Knowing that I needed to get a move on, I located the tracks and followed them along the edge of the stream, taking only a moment to eat a few pieces of jerky and drink from my waterskin. As I followed the tracks, I did my best to maintain a moderate pace, while also trying to rely on all my senses to help pinpoint any danger I was walking towards.

As I went, boots crunching in the snow, the light around me began to quickly fade. What light was left in the sky was quickly swallowed up by the approaching storm cover. Even as the darkness grew, my vision never waned, the world slowly moving from a full spectrum of color to grayscale due to my darkvision.

Several notifications started to pop up in the side of my vision as I continued to follow the tracks, the notification icons indicating that I was leveling up in certain skills. Not wanting to waste any more time, I asked Pat to move all skill notifications to a subfolder moving forward so that they could be reviewed later. As I leveled up in yet another skill, I received a quick alert, and the icon immediately moved into the new folder, with the icon showing me how many notifications I had to review.

After hiking about a mile along the stream, the tracks suddenly veered off to the northeast. The animals seemed to have gone off in a hurry, with the snow being kicked up and their tracks being more spaced out after they changed direction. Now I had to make a decision. Do I continue to follow the stream, or do I continue to follow the tracks?

Either option came with its own cons. By following the tracks, I would be taking an indirect course through rougher terrain, making it increasingly likely that I would get caught out in the storm before finding shelter. Moving eastward also increased the chance that I would walk past a cave or mine before I reached the forest's edge. On the other hand, I was fairly confident that these animals would be a threat if they found me. Would it be better to seek them out and fight them on my own terms or hope they didn’t sneak up on me while I slept?

Ultimately I decided to continue to follow the tracks. For all I knew, these animals might be leading me to a form of shelter, and if not, I just couldn’t shake the feeling that they would end up finding me at exactly the wrong moment. I continued to follow the tracks as fast as I could walk on the more uneven ground without lowering my stamina or risking a fall.

About 400 feet from the stream, I suddenly came across another set of tracks. As I looked them over, my breath caught in my throat. The tracks were man made, clearly boot imprints, but they were small, around a size 6 or 7 men’s shoe. The right size for a kid. I felt a cold sweat form on the back of my neck as an image from that morning came back to me. The dwarven woman with fire red hair, tears running down her face. As soon as the memory came to my mind, a new notification appeared in the center of my vision.

Chain Quest: Lost Child

Quest #1: The Starving Beasts

Difficulty: Hard

Quest Details:

You have discovered the tracks that you believe belong to the child of the widower Kathra Baldurk. Whomever these tracks belong to, they are clearly being followed by a pair of hungry predators. Will you follow the tracks?

Quest Objectives

* Kill the predators: 0/2

* Rescue the child: 0/1

Quest Rewards

* Improve reputation with Child by 2000

* Quest #2 Unlocks

Quest Failure

* Lose reputation with citizens of Jadestone if failure is discovered

Accept Quest

Yes/No

Without wasting a single second, I accepted the quest and took off at a run, going as fast as I could without risking losing my balance. As I went, I could tell that the kids' tracks had doubled back on each other. He must have been on his way back towards Jadestone when the animals came after him, forcing him to turn and run back the way he came. What was most interesting, the boy wasn’t running in a straight line, even as he ran away from his pursuers. He knew better than to try and run through the larger drifts and seemed to have a knack for finding footfalls where most of the snow had been blown away, while the predators chasing after him simply barreled ahead in a straight line.

Eventually, I came across a thicket of low hanging pines, much too dense for me to go through. The boy seemed to have slid and crawled underneath the low branches, while the canines were forced to go around. Taking the time to run the several dozen feet around the edge of the stand of pines, I finally started to pick up the sound of light barking.

Picking up the pace, at the expense of my stamina, I ran as fast as I could over the snow, hoping beyond hope that I wouldn’t be too late. As the barking grew louder, I came into a clearing about 100 feet in diameter. On the other edge of the clearing in a large fir was a boy wrapped in a small bundle of furs. He was sitting on the lowest branch of the tree about eight feet off the ground. Underneath him was a white wolf, barking and jumping up towards the boy, jaws snapping a mere foot away from his legs.

Knowing my approach would be completely exposed, and not trusting that the wolf couldn’t reach the boy, I continued to run across the clearing. As I ran, my mental combat log started, first identifying the wolf.

Starving Wolf - LVL 4

This male wolf has been chased off from its pack and has begun to starve. Due to the wolf's condition, it will go to extreme lengths to feed itself, attacking creatures most wolves would avoid.

You have Identified additional information about this animal!

Strength:

* A starving wolf will go into an adrenaline fueled frenzy when it tastes blood.

* After biting a creature, if the wolf's bite causes a bleeding status, it will latch onto the creature with an enhanced bite strength and start to thrash about, attempting to worsen the bleed effect.

Weakness:

* Unable to identify

Before the combat log could finish reading through all the information for me, I quickly realized that I had made a mistake. In my haste, seeing the wolf jumping up at the child, I had forgotten that I had been tracking multiple wolves, not just one. When I was less than 30 feet from the wolf, I just managed to make out the sound of something bounding through the snow, before red hot pain shot up through my right calf. As my momentum carried me forward, I lost my footing, falling to the ground, my right leg grasped in the jaws of the second wolf that had come around from behind me.

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Starving Wolf bites you. Bite Fails to penetrate Hide Armor. You take 21 crushing damage.

While the wolf had done a serious chunk of damage with its bite, it luckily hadn’t been enough to penetrate through my hide armor, saving me from a bleed effect. Unfortunately, I was now splayed out on the ground, stuck between two hungry predators.

Swinging around onto my back, I struck down towards the face of the wolf with the butt of my spear, striking it in its eye. The wolf let out a yelp of pain as it let go of my leg, jumping back away from me. I had just enough time to get to my knees as the other wolf lunged towards me. Acting on instinct, I brought my spear up, managing to catch its bite on the wood of the spear's haft.

“Kid you gotta run! Get somewhere safe!” I yelled out as the wolf tried to pry the spear from my hands. I weakly kicked out with one of my legs, trying to keep the other wolf at bay, but it was fruitless effort. The emaciated beast dodged my foot with ease, quickly recovering and managing to lunge back my way before I could pull my leg back.

Starving Wolf bites you. You take 23 crushing/piercing damage. You are bleeding (minor). You will lose 3 HP every 5 seconds for 30 seconds.

As soon as the combat log declared that I was bleeding, I could feel the force of the wolf’s bite increase in power as I was pulled back down onto my stomach. Down to about 80% of my total health, I was in danger of being overwhelmed unless I could start to turn the tides of the fight. With my weapon pinned on one end, and a wolf latched onto my leg, I was at a loss for what to do.

If I released my weapon to try and pry open the wolf’s jaws, I’d have nothing effective left to fight with and the other wolf would likely bite and latch onto another limb. If I continued to try and pull my spear free, the other wolf would begin to thrash, gradually worsening my bleed debuff. Almost on cue, I felt it begin to wrench my leg about in its jaws, sending fresh agony through my calf as he and his partner tried to stretch me out between themselves.

Starving Wolf thrashes you about, causing 14 points of crushing/piercing damage. Debuff Bleed (minor) has worsened. You will lose 6 HP every 5 seconds for 30 seconds.

I yelled out in pain as the wolf worked my leg back and forth, like a dog playing tug of war. Not seeing any other option, I tried to push the pain of my leg from my mind as I pulled against my spear as hard as I could. Having far more mass and strength than the emaciated wolf, I managed to pull it from its feet, its body falling in front of my face. Abandoning my spear, I managed to grab the wolf by the loose scruff of its neck, dragging it towards me. Gaining some momentum, I threw my body on top of the wolf before its partner could pull me away.

Rapping my arm around its neck, I squeezed with all my strength, letting out a roar full of both pain and effort. My combat log quickly let me know that I had successfully frightened the wolf, applying fear. While it fought back against my grasp, the weight of my body combined with its lowered attack speed from the fear debuff allowed me to maintain the hold I had on its neck while keeping its legs pinned. Unfortunately, while I tried to strangle the life from one wolf, the other continued to savage my leg.

Starving Wolf thrashes you about, causing 12 points of crushing/piercing damage. Debuff Bleed (minor) has worsened. You will lose 9 HP every 5 seconds for 30 seconds.

Starving Wolf thrashes you about, causing 13 points of crushing/piercing damage. Debuff Bleed (moderate) has worsened. You will lose 2 HP every second for 60 seconds.

I started to feel the wolf in my grasp begin to weaken, as its brain became starved for oxygen. Even as its strength dwindled, I knew it would take too long to completely pass out. If something didn’t change, I likely wouldn’t be left with enough time to turn and kill the wolf latched onto my leg before I succumbed to blood loss.

At the moment when I was about ready to abandon my hold on the wolf in a last ditch effort to free my leg, I heard the sound of crunching snow quickly approaching. In the corner of my eye, I could make out the boy scurrying towards me, a long knife held in his outstretched arms. With a surge of energy, I rolled over onto my back, pulling the oxygen starved wolf with me. As its fear debuff wore off, it began to fight back with a bit more spirit, trying to twist its body out of my grasp. Swinging my free leg around, I managed to hook its hind legs, stretching out its belly.

Seeing his opening, the boy threw himself at the wolf, plunging his dagger into its soft underbelly, ripping the blade up towards its rib cage. I held onto the wolf for a few extra seconds, feeling the life drain from its body as its hot guts spilled out into steaming piles. Rolling the dead wolf's corpse off of me, I managed to pull my spear out from underneath me as the final wolf continued to savage my leg.

My bleed debuff had worsened, now causing me to lose 3 HP every second for 120 seconds and my HP had dropped to just below 30%. Getting up into a sitting position, I brought the end of my spear down, driving the iron tip directly into the beast's eye socket.

You hit Starving Wolf with Iron Spear for 12 points on damage. You destroy the creature's eye. You have partially blinded the creature. Creature is Bleeding (moderate). Creature is losing 1 HP per second for 30 seconds.

With the sickening sound of metal grating against bone, I yanked the spear free, the wolf still unwilling to release my leg. As blood slowly trickled from my wound, depleting my health pool, I felt a sudden surge of power washing over me. Letting out a roar of rage, I drove my spear forward with all my might. The iron spearhead shattered what remained of the wolf's orbital bone, and plunged deep into its brain.

Your health has fallen below 25%. Weapon damage now increased by 20%.

You hit Starving Wolf with ‘Power Attack’ for 17 piercing damage. You critically strike a vital organ (brain) for 42 points of critical damage. Starving Wolf is brain dead. Starving Wolf is Bleeding (Serious). Starving Wolf will lose 10 HP per second for 120 seconds.

With the death of the wolf, I felt the focus of battle leave me. Feeling my strength start to wane, I fell back to the ground, leaving my spear buried in the head of the wolf. The beast’s jaws remained latched to my ruined calf, and I didn’t have the time to try and remove them. I was still losing 3 HP every second due to the bleed debuff the wolf had inflicted on me and my HP total had just dropped below 50. If I didn’t act fast, I would die, and there wouldn’t be any respawn for me.

Acting on familiar instinct, I clumsily worked at untying the rope belt at my waist. Familiar pain shot up and down my entire leg as I ripped the rope free from my armor, stripping my tools from it, and started to wrap it around my upper thigh, hoping that the game's realism would extend to emergency first aid. Tying the rope as tightly as I could, I inserted the handle of my hatchet just under the rope, twisting the handle to torque the rope even tighter.

In a brief fit of panic, I looked around for the kid, hoping that he didn’t run off into the forest. As I looked behind me, I found the fir tree that the boy had sheltered in was gone, along with the rest of the trees. It had been replaced by a snow covered field full of short, dried corn stalks standing at attention above the snow. Turning back, I saw that I was now laying at the bottom of a deep ditch, looking up at a ruined guard rail, red and blue lights illuminating the snow as it fell.

As I pulled at the leather belt on my thigh, I couldn’t help but look at my ruined leg. My foot laid flat on the ground pointing towards my left, while my knee lay pointing towards my right. A sickening shock of white bone penetrated through a tear in my jeans that was quickly growing redder as the seconds passed. I cried out in pain as I cinched the belt tighter, doing my best to stem the flow of blood.

Barely able to maintain consciousness, I let my head fall back into the soft pillow of snow, welcoming its cool touch. There was noise, so much noise. Boots running around, sirens blaring, orders being given. Laura’s scream pierced through it all. Not a cry of pain, but one of grief and hopelessness, calling out my mothers name over and over and over. As my eyes filled with tears, I could see someone looking down over the guardrail towards me, calling out to me, before everything went black.