Belli Mundi - Chapter 37
After getting their act together again, the squad moved out again. Having marked the mushroom on their map, they were keen to find the next treasure. Therefore they opted to move deeper into the forest.
The thing with a forest that hasn’t been explored for decades, is that there are things more dangerous than a couple of goblins lurking about.
Unknown to the squad, they were being observed from the branches of the trees. Like all new adventurers, they weren’t used to look up when scanning for danger.
Still, the squad kept a tight formation. They had learned from their encounters with the goblins and the boars. Slowly they kept moving forward in the hope that they would uncover another natural treasure.
With Erik on point they had walked for over an hour without finding anything, when suddenly Steve was flung away from the formation. For a moment nobody moved, stunned by the sudden attack. Then their training prevailed and they immediately straightened their formation. Sam, who the closest, was at the back. Now she was the closest fighter to interrupt the dark form that had attached itself to Steve.
The form seemed to flicker in and out, making it pretty hard to make out what kind of creature it was. One thing she did know though, if she didn’t attack it right now then Steve would probably not survive it.
Thus she used the quickest attack she could, by performing a thrust at it. Before her sword could connect though, the attacker moved away. Within a moment it was several meters away facing Sam.
Finally she could get a good look at it. It was some kind of lean feline. Its fur was entirely black, with some spots that were even blacker than black. Sam didn’t understand how that was possible, but those spots didn’t even seem to exist some of the time. That was probably why the creature was so difficult to see.
Without hesitation, and even without sparing a moment to look how bad Steve was hurt, she attacked the cat again. This time it didn’t evade her attack, but took it head on. Unfortunately her sword didn’t seem to do much to it. It just bounced off of its head.
The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Meanwhile the cat used its claws to attack her, which she managed to block with her shield. A split second later the cat was once again several meters back, staring at her.
“Guys, I could use some help over here. Normal weapons seem to be ineffective against it!”
Before she could hear an answer though, the cat attacked again. This time it jumped at her, trying to get over the top of her shield. Luckily she had enough skill with her shield to block this attack as well, but as she did so, the cat attached itself to it. Now she had a large cat hanging off of her shield, while it kept shredding it with its hind claws.
Just then Leophon arrived and tried to chop the cat in two. Once again though, the cat managed to somehow evade the attack. Leophon couldn’t react quick enough, and an enormous force slammed into Sam’s shield. It lifted her into the air, and she flew right over the heads of Steve and Tia while the latter tried to bind Steve’s wounds. Her shredded shield had fallen apart after the blow, and one of the pieces managed to hit Tia on her head.
Dazed as she was, Sam took a moment to get up again. The moment she did, she saw that it took all of the other five fighters to keep the cat from injuring them. Only when Xanthe and Virgil started to lob spells at it did the cat show any signs of damage.
After several spells connected to the cat, it suddenly stopped attacking and retreated into the trees. When it did, the fighters circled the others, while the mages and archers used their own senses to look for it and other dangers. Tia meanwhile had bound Steve’s wounds, but he would need healing from a real healer if he wanted to get away without large scars.
Before they left though, both Tia and Sam had some choice words for Leophon. The oaf hadn’t listened to Sam yelling that the cat appeared immune to mundane weapons and assumed that she was just weak. Thus he opted to attack it with everything he had, resulting in him hitting Sam and Tia both. Neither of them appreciated that, and thus after a lot of swearing and glaring, Leophon had to carry both of their packs on the way back.
With Steve on a stretcher carried by Zach and Jasper, the squad started their way back out of the forest. Leophon started by complaining about the weight of three packs, but when no one showed any signs of mercy, he shrugged and took out a dimensional ring and made all three of the packs disappear.
“Wait, you’ve had that thing all this time?” Jasper shouted at him.
“Well yeah, I didn’t want to carry all the heavy stuff they gave us.”
“And you didn’t tell us because?”
“I kinda thought it was part of the training, and I’m strong enough to not need that.”
Jasper looked like he was about to explode, but then Tia interrupted.
“So you just had us carry all the heavy shit even while we were moving through the forest or being attacked by goblins. Wait, you could’ve used it to carry extra arrows and shit while we were on our dungeon runs. You’re an ass! Now stuff all our supplies in it, so we can move quicker. We need to get Steve to the healers!