Soon the sun rose from the East. A new day had started and no demonic beasts came during the night. I went back into the cave and found both Ana and Astra already awake. They were undoing their bandages and their wounds were already healed.
"Man I'm really jealous of how quickly you both recover. Anyways I'm gonna take a quick nap. We'll talk then so think of what you want to say."
"Okay Sylvain."
"Yes have a good rest Sylvi."
With that I went to my room. I just dived straight into bed and went to sleep. It is really weird, but as long as I wish to rest I will just fall asleep. I don't remember when this started, but it definitely happened after I entered the Forest of Calamity. I don't know what to make of this, but it is definitely a good thing. After a couple of hours of resting I woke up and found both Ana and Astra eating some meat.
"I'm awake now. You can tell me whatever it is you want. I don't care if you keep some things since we all have things we would rather keep to ourselves."
"I guess we should start from the beginning then Sylvain. First the person we fought was named Watson and he is the son of the king of the rainbow fox clan. Originally one of us was supposed to inherit the throne, but since we are not rainbow foxes we lost that opportunity."
"Wait, hold up for a second. You two were originally supposed to inherit the throne."
"Yep. I guess we never did tell you, did we Sylvi. Our mother was the first wife of the king and as such we are technically princesses of the rainbow fox clan."
"And just making sure since I never had this confirmed. The rainbow fox clan are the demonic beasts that live in the forbidden zone of theForest of Calamity."
"Yes that is correct."
"So I've been casually talking with those from the strongest clan. I hope I'm not going to get kicked out because of this."
"You should be fine. Like I've said we had been abandoned by the rainbow fox clan."
"Well that's a relief. Sorry for interrupting your story. You can continue now Astra."
"Okay then. Since we were technically princesses that couldn't inherit the throne we were bullied. We were called the failure princesses, the disappointing duo, and many other mean, degrading names. The person who propagated this was Watson. He probably felt threatened by us even though we have no right to the throne. He even made some threats to us saying that he would kill us in very brutal ways."
"He would never go through with it though. The coward."
"Anyways this all should have ended when we were forcefully kicked out of the clan."
"Do you have any idea why he would still pursue you and even follow through on those threats?"
"There is one reason why he might be doing this."
"Okay and what is it?"
"Well he isn't the only one who is trying to take the throne. The king has many children after all and they all have rights to the throne. As such he should be trying to do things that would make him seem better than the other candidates."
"I don't follow Astra. How is killing you guys gonna prove he is a better candidate?"
"Although rare there have been other cases of different elemental foxes being born from the rainbow fox clan. The problem with that though is that those foxes would be overloaded. The amount of power that usually is divided equally into the 9 elements for the rainbow foxes just gets dumped into one element for the elemental fox. This causes many problems with the most notable being it is harder to control. It does provide a big advantage though and that is the fact that the element is overall stronger."
"Wait let me guess the rest. So with a stronger element that is more prone to go out of control there are many injuries. As such your type is usually killed at birth or kicked out to avoid damages. However since you are the daughters of the queen and king you were given time to see if you could defy the odds and control the elements. When you failed to do so you were both kicked out and now to stabilize his position Watson will kill you. He will be erasing a future threat which will make him seem more useful. Well how did I do?"
"Man Sylvi, that's exactly what I was thinking."
"Yeah Sylvain. I think that maybe Watson might also be doing this for himself too, but yeah that is exactly my thoughts."
"Okay so how do you guys want to do this?"
"Huh do what Sylvi?"
"I'm asking, do you want to hide till all this blows over, or do you want to end the problem?"
"To be completely honest, I would want to end the problem. However that would just cause trouble to you Sylvain as you will probably be hunted for vengeance."
"Yeah I wouldn't want to see Sylvi being hurt because of us."
"A little too late for that don't you think. How many times have I had to save you guys these last twelve years."
"Many times and we are grateful for that."
"Yeah, but don't forget Sylvi, we have also helped you many times as well."
"Okay then it looks like you will be staying in the cave and laying low while I go collect what we need. I say we stay low for a year or two."
"Yeah I think that's fine. Also Sylvain thanks for this."
"Your welcome. By the way how much do we have stocked up."
"We are all out."
"Wasn't the storage a ⅛ filled yesterday."
"It was Sylvain, but we finished it off for breakfast."
"I assume you are not hungry then."
"I could go for some more if you're hunting Sylvi."
"Uh you gluttons. I'll hunt down three demonic beasts and we can each have one then."
Saying that I quickly leave the cave to hunt. I'm gonna need to collect a lot of food. Even though I said they were gluttons they usually don't eat that much. It is only when they are injured do they eat a lot. Maybe they can heal themselves by eating. Uhh who cares. It's not like I'm going to be able to do the same. Whoops I'm trying to stay low here so let's put on my hiding spell.
"O spell of wind flow around my body to hide myself."
With the spell properly working I then resume my hunt. Very soon I am able to find a pack of wolves. There are six in the pack, and only killing three seems hard. I'll just kill all six and put the extra three in storage
"O spell of wind, form from my hands a mighty blade that follows my movements to destroy my enemies. O spell of wind flow through my body to reinforce myself."
With those two spells fast I rush straight into the pack of wolves. They can't see me because of my hiding spell. If I tried this like say ten years ago I would have been caught. Luckily my increase in mana quality increased the spells quality. My control has also gotten a lot better. I wanted this fight to end quickly so when I reached the wolf pack I put my free hand in one of the wolves.
"O spell of wind gather in my hand to drain the mana of my opponent."
I stole the wolves mana and slit its throat with my spell sword. After this, confusion ran in the pack as they couldn't find out why one of them died. I then did the same thing with another wolf. When the third wolf dropped the remaining ones scattered. I chased them down before killing all of them. I then stored their bodies in Ana and Astra's bag. This bag is really useful because despite its size it can hold a tremendous amount. I don't know the max capacity, but they said they were able to fit in around 50 animal carcasses before it was full. This bag has really made gathering much more efficient.
After quickly putting the bodies in the bag, I started heading back to the cave. I had already dispelled my spell sword and reinforcement spell, while keeping my hiding spell active. After walking for a few minutes I heard the crunching of leaves. Not taking any chances I quickly hid myself up in one of the trees and looked in the direction of the noise. From there I saw Watson and his retinue examining the blood that I left behind.
"So what do you think Watson, is it their blood?" One of his followers asked.
"No it's not, but the trail leads here. They should be around this area somewhere. I think they hunted some demonic beast here and ate it bones and all." Watson replies.
"So we just keep searching the area right?" Another of his followers asked.
"Yep and this time we will kill them. I don't know how they escaped last time, but they won't be able to do it again." Watson said.
While they were talking I was trying to figure out how they were tracking us. I should have used the hiding spell which erased our sound and presence completely. They were talking about blood, so maybe when I carried Ana and Astra their blood spilled on the ground. If that is the case then I need to retrace my steps and clean up the blood spills. Wait, they would get suspicious if clean areas appeared in the area. I think what would be best is to leave some demonic beast carcasses in the area. That way their blood would hide Ana and Astra's blood. It would also be very reasonable that demonic beasts fought and killed each other.
Thus I went about enacting my plan. I retraced the same path I took while carrying Ana and Astra. On the way I didn't find too much blood, around three areas that needed attention. Luckily I had three extra carcasses, so I left them in the area. I was hoping that other demonic beasts would come and eat some of the meat to make the story seem believable. After all that was done I headed back to the cave. Immediately I was greeted by Ana and Astra with rumbling stomachs.
"Be patient." I tell them. "I still have to dismantle the carcasses and cook them. Also I have something to tell you, but we can talk after you eat."
They both nod and head to the kitchen to wait. I then also head to the kitchen and begin cooking. First I dismantle the bodies. After they were cleanly cut, I placed the edible parts in a pile, the fur in another pile, and the unneeded parts in a third pile. I would throw away the unneeded parts later while keeping the fur for future use. Then I picked up the edible parts and started washing them. The rumbling of the foxes stomachs grew louder so I decided to cook simply to make it faster. After a couple minutes of cooking it is done. I give a majority of the meat to them while I keep a small portion for myself. I am lucky that the winter months aren't coming. If they were we wouldn't have had enough food in stock.
"Well since you've pretty much finished I will tell you what I wanted to earlier. Watson is still looking for you guys and seems intent on finding you. I think the barrier should keep him away. I also think that I covered our tracks pretty well. However we should still be cautious."
"Okay Sylvi. We'll just stay in here. Probably try to expand the cave a little bit."
"Yeah, okay Sylvain. I really doubt Watson would be able to find us, though. So I think we have no need to worry."
"Well if that's how you really feel about it then fine. Have fun expanding the cave then. I think we should make a common area where we can gather and talk. I'll leave the purpose up to you though since it will be you that is digging. I'm a little nervous though so I'll go out and monitor Watson."
"Okay don't die Sylvi."
"Yes we'll be waiting for your safe return."
"And I'll return, hopefully with some good news."
As such I went out and looked for Watson and his group. It honestly took longer than expected, but I did eventually find them. I think I might need to create a detection spell in case a situation like this occurs again. Since I didn't want to be discovered by them I chanted my hiding spell to hide from them. I also chanted my reinforcement spell to help hear them.
"O spell of wind flow around my body to hide myself. O spell of wind flow through my body to reinforce myself."
Then I began to watch them from afar. They were close to the are where I left a dead body. My earlier assumption that they were following the smell of blood must have been right then. They soon encountered the body.
Once again a follower asks, "so what do you think Watson?"
"It is hard to tell," Watson replies. "Their blood definitely leads here. However their blood is masked by this demonic beast's blood. If I had to guess, they probably realized they were being tracked and used this to confuse us. The good thing is that they wouldn't be too far away. Quickly search the area for any clues."
After he said that his retinue split up and started searching. Honestly they were so bad at it though. Watson himself was fine, but his retinue was horribly. They were just going all over the place, all willy nilly. This would definitely create more tracks and make it harder to find anything of note. They also trampled all over the foliage which would make finding clues through it almost impossible. Basically they were of no threat unless they were tracking blood, but I had already masked the scent of blood. I thought that this could be an elaborate ploy since they knew I was watching. However they shouldn't know that I am watching making that an impossibility. If this is how they usually acted then I could see why he was in danger of not receiving the throne.
In the end I decided to leave after a couple hours of watching. The only way they would be able to find the cave is through dumb luck. They had found all three bodies and had practically ruined their chances of finding anything out. So I ended up hunting some more demonic beasts. I hunted all different kinds and filled up the magic bag to the brim. I also kept some bodies out so that there would be more blood, which would serve to confuse Watson even more.
In the end I think I was able to hunt 60 with 50 going into the bag and the remaining 10 spread out in various places. I made sure that the places were extremely random and killed each of the 10 in a different way. This was to make it look like they were hunted by other demonic beasts for food and left for some reason. I also gathered some more edible plants before heading back the the cave.