'Dig deeper, deeper and faster. '
That's what I tell myself again and again as I make way below the ground. Wasting my mana on creating footholds on the surface wasn't going to get me anywhere, so I took the first chance that I saw to use my mana to move the earth. Instead of creating a foothold, I took a big chunk of soil as my target and made it part ways, letting me fall inside and closing it behind me.
Once the way in was sealed, I gathered mana again and again to keep repeating the process as fast and efficiently as I could, leaving the place after taking a random direction. I only make sure to not take the one towards the center or the way back, to avoid being too obvious.
Even while I use my qi outside my body to gather more mana, I coat all my skin on it, that way avoiding showing up on any mana scans. Once that is done, they will only be able to track me by the shifts on the ground or the decrease in mana that I create along my path as I absorb it.
'As long as they aren't able to manipulate qi and sense mine moving I should be fine.'
I dig deeper and further away from the place. A minute passes, then the second one, and the third… I just keep pouring all my efforts to get as far as I can, hoping that their search will scatter the wave of monsters enough for me to escape once I leave the soil.
*uff-*
Sweat drips from every pore of my body after being subjected to the strain for such a long time. The worst part though, it's the lack of air. I knew I would be able to maintain it for a longer time now that I am superhuman, but as the three minute part approaches I start to run out of oxygen and feel sleepy.
*argh* *crackle*
I make my way out, but fall unconscious halfway there. Fortunately, Bruma reacts fast enough to wake me up with a quick discharge of her lighting, helping me get back to moving dirt and escape our underground tunnel with a final push.
*thud*
I fall on the ground, close to passing out. I do feel a tug on my shoulder as I am dragged away while I grasp for air, but I am unable to react, too focused on breathing some air in. The wet and rocky floor of the forest doesn't bother me at all as I am pulled, and even the foliage brushing against my face is nowhere as disgusting as my blocked respiratory tract.
*Cough* *Cough*
After some coughing, I finally clear my system of the dirt that I breathed in and started looking around, examining my surroundings.
I am inside a thick bush of some kind that helps me stay camouflaged. Bruma's on my chest, keeping watch in every direction to the best of her possibilities. 'She must have held her breath the moment I warned her about my plans."
Thanking the small animal through a newly established link, I scan the landscape around us with my eyes, looking for threats, but there are none, at least at first sight.
I take a few seconds to calm myself from my near death experience, and only then do I get back up after rolling out of the bush. Realizing that I've been here for a minute already and there are still no signs of the monsters around I quickly search for the hole that I popped out of.
Once I find it, I identify which way I should take to leave the area and make my way out before anything else shows up to kill me. I wasn't really planning on going back so early, but I am sure that the information I've got will make it worth it.
My first thought about this whole thing was that I could take advantage of it to make a profit and get more information out of people, but I now have no doubts that I should take the side of the mercenaries to get rid of this problem.
My priority right now should be to get back safely though, once I am out of danger I will see what I can do, rushing inside like I just did isn't the best way, that's for sure.
I run for hours, but it doesn't seem as if I am getting any closer to the edge of the forest, in fact, the canopy of trees is getting thicker instead of scarcer. A clear sign that I either choose the wrong path or that I am lost.
The possibility of me taking the wrong direction is nearly impossible from my perspective as I was and still am sure of the direction that I took being the right one, even if I can find my current spot in the map.
This whole thing smells fishy. It all went from a swarm of monsters of all kinds rushing at me from all sides, to nothing… Quiet, peace, there are no noises at all around me, only those that I create when moving. I am sure I would be able to hear my heart beat if I stopped to hear it.
'Just way too calm for a forest.'
No songs being sung by birds, no rustling of leaves, or even the creaking of the trees. For a while I contemplate the chance that I had fallen on an illusion of some kind and ask Bruma for another short discharge.
Obviously, it doesn't work. It's not like I wouldn't feel her lighting the same way that I feel the sounds that I make, but I needed to try.
Seeing that qi was the best counter I could find against mana, I thought that I would be fine against most types of illusion or mental attacks that branched from a magical source, but I guess I was wrong. Whoever made this complex thing that trapped me must be a very good mage. The influence that's keeping me from leaving is so subtle that I can't even find it now, even after knowing that it exists.
There are no clues around, so after walking for a long while trying to find a crack in the spell, I sit down to rest. Starting up a fire, I find some small game too to eat, not wanting to eat the rations that I pack, just in case.
Using an obnoxious amount of mana for the trick, I create a small spark of fire that helps me start a fire and cook my prey, a small rabbit of a greenish fur that helped it mimetize with the environment, and something similar to a squirrel with canines sticking out of its mouth.
'What are you? A vampire?' I look at the squirrel as I skin both of the bodies to eat.
A few minutes after, I have already finished the squirrel and ate enough of the rabbit to feel fulfilled, stocking the rest of it on a couple of giant leaves that I securedFew and tying them up with some small and flexible roots.
I take a leak, do some experiments around my fire and then walk in circles.
'Nothing.'
There's no sign of monsters, humans or anything at all, but I have devised a strategy to get out of here. The same way that I used qi to detect the lifeforced of the rabbit and the squirrel with qi, I should be able to do the same with the trees if I focus hard enough. In theory, I could even feel the lifeforce of the grass on the soil I really, really, really tried, but that would require a lot more control and dexterity over qi that I currently have.
Taking the long yet for now secure approach of trying to pinpoint each and every tree around me with qi to help me leave, I start the process with one single tree. I start by filling my entire body with qi, cycling it again and again before expanding it and sending it outwards, looking for anything that it touches with a speck of lifeforce.
Hours go by, and the sun goes down when a huge, unparallel wave of mana comes from nearly all sides. It washes over me as I protect myself with qi. It courses through everything around me and for a moment I can even see the real outline of the real trees and soil in the surroundings, which I take note of.
All of the mana is benign gathered by someone, or something, somewhere deep inside the thick forest that I am still trapped in.
I wait for a while, feeling on end as I ready myself to start fleeing at any time, more or less expecting another attack from the monsters. But it never comes, it all goes back to normal.
'Still no movement around… Am I being paranoid or am I being watched?'
With no one to answer my question but myself, I eat the rest of the rabbit and then go back to work with renewed hopes to leave this place.
Somewhere inside the forest
Leheron was Gallard's first knight. He was and had always been his second in command and right hand. Far from a slave to his master, he was one of the few ones that chose to follow him in life, even if later on he died serving him, and Gallards called upon him once more back from the dead.
He had always been the person in charge of things when his master was away, and now that he was keeping an eye on that human while keeping any strong individuals far from here, he had yet again been entrusted with a mission.
His role on the following days was to trap the human his master had his sight on and let him surpass his limits, facing death threatening situations and deadly traps one day after another. That part was easy enough, the whole forest was plagued with traps on its own and the army of his master. However, he was commanded to gather mana in preparation to wake up the other two knights of his liege, and he was just doing that just now.
With all the manna he had gathered till now, he set up an array to siphon even more. There were no strong humans close by either way to notice it anyway, so he might as well hasten the pace.
Once again this week, powerful waves of mana ripple through the forest after years of calmness. All the manna is concentrated on a single target, the undead in the center of the circle.
Leheron absorbed everything he could before the formation broke and scattered. Leaving him thirsty for more, but that could wait.
Filled with mana like never before, he used it all on the spell his master had taught him before leaving, searching for the remains of the sealed body of his partner Liria, the second knight of his master.