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"—What a mess."

Caroline didn't even know when she fell asleep; she shouldn't be sleeping on the job, but just like the night before, she awoke to the feeling of dread sending shivers down her spine. -Gods, she wished that it was only the demon playing with them again; but this was different. More... primal.

Everyone felt that, fear spreading fast like wildfire. Chaos— that's the only word to describe what happened during the attack - her orders and cursing lost among the scream and shouts. While most tried to run, others were attempting to save the carts as the animals started to panic carrying them away, sometimes with people still onboard. Some got hurt in the process, either falling off the run-away wagon or being hit by it. Few bones and wheels broke.

Thankfully no one died —except for the pair of unlucky bandits they've found left on the road; the rest of the bastards managed to get away into the mist during the chaos. A bad choice.

-If that green cloud got blow their way... Luckily, despite how this odd mist behaves, the wind is actually blowing from the sea so the beach was clear of poison, and Caroline made damn sure to burn away whatever got carried by the unnatural phenomena.

The fight ended as abruptly as is started, and in a similarly dramatic fashion.

She takes off her gloves to fix her disheveled damp hair. -At least the rain stopped.

Now she stands on the road surveying the damage. Four carts and a horse were lost during this battle between the demon and a god-damned hydra. Few other animals also got hurt, so that has to be dealt with, some vehicles require a quick repair. They will have to adjust; transfer whatever wasn't ruined and still find room for the injured...

-Damn it! Third day in a row! She sharply inhales through gritted teeth and throws down her gloves in frustration.

No one suspected such monsters lived around here, and if Caroline knew it, she would have seriously reconsidered ever taking this route. Everyone was shocked, the locals especially. Even more so that they've actually survived the ordeal; there are many stories about the almost legendary monster, thankfully it seemed to be a young one. The fearsome creatures supposedly live on the southern continent, terrorizing the vast jungles and deserts that span the beast-men homeland, where they can grow up to eight heads.

-Those were supposed to be extinct here on Thyra. Where did this thing even came from?

A movement in the mist caught her attention.

Through the brume she watches a thorn covered tendril - or rather some sort of a vine, creep along the ground, following a dark red trail; It then slowly drags a dead horse off the road, and towards where the greedy demon is sitting by what remains of the golem that has been protecting their caravan... Crouching on what the hydra has left behind. Even through the haze she can see the long, serpentine neck, ending with a horrifying reptilian visage - now covered in whatever creep it is that's growing out from the demon; it is still leaking copious amounts of blood and the red menace is seemingly feasting on it while inspecting the damage done to its creation. The stone giant lost an arm and many deep gashes cover its form— this was far worse than the dragon-turtle from two days ago.

Even though she had a good rest, Caroline has no strength to argue with the demon about the dead animal. -It can have it for all she cares.

She glances at the huge chunks of ice by road, still remaining there after the demon lashed out and broke apart the massive ice formation that bloomed there at the end of the fight; and then turns towards the trampled plants visible on the opposite side, across a ruined section of the highway, left in the path the of the escaping hydra. Caroline shivers again before taking a grip of herself. She has a job to do.

"Carol, you alright?" There he is. Sorry for dragging you into this Marcus, but damn, I'm glad you are here. She closes her eyes and takes a deep calming breath.

"Yeah. Never mind me, will they be able to move? I want to leave these swamps as soon as possible." He joins her in watching the rolling mists, standing by her side.

"Jarred offered to buy all of the stamina potions from the gnomes; there isn't nearly enough for everyone, still we should be able to push for Port Coral if those who need it share a sip."

"They are going to regret this after the effects wear off, but it's better this way; even if the gates are closed when we arrive it will be safer under the walls."

"I hope you are right."

Damn it, me too.

This caravan is cursed: Undead, demons, bandits, orcs and monsters— this is just to much. Life wasn't kind on them the past few days - as if a malicious god was playing with them, not letting the people rest; or is their luck really this bad?. She already dreads what is going to happen once they set sail. -And we are still a few hours away from the town. These dense white clouds are also a bad sign... we have to move no matter how tired everyone is. She has a very bad feeling.

——

I put away my enchanting tools after finally being done fixing the golem; giving it a last critical glance as I command it to step away and test its new arm. The damage was worse than I thought.

All this time, Rose has been angrily tearing through what the hydra has left behind, and flinging the scales around. She really didn't like the damn thing running away... It escaped, and we missed on such a splendid meal. A shame, but at least we took our pound of flesh; the severed head was still full of essence and vitality after being cut off, and even tried to bite at the golem at one point. The unlucky horse she snatched from the road was gone in minutes, but she's been at this for an hour. I can feel she's on the verge of growing more flowers again, so I let her take most of the essence. Trying to drain the whole thing would have taken us all night or more, and we apparently don't have that much time. The caravan is in a hurry and likely for a good reason...

I was able to pocket most of the intact scales that were torn off, hoping to craft something nice with them later; maybe we can exchange some of them for more enchanted glass since I've ran out of bottles and the spacial ring is getting unpleasantly full at this point.. A vial of hydra blood could also be highly valuable, and we now have three since I've managed to gather some before Rose got her roots on it. —But personally, I'm the most happy about the venom we extracted, it seems to be a really nasty stuff and I'm sure we can find a good use for it - will definitely need to get more vials from the alchemists, to fully empty the gland.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

Maybe we should have given chase after all, this was a treasure trove of amazing materials— but before we were able to free ourselves from the mana rich ice, the beast was already pretty far; despite its size the thing was damn fast when moving through the swampy terrain... And the fight would be hard without the golem taking its attention. I won't be able to perform another cut like this again, not today.

> Mastery: Focus and put your Intent behind an action. From making your tools perform better, having an arrow fly true, or enhancing your magic - to pouring your soul into your work, forcing a desirable outcome. Scales with user's Spirit. Cooldown depends on an action performed.

Such a vague description. The skill showed up on the list when we reached 75 Spirit; but I was skeptical about it, something was off— how would it even do all that? It seemed way too similar to my demonic magic, where we can just make things work by throwing mana at the problem. Yet now, after developing Presence, it feels like I understand it a bit more - what the system actually means.

Those three should complement each other very well; the similarities not redundant, but adding to their strengths.

The slight wrongness I'm getting from the Skill; a dichotomy between its intended purpose and principles that were subtly implanted in my mind, and how it actually performs after we adjusted to the changes, reminds me a bit of Animal Form—

-This worries me a bit, I won't lie. But the system wouldn't offer me this choice if it were to break something, right?

Cracking sounds on the thin sheet of frost - still covering the ground around here and collecting mana, being crushed under the slow steps, mean that our guest finally decided to approach.

I push away the Skill's description from view and look up from the piece of dried gore -it's essence still flowing into us in faint streams of power, filling both Rose and my own core. I've noticed today that she can't process everything herself. -Will need to investigate that when we have some time for ourselves.

"Red, the caravan is ready to move." Marcus came over to where we are having our well earned meal. Damn, those people work fast. They were preparing to set camp before, and now everyone is ready to go. "Is the golem ready? We can't stay here for much longer with that thing still out there." I follow his glance to the earthen construct. The thing sure took a beating, any normal golem would have likely crumbled down after losing almost half of its mass-

"I'm more worried about what spooked that hydra so much—" I murmur while checking out my work for the last time with a slight grimace. -Why did it end up like this?

-The elemental inhabiting it was able to fill in most of the damage with its own power, even during the intense fight. As long as the heart is safe, full of mana and nearby, and the core enchantments stay relatively whole; the thing should be able to raise even from rubble... Unfortunately, by itself, it can't do much about the frayed or missing arcane formations that animate the enchanted stone serving as its vessel.

The piece that keeps it 'alive' is safe with Angie - that's the only thing that can be considered as its true form; but after we removed it from the shrine that chained it to the land around the inn, without a suitable vessel, it is just a disembodied spirit with some control over Earth. It could likely make itself something resembling a functional body, but the heart would have to be a part of it; that's risky, and its combat potential would be questionable. So we spent a lot of mana to return it to fighting shape and then even more time, fixing the magic circuits and reattaching the broken parts. The acid was more effective against the construct than expected. Me freezing part of it in that last move didn't help either. Sigh.

Despite all that work, it is now much smaller, standing at maybe four meters high - some of the enchanted stone was simply beyond me to repair and unusable, we had to rearrange it a fair bit. Even with the Rod serving as the reference point, there is a lot I don't understand about the the topic.

Well, I've learned a lot in the process; makes me wonder if one day we will be able to create a proper golem by ourselves, or maybe even something like this Rod. Cheating with demonic magic would likely work, but the cost could be—

"Red?"

-Oh, right. "It should be fine now, even if it looks like this. I'm also almost done here, just a few more minutes." And we get a stiff nod in return.

"What did you mean by 'spooked the hydra'?"

"The thing was running away from something - I could feel its fear." I just shrug at the man. "All the animals in the marsh are scared, ever since the mist showed up hunting became harder. It wasn't all me that was stressing the horses." I look back at him. He looks concerned.

"Carol and Reggie said the same thing; that this isn't natural. According to the boy, death travels through the mist. Damn fool should have said something sooner." I nod at those news.

Ah, yes. I should have asked the young Spirit Whisperer what he thought about the thing, he is also a local so would've known about strange mists appearing over the area. Well, it doesn't matter; not like the caravan could travel much faster.

"It is getting dark though, and then there's this?" I point at the white veil covering the land and slowly rolling over the road.

"Caroline will provide us some light and the road is in a good condition, we can make it even with the mist."

Alright, not for me to decide anyway.

"I will be with you in a moment; still want to gather all the remaining scales." And with that assurance he moves away, back to where everyone was gathering on the coastal road built along the beach. -What got into him? So stiff.

Everyone is ready for a night march to the nearby town; just few more hours and we will be free from our contract. Maybe we could go hunting before returning though? Not necessarily for hydras, but there are many monsters living here in these marshes.

...

——

To everyone's surprise, we made it to the town unmolested, and it took us just under three hours of forced march. People were rushing as if death itself was chasing them. That might be quite accurate, actually.

To no one's surprise, the gates are closed and the guards refuse to make an exception, especially after seeing the oddly shaped golem following us. -Seriously why did it turn out like this? We will have to wait until morning, when important people wake up. So the caravan made an improvised camp by the wall, near the entrance.

Unfortunately for me this means I'm stuck with them until dawn - as Elen pointed out I was supposed to escort them until they are safe beyond the walls, *Tsk. The grunts on the nigh-watch had at least enough smarts and decency to bring a proper healer, and exchange information with the 'leadership' of our merry group. None of them paid any attention to a cat sitting nearby, and everyone else kept their mouths shut about me — although their cooperation might have had more to do with the fact that one of the women we saved from the bandits, ended up being someone important.

Well, most people collapsed as soon as bedrolls were out anyway; many not bothering with tents, few tarps spread between carts enough for them. The rain is gone, but the heavy clouds still hang overhead, threatening to make everyone wet and more miserable at any moment.

What we have learned about the current situation, doesn't paint a pretty picture - not for this area at least; apparently the kingdom fielded an army to clash against the main horde of undead, and preparations were made to ensure the threat was dealt with... But on the eve of battle, the damned things suddenly turned around, and started marching south.

They of course went to pursue the retreating enemy, destroying many of the walking dead; but soon lost them in the vast forests and among the rolling hills that Kora is so proud of. Unlike mortal armies the undead didn't need to rest or sleep and kept moving even through the night. The biggest issue is, many people decided to move south when escaping the skeletal menace since this whole mess started... Jarred's caravan included.

This port town is actually full of refugees, and now after the news broke out to the public— everyone is looking to get a spot on a next ship. On any ship...

Well... Fuck.

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