Of course, the boar didn't give Leo the time to regain his bearing and started to stand up abruptly before searching around for its assailant.
After seeing Leo, the beast rightfully decided that this was the culprit and sprinted towards him, at least as fast as it could on three legs.
Leo held onto the metal wire making the kunai cut upwards, enraging the boar even further as well as pulling Leo upwards towards the branch the metal wire was thrown over. With a swing of his body, he managed to wrap the wire around the branch once more while simultaneously jumping onto the branch itself.
The boar's eyes seemed to glow with rage as it looked at the small creature that caused him pain perched upon a branch. The wild boar decided that it would just fell the tree by ramming against it, making the kunai pull upwards cutting through its skin before exiting its body entirely.
Leo quickly jumped down after seeing his weapon go loose. Midst flight he grabbed the kunai and flung it upwards and around the branch in the opposite direction making it unwrap itself from the branch.
The boar didn't even consider Leo jumping down as it rammed its head against the tree once more, finally breaking through.
With the final charge the tree exploded into splinters while some black marks of burned wood could be seen among it.
With a roll, Leo dispersed most of the energy that the fall would create and quickly pulled on the wire, making the kunai fly towards him before catching it and throwing it again this time around a bigger tree. After it wrapped around the tree twice, Leo used the wire to make the kunai fly back towards him.
The boar had already turned around and spotted him. It quickly charged at him with increased aggression as it saw Leo in reach. With a stomp on the ground it blurred towards Leo, who quickly dive rolled behind the tree that thankfully resisted the boars charge if just barely.
Leo quickly ran around it in an arc as the boar shook his head to disperse its dizziness before it looked around again. After seeing Leo again, it dumbly charged at him once more and the show repeated itself with Leo throwing his kunai around a tree before dodging the angry charge.
The wild boar lost a lot of blood with his missing leg and with his continuous attacks he grew weary. It was clear that it stood on its last legs.
The little battlefield that Leo created with the metal wire prevented the boar to gain much momentum as it tripped over it continuously slamming onto the ground multiple times only for Leo to stab it whenever he safely could.
It stood up every time as it knew that once it gave up it would be this little creature's meal. However, luck wasn't in the boar's side as more of Leo's group joined in their battle. The boar squeaked occasionally making the concern about the noise they would make with a gun inconsequential, which led to Sarah firing her pistol.
With a bang the gun fired a bullet towards the struggling boar, penetrating its skin, but it was evident that the damage made by the pistol was insufficient to seriously damage it, especially with its size and apparent resilience.
Shunlei skewered the boar with several kunais, while Laura took out a machete which she used to make long cuts on the boar. Leo was honestly surprised where they suddenly got their weapons from, but the three did go out of the hostel with full backpacks.
Leo wouldn't be surprised if the three got full outfits packed inside just in case, not that he didn't but he doubted that they only packed tactical clothes for covert missions. After learning a few tricks from some soldiers and ninjas on how to efficiently store their clothes and weapons, they had carried most of their necessities with them.
Sarah only picked up the stuff that would help her store as much makeup and hygiene stuff as she could.
Either way, now the boar was hardly able to move while it was stabbed and slashed from every direction until it couldn't handle it anymore and succumbed to its wounds. Leo and the rest moved quickly as they cut up as much meat as they could, while Leo also removed the tusks of it.
They cut the meat into tiny strips and cleaned them with the stream water before Leo and the rest tied it all up inside several plastic bags which they then tied to their backpacks before they ran into the direction of the ocean again.
They would leave all the remaining organs and meat to some scavenger or predator that decided on an easy meal since they couldn't carry it anyway. The scent the carcass makes would also make it less likely that an animal would hunt them down for a meal.
The food was tied up inside their bags, but one shouldn't underestimate a hungry animal's ability to take up a scent, so after moving away from the carcass for quite a distance they quickly started a fire and used the hot smoke to dry the meat.
It would take a while, so they kept watch for any animal that decided that they wanted a piece from them rather than the carcass that was probably being eyed by their competition.
Maybe the scent of cooked meat was more appealing to them, either way Leo wasn't surprised when he saw some wolf like creatures spying on them. They didn't look taller than normal wolves and looked almost the same except for the scalier look they had going for them and the glowing marks on their body not unsimilar to the boars.
They didn't attack them instantly and when the group decided to stand up to them, the ten wolves circling around them backed off after a stare down. Leo was grateful that common sense existed among animals on this world as well.
You would hardly find a predator attack another if it weren't necessary and if the fight would end in their favor. Even if victory were guaranteed, predators would usually back off against other predators to prevent injuries or even deaths in their pack.
After all, this was real life and hardly any animal would take the risk of getting a wound that may get infected.
Leo and the rest still didn't want to wait around for a bigger badder wolf that threw caution to the wind and attacked them regardless.
They quickly finished up drying the meat with hot smoke and started storing it in clean bags with a lot of salt to preserve the meat. Salt would slow down the growth of microorganisms by extracting water from the meat. The lack of moisture would lessen the hospitable environment for bacteria.
With this they had enough food that provided a good number of proteins for the following days without it going bad. As they made their way through the forest once again only now with food and water for the foreseeable future, they started to hear screams again.
Now they knew that mere prey was strong enough to take on their whole group and as before they ignored the daunting screams and death throes. As time passed it only made them more nervous as the screaming started at random intervals and stopped randomly again.
Each time they listened to the death screams of different people they got stressed out almost to the point until they couldn't handle it anymore. With Leo and Laura being their emotional support the other two managed to not let it weigh too much on their mind.
At one point the screams even returned in the middle of the night making Sarah, who had just started her night watch, scared out of her mind. It did wake up the others, but she reassured them that she could handle it. She knew that they desperately needed the nightly rest as they wouldn't know how much longer it would take until they reached anything that resembled civilization.
Unsurprisingly, after swapping watch duty with Shunlei, she had trouble falling asleep. Only after Shunlei comforted her to sleep was she able to get some rest.
Their trip otherwise was rather uneventful and could be considered peaceful, but Leo knew that whatever monster was playing mind games with them was slowly getting to them. Leo wasn't unaffected by this either.
He might be the one in the greatest shape with all his techniques to calm and ground himself but listening to someone dying day in and day out was chipping away from his mind. Leo had considered to confront the monster that seemed to follow them, but he chose against it.
It was safer to stay as a group to cover each other than to confront it on his own. They were close to the ocean as well. With the ocean on one side, they would only have to be half as alert, at least in theory.
Saying that they were relieved to see the ocean being only away a day's worth of travel would be an understatement. They had jumped in joy, so happy were they to see their destination being nearby.
Happy that they got to leave the terrifying forest and arrive at the hopefully pleasant beach without a monster lurking in the dark. Although Leo had his doubts with that after some days of travel.
They had heard it more than once at night and at day, but they haven't even caught a whiff of it. Either it was stealthy enough to escape or confuse the senses of three peak human fighters, who have sharpened their senses to almost supernatural degree, or it just doesn't exist.
Even if it were invisible and could fly, they would be able to notice at least something in the surroundings but no one until now has. The three fighters of the group silently came to the same conclusion.
If a monster could fool them for days straight in every period of the day, it could have killed them already. After Laura voiced her suspicion out that, they figured since it didn't kill them already, it, A doesn't exist, B feed off their despair, or C it needed to weaken their mental defenses to control them.
They considered more options courtesy of Leo's strange imagination, but they were even more absurd than a monster stealing its victims voices to lure in others. Either way, after coming to that conclusion the three calmed down considerably, since now they could wrap their head around it better without the unknown scaring them.
After hearing their suspicion, Sarah only gave her thumbs up to them. That earned her three blank gazes. To their surprise after the night that almost terrified Sarah to death, she was the calmest of the group.
She said that after working with them to slay that boar with a pistol which made a lot less damage than their attacks and then being comforted to sleep by Shunlei, who had heard the screams as well, she figured that she could just lay her safety in the hands of the most capable persons she ever got to know.
Obviously, that earned her a lot of brownie points, but it also made them jealous as she seemed to be carefree knowing that they could protect her better than she herself could or any other person she had ever met for that matter. That's not to say that she didn't take her responsibility lightly.
For the last day nothing distinguished itself from the previous days as they made their way through the forest, eating their rations and drinking tree sap water.
This day they found a clearing with a bit of high grass that was quickly cleared by Shunlei and her blade attached to a wire. She stood in the center and whirled it around her in a circle, while slowly extending the wire to further her reach.
They left most of the grass standing as Leo used it to hide his trip wire in it and the surrounding trees that were some distance away. They set up camp there and even started a campfire that attracted some insects, but it didn't hamper their good mood of reaching their destination the next day.