"Great job, everyone. Let's pick up our speed and search before heading back." Hespar tried to motivate his team due to their fruitless luck today. To the team's surprise, it's been three hours after encountering the Forest Wolf, and they have not met with any monsters until now.
The team occasionally met with one to two goblins or lizards, but their age was too young to be included in their hunting list.
While killing the beast before they grow up would contribute to their safety, doing it too often would destroy the wilderness ecosystem. After all, humans, monsters, and plants rely on one another to survive. This is a cycle of life that cannot be avoided.
Furthermore, if the monsters like goblins, lizards, wolves, and slimes were hunted too vigorously, it would create another problem sooner or later. For example, a powerful beast from the inner wilderness might come out to the outer zone due to the lack of food.
While it was easy for a human to hunt goblins and others, the same cannot be applied when going against the powerhouses from the inner wilderness.
Without a proper strategy, it would be a foolish attempt to fight against a Demonic Tiger or Boulder Snake about two to three meters in height and at least five meters long. Even a group of Orcs, which had the most similarity to mankind, would be easily decimated by one or two of these monsters.
(Giya!)
The cry of a goblin caught the party's attention as they headed further into the wilderness.
Stolas, who had the best hearing amongst everyone present, made a quick trip to where the noise came without needing Hespar to tell him. The others choose to stay where they were to recover some stamina.
A few minutes later, Stolas returned with a goblin's heart in his hand. But it doesn't seem as fresh as it should be.
"Did you kill it?" Hespar asked. While he had no question of Stolas's ability, the time was too short for Stolas to kill, bleed the corpse, and taking the heart out, and then return to the group.
"No." Stolas honestly replied. He even shook his head slightly while answering. He then asked everyone to look clearer at the organ he was holding.
"The goblin is no different from a mummified corpse by the time I'm there. I noticed that not a single drop of blood was left inside the body. When dissecting the corpse, I noticed that the other organs were in the same condition as this heart." Stolas added.
His explanation puzzled everyone, as this was the first time they had encountered something like this.
"In your opinion, who did this?" Hespar asked the question to everyone. It seems nobody had the slightest clue of what was happening here. At least till now, nothing related to a blood-sucking monster came into their mind.
Furthermore, Hespar was only here for less than a week. It was accepted that he had no idea of the cause behind this.
"I don't think a beast or other monster did this. The dead goblin had a slit on its throat, and the tool was likely a dagger or something with average sharpness." Stolas added. He then took his dagger out and made a cut at the organ to show the others roughly how the slit would look.
All the clues here made Hespar question their own safety. But as Hespar was about to order a retreat, many Mountain Lizards suddenly appeared. The party was surrounded by ten adult lizards without notice.
"We got trapped, boss!" Ashen quickly grabbed a wooden branch nearby and tossed it at the group of a few Mountain Lizards. The action was not meant to be a threat but a distraction.
With a few Mountain Lizards distracted, the group quickly banded together. Stolas, being the archer, was protected in the middle as they circled around him.
"Leader. Let me take the vanguard position. I am confident in my fighting skills." Fulham interrupted as Hespar was about to give out the following order.
Feeling curious about Fulham's ability, Hespar agreed.
"Alright. Fulham, Foster, and I will take the vanguard position. Stolas shall prioritize your attacks on our return direction. Ashen and Quinn will protect Stolas well and only fight if you see the advantages.
"By my mark... Let's go!" the previous two days of experience made Hespar somewhat better at coordinating his party. It allowed him to manage them more efficiently, and the experience also helped Hespar's Aura grow.
Of course, the growth was minuscule to be seen by the naked eyes. Perhaps amongst all of them, only Brent could roughly see Hespar's Aura when it manifested.
The number of Mountain Lizards here would be enough for them to complete the assignment by today. But making this happen comes with a huge risk. The challenge was different in fighting against the lizards compared to goblins.
Generally, going against a group of goblins would be much easier than going against a bunch of Mountain Lizards. This was because the goblins are perceived as a bunch of timid monsters, making them easier to control and expect as long you had advantages over them.
But Mountain Lizard would be more challenging due to their aggressive nature. Their habitual instinct is also harder to follow and different from one another. Furthermore, a reptile hardly chooses to escape when losing and would often fight to its death.
It was said that the same effort in handling a Mountain Lizard can be used to manage five goblins at once. This shows how different was the stress levels when comparing the two.
And with ten Mountain Lizards here, the difficulty is about the same as getting surrounded by fifty goblins. But to Hespar's surprise, Fulham was the first to earn a kill after the vanguards charged outward.
The short spear seems to be Fulham's weapon of choice. Although the word "short" was in the name, that was not the case in how far the attack could reach. When wielded by Fulham, the spear's attacking range is still a tad longer than a regular sword.
Considering Fulham's skill with his spear, he should be someone from an impressive background or somewhat similar to Hespar's. When the spear is in Fulham's control, the weapon seems alive like a slithering python.
It cost Fulham almost no effort as his spear dances around and stabs right into the second Mountain Lizard's jaw, killing it from the inside.
Unfortunately, while Fulham's fighting ability was above what Hespar imagined, his attack was too mutilative. The two Mountain Lizards he killed can hardly be recognized as a complete corpses.
Perhaps, this was why he was considered one of the problematic recruits in the Eleventh Camp. This might be why Fulham rejected Hespar when he suggested the party hunt together two days ago.
Due to his skill's destruction, Fulham can only choose to accept the assignments that require no elegance but pure power.
"Fulham!" Hespar called his name before he managed to get further away from Hespar. The shout caught everyone else's attention, as they were curious about Fulham's soon-to-be fate in this hunt. As a part of the problematic recruits in the Eleventh Camp, everyone here roughly knew what problem one another had.
Suppose they're as good as the other recruits. In that case, they won't need to be reassigned to a new Officer candidate right after Hespar reported for duty.
"Ye, Sir." Fulham stopped on his track and already getting ready to get reprimanded for spoiling their effort in this hunt. He seemed used to it, as this wasn't the first time he was approached similarly. But to his surprise, he misunderstood Hespar this time.
"Try to leave as many complete corpses as you can. We can eat just eat the damaged one, but I'm sure you'll complain sooner or later because they got too much meat on them." Hespar said. His sentence was the first and one of a kind of reply Fulham ever heard in his life.
"Oh... Noted, Sir." Fulham stuttered as he had no idea how to reply. But he secretly smiled as his spear discovered tranquility after listening to what Hespar had to say. He knew that he had more than enough skills to fight one-to-one against a Mountain Lizard, but that's only on his physical ability.
Mentally, all it takes for him to do better is a trusting sentence from his leader and acceptance to gain control over his self-rebellious phase.
Hespar instantly gains the support of a powerful recruit by his side through a few simple words. Fulham might be stuttering in his reply, but the hint of disrespect is no longer there. The others hadn't commented anything but understood the meaning behind Fulham's reply.
The battle ended nearly twenty minutes later. And it was concluded without a need for Hespar's Aura. Although the support from Mortal's Authority would make the hunt smoother, all the benefit they could expect is perhaps shortening the overall time spent and nothing else.
In that case, they might as well save the Mortal's Authority for something unexpected, such as the goblin's attack like before. After all, there's no guarantee that something like that won't happen again.
Due to the fierceness of the battle, only four out of ten corpses were well preserved. The remaining had minor to major damage, making them hardly pass the quality check required by the Processing Division.
But the same quality control wasn't applied if they were treated as culinary ingredients. Despite their damage, the meat from the six Mountain Lizards is still well preserved from being contaminated by the guts and blood.
"Let's call it a day here. We should get back to the camp before it's getting darker." Hespar said. Even though they only have four Mountain Lizards added to the assignment's completion, there's no hint of disappointment on Hespar's face.