The travel had been hard for Chris. He had jumped in fright from the bizarre, and sometimes disgusting looking creatures that came out from the forest from time to time, they had even been attacked by the more aggressive of the creatures. He had been of no help, one would wonder why this lad thought he could defeat the disaster.
He had also played with sim along the way, and with every chance he got. When ever they sat down to rest, or came across a watering hole, he would talk to sim in cute baby voices and rub her belly. Leaving the men riddled in disgust. They obviously did not hold him in high regards. 'It's just a dog, why go so far?' They thought.
After having come a long way, they had travelled a whole day, and night had finally arrived.
The guide took them to a clearing and had them make a tent.
"Phew," Chris sighed in relief, since he had forgotten to buy a tent, and he didn't know how to make one either.
Instead of lying on the skin mat that Zulock the guide had brought, Chris brought out the medium quality hay bed for Zulock and the stableman to use.
He used a spell to reverse the items back to their normal size.
"Thank you, young master."
"There's no need to be thankful. It's something I should do."
Chris had also given them a blanket to protect them from the cold.
Their cold hearts softened a little as they were grateful for his kindness.
Around the campfire that Zulock had made, the stable keeper and Zulock told him their plight.
They recounted how the chief had torn down the statue of the Helper's that protected them, he had said that the people didn't need gods to protect them; well he was clearly wrong, the disaster proved him so. He also told him about how he had almost been killed by the village chief, while delivering news about the appearance of the disaster.
The stable keeper also had his tales to tell. He told them about how he had almost lost his life when handling, the horses of a noble, and how the innkeeper had taken him in. He managed to somehow keep a story about horses going on for hours. He took his time to explain to them how the different types of horses were raised, how they were bred, how they reacted, how to ride each breed to the achieve maximum output, how to care for them and how to handle various situations and emergencies, he was quite passionate about his job and clearly skilled.
They drank by the camp fire until they were drunk, if they had anything in common, it would be their ability to have cheated death countless times. The campfire side drinking went on into the night, until Zulock drunk on alcohol shouted out, " Let's go hunting! What could be better than fresh game and good wine."
Chris was firmly against it.
"Oh? You are such a worry wart, we're not drunk."
"You should just stop being a baby. Bwa ha-ha." Their eyes glistened.
"No, you are drunk." In the end he couldn't stop them.
Chris was worried that they would run into a creature they were unable to handle, or worse. He was hoping that they wouldn't be able to find any game, but as if being true to his name, Zulock found a young game with relative ease.
Pink and hairless, the skin of the game looked quite foreign. Its red eyes seemed ominous. Chris was hoping that they could get the hunt over with and return to the camping ground.
All of a sudden, Chris heard a low growl.
Raaow! Kurgh!
He looked to the side, and saw a beast which looked much like a leopard, except for it's leather like skin, along with its large and sharp shark like teeth, staring back at him.
Gasp.
Alarms went off in his head
'We need to leave!'
Chris badgered the two men, "we need to leave now, it's dangerous," he whispered
"What are you talking about?" Zulock asked taking aim at the game.
'Fuck! These two drunk men are they planning to get us killed.'
Chris spoke to them as quickly and as cautiously as he could, while making various hand signals.
"There's an animal." Chris signalled
"Like hell there is." Zulock snickered
"There's one really delicious animal right in front of us now." Barns replied bashfully
These men, can't they keep there voices down. Chris blamed his choice of words. He said it so as not to alarm them, but it had a negative effect, he was getting angry, but he endured it. "There's a wild beast just around the corner." But the men couldn't hear him since they were tipsy and not listening.
Chris started to drag them away, but it was too late. Zulock had shot the game with an arrow and the game dropped dead.
"Ah Fuck. We dead." Chris sweated nervously.
The beast immediately jumped forward and pounced in front of them with a growl.
Gurr! Raow!
Their drunken state, which had blurred their judgements vanished in a moment, and their eyes quickly regained their focus.
"What have you done?" Zulock quickly asked grabbing a dagger from his holster.
"Me you punk? Who do think threw the damned dagger?"
Zulock looked at the arrow that killed the game. He could clearly make out what had happened. He quickly broke out into a cold sweat. It was his dagger, he had caused this problem. While drunk he had acted rashly.
Normally a beast of this nature was nothing to him, but they were so poorly equipped.
"…"
"..."
"I will never drink again."
"You'd better not."
Gulp.
'Tsk.'
Chris didn't thing he would have to reveal his main hand so early.
It was true that while they had entered the forest he was scared because of the creatures that popped out of the forest, but he had entirely gotten used to it by the time half the day was gone. They had lost their novelty.
He just didn't want to draw attention to himself in case someone was watching.
So Chris ended up unsheathing his sword, he took a fighting stance. He was ready to attack.
"Grraow!"
"The tiger growled at him."
{You have been inflicted with "Confusion"}
"?, why not fear?"
{You will lose coordination and control over your body for 3 seconds}
"Ugh," Chris felt his body go numb, due to that the guide and the horseman were slashed by the creature and barely managed to avoided death.
"That was close." The beast could have attacked him but it choose not too.
The beast immediately attempted to pounced on Chris, but the duration for confusion was over. Chris swung his sword forward and sunk it into the creature's chest, barely.
Thud.
It was the sound of the animal's chest absorbing the impact and preventing the attack from getting through.
"Aim for the upper region of the neck that's barely exposed." Zulock shouted from behind.
Chris pushed the animal away and swung his sword at the upper neck region of the animal, it was the least guarded area and barely exposed.
"Couldn't you have said that sooner," now the animal was wary of Chris, so it didn't approach recklessly like before, instead it attempted to go for the other two, but Chris chased after it.
Immediately the animal turned around and slashed at Chris.
! ! !
'It was a feint'
Huff, Huff, Huff.
Chris held his chest as blood gushed out like a fountain. It had completely slashed away at the skin, exposing Chris's bones and flesh. Where it's nails had passed, a portion of his heart could be seen beating through the cracks.
Thump, Pump, Thump.
Blood gushed out from the wound.
"Ugh."
Blood gushed from his mouth.
Fuck.
Unimaginable pain, and the fear of death coursed through his body. Luckily, Chris didn't give up and managed to stop himself from losing consciousness.
"Damn it, just a little more and I would have been a dead man."
"Shit, Shit, Shit." 'What do I do now?' He was in bad condition and didn't want things to drag out.
The leopard like beast sneered, and went to attack his companions before they had a chance to retaliate, after all, Chris was as good as dead.
"Another one? Why do you all disregard me, you consider me to be easy pickings?"
"Who the hell do you think you are?" Chris was down not out and yet he was being disregard, he intended to make the beast pay.
"Fire explosion."
"Bam."
"Fire explosion."
"Bam."
Grrahrrrg!
"Fire explosion."
Bam.
Growuh!
The creature changed its direction in order to finish Chris off.
The animal charged through the bombardment of fire explosions, towards Chris.
Along with his already worn out state, he could only use fire explosion 5 times, in his best condition 10 consecutive uses was his limit, but he had already used it 3 times.
The creatures exterior began to burn, but that wasn't enough to kill it.
Going with the flow of the battle, if they let the creature roll a few more times on the ground, the fire would obviously be put out.
Even if they were the flames of the phoenix, Chris's control was very poor, his cast speed slow, needless to say his skill mastery was very low. If not for the aggressive output of the skill it would have been totally useless
The creature opened it's needlessly large mouth, to gnaw Chris in half, ignoring the flames still smothering on its body. It deemed it best to kill of the pesky annoyance.
"That's right you bastard"
"Fire explosion."
"Fire explosion."
Bam, Bam.
Chris shot the flames right in its open mouth, and eyes respectively.
The creature yelled out in pain as it stood on its hinged legs, it planned to crush Chris with its weight.
Grahwol!
Pew.
One arrow. Zulock had shot it.
He gathered all his momentum into the arrow, allowing it to knock down the beast who chose to utilize its hind legs.
It's own momentum was used against it. Along with its loss of vision, it's balance had been compromised.
Chris sighed in relief, if Zulock hadn't shot it, he planned to use "Sweep attack" to chop at its hind legs. The question was if he would be able to execute the sword strike in his current state.
Chris got him self up and stabbed the animal in its throat as he was the closest to it. It struggled for a while and naturally died.
Chris fainted.
◇◇◇
When Chris opened his eyes, he was back at the camp site.
It was late into the night.
Chris got up hastily from the hay bed and looked at himself, his wounds were healed. It appeared Sim had given him a high-grade potion. She was lying right next to him, her head which was previously on his chest, lay nested on his lap after he had awoken.
"Ha-ha," Chris chuckled.
'It seems she wanted to make sure my heart was still beating'. She must have wanted to make sure that I wasn't dead.
Damn. Chris felt guilty.
"I must have really made her worried."
He stroked her head.
"It's alright Sim. I'm not going anywhere." I'll do my best to not make you worry.
He looked around for the rest of the men.
Zulock was standing guard, while Barns was sleeping, they were both heavily wrapped in bandages.
He on the other hand was completely fine. "They are still in bandages?" It seemed they felt guilty for what had happened and had refused after Sim had given them potions. So he went to them with a low-grade potion each.
"Here, take this." Chris said handing him a red potion.
"How can I? Because of me you got hurt."
Chris smiled, "the fact you owned up to your mistakes is already admirable, but I'm also to blame for this. I should have stopped you."
Chris scratched his head.
"To be honest, I was hoping to get some experience. I don't come out frequently, my curiosity just got the best of me, so I'm sorry. I won't let that happen again, I put us all at risk due to my selfishness, so don't feel burdened and accept this."
Zulock was shocked, 'was he trying to take the blame, even after all I've done?' His heart softened a little.
He was well aware after what had happened, that Chris was no ordinary man. From his incredibly intelligent dog; who had managed to treat Chris and stabilize his condition from the brink of death, to the high grade potion that the dog, Sim, had used to cure Chris.
He had refused the potions Sim offered because he felt bad about how he had treated them both. He didn't even bother to hide it.
He perfectly understood why Chris would treasure and treat Sim so well, she was highly capable, even more so than most humans.
The dog seemed to have turned into a different entity once it saw Chris returning hurt. The usually aloof dog who loved to eat treats and play puzzles, scowled at him and had scolded him for more than an hour. He couldn't believe he had been scolded by a dog. If anything, it seemed that her previous behaviour was merely for Chris's amusement.
She had also given them the bandages, since they didn't have enough, as well as ice packs and medications to treat their wounds.
She glared at them dangerously, he was sure that if they weren't Chris's allies, she would have ripped them to shreds. That was how frightening she appeared, and who could blame her. Zulock was sure that if Sim was there, she would have done a better job of keeping Chris safe. In a way she seemed to be watching over Chris, it was definitely more than just his imagination. From his instincts he could feel it. She was fiercely overpowered.
He had come to respect her. She was the overpowered entity who kept a low profile beside a human, and looked after him.
Zulock shuddered, what could bind such an overpowered entity. He had more faith in Chris as a result. He felt that if Chris was capable of keeping such an overpowered being, he would some how manage to slay the Lepercuchin.
"I would feel even worse if you don't." Chris bowed, handing him the potions once again.
"Alright, if you say so." Zulock took the potions from Chris.
"Since Barns is asleep, I'll explain everything to him when he wakes up," Zulock nodded at Chris, then he walked back into the tent to safe keep the potions. His goodwill had been conveyed.
"With this, I've confirmed them to be trustworthy allies," I'll depend on them during my stay here. Chris walked back to his tent and found Sim still sleeping. She was probably exhausted. He patted her a bit before placing her back on her bed.
Chris hadn't expected things to turn out like this, but he couldn't lose barn and Zulock. He was planning to part ways after arriving at his destination, but now he could change his plans, it would be too much of a waste to cut off such trustworthy people.
◇◇◇
Zulock drank the potion, and regained a bit of his vitality. His complexion instantly regained its colour, and the cold damp air which he felt around him immediately dispersed. He could breathe a lot easier than before, and his wound didn't hurt as much.
"So this is a lower grade potion, I feel much better." He sighed. "I'm glad."
'Now I don't have to feel so burdened. My heart would have bled, if he had given me such a life saving treasure, that so was hard to come by.'
"Such a good man. Even after all the mess we've caused him."