Chapter 45 Hunter or Prey.

There’s nothing out there but death and misery!

You should value what you hold in your hands.

Your family, your friends, your home.

Don’t go and look for death out there!

Lokamesh, Father of Mortal Kind.

“Why is it dangerous? What can it do?” I eye the bear-like badger.

Berthold is still tugging my arm. “It’s very fast, it can breathe some sort of acidic vapors, and it’s very aggressive if it feels it’s cornered. I think it’s best if we find another game…”

“If I am up high, can it reach me?” I raise an eyebrow at him.

“Up high? Do you mean a tree? It’ll chop the tree down, or climb it to attack you. Trust me they’re very dangerous… come on let’s go!” he grabs my arm trying to lead me away.

I pull my hand back. “I mean flying. If I am flying around the treetops and shoot my crossbow at it. Will the acid be able to reach me?” Even if it supposedly does I can also fly away… this is what I learned how to fly for…

“I am not sure…”

“Then I’m hunting this. You can sit back here and I’ll show you how it’s done!” Ha! Right back at you!

I wrap Loyal's reins around a tree, tie up my hair, grab the rose petals in my belt bag, and chant.

“myrsha, nia tsaf lah! Lu myrsh ni kull lah! Nia wuan nalahi myrsha!”

Losing my sense of weight, I kick the soft earth in order to float upward. Purplish smoke comes out of my belt, and the small elemental circles me in the form of a violet speck of light.

I enjoy the look on Berthold’s face. This mix of awe and astonishment is worth the sharp drop of my mana. I love magic and power, it really suits me…

“Felul” I exhale. The wind blows on my back, lifting me the way I command it.

The black badger feels the presence of my magic. It lifts its low head, looking at me with a pair of glowing green eyes. I can tell it doesn’t know what my plans are, it only senses that the essence of my magic isn’t offensive. It can’t make sense of what I plan to do and is puzzled at my presence.

The moment I take the crossbow off my shoulder, I can tell from its eyes that it realizes what’s coming next.

The creature darts forward at an astonishing speed, my bolt misses it entirely. My hands are shaking as I pull the loading mechanism. Badgers shouldn’t be that fast!!! I should stop thinking of it like a badger! This is a magical creature!

Berthold turns around and runs off. To my relief, the badger ignores him, it focuses on me. The massive creature climbs a tree at an astonishing speed, and releases a stinking breath in my direction.

I dodge, swiftly flying away from it. The magical wind that moves me around, also blows the dark cloud in my direction, but it scatters the cloud as well. By the time it reaches me it’s no longer that concentrated. I wince as it burns against my skin, I can tell it’s acidic, but not even close to the level of Rushmia’s or Oshi's acid.

I aim my crossbow at the tree. But before I can pull the trigger, the creature slides down, leaving deep long furrows on the bark. It runs and scales another tree. All I can see is a black and white blur as it moves. It does not release a breath this time, instead, it jumps in an attempt to catch me in mid-air.

I exhale and give a mental command to the wind through my mana pattern. The wind carries me and I dodge the deadly pounce. I aim my crossbow again, I wait for it to repeat this move. When it jumps from the next tree, I squeeze the crossbow’s trigger. The creature is incapable of dodging midair.

My bolt hits the badger’s belly, and I float backward avoiding the large bear-like body. It falls to the ground, impaling itself on the bolt, and groans loudly.

My heart thumps up rapidly in my ears, I pant with a victorious smile on my face as I watch my immobile prey. I enjoyed this fight, I enjoyed the adrenaline, and I know that despite the danger the creature posed I just won this battle.

The badger wobbles up to its feet and limps forward in pain. I float in place, and aim my reloaded crossbow at its head, but my kill shot doesn’t hit.

In a blink, it climbs another tree and jumps at me again. What?!

When I realize the creature was just pretending to be badly wounded, it’s already too late. The badger pounces straight at me.

Only now do I notice how large this thing’s claws are. They get stuck in my gambeson and belt. With a sharp pain in my waist, the creature’s weight pulls me down.

The air is knocked out of my lungs when my back hits the ground. The creature gets on top of me, pinning me down. It snarls in my face. I turn my head to avoid the brunt of its breath. I gasp sharply when its teeth gnaw into my left shoulder.

“Myrsha ritsa!” I call out desperately, my hand pressed against its furry belly. It feels less like touching fur and more like touching a massive porcupine.

*Thoooomp*

With a sound of a stopper being plucked out of a bottle full of air, the creature screeches, trembles, and collapses on top of me.

I can feel the warm blood and gore pouring out on my body, a pulse of pain in my shoulder, and hot brands on my waist. I am stuck under the heavy creature.

“Myrsha kalfit” I cast and cough, lowering the creature’s weight. I channel for a little while. But even at a third of its original weight, this thing is way too heavy, and it’s probably above the weight limit of my weightless body spell. Rot... I’m stuck.

“Berthold? A little help over here?” I call out with my heart still pumping the adrenaline throughout my body. He didn’t leave, did he?

“Are you alright down there?” he asks worriedly.

“Yes. I just need you help lifting this thing! I’m stuck!”

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"Alrighty." He drives a thick wooden stick under it and lifts it a little, enough for me to crawl out. “Weird, I thought this thing was heavier…” he mutters.

I crawl out and cancel my ‘Light Weight’ spell. The wooden stick snaps as the creature’s weight go back to normal. “It’s heavier, I just made it lighter for you,” I say with a grin. I did it! Not the way I planned but I did it! I got lucky. And now I just have to do it for the rest of my life… great… I'll get better.

“I… Your face… Your shoulder... it doesn’t look so good…”

I shrug. It does burn, but I’ve seen worse acids before. Nothing compared to Oshi’s breath, and it’s not even close to Rushmia’s acid, but it hurts. Why is it always acid?

Should I use a healing potion for this?

No… save these for emergencies… I should get that washed though… "Nimuwal." I direct to water jet to clean my wounds, groaning from the burning pain.

It’s nothing the hag can’t heal, right? She did mention she had to heal her other apprentice all the time. And it was part of my deal with her. She gets the animals, and provides me the equipment and healing services in return… It’s nice to have backing like that… Let’s get that soul first before it disappears!

Putting the bottle in the creature’s mouth, the skin on my palm burns a little. The creature’s mouth still leaks acidic vapors. Seeing the animal body move, I become aware that the creature is still alive. It has a large blown-up bloody hole in its torso, and the gore on my gambeson is evidence of how bad it is. I know its internal organs should be blown apart inside, and yet, it’s still breathing somehow.

I feel like an idiot thinking I could take this creature down with a crossbow. It’s smart… smart enough to fake an injury… it’s fast… and tougher than anything I’ve ever seen…

Using my dagger, I attempt to slit the creature’s throat, but it’s no good. The bronze dagger can’t even penetrate through the hard fur. The badger groans in pain. Looking into its green dim eyes, I can tell that it wants me to finish it off, to end its misery. I am trying, ok?

My crossbow is buried below the creature and I can’t use it… my dagger probably isn’t long enough to reach its brain through the eye… stabbing it will only torment it more, not that I care how it feels, but I needed to kill it… magic then… icy spike…

I weave the four required patterns of water mana. “Rinim ril shariss.” A sharp bolt of ice forms above my hand and flies into the creature’s eye, penetrating its brain. The creature stops breathing.

Filling up the glassy bottle is fast this time. At some point, the diamond heats up and I realize that the bottle must be full, even if it takes time for the gassy ectoplasm to condense into liquid. I take out another bottle and manage to fill all three of them to the brim. Now I wish I took more bottles from the hag. Next time…

I take out the roll of cloth and spread it on the ground with the intention of wrapping the large animal up. “What are you doing? You’re not planning on taking this thing with you, are you?” Berthold is perplexed by my actions.

“Sure do! Help me with this, will you?”

“I am not carrying this thing! No way! There are limits to what I’ll do, even for a girl!”

I chuckle. “I was the one carrying the doe the other day, remember? And it’s not like you haven’t seen what I’ve done with that fox. I didn’t ask you to carry it, just help me wrap this up, ok? I need you to roll it on the cloth with me, can you do that?”

He nods helplessly, muttering under his breath. I cut the cloth and spread the slices on the ground, making a small cloth bed with it. After casting another ‘Light Weight’ spell on the massive creature, we push the creature together onto the bed of cloth.

When it’s finally wrapped up, I attempt to squeeze it into the bag. According to the hag, even the biggest creature in the world could fit in here, as long as it’s dead. And it proves to be right. The bag’s hems turn the creature into a toy sized badger and the bag swallows the wrapped creature whole.

“Thank you. I’d be stuck under that thing if you weren’t here.” I kiss his cheek.

“Erm… you’re covered in blood…”

Looking down, I am indeed covered in gore. It’s bloodied from below my neck down to my thighs, the smell isn’t pleasant either. I blush up to my ears in embarrassment. My gambeson is in bad shape too. A part of it is torn off, exposing a nasty gash on my waist, and the ugly wound on my shoulder. I’m probably alive thanks to the thickness of this armor... This was a close one…

The skin on my stomach is red and blistered. It burns the same way half of my face and my shoulder burn. My shoulder pulses with a steady pain, I move my left arm to test the injury, it hurts, but nothing is broken. My arms and back are bruised, and my whole body is sore. Yeah… I am in no shape to kiss anyone’s cheek… he’s right about that…

I pick up my mangled crossbow from the ground. The wood is cracked and the string got torn apart, it’s damaged beyond repair. I throw it aside finding comfort in the fact that I filled three soul bottles to the brim. This is what I came here for, goal achieved. If I keep this up, I’ll be able to win my bet with the hag.

Or die horribly as some magical beast’s dinner…

I wonder how long will these three bottles last for… I should’ve asked for more of them…

It doesn’t matter, I can go on another hunt later on… It’s not like these animals are going somewhere…

I should bring Berthold with me on these hunts. The way he’s looking at me is fun, and having him around for these hunts is really useful…

“You need to wash that too…” He points at my blistered stomach. “Come, there is a magical healing spring not far from here. Better than one of those expensive healing potions or your magic.”

Magical healing spring? Solves my potion dilemma… “Let’s go!” I pull Loyal’s reins. The horse neighs and tugs some of my hair with his teeth.

*~*~*

Power level: 2nd stage apprentice.

Mana pools status:

Crown-knot: Affinity 10: formed: 1 gem replenished per five minutes.

Neck-Bridge: Affinity 6: formed: max amount of gems drained per day: 66

Abdomen-storage: Affinity 5: formed: 6 gems. Conversion ratio: 6:1

Air: Affinity 4: formed: 18 gems

Fire: Affinity 2: formed: 9 gems

Light: Affinity 3: formed: 14 gems

Water: Affinity 6: formed: 27 gems

Earth: Affinity 1: opened: 3 gems

Wood: Affinity 2:

Gravity: Affinity 9: formed: 40/41 gems

Cantrip known:

Air: Shavi’s Breeze. Shavi’s Sword. Shavi’s Hair Dryer. Aria’s Enhanced Hearing.

Fire: Nuriss’ Flame. Effrat’s Firefly. Effrat’s Fire Breath. Sorladika's Lesser Heating.

Light: Noxi’s Light. Lako’s Blinding Light.

Water: Water Evocation. Water to Ice. Ice to Water. Water to Vapor. Vapor to Water. Mayan’s Icy Spike. Ayla’s Water Jet.

Earth:

Wood:

Gravity: Lumina’s Kinetic Burst. Tukado’s Repulse. Tukado’s lesser shield. Imari’s Minor Telekinesis. Imari’s Jump. Leo’s Pull. Leo’s Grounding. Alino’s Light Body. Alino’s Heavy Body.

Spells known:

Gravity: Alino’s weightless bodyb.

Focus capability: 10 patterns

Social status: apprentice to the maven of mysteries.

Wealth: 900 gems. 1843 gold coins, 13 silvers, 47 coppers.

Items:

Two simple healing potions.

Two potions with unknown effects.

An enchanted belt with eight pouches, the enchantment keeps the pouches’ content fresh.

Fresh rose petals, 8g

3 soul containers size 1. (Borrowed item. Ownership: Maven of Mysteries.)

Roll of magical cloth, any carcass wrapped fully in the cloth will not rot. (Borrowed item. Ownership: Maven of Mysteries.)

A magical pouch, any carcass attached to the pouch will shrink in size. (Borrowed item. Ownership: Maven of Mysteries.)

Companions:

Berthold.

Languages:

Toml’a Fluent

Sinteo 9/10

Myrsha 5/10

Injuries and scars: Back, lightning scar bruises. Left shoulder, open wound, cleaned. Stomach, open wound, cleaned. Face, acid burn.