Since they are in a forest, Caroline was mindful that she would limit the use of her fire elemental power. So instead she started relying more on her new elemental power in her attacks and defenses - wind.
Different from that of fire, the power of wind had comparatively less attacking power, at least against these Blinker Raccoons, but it granted Caroline more and finer control, as well as more defensive abilities like constructing walls of wind, which seemed to cost less Xuanli and concentration to do, to block and thwart incoming attacks.
"Go! Go back! Let's break out of here first!" Emily shot more arrows into the air and conjured more falling balls of lightning around the team to strike down and push back incoming attacks from the Blinker Raccoons. These racoons all seemed to come from positions some distance away from them, and with their short and mid distance teleportation ability, they were able to come at the team of four from all angles, and sometimes they could even come out from close and unexpected angles, causing the team quite a lot of troubles with their razor-sharp claws and some kind of instinctual metal magic.
Michael formed a couple of hand seals, then an energy seal appeared in his hand. Then he threw the energy seal into the air. When the seal exploded, some kind of dome-shaped energy seal appeared right above the team's heads and covered them inside.
"Bonk!" "Bonk!" funny clashing sounds started coming from around the team, several Blinker Raccoons seemed to have bumped into an invisible wall and bounced off through the air when trying to teleport to positions close to the team.
"Anti-teleportation seal is in place, we're good to move." Michael said to the team: "Don't use space magic if you don't have to - it will break the seal."
"Not gonna be a problem." Paulo laughed as he swung his swords and sliced through the bodies of more Blinker Raccoons.
The team of four started moving in the direction from which they came, with the invisible dome over their heads, the Blinker Raccoons were no longer able to teleport to positions that were too close to them - they were still able to teleport to places that were further away and launch their attacks on the team, but the elements and advantage of surprise was just simply lost.
The team was finally able to move relatively unhindered under the protection of the anti-protection seal. Caroline, Paulo and Emily formed a triangle and kept Michael who maintained the seal at the center, which was a strategy they only briefly discussed before the hunting trip, and yet right now their teamwork was going quite smoothly, considering the circumstances.
A couple of big ripples of energy waves appeared right above the team, and a Blinker Racoon with the size of a bear, especially long arms, spiky hair and bristles on its back and fierce eyes came out from thin air and fell down with great speed aiming at Michael.
Caroline rushed to Michael's side and raised her shield up in the air. Her shield glowed in orange, red and light green, and an energy shield appeared right above her, just in that giant Blinker Raccoon's way.
The energy shield cracked up on contact with the giant Blinker Raccoon and made a high pitched scratching sound as the Blinker Raccoon tried to claw it open. The impact was transferred to Caroline, who had to lower her body and get down on one knee to absorb the shock. The weight and velocity pressed against her whole body, especially her arms and legs, to the point of almost making her puke. But she was able to withstand it, and with a full force roar, she was able to push the giant Blinker Raccoon back into the air.
Emily's bow string shook with great force as she unleashed three powerful shots at the Blinker Raccoon's face. And Paulo swung his sword downward, releasing an energy blade at it.
The Blinker Raccoon was smart enough to protect its face with its forearms and claws, yet the three arrows still pierced through them and hit it in the face, while the energy blade from Paulo cut into its lower body like a giant chainsaw. It cried in pain and just teleported away.
No more Blinker Raccoon came after that, and the team of four was able to retreat to a relatively safer place.
"They're still following us." Michael sat down on the floor and said, holding his water bag in hand and trying to recover his magic: "Looks like we went in too deep, they've sent out a protector after us. And now they probably won't give up easily."
"I'm sorry, I didn't know..." Caroline sighed.
"No, not your fault. " Emily said: "We're just following our tracks, no one could have expected them to function in such a way."
"Yeah. This is quite unusual." Paulo added more dried tree branches to the small bonfire they created in a contained portable array: "How did they do this anyway? I mean setting a trap like that, luring us in and then surrounding and attacking us in waves. That's like the attack patterns of wolves, I've never heard of it from Blinker Raccoons."
"Sorry, I'm gonna need a minute before I can attend to your wounds." Michael saw that Emily and Paulo started patching their wounds by themselves and was a bit embarrassed: "That seal was quite draining."
"No worries. We can make do with these simple..." Emily was about to patch up a wound on her leg, and was surprised how deep it was and it was still bleeding.
"Here. Let me help you with that." Caroline approached Emily, her hands lit up and a breath of warm energy was projected onto Emily's wound.
Emily felt a warm wave of energy spreading across her leg, and her wound grew itchy and slightly numb. Within seconds, the bleeding stopped, and the wound slowly stitched itself up without the need for actual needles, and eventually what was left was only a piece of pink scar.
"Nice this is a nice healing spell. It enhances the self healing properties and lets the body heal itself - nice." Michael's eyes opened up: "It's really good, even for actual healer standards. What's it called? You gotta teach me that someday."
"Flame of Vitality." Caroline shook her head: "Too bad I'm not that good at it, I wasted more power than I should."
"It takes practice." Michael said: "The spell I know that functions like this - Reinvigorating Touch can also be a bit wasteful if not well practiced. Please, I insist, teach me that when we're done with the hunt. I can teach you a spell or two in exchange."
Just this moment, Caroline's phone rang, it was from Jason.