"Mm?"
Rada looked around, the sight before her eyes was somewhat familiar.
"A forest again, huh?"
This time, however, the forest didn't give off a gloomy or dark feeling. It was strangely calm, the light was still clearly visible, though the trees were thick enough to dim it.
"Hey Kiba, can you smell Rei?" he asked, looking around.
The pup suddenly opened his eyes in response, sharpening them right in the direction in front of them.
"No, however there seems to be someone in front of us."
"Who?" asked Rada surprised.
What were the chances of finding another participant as soon as they entered?
"He's not a participant, he smells different, he seems to be one of those from the capital," said the puppy.
"An observer??" he asked puzzled.
"Maybe."
"Better play it cool then, let's think about reaching Rei first" as prefixed earlier, the main goal was to reunite with the girl first.
"Um, it won't be easy," said Kiba worriedly.
"And why is that?" asked Rada.
"I can't smell her."
The puppy's expression grew more serious.
"It can only mean that it is out of the range of my sense of smell."
"If so, then this forest must be unusually large," Rada sighed as he said this.
"We can only move on then, somehow hoping to be close enough to have Rei within range of your nose."
Reuniting with Rei didn't seem as easy as expected.
But Kiba was with him, his presence was reassuring. He wasn't just a pet, his contribution was more than welcome.
"Put me down," he said.
Before he could even move forward, the pup decided to walk side by side, he continued to have a strange expression.
"What is it?" asked Rada, intrigued by his behaviour.
"I don't know, my gut tells me something's wrong," replied Kiba. His small pointy nose kept sniffing for any clue it could.
"Did you smell something?"
"Nothing unusual at the moment."
"Has your instincts always guided you well?" asked Rada teasing him.
"It's led me to you," replied the pup indifferently.
"Heheh, I thought it was because of the Pearl," Rada whispered with a grin.
"How about you go ahead instead of wasting your time here!"
Annoyed that he couldn't retort, Kiba moved forward, leaving him behind.
In the meantime, not far away, Encar, the man sent by Evan, was observing the movements of the two with a strange expression on his face.
"Could it be that they have discovered my presence? It would seem not..."
On the other side, near the edge of the forest, one of the surveillance staff found himself in an abnormal situation.
"Where do these wolves come from!?"
The man was dripping with sweat, shivers running down his spine...
"They're not just wolves..."
Each of the wolves present gave off a menacing aura, he tried to think of some way to warn everyone.
But all his thoughts were suddenly shattered:
"Impossible..."
Behind the pack, a huge wolf with blood red eyes appeared, the man's face turned white as a sheet.
(This is the end)
That was the man's last thought before he met his fateful destiny.
"We're in the confines of the forest, once inside, finding them will only be a matter of time," fresh blood was still dripping from Scarn's jaws.
"Let's move!"
After removing all traces, the pack disappeared into the shadows of the forest.
Away from there, however, in another part of the forest, covered in mud and earth, a girl was cursing her bad luck.
"Damn... a scarlet bear from the mountains."
Rei, who entered the portal before Rada, found herself in the hunting area of a scarlet-red bear of mammoth size.
The beasts, like the possessors and cultivators, were diversified by levels called "Stages."
Each beast began at the Embryonic stage and continued on to: Metamorphosis, Hunter, Slayer, Dominator, Royal, Imperial, Ascetic and Divine.
The bear that found itself facing Rei was in the final stages of the Hunter stage, just short of ascending to the Slayer stage.
Rei, on the other hand, found herself almost completely unable to face him, as she had just reached the materialisation level, well below the beast.
At first glance, the difference might have seemed imperceptible, but that was not the case at all, the difference in power was almost as substantial as the distance between heaven and earth.
Dirty and frustrated by the exasperating situation, she could do nothing but hide and wait for the best moment to get away.
She was also worried about Rada, but was relieved to know that Kiba was with him. She knew that reuniting would be more complicated than it seemed, this fact gave her a lot of anxiety.
"Hey Kiba, are you sure it's this way?"
In the meantime a boy and his puppy, hidden in tall thick bushes, found themselves whispering in front of what looked like a cave.
"Yes I'm sure, the smell is coming from there" Kiba, nodding, continued to observe the surroundings in case there were any unexpected visitors.
Not far from their position, Kiba caught the scent of a beast that led them right in front of the cave.
"What do you think we'll find in there?" asked Rada. Inside him was a mixture of tension and excitement at the same time.
"Whatever's in there, the bow will be of little use to you in there," Kiba's gaze darkened.
"If the smell is so strong that it's coming out of the cave, there's only one obvious explanation," he explained.
"That the cave is inhabited by a real predator," Rada interrupted.
"Exactly."
A short time later, Rada asked again, "So what do we do?"
He relied on the pup's advice without much thought.
"We're here to hunt, aren't we? Let's go knock on the landlord's door," Kiba's eyes sparkled as he said that.
"Wha...? You want to go inside the cave? Haven't you ever heard the phrase don't wake the sleeping dog?" Rada didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the puppy's bravery.
"Let's hope it's a dog then, I'll have nothing to fear!" Kiba slipped away in the direction of the cave under Rada's incredulous eyes.
"Huh, and to say I had practiced so much with the bow... Sigh."