and horses around them.

Even YunYun had no more of her usual playfulness left as she stared at the woods trying to discern anything without any real results. She, Clayton, Steven and Nick positioned themselves around in a square formation with the three Hyena brothers in the middle and watched the woods holding their weapons in one hand and large torches in another. The enemies were not human bandits and were instinctively afraid of fire, in addition the torches illuminated the surroundings and, even if it was not much, it made everyone feel safer.

“They're here!” After nightfall one of the guards few hundred meters further to the front shouted. Soon loud confirmations echoed around caravan waking up most of the merchants that found it almost impossible to fall asleep again for the rest of the night. Low growling and barking noises kept coming from the darkness and it seemed like the predators were picking out the most delicious pray or may be a safer spot to attack.

Nick soon realized it was the latter. There was increased activity in the woods around their spot and it was obviously because there were less guards with drawn weapons around, not because the horses of their merchants were tastier.

“The three brothers – draw your weapons and stand around perimeter as well!” Nick commanded, “Watch out for sudden attacks!”

The last part was directed to the other three people who were actually capable of fighting. Everyone became even more tense when several minutes later they could discern dark silhouettes dashing between the trees. Nick shot out two of his illumination arrows and all of them froze in shock – for a split second they all saw dozens large, almost two meter high and over three meters long, black wolves staring at them while some already were moving in their direction.

There was no other way but to fight. Nick and Clayton dashed towards the wolves with torches in their hands leaving illusory lines of light behind them. Blood splashed around as the first wolves fell, but in contrast to the regular human bandits, wolves didn’t charge over blindly. They dodged, leapt away, tried to attack from behind and surround their pray. The wounded didn’t linger around and speedily disappeared between the trees while giving out soft whimpers.

At this sight Maxwell sisters and Kate felt like they hearts almost stopped. Instinctively they took few steps back and grabbed swords with both hands in front on them.

“Merchants! Calm down the horses if you want to keep them!” Nick shouted and the few nearby merchants woke up from stupor. Together with their servants they tried to calm down the panicked animals, but few still managed to throw their owners aside to run into the woods in panic only to die painfully soon after.

If the fights between humans were short and fatal, then the fights with beasts at night were long and exhausting. Nick and Clayton couldn’t hold back all the wolves and YunYun with Steven had to join them soon. Luckily the attack was only from one side, therefore it was easier to defend, but only Nick’s and YunYun’s weapons dealt serious damage to the attackers, while Clayton managed to inflict only mediocre wounds and Steven could barely cut through their skin.

This mess continued for over twenty minutes, but for onlookers it seemed almost eternity. The guards from other parts ‘didn’t want to leave their posts’ with excuse of potential danger to the merchants under their protection and there was no one coming to help out the ‘Southern mercenary group’ which was already bathing in blood.

Because of Nick’s and Clayton’s speed, the group managed to deny wolves any real opportunities to close in on the other people in convoy, but for that they had to suffer themselves as multiple scratches covered their bodies and their clothing was torn as well. From time to time Nick shouted out some nonsense like ‘brothers, keep the merchants safe!’ or ‘Hyenas, watch our back!’ to keep the panicked girls in check and also to calm down the merchants.

Unfortunately during this time the other parts of convoy suffered some attacks as well and the Qi masters who could have reached this spot had to take care of others. They were confident these battle maniacs will manage by themselves, therefore fully concentrated on controlling the overall situation and repelling attacks elsewhere. But even though the ‘battle maniacs’ didn’t have the relaxed battle as others expected, they still managed to slowly reduce the numbers of attackers.

When it finally looked like they could have breath of relief, a huge shadow crossed the battlefield in a lightning speed and with a huge leap jumped towards the crouching servants who were ‘protected’ by Hyena brothers.

May be because he was closer or because it was the instinct of a loving husband, Steven moved several meters in an instant to push Conny away just to twist his face in pain as the huge jaws bit down on his left shoulder.

YunYun earlier was next to him and arrived first to help and slashed the enormous black wolf several times, but only to realize her slashes cut the beast’s hide and stabs made it only to its bones. This was the first time her Katana didn’t cut through someone, but she didn’t stop and within seconds performed tens of attacks.

The wolf whose scruff was almost two heads taller than YunYun, seemed to get mad from the pain, that despite shallow wounds assaulted its mind, and clenched its jaws what caused Steven to cry out in agony.

At this moment Nick finally arrived and with several slashes managed to severe the head of the beast that fell on the ground together with Steven.

Almost in that instant all the other wolves froze and then darted in back the woods while loudly howling. The one that team managed to kill was probably their pack leader or simply a higher ranked beast and others could do nothing about the panic which overwhelmed them because of their basic instincts. At the same time all the other attacks along the caravan stopped as well and wolves fell back into the woods.

“Don’t you dare to cry!” Nick hissed at panicked Conny and together with Clayton freed their friend from the huge jaws.

Steven, despite looking miserable, was still alive and even conscious.

He tried to smile and weakly said, “Hyena brothers, you owe me one!”

His friends around him understood the meaning and, while tears filled the eyes of two sisters and Kate, Nick sternly looked at them, pointed at YunYun and then waved around the bloody battlefield, “You, lead the Hyena brothers to clean up! Remove the beast cores, stack their bodies in a pile and then burn them!”

Nick took out antiseptic he already prepared back in Aurora and let Clayton wash Steven’s wounds while he himself infused Qi in his body to help him recover. After Clayton was finished, Nick passed over the best healing paste he had and together they bandaged their friend and turned him into a cute looking mummy.

After putting him on the carriage that one of the merchants offered, Nick joined the girls and helped them cleaning up the corpses, then sprayed them over with his old ‘burning powder’ mix and soon a stench of burning bodies filled the surrounding woods. It might have been the last deterrence they needed, but for the rest of the night there were no more wolf attacks even though some angry howls sounded around the caravan.

“It makes no sense!” Nick looked at over twenty rank three cores in his left hand while holding a larger, rank four, core in his right.

“The bigger one that attacked Steven would probably soon advance to rank five and most likely was the pack leader.” Clayton said in serious voice.

“No, I mean – the pack is too big! It makes no logical sense for it to exist … except … of course! I should’ve thought of this sooner.” Nick’s eyes lit up, “Sun is up and I’ll go visit our vice caravan leader. Watch them!”

Not waiting for an answer of confirmation, Nick darted along the caravan in full speed. He had gotten an idea on how to deal with the situation.

“How confident are you?” Ten minutes later Rushdi asked while staring at Nick with a serious gaze.

“Almost hundred percent. That is the only logical explanation and I believe with your experience you can confirm my theory. Let’s call few Qi masters over and make a good plan so we can relax for the rest of our journey along the Dark road.

An hour later, while caravan was already on the move, Qi masters surrounded Nick with stern faces.

“All of you have done this route multiple times and can judge yourselves, but please hear me out. I’m willing to bet that there is almost no difference between the wolves and the hillbillies from Beliz. These wolves act in a similar way, only they are stronger and as beasts they are more deadly. In addition there is no way for them to have friends or relatives between the caravan guards, therefore the fights are real when they attack.” Nick begun his explanation.

“Boy, just because you want to bet, it doesn’t mean we are willing to risk lives of our people in caravan!” Qi master Hawi furrowed his brows.

“Sorry, poor choice of words.” Nick apologized, “Let’s analyze. Only big caravans or army troops brave this route and the lone merchants or travelers wait in the nearby cities for the next big caravan to join, right? When caravan enters the Dark road, it gets constantly harassed by these beasts until it reaches the other exit.”

“Of course! The woods are packed with them! They are simply everywhere – don’t you hear their howls in the distance even now?” Rushdi was not convinced at all.

“That is why I’m saying it doesn’t make any sense.” Nick smiled, “How often caravan passes here? Once every twenty days? Or once a month? What do the ‘countless’ predators eat meanwhile? While in savanna we could occasionally see packs of herbivores and sometimes even hunted them ourselves, we haven’t seen even a little bunny or a squirrel here! If these beasts lived around these parts – they would have eaten each other long ago or died from starvation, but instead they are big, strong and even have a decent discipline and hierarchy! These animals are not stupid, but you guys look at them in the wrong light – they are not wild animals, but vultures who feast on the human society. In current case – caravans just like ours. They wait in the outskirts of the Dark road scattered around wide area, but when the next caravan arrives, they group up to feast on fat merchants and their horses.”

“But what about the rank five attacks?” Zaki was holding his chin while deep in thoughts.

“Those are separate unique events and we shouldn’t even consider them. Higher rank beasts are not interested in human flesh or the flesh of the regular horses. The Qi density is too scarce for them to even think of it as a real food, but trust me, from level five and up – those beasts are not stupider, most likely even smarter than us. How many such attacks have you seen? They probably happen mostly in the drunkard’s tales in taverns.” Nick looked at the old men around them, “You guys are extremely experienced and know how to do your craft, I won’t teach you that. What I want to suggest is to get rid of these pests for the rest of our trip in one go without having any serious casualties, or may be even without any at all!”