It took us hours to reach the forest, and several more to reach the area which Mabel was planning to hunt in. Enough time to get talking, especially with Mabel around, who happily asked this and that question about me and my magic and past. Naturally, I happily answered all of her questions - those that I could without telling her too much. I didn’t tell her about my real past, or about how I could talk to Cilia, but there still was enough to my story to keep us busy for the meantime, especially with my newest magic skill still fresh in her mind.

Mabel herself was the daughter of a couple of mercenaries that had their home in Siltar, the town I too called home now. She grew up in the town and spent her whole childhood thinking of joining her parents on their adventurers, so she just did. When her parents were off protecting merchants that traveled throughout the country, Mabel took the chance and talked Ofris into teaching her to become a mercenary herself. Her parents of course did not approve of this at first, but they could do little when it was already a done deal.

Currently, Mabel’s main tasks were collecting materials for local merchants and artisans. For this she often hunted local wildlife for their fur, horns and claws, or whatever else there was to be gained from their corpses.

Mabel made sure to tell me she didn’t throw punches over her own weight class and would never hunt goblins, orcs or pridestalkers. Latter of which were large, flightless birds that hunted everything slower and smaller than them, which included children, making them a favorite monster for macabre fairy tales told to children.

The dinosaur-like creature and armored hippo I could tell her about were far above what she or even Ofris could reliably handle. It was only sheer luck that we had survived attacks. But according to Mabel, we had really, really bad luck even encountering such animals, as they were exceedingly rare to begin with. That didn’t change the fact that cold shivers ran down my back even thinking of the creatures.

Our hour-long conversation finally stopped when we reached a large clearing in the middle of the forest. It was as big as several soccer fields and had nothing but a lush meadow with colorful flowers and some scarce big rocks waiting for us.

I felt tranquil just looking at it.

“Glad you like it!” Mabel commented on my facial expression.

“It is beautiful! But what are we going to do here?”

When I looked around I found nothing, neither rabbits nor wolves, not even a ruin or cave of some sort. We were in the midst of the Forest with only birds revealing their presence.

“We will be waiting. The boars will only be active in the evening.”

“So we will be hunting boars?”

“They are easy to hunt, once you know what you got to do.”

“But you don’t look like an archer to me.”

“Why would I need to be an archer?”

It was only now that she explained to me her plan. Apparently there was a fruit called Prinja that was so perfect to lure a certain species of boar that it even got named after it. Prinja-Boars would go out of their way to search for fruits and fight anything standing between them and their fruits. And Mabel had brought a bunch of it. To show me she pulled out a fruit that looked like a fluffy, pink-redish pear slightly larger than a normal one. It looked inedible at first, but Mabel obviously knew better. She selected a random rock on the meadow, walked up to it and started rubbing the fruit all over the rock, turning it pink from all the juice and fruit flesh.

“That should keep them coming,” she explained.

“I see…”

“How about we put up the tent now and prepare our dinner?”

The thought of an early dinner immediately lifted up my mood and made me forget my exhaustion.

“Itembox!” I said, thinking of the tent I had put in.

A red and white package appeared in my hand. It looked similar to the tent I had put in, but that one had been a muddy brown, it didn’t have such vivid colors.

“I think I messed up,” I said, already unfolding the package.

“What do you mean?”

Mabel didn’t need to ask twice. She noticed the package was a tent, her tent, and hurriedly helped me build it up. When we finished this task, we both felt like little children, as the tent now came with two large fox ears on its top.

“That’s my tent?” She couldn’t help but ask.

“I am sorry. I didn’t know it had such an effect.”

I absentmindedly walked over to a large rock and pushed it into my Itembox. The fox-shaped portal swallowed the rock easily, despite it being bigger than myself. When I released it once again, I had a perfect statue of a sitting fox.

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“That’s quite something you made there.”

“I- why would it do that?”

My answer came immediately:「Everyone needs more foxes in their lives!」

I couldn’t help but laugh. That was so much like Cilia.

“I think you deserve this one.”

I sat down in front of the statue and prayed for the first time in a long while. Cilia just listened to my honest words of thanks, not saying a single word. But I could almost feel her thanking me.

Satisfied I raised up and turned towards the other stones.

“Might as well…”

It took me about a quarter of an hour to finish my little project. When I did, I had turned every single rock larger than my head into a fox statue, a few dozen in total. They were everywhere, some alone, others I had placed in groups like a family. The smaller ones certainly did look like family material, as chubby and cute as they were, the bigger ones looked far more realistic, however. Given a good paint job, nobody would be able to tell them from the real deal from afar. I was elated. It was only when Mabel tipped me on my shoulder that I realized I had played around too much.

“Oh, right, Dinner!”

“You looked like you had fun, with your tail wagging like a dogs.”

“My tail wasn’t wagging!”

It was. It still was waving from one side to the other to this moment.

“Fine. It isn’t wagging. And you aren’t cute.”

“Ye- yes…”

A squeal suddenly echoed through the forest. Within a heartbeat, Mabel was already standing at my side, a sword in one hand and the other in front of my face. She was trying to push me behind her back.

“Stay behind me!”

“What is that?!”

“It is the Prinja-Boars!”

“Boars?!”

“They must have smelled the Prinja!”

“The Prinja? Just how good is their nose?!”

Mabel didn't waste any time on answering me. The hand that was still waving in front of my face a second ago now pushed me behind her slender, armored body. I could barely see a thing.

“Stay behind me! They are here!”

Just as she had said it, a number of creatures rushed out of the forest and onto the meadow. They were smaller than me by a few heads but each of their brownish-black bodies was packed with muscles and fat. The boars had black hair covering their backs all the way down to their tails, and large tusks growing out of their maws.

When the boars began to attack, I couldn't even react to them. Their fast and ruthless charges alone would have been enough to leave me petrified, I was, however, far more astonished by the movements Mabel showed me. She wasn't exactly the most seasoned fighter, given she was as old as me, but she still moved at least twice as fast as any of those boars. Whenever the boars charged at her, they did so in a straight line and tusks first, leaving ample room for Mabel to strike at their necks whenever they passed her. Even when two of them ran at her at the same time, she still found a spot to dodge to and retaliate.

With her swift and relentless attacks, it was only a matter of time before the first boar dropped to the ground. It was still breathing, but it was only a matter of time before its heart would stop.

The other boars weren’t better off. Mabel struck at them, again and again, leaving them barely any chance to strike back. And when they did, she still didn’t get hit. It was like watching a dancer performance, only spiced up by sword and blood.

“She really is strong.”

The monsters seemed to realize that they wouldn't be able to defeat Mabel this way. Commanded by a squeal released by one of the larger ones they surrounded her, all but two who instinctively had searched and found a much easier target.

“Stay away!” I shouted at them.

Just when Mabel spun around to fend off the two boars trying to get ahold of me, the remaining ones attacked all at once. I could only watch her trying her utmost in defending both of us at once. This time, she could not dodge without risking the attacks to reach me, so she tried blocking them with her sword instead, which left her wide open.

It was only a matter of time before Mabel lost her sword and the attacks reached her armor, her clothes, and even her flesh. A pained scream rang in my ears, one that didn't stem from any of the boars. 

“Damn it!” I heard myself curse. “Foxfire! Foxfire! Foxfire!!”

Balls of fire began forming around me. There were nine or ten of them, several for each of the four remaining boars. The fireballs began spinning, faster and ever faster, before they shot out in all directions.

A series of pained squeals soon ringed in my ears. The boars were panicking, then screeching in pain, before they panicked even more. Within the time it took to take a breath the boars were already running around chaotically, desperately trying to extinguish the fires that were slowly burning away their precious fur.

Mabel didn't even need to worry about attacks anymore as all of the boars’ attention was focused on saving themselves. She picked up her sword again, took a few deep breaths and waited for her chance to then strike with a viciousness I hadn’t expected of her. Her sword found eyes, necks and even a heart, latter of which immediately killed that boar. Mabel’s opponents didn't even get the chance to realize they still had to fight until it had been too late.

Just as the sounds of death resonated throughout the forest as a faint heat began to spread through my body. Almost every time Mabel swung her sword it connected with flesh and as it did so, the heat grew even more intense, until eventually I was barely able to feel anything else. Several green screens appeared in front of me, toppling over each other as if they were fighting over my attention.

『Level Up! Level 20!

+7 Vitality

+4 Strength

+8 Spirit

+6 Intelligence

+5 Dexterity』

I couldn’t care less. Mabel was hurt. She was hurt because of me!

“Orb of Lia!” I cried out before dashing in. Within a second I had already embraced Mabel. I licked her, over and over again, each lick applying a small healing effect. Soon enough her laughs chimed in my ears.

“I’m fine! I’m fine!”