Just when Agacie and Renn reached the top of the slopes, an endless plain stretched off to the distant horizons.
Tall grass was covering the entire plain and they both enjoyed the last reddish sunrays and the ripples the wind caused within the grass.
Renn could feel Agacie stiffen slightly. 'Here they come'
The moment she finished speaking, 2 big wolves appeared before them, both at least a wolf head taller than Agacie, who already had a height of 2 meters.
The one to the left seemed older, his original dark grey had turned whitish of age. His posture was majestic and authoritative, showing that he was used to being obeyed to.
The other one seemed... rather laid-back. His fur had the same colour which the older wolf must have had when he was younger. He threw an interested glance on Renn, before he looked at Agacie, his expression turning a notch more delighted.
The older one stepped up 'Agacie, welcome back home.' he said gently, before turning an odd glance at Renn. 'But I would not have expected from you to bring a human child. This is not a place for those barbaric humans to be.'
Renn realised that he was talking about him. He was called a human? What was that even? I'm just a wolf like you too!
He could feel how his mother turned still before she spoke calmly 'This is my son, Renn. If you got a problem with him being my son, you are looking for trouble with me. He was raised by me.'
Renn would not forget, how his mother then stepped closer to the old wolf and growling terrifyingly 'He. Is. My. Son!'
There was silence for a moment before the old wolf cast an amused glance at her before reminding her sternly 'You will be responsible for him.'
Calmed, she said 'Of course.'
Without a second word, the old wolf vanished, although Renn could swear he winked at him.
'Haha our old man always has to act like that imposing, but he's really not.'
Intrigued, he looked more closely at Renn. 'So my nephew is a human child? Interesting!' he said cheerfully.
'Nephew?' Renn look questioning at Agacie.
Agacie sighed 'That's Phileo, my younger brother and thus, you're uncle.'
'Exactly and that old man's you're grandfather. He must be really happy to see his grandchildren and beloved daughter, right Agacie?'
Agacie smiled mildly before answering dryly 'You bet.'
They made their way to their new home when 3 wolves appeared next to them.
'Renn, mom you finally made it!' his siblings greeted and licked them cheerfully.
'My beloved' Agacie said warmly. 'Did you warn the council?'
'Yes, ma' Kaede said. 'But they asked you to come personally as quickly as you can, they want to see it with their own eyes.'
'Alright' Agacie said and vanished.
His siblings also looked apologetically at him 'We have to go too, sorry we can't show you around!'
'Just go' their uncle reassured them 'I will take good care of my nephew.'
'Thank you uncle!' they said before also vanishing.
'Let's go, Renn was it?'
Renn blinked agreeing.
His uncle then led the way while explaining. 'Since you have never been to the main pack, I will need to tell you everything from the beginning.
So, this main pack consists of several packs. At least a few dozen packs of light wolves and other wolf races, call this place their home and like you just heard, also your mother and I were born from this village. We call this place Xanten, meaning old castle since it really is the home for light wolves as long as we can remember. You must know, the light wolves exist since ancient times, always with the duty of keeping the knowledge and wisdom of past generations and sometimes other beings, which decided to pass us their experiences.
Not every single wolf knows everything, especially not the male wolves. But the sum of every living light wolfs knowledge must be a sheer unimaginable amount.
As such, our race has a special position within the beast world and we are respected by everyone, except for the ignorant ones, of course.
This is the general rally point' Phileo interrupted himself, pointing at a large blank area with a large stone on its edge.
'Anyway' he continued 'Most male light wolves' duty is to guard their packs or the main pack as a whole. They will, therefore, spend more time cultivating their battle senses and usage of true energy. Do you see the place over there?' He pointed at a large place with more wolves training with different devices, tools or sparring against each other than he had seen in his entire life. 'That's the training ground.'
He was especially captivated by a pair of wolves, one with crimson red fur and one with silver fur. They were both currently sparring, the silver-furred wolf was currently dodging the crimson wolfs fierce attacks and to Renns surprise he saw how talons made of flames shot out from its swings.
Just when Renn thought the silver wolf would be hit by a talon, it vanished reappearing behind its opponent. The crimson wolf seemed to have anticipated this move and turned in a swift circling motion, intense flames exploding from the marks he made with his hind leg on the soil.
The silver wolf barely managed to avoid the flames and teleported a few steps behind, when already another flame talon appeared amidst the flame wall which obscured the vision, hitting its shoulder. Although the flames seemed to hit an invisible barrier and did no damage at all, the silver wolf still stopped the fight and walked up, congratulating the crimson wolf on its win.
Loud cheers came from the onlooking wolves and the crimson wolf was smiling happily.
'I see, Targ has really gotten quite strong. As you could see, he is a fire wolf, and thus has a fire affinity. Maybe Joanne won't need to hold herself back in the future.' Phileo commented casually.
Seeing Phileo walking on, Renn quickly snapped out of his daze and caught up.