After all these months of constant fighting I was finally calm after waking up and took my sweet time to stand up and prepare everything for the continuation of my journey.
I was eager to finally really set ablaze and leave this area, I hadn't felt the presence of anything dangerous besides the three Orzeths I had to fight yesterday. I didn't manage to find there corps, but I didn't really search for them either, after all the woman that saved me should've disposed of them.
"It wasn't all a dream, right?"
I exited the cave and walked outside into the bright sunlight that welcomed me on this new day, it really felt like a good day to leave this area. I tried to activate my magic and my eyes turned into an endless darkness again, it was the same as yesterday and everything I had tried out with this power seemed to still work.
"So I really managed to achieve this power?"
I decided to stop my magic for now and looked around once more before finally leaving.
I didn't know what lied in the directions around me and the only way I could take back would be to go through the cave again and then follow the stream of the river on the other side of the massive mountain to get to Raiken, but I decided that it would be pretty boring and the monsters would be too easy for me to kill and no real challenge.
But I still needed to get information about the current state of the world, after all half a year can change a lot in worlds like this and there could easily be problems between two big races, which could easily lead to a big war. Especially humans are a race that are mostly foolish.
It's not just for show that in most stories humans are the big enemies that always fight amongst themselves, after all there are many humans who are greedy, because of their short lives and many big families that think they have the right to exploit commoners.
"Ugh, there's no point in thinking about it too much I just need to pick one direction, the best choice should be to just follow this river."
Now I had decided the direction of my journey, so I began to walk alongside the river and simultaneously train my magic.
It was way easier to train your magic than your sword or bow skills because I already found out that in this world it seems like it's way easier to get stronger. Although it will be hard at first I decided to use my magic in certain ways, while walking and sensing my surroundings to look for enemies.
Just by using my magic I should over time get better control over it and if I do other tasks I would even be able to fight against someone while at the same time using my magic.
And just like that I began my journey through the wild and I was calm at first, but after walking for a few hours and then days I was slowly getting really anxious.
"Something is wrong!"
That thought wouldn't get out of my head. It wasn't because I was facing many strong beasts, but rather the complete opposite. I only encountered beasts that were on roughly the same level of the bear I faced before entering these mountains and although these bears are quite dangerous they are nothing that would be able to scare such a huge goblin colonization in these mountains.
It was mainly because these beasts hunted alone and not in groups, which would be fatal against a group of a dozen or more armed goblins. One of these bears was not even as strong as one of the Orzeths I fought and that was only logical if you think about the fact that these beasts are way smarter than the bears, even if it's just simple communication or tactics like hunting together.
So I concluded that there had to be some sort of overlord in this region that no one would want to face. I would surely hear something that terrifying from a long distance away, especially by using my enhanced hearing sense, but if I were to hear it I would probably already have been noticed by it.
So I had an idea. I thought of a way to use the power of the darkness to hide myself if I were to encounter it.
"So how am I gonna go about this?"
I sat down and was eating some meat and already had a plan in mind, but I wasn't sure if I would be able to do it with my magical ability. But even if I wouldn't ever meet it it was a skill that would surely come in handy in the future.
"Hmm, but this would only work in dark places, wouldn't it?"
I finished eating and was searching for a dark place to test my theory.
"Looks good here."
I found a big tree that could hide me from the sun and was producing a long shadow, which I could use to my advantage.
"Darkness, obey my command."
It wasn't necessary to say something like a spell, but I thought looking cool couldn't hurt, could it?
I concentrated on my sensing my mana and could feel the magic flowing from my mana center away through my whole body. It was easier than a few days ago, probably because I got used to the feeling and for what I was about to do I had to control the magic and let it flow through my whole body.
I began to sweat from the exhaustion that came with controlling the magic and expanding it to cover my whole body. It brought a lot of struggles with it, but I managed to get my whole body to be covered by the darkness and although I couldn't see anything it wasn't really that inconvenient for me, because I was already used to it from the time I had spent not being able to see anything.
"This is quite stressful, but it should work."
I was almost ready to stop the magic flow, but then I suddenly had the feeling that I had forgotten something essential, but didn't really get what so I just let the magic flow away. I was really exhausted, so I made sure nothing too dangerous was around and laid down on the floor and fell asleep almost immediately.
-A few hours later-
"Huh, why did I wake up?"
I was a bit confused, but then I sensed the the thing that made me wake up. It's mana didn't feel like it was any more than that of the usual bears I was facing, so I wasn't really panicking, but then I had a good idea, which could turn this encounter into a good opportunity.
I quickly stood up and took my sword leaving my other stuff behind and went behind the tree, behind which tested my new skill out. I was ready to use my magic and the beast was still a few hundred meters away from me, so I tried to not get distracted and activated my dark magic.
I tried to not make any sounds and just stand still while I was surrounded by the darkness. I could feel the beast slowly approaching me, probably thinking I couldn't hear it and didn't know where it was.
Now it should be able to see me! It didn't do anything, but rather stopped, which seemed odd to me, because it should think that I went further into the direction, after all my magic should trick it's eyes and I doubt there's a lot of creatures that have the ability to sense mana like I have.
But after a few seconds it didn't go away, but rather seemed like it was slowly approaching me. I was confused about my mistake, but still hoped that it didn't know that I was here.
Instead of slowly approaching me it now picked up speed and quickly leapt at me.
I was now sure that it could really somehow know I was here and I decided to let my magic stop and grabbed the sword from my back.
"Die damn beast!"
I was disappointed in myself, because I was clearly missing something and unconsciously let my anger out splitting the beast that jumped at me cleanly in two. The blood was splashing all around me and I quickly jumped away from it, trying not to get the blood on my clothes and body.
I was curious which kind of beast it was and looked at it.
"So it was one of you, huh?"
It was what like a bigger version of the wolves I faced on the other side of the mountain, before going through the mountain. It was not as heavy as the bears I was normally facing, but it should be on the same level considering the speed of the leap, with which he attacked me. Even when it was way smaller it was still faster than the usual bear, but it could never face it considering their weight difference.
It probably wasn't able to see my big sword and wanted to take me out quickly, but then it got baited and while in mid air it was in perfect range for my sword making it easy to split it in half even though my speed with the sword was definitely slower than it's leap.
"But why didn't it work?"
If it really wasn't able to see my sword then my darkness should've worked. I looked back at the place I was trying to hide and when looking at it began to notice my own stupidity.
"Oh, this is really obvious."
In fact it was so obvious that I was thinking I was kind of ashamed to have this power of the darkness and then not realizing such an easy fact.
What I missed was that I did indeed cover me with darkness, but in fact that was just like seeing a birch in the middle of a forest full of oaks. I forgot to also look at my surroundings.
I was so focused on covering my own body and my weapons that I was probably a lot darker than the darkness surrounding me, which would maybe fool someone at a glance, but not for more than a few seconds.
I was honestly a bit disappointed in myself, but then I reminded myself of the fact that making mistakes is natural and not being perfect is normal. Well that actually sounds pretty cringy, but it did the job in making me a bit more happy and I told myself that I would definitely learn from this mistake.