Velik recoiled from the woman. “You are mistaken,” he said harshly. “Return to your homes before another monster finds you.”

“No, Velik, please!”

He turned away from her and pulled the hood of his [Hunter’s Cowl] lower. “I told you, that’s not me.”

“Of course it is. How stupid do you think I am? Please, just let me explain.”

There was nothing to explain. He’d shown up in town, seven years old, clothes in tatters, shoes long since lost, and the adults had seen [Duskbound]. They’d already weathered three assaults and were eager to blame someone. His own family had died on the second night, well before Velik had returned. There was nobody left to speak up for him, nobody except Sildra’s family. He’d thought for sure that they’d listen, even if no one else had.

Even back then, [Duskbound] had given him exceptional night vision. He could clearly remember seeing her crying face in the window when her parents had closed the door on him. What could she have done? She was a child, barely a few years older than me. It wasn’t her fault.

“There’s nothing to explain,” he said gruffly. Glancing down at the man, someone Velik didn’t recognize, he gritted his teeth in annoyance and reached into his supply pouch for one of his few healing potions. They were a thousand decarmas each at the system store, but without it, there was no way the man was going to walk back to town under his own power. With a grimace, he tossed the glass vial to Sildra. “Give him this.”

And then he was gone, employing all his considerable speed to reach the trees before his childhood friend could reopen any more old wounds. Once he was out of sight, he slowed down and took a deep breath. He hadn’t seen Sildra in a decade, hadn’t expected to ever see her again. Stop freaking out, idiot. You're fifteen miles from getting these people to safety and there’s still three hours until the sun comes up.

He stood on a thick tree branch thirty feet off the ground and watched Sildra uncork the vial to the healing potion he’d left behind. Hesitantly, she grabbed the man’s head and tilted it back while she poured a trickle of liquid down his throat. The man coughed and jerked upright, grabbing at Sildra’s wrist while she flinched back and spilled half the potion all over the ground.

“Oh, no!” she yelped. “Hold still!”

“Come on, those things are expensive,” Velik muttered. He glanced around, spotted a ring-tailed giant ferret sniffing the air a few trees back. Probably smelling human blood for the first time. He’d figured out a long time ago that they had freakishly powerful senses of smell, so strong that he’d baited an entire infestation of them in three years ago, wiping out two hundred of the nasty little beasts in one night.

He jumped between trees, nothing but a whisper in the night, until the ferret was right below him. Six feet long. That’s almost a record. His spear slithered down into his hand, tip poised, and he dropped out of the tree onto the monster, pinning it to the ground. It spasmed in pain and let out a squeal before dying.

[You have a slain ring-tailed giant ferret (level 12).]

“What was that?” the man yelled, making far more noise than necessary and probably attracting the attention of something else that Velik would now need to kill.

On the other hand, maybe I can just follow him around all night and ambush everything he draws in. That might be even more efficient than my normal route.

The man eventually managed to regain his feet. After a bit of searching around, he picked up a sword from where it was hidden in the knee-high grass, then peered around. “This has been significantly more dangerous than expected. An elite appearing like that… I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you, but we should turn back before our luck runs out.”

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“But I didn’t get enough [Moonsilk Blossoms],” Sildra argued. Her eyes slid over to the corpse of the giant bat, its face split open and the side of the hill stained black in the moonlight. “Maybe you’re right.”

“The Black Fang watches over us,” the man said, almost reverently, causing Velik to pause in his tracks a few hundred feet away. “But it’s best not to tempt fate.”

“You’re probably right. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find a few on our way back.”

“I wouldn’t recommend going out of your way looking for them. I’m not at full strength and even the normal monsters are starting to become challenging to defeat. If we were to encounter even a small group in our condition, we’d be in trouble. We can’t rely on the Black Fang’s generosity all night.”

“Very well, but don’t mention him when we get back to Deshir,” Sildra cautioned her companion.

“Why not?”

“He’s not well loved there, Gorm.”

“But—”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Gorm studied her for a moment in the dark, then nodded. “Very well. If it’s a sensitive topic, we’ll leave it alone. I think I’m ready to move now.”

* * *

In the morning light, the forest looked far more peaceful. The worst of the monsters had slunk back to their burrows and dens, and the half of a healing potion Gorm had gotten down had done its work. Velik was confident that Sildra’s bodyguard could keep her safe without assistance now, and he needed a few hours of sleep for himself.

He moved through the trees, not nearly as swiftly as he’d been going a few hours ago, but still far faster than anyone else in the area could have. Old, familiar trails guided him home, such as it was. Within an hour, Velik was standing on the bank of a small, clear stream, stripping down to clean himself and his clothes.

The bloodstains weren’t coming out, but that was nothing new. All of his clothes were monster-blood black now and had been for years. The only exception was his sturdy system-crafted boots, enchanted with [Mending] to keep them whole and clean. Everything else was dunked in the water and vigorously scrubbed more to get the stink out than from any real hope of returning the outfit to its original color.

After he was done, and still wearing his spear as a band that looped around his arm several times, Velik jumped into the stream himself. A quick dip was more than enough—even with his high physical stat, the water was shockingly cold. Then he scurried back to his home, a low-ceilinged hole in the ground formed when a summer squall had partially ripped up a tree a few years ago.

Velik had discovered the place, enlarged the hole underneath, and fortified it with planks of what could only generously be described as rough-hewn wood. There was no skill in their crafting, just a tremendous amount of system-granted strength and coordination keeping his cuts straight. The doorway itself needed to be lifted out of its groove and slid to one side to gain entry, no easy feat considering it weighed a quarter ton.

It wouldn’t stop a monster from ripping its way in, but it did prevent casual exploration from monster and animal both, and when he was inside trying to sleep, it would give him enough of a warning to prepare for a fight if something did scent him inside and attacked. That was all Velik could ask for, and it was a far sight more security than anyone else sleeping in the forest could claim.

Lot of people out in the woods lately, he thought while slipping inside and setting his door back into place. I suppose I’m not the only one who noticed how thick the monsters are getting. Something’s got to give soon. Hopefully winter will slow them down in a few months.

A decade of killing monsters had done nothing to slow the rising tide, but Velik was older, smarter, and stronger now. It had been three years since his last expedition into the deep forest to hunt for the source of the monsters, but he was planning another one now. He just needed the influx to die down, preferably after he reached level 30 and merged [Stealth] into [Predator’s Visage]. That would give him two open skill slots, and he was looking at a few options to give him both range and burst damage to help deal with the next elite monster he ran into.

A few thousand more decarmas wouldn’t hurt anything either. His funds were extremely low right now and they didn’t reliably appear when he killed a monster. But at the rate he was going, he expected to be ready to go hunting again soon. It was just a question of when.

This time, he was determined to find the source. It was out there, somewhere, that thing he’d accidentally unleashed as a child, the father of all monsters. It had taken everything from him, and Velik meant to return the favor.

Soon.