Roman dropped to his knees and sighed in relief as the Red Ash Fox mysteriously dashed back into the wolf, allowing Roman to avoid imminent death.
But just as his worries faded away, Roman turned his attention to the end of the path just like the Fox had done before leaving the scene. He heard some commotion and turned to face that direction.
In the distance, Roman could make out four figures walking towards him.
"Hahaha! Look at you, weakling. Killing a Grass Rabbit and getting beat up while at it. Look boys, the weakling was even brought to his knees!"
In the front of the group, Crid pointed at Roman who was on his knees beside the Rabbit that the Red Ash Fox had killed.
The rest of Crid's group laughed along with Crid at Roman's predicament.
Technically, Crid's large group had given the Red Ash Fox the impression that Roman's reinforcements had arrived to save him. Unfortunately for the Red Ash Fox, it could never have known that Crid and his crew never had that intention.
Instead, if Crid and his boys had found Roman in a life or death situation, they would have given the Red Ash Fox a hand and laughed at Roman while they were at it.
But in this case, Crid and his crew had unconsciously allowed for Roman to avoid such a dire situation. They had also mistaken the Grass Rabbit for being the one that dealt such heavy damage against Roman.
However, at the thought of Crid mocking him, Roman glared at Crid and retorted.
"Look Crid, I stay out of your business so you should stay out of mine."
Roman wasn't willing to be too harsh even with Crid mocking him because Crid had saved him.
In response, one of Crid's lackeys who stood to his right stepped forward.
"You dare?" Matthew yelled.
Matthew was Crid's biggest advocate and the vice leader of the group. When Crid wasn't around, Matthew was charged with the responsibility of taking on Crid's duties of making Roman's life difficult.
However, Matthew was nothing without Crid.
Matthew was a rotund, short kid that found his life's purpose after Crid decided that he would be useful. He was often incompetent and couldn't get anything done right the first time around, but Crid kept him around for an entirely different reason.
Matthew was loyal – not that he could be anything else around Crid, though. Crid had given him authority and a marginal amount of prestige by always making sure that he would be the first one Crid turned to.
The rest of the group also recognized Matthew's importance to Crid and gave him due respect despite his incompetence.
Before Matthew could do anything to Roman, Crid stuck out his arm to stop him. Crid was going to take action himself.
"As if weakling, see how I deal with your insolence!" Crid approached Roman and shoved his kneeling figure onto the ground. Roman was too exhausted and injured to react.
Crid then laughed out loud and signaled for his crew to leave.
It wasn't that Crid didn't want to take care of Roman right away. However, where would the fun in that be?
It would be much more satisfying to torment Roman gradually.
Not to mention, Crid and his boys were also participating in the Egg Hunt and had a deadline to meet. They could still deal with Roman at any other time, but they had their priorities in check.
Ultimately, Crid was confident that he and his boys would end up with at least bronze ranked beast partners whereas Roman would have to result to having to rely on Branch Village to obtain a copper ranked beast.
They had predicted that not only could they take on Roman easily in the future, their beasts would be strong enough to do the same to Crid's partner beast as well.
Crid, alternatively, believed that not only would have get a beast at least at broze rank, he was confident to completely outshine the other five-year-olds in the village and attain a beast with higher potential just like his brother had done three years ago.
In fact, Crid's brother was one lucky guy.
During Crid's bother, Jake, was about to fail the egg hunt as a result of being too ambitious. Just like Roman, Crid's brother took a chance at the mountains. However, when Jake got to the mountains, he didn't dare to confront any of the beasts as they had protected the eggs within their herds and packs.
He didn't stand a chance.
However, Jake got lucky when in fighting occurred amongst a group of Mountain Rock Rams. Typically the herd stuck together against external threats, but was, in truth, full of competition within. Male Mountain Rock Rams would charge at one another to gain dominance of the herd when they believed it was their time.
Mountain Rock Rams were given the moniker Rock Ram due to their horns. The Mountain Rock Rams grew horns that were as hard as rocks and had a natural affinity towards the Earth and Metal elements.
The combination of both elements resulted in an extra strong formation of curled horns growing on the head of these Mountain Rock Rams.
Jake happened to be hiding behind a rock while a fight between two male Mountain Rock Rams took place.
After the fierce battle, both Rams came to a tie and collapsed due to exhaustion, leaving room for Jake to take advantage of the situation to steal the silver ranked Mountain Rock Ram egg from one of the females of the group.
If everything panned out right, Jake could someday join the military of the kingdom and bring glory to his family and the village.
The reason why most of the villagers ignored Crid bullying Roman was because of Jake. If Jake made it to the military, his family would gain unimaginable benefits from the barony and from the kingdom itself. These benefits would naturally extend to the people who wanted to make connections with his family.
From the point of view of the village, Jake's potential was endless.
Naturally, Jake returned home after his hunt and was celebrated as a hero. But he also lied and never told anyone of his cowardice.
Crid had always thought that talent ran in the family, and he would continue to raise the family name.
"Count your blessings as this great master is magnanimous. I'll fix you after the Hunt."
Crid then brought his boys to leave.
With that, Crid and his lackeys left the scene into the forest.
As Crid and his boy's backs faded behind the trees into the distance, Roman finally believed that he was out of the weeds.
He dragged his ragged body over to the nearest large rock and leaned against it to try to recover.
His Egg Hunt had just begun, and he was already experiencing a ton of setbacks.
Roman was relieved at the thought of Crid and his boys leaving him be when he was in such a vulnerable state.
But were things in life ever that simple?