Ker awoke to something rather unamusing. A loud deep roar, the tree shaking, his newfound home in peril. As he looked down, he saw how deep in peril his place was. A bear of significant size began climbing his tree.

Kee knew if the bear was here for him, just the tree or something entirely else. However, he knew very much that that bear could end him without a second thought. A stark reminder that his journey just began.

As he watched warily the hulking beast climbing up, the beast turned its head up and looked im straight in the eyes.

Ker froze. There was nothing he could ever do against such a primal creature.

The difference in raw power and ferocity was worlds apart.

But he could make certain that he survived. Ker broke free from his drozen state to immediately climb down on the other side of the tree. With every step, with every halt closer, he hoped the bear would just ignore him.

Knowing his luck, he prepared to jump. Just in case.

This case never happened. The bear completely ignored him. Ker felt relieved, the pressure of the survival situation lifted.

Of course, he still was on guard. The bears must have a reason for climbing exactly this tree. No animal and no beast does anything in the wilds just because it wants to.

So Ker distanced himself to a good vantage point to observe.

The bear didn't stop until reaching the top of the tree. It wasn't interested in his 'place'. Ker saw what the bear was interested in, and he really didn't like what he saw.

There was movement up in the tree. The bear tried to reach something - a structure, which was hanging down from a branch. The creatures moved out the structure and flew towards the bear.

Ker could hardly believe his eyes. Even from this distance, he saw wasps. He used his thump to estimate their size. They looked just above the size of one of his fingers. But this meant these wasps were as big as his head.

Ker silently and quickly picked up his spear to move as far away from here as possible. He would not return to this place. It was not his home any longer.

He found himself wondering what to do next. Leveling was one possibility, consuming more beasts for EP a next on his list. Overall, growing stronger was an agenda main point. He needed to learn how to survive properly and how his new world worked. Ker was basically in a new different world, with different rules and different goals.

Ker stopped and took a deep breath. He decided to go back to the facility - the bad place. He would learn whatever was hidden there. Why something like this existed in the first place. His discoveries serve him how to overcome the challenges ahead.

First point: food. Only a warrior with a filled stomach can fight good. That was what his mother had always said when he refused to eat his greens. A pang of pain ran through his chest.

He would return and everything would turn out right.

He refused to linger on that thought and its painful implicated feelings - he needed to move.

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After consuming two voles and a few eggs he found, Ker felt ready to take his day on. He already knew the drill, made a trap field nearby, lied in wait and bated any weak enough beast to the traps. Since last time worked out just fine, he saw no reason to change a working plan.

Ker observed the squirrels do their thing. He thought if they had any kind of society. A very primitive one, but a society nonetheless.

Probably not.

The first squirrel fell relitve easy, and Ker also looked for one of the weaker ones. The second squirrel caused more problems, and Ker had to fight harder and take some hits in. His left arm got sliced open and his right leg had to endure a nasty bite. But with eating the 'precious' parts of the dead beasts, mostly its organs, the wounds healed. Healing meant closing the wounds and making it workable again. There were still nasty looking scars on his flesh. His bones were also slightly itchy on affected places.

The third squirrel looked larger than some other. But Ker already progressed to level 10 and felt ready.

That was before the fight with said squirrel.

He lured it to the prepared traps. First, it avoided some, then it bulldozed through the rest, taking minimal damage in form of scars. Last, it thrown itself on Ker in a fit of fury, burying its teeth in his left side, while clawing in his right arm. His spear proved of minial defense against such a foe. Ker struggled to push the beast of him, still pinned down his spear diagonal between them. Ker let go of the now useless weapon, gripped with both his hands to the throat of the squirrel and pressed and clawed until it let off.

Ker was now heavily bleeding and still locked in a fight. The squirrrel coughed weird. Ker eyed his spear, the squirrel's eyes followed his gaze, he saw the intention in its eyes. Ker put his left foot back, readied himself and twitched. The squirrel instantly reacted with a jump to his weapon, throwing itself on top of it. Exactly what Ker waited for, stepping back just to let himself kneedrop on top of the squirrel. He voluntarily gave up.his weapon to gain the upper hand - or knee in this case.

Even when it cracked under him, he let not go, putting his entire body weight on the beast to surpress it. The beast, still ferocious, struggled against the pressure. The situation now turned on its head, looked much better for Ker. He was still bleeding, slowly losing strength.

So he decided for a slightly risky move. He pulled one leg closer to him, fiving the beast in turn more freedom with one shoulder. Luckily, only Ker had basic wrestle training. He profited on this by putting the free leg under the neck of the squirrel, twisting to put the other leg on top of its neck and closed.

The squirrel made coughing noises, high-pitched to low gurgling noises. Until it dtopped moving. Until Ker finally got the message of the kill.

His gains were good, but he didn't get another level despite the power difference.

You slayn a Treesquirrel lvl 4 (I) You slayn a Quickpacer Squirrel lvl 2 (II) You slayn a Woodsquirrel lvl 5 (III)

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2 lvls gained + 3 EP + 5 EP + 7 EP

In total, he gained 16 EP. His bonus was already showing. Before this disaster, the additional gaines from his titles were rather meager. Having good titles was really worth it.

He really did not like the raw beast eating business. But in his current situation, he couldn't afford luxurious thought. That was also the reason he devoured most of the last squirrel without hesitation.

Now, he reached his limit as it seemed. No more levels if he understood his situation correctly. The higher the evolution, the stronger the beast. That he had met no squirrles over lvl 5 indicated that they had to evolve then.

However, he still had no clue how that worked. So he tried to do what every good scout would do, observe and learn.

He looked at squirrels now for quite a time. Even if it was somewhat interesting in the beginning, it was also boring. Nothing different happened. Until one squirrel started a fight with a neighboring squirrel over some food. One of the beasts won, subdued the challanger. But it didn't end there, the other squirrels suddenly focused on the pair. Ker held his breath as all the squirrels streamed towards the loosing one and ripped it apart in a flood of teeth and claws. Afterward, the seeming peace returned.

Ker withdraws to assess his situation.

Maybe it was not that good of an idea to hunt murderhobo squirrels.

He really didn't know where exactly he was. He recently discovered how to kind of survive in the wilds, just only against weaker beasts. But a big part was missing, evolutions.

He accepted regretfully the decision to go back to the bad place.

His walk to the facility was pretty uneventful. Ker was thankful for that since, in this hellscape of a wood, he had to be aware of every step he made. Wondering where to start looking, he arrived at the facility.

He was greeted by the ususal overgrown walls and dark entryways. Inside the building, the light was dim, just what the late noon aloud to illuminate. For the first time, Ker took time to look at the walls.

In some places, they were covered with words. He could not understand a single one and rather moved on. He would need someone with language skills, someone who would be interested enough to not only go through the deadly wilds, but to a not understood, dangerous place. The odds were slim.

After walking for some time, he found signs with symbols and words hanging from the ceiling. The words were just a part of the mystery as before. The symbols made more sense.

There was a weird beast on the sign to the left. There was one of those syringes depicted on the sign to the middle hallway. Bad memories occurred in his head and he stuffed them back in. There was a weird flower on the sign to the right. Since he was interested in beast evolution, he chose the path to the left.

Soon enough, he encountered pictures and potential descriptions of various beasts. He recognized rwo of them: the famous griffin and the hippogriff. The first was a mixture of eagle and lion. He actually never saw one before but heard stories from the knights and his grandparents. The second was known to him since some of the higher standing knights had the honor of riding it. The hippogriff was a beast with the front of a giant eagle and the back of a horse. Thanks to one of the knights, Richard, he did pet a hippogriff when he was younger.

The other beasts he didn't know much about. A mixture of a snake and a normal chicken...

A horse with large fishtail...

A creature that had four legs and many snake heads...

And last horned creatures walking upright, that looked simply evil.

He couldn't quantify what it was, their ragged horns, the large claws or the wide, sharp toothed grin. Ker simply rather never meet any one of those.

He entered a large hall with lots of depictions and more words he could not read. There were also old scriptures, just the first one literally disintegrated to dust as he rried to unroll it. Ker thought better of it and didn't touch any other thing in this room.

One of the depictions holds what he needed, probably. An animal or small beast, wolf like, followed an arrow. Next, it was larger and had more mane. Then, it became gradually larger and more fierce with every depiction. Obviously, it was a description of evolutions.

Now to the next part.

Under it were another depiction, simiöar but different. It showed a dog that was then inside a cocoon and evolved there to something else. The rest of the evolutions seemed to work without cocoon.

Ker suspected what the cocoon was: the damned egg-thing he was placed into. And now it seemed he had to endure all that again.

But could he really find his way home and survive.

Ker gritted his teeth and looked into every niche and corner of the hall. He had to find something else. But what he found was just worse, a depiction in which every single evolution was inside the egg-thing. It was highlighted and probably important for whoever deranged had worked there.

From the depiction alone, the evolution came of a stronger. Ker was also certain through firsthand experience that this poor creature must have been broken inside. No living thing should have to endure such torture continuously.

It did not help, neither his mood nor his conclusion. He had to do it.

He really needed quite some time to find his way back to the center of the wing, where the hall with the egg was positioned.

It still looked the same as he left days ago. He walked up to it to inspect it. Ker could not make sense of his thing.

Four big shell parts, like leaves, open to all sides. Inside looked like an amalgamation of flesh and metal-constructs. Dried fluid glued to the leaves.

Inviting.

The room still eerily dark, nothing activated jet. Not that Ker would know or understand any part of this. He still took time to look around since you never knew what you could find without trying first.

Apparently nothing that helped him further his goals. Ker steeled himself, stepped on the middle platform and sat down. All his instincts wanted him to be somewhere else, but he had at least to try.

Here we go.

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The tent door was pushed aside. Ellora entered with a conflicted grimace on her face.

"You said you could have done nothing to rescue him,"

Helm answered: "That's now the fifth time. No, we were helpless in this situation. I fear there's nothing thst could been done."

"That's what you say. And Adam is silent and doesn't even comment on it. We had, we have a responsibility towards younger adventures we take in. I can't believe we didn't stop him."

"I know." replied Helm somber.

"And what is it with his family name, why withhold it?"

... Helm remained silent for a while.

"He asked me not to tell anyone. He wanted to be accepted just as Ker, not as Ker of Eldoria."

Ellora gasped in realization: "He was a noble. You let a noble die. Do you understand... we will be executed on return."

It seemed Helm just accepted the fact in defeat.

Ellora left the tent mechanically.

Helm was left in thought.

There will be send a search party. They will have to believe that we could have done nothing. They will have to...

Outside in the camp, the mood was grave. Some looked more busy, some others more sorrowful. Everybody did something to distract themselves.

Finn was sorting his tools, Hallauer did sharpen his knives, his look a mix between worry and nervousness. Ellora catching on: "You mistrust him actually returning. Giving reports in the guild could cost his head - and ours." A glance towards Helms tent, Hallauer grunted in agreement: "There were stronger men running and become lawless. Believe me." Ellora eyed him, "You knew of Ker, you who he really was." Hallauer nodded.

Not far sat Snap, his eyes staring distantly at his knife. He rubbed his left arm, where it ended, and looked at it as if to ensure it was really gone.

Ellora sat beside him, knowing it was not the right time for her to speak. Words only carry so far. She knew it would need a lot of time to process the events. It would need even more time to come to peace with the losses.

There was a look of determination on Snaps' face that showed he didn't really believe Ker was gone.

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In the meantime, in the deepest part of the abyss.

9 symbols etched with blood in black stone, 9 streams leading to a circle as the center piece. 9 creatures in large robes stood and chanted 9 different spell parts. In the center stood a figure, pleased with the progress. It was time to fulfill her promise.