Now in a weakened state and covered in blood, Loran knew he needed to get back to the village as soon as possible.

‘It took me what, four days to get out here? I can cut that down to one if I hurry right?’

He was obviously just trying to reassure himself in this dangerous situation, but he certainly should be able to get back faster than the four days it took to get this far. While he was hurrying for the first day of his journey, the rest was spent at a slow pace in the hopes of taming some animals or finding a Demon Bear closer to the village.

Without that restriction, he could easily double, or even triple the distance he could travel in a day by running and using [SPRINT]. He also lost several hours of today to [MANA EXHAUSTION] so it wasn’t as if he spent a full four days traveling.

Overall, getting home in one day was probably not going to happen, but he should be able to manage two.

‘...Actually, if I run through the night, maybe I can get home in a day.’

His body was absolutely going to hate him afterward, and he would probably get some kind of [EXHAUSTION] debuff, but being exhausted at the village was better than being out in the woods in a weakened state.

As it stands, setting up his perimeter alarm spell would nearly empty his MP supply, and with his reduced regeneration rate, it would take more than two hours just to recover 50%, and more than five hours to be fully restored.

Loran could handle most forest predators with stats alone, but if he ended up facing another Demon Bear then he was doomed. He didn't know if he would run into another, but he had already wasted five hours in their territory and was really pushing his luck.

Additionally, thanks to [MANA EXHAUSTION] he had essentially just finished a five-hour nap and was feeling fairly rested, so it wasn’t as if he was going to be up all night after having spent the whole day hunting.

…And if he was being completely honest with himself, now that Loran realized that getting home in a single day didn’t seem completely impossible, he wanted to attempt it just to see if he could.

‘I guess that settles it,’ he thought, gritting his teeth as he ran through the dark woods. ‘I can totally run a marathon or two, I’ve got the stats for it, right?’

~~~~~

Traveling through the woods at night was a surprisingly calm experience. With Loran’s high Perception the stars and moon gave off more than enough light to see by, and despite having traveled for several hours now he has yet to see any other living creatures, let alone any predators.

He hadn’t tried keeping track of the time at first, but once the timer on [MANA EXHAUSTION] started ticking down again he started using it to keep track of how long he had been running, and six hours seemed like a decent estimate.

‘Now if only running for six hours straight could be less exhausting, or less boring,’ he thought while breathing heavily. Even though his enhanced stats gave him enough stamina that he could keep running, it couldn’t completely get rid of the burning in his legs and lungs, or stop the rivers of sweat from pouring down his body. On top of that, the quiet night was quickly starting to bore him. It wasn’t as if he was hoping for an attack, but Loran had nothing to keep his mind occupied while his body kept working mechanically.

Worst of all was that while the adrenaline was enough to keep him awake, he was still getting more and more exhausted by the second. His five-hour nap hadn’t been as restful as he hoped since it was forced on him by the [UNCONSCIOUS] debuff, and before that, he had spent most of the day running around the woods and fighting a Demon Bear! Needless to say, Loran’s body was demanding rest, and he was doing his best to ignore it.

‘There’s still no Exhaustion debuff,’ he thought checking his menu. ‘I can still keep going.’

It was difficult to tell how far he had traveled in the dead of night, but he felt like he was covering a lot of distance. In addition to jogging non-stop, he was regularly using [SPRINT] without ever letting his SP bar refill or empty completely, ensuring he always had some leftover in the event of an attack while also constantly regenerating SP.

‘I sure wish SP would regenerate a little faster though, this would be so much easier if I could just Sprint the whole way home,’ he thought jokingly.

~~~~~

A few more hours passed in boring silence before the sun, finally, began to rise in the eastern sky.

‘Maybe I’m almost there?’ Loran thought hopefully. Sadly, the eastern mountains were still far in the distance. There were still many miles between him and home.

It had been around twelve hours since he started running home, and he just couldn’t keep up anymore. That didn’t mean he stopped moving, but [EXHAUSTION] had set in and he just couldn’t maintain a constant running pace anymore. Now he would allow himself brief walking periods to catch his breath, but it was barely enough in the face of the debuff.

Loran couldn’t stop though, no matter how desperately he wanted to sit and rest his legs. He vaguely recalled reading that stopping in the middle of a run made starting again unimaginably difficult. Something about how the muscles would start to stiffen once they thought they had time to recover.

The idea of stopping was very tempting at this point, but it was far too late to stop now. With the sun rising, the Moss Wolves and Hell Pigs would be waking up soon, and with how tired his body was fighting them could be dangerous, even with his greater stats.

Walking made the process easier at least, and it gave him more opportunities to drink and cool himself off. He even figured out a way to use the inventory to take a shower. By positioning the menu above him, putting his hand through and calling out the water, it would rain down from above in a stream that he could adjust somewhat with his thoughts.

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As the sun rose higher, Loran took a moment to check how far he had gotten. Sure enough, the western mountains were notably further away than the eastern mountains.

It had taken him around twelve hours, but he was a little more than halfway home.

Feeling emboldened by the knowledge, Loran took a big swig of water and started running again.

‘Almost there, just a few more hours.’

~~~~~

Maxie sat on an uprooted tree in the western woods, quietly eating a piece of deer jerky with a dead Green Rabbit on the ground in front of her. Most of her team had gotten injured during their last hunt, and while it was nothing major it was enough that they wanted time to recover, so she decided to head into the western woods for a little target practice and to put her new Skills to the test.

For many of the bow-using players, the leather targets were okay but too stationary to meet their needs anymore. Fortunately, while the larger animal populations were shrinking from overhunting, small game like the White Squirrels and Green Rabbits were too plentiful to ever get rid of, and only became more common now that the version update had increased the spawn rates.

Despite being out here for a few hours, Maxie only managed to kill three rabbits, but that was mainly because she was aiming for their heads instead of their bodies to increase the difficulty of the shots.

‘I’m definitely getting better, but that last one had to be a fluke,’ Maxie thought looking down at her most recent kill. The arrow had managed to pierce through both eye sockets, leaving the small critter’s pelt completely unblemished. The sight was a bit unnerving, but between New Eden Online and the many other games she had played, Maxie had already gotten used to more gruesome sights than this.

‘Honestly, why couldn’t I ever get kills like this in Terrorbeast Tracker? The reward for a 100% undamaged pelt would have been tripled.’ She sighed as she finished the last of her jerky. ‘Whatever, at least this Skill is working better than I hoped.’

Yang, Alexx, and Zed had returned to the village a few days ago, along with the various other players from the Ziege Basin, and Alvor’s [GOAT WHISPERER] quickly became a huge focus for many players who wanted to try taming animals. Maxie was at the forefront of this group, and had been looking into taming methods for weeks now, with unfortunately poor results.

She was hoping that learning this Skill from Alvor would better her chances, but what she hadn’t expected was that it also helped with hunting by letting her read the target’s emotional state. Squirrels and rabbits weren’t particularly expressive, but the Skill was more than enough to tell if the critter was able to detect her, or what it might consider a threat.

So far, Maxie’s only complaint with the Skill was its application in animal taming. [GOAT WHISPERER] was not a direct taming Skill, it just let you communicate with animals more easily. With most animals having a very violent reaction to anything that wasn’t a part of their pack or herd, just being able to talk with them had limited usefulness.

This was actually why several members of Maxie’s team were injured. They had tried to subdue a group of Hell Pigs yesterday, with the stronger players holding them down while Maxie attempted to calm them down. Unfortunately, she wasn’t very convincing, and by the time they decided to give up the pigs had thrashed around enough to give everyone a collection of bruises and bloody wounds.

‘Honestly, taming the pigs probably isn’t even worth it. What would be the point, raising them in captivity for bacon?’

*BARK*

Maxie was pulled from her thoughts as she heard the call of a Moss Wolf close by. Turning her head while reflexively reaching for her bow, she paused as she saw the wolf staring at her while standing a few dozen feet away, not attempting to hide in the slightest.

‘Why is Sixth Sense not reacting?’ she thought, wondering if her new Skill was glitched is some way.

She couldn’t sense any hostility from the beast, instead [GOAT WHISPERER] was telling her that the wolf wanted to… ask her for something? It was strange, seeing the deadly predator paw the ground and twitch its head like a dog that wanted to go for a walk, as if the wolf was pleading but less desperate.

After a moment, the wolf turned and began walking briskly through the woods, pausing to look back, wanting her to follow.

Maxie had no idea why it would be leading her further into the woods, but outright leading her into an ambush didn’t seem like it was something a Moss Wolf would do, so after picking up her supplies she chased after it.

Once it saw that she was following, the wolf began to move faster. The beast wasn’t anywhere near as fast as she was though, and soon she was jogging right alongside it.

It only took a few minutes for them to reach their destination, and Maxie’s eyes widened at what she saw.

Lying in the grass was Loran, covered in streaks of blood and sweat. One of his feet was bare and covered with dirty cuts, while the shoe on the other was extremely worn out and looked like it was barely holding itself together.

A pair of Moss Wolves were sitting on either side of Loran, sitting vigilantly while a group of wolf cubs were moving around them.

Maxie’s jaw dropped at the strange sight before her, almost forgetting that Loran probably needed help right now.

As she got closer, the wolves noticed her and started to back away from Loran, save for one cub that was sitting on his back and licking his cheek with a mix of concern and curiosity. Maxie knelt next to him and calmed down slightly as she didn’t see any injuries that needed immediate attention. Checking him with [ANALYSE] revealed that he was suffering from both [MANA EXHAUSTION] and a new debuff called [EXTREME EXHAUSTION].

Maxie quickly read through the debuff, her face turning paler with every word.

‘Fuck, this is bad,’ she thought. ‘I need to get him back to the village yesterday.’

Maxie turned to look at the group of wolves that had apparently been protecting the unconscious Loran. She was sensing a strange mix of emotions from their movements. Relief and concern was there, but also hesitation as if they were conflicted over something.

‘Regardless, he would have died if they hadn’t led me to him.’

Reaching into her inventory, Maxie handed over all the fresh meat and rations she had on her, even using a few wooden bowls to offer them water.

The wolf cubs practically dove into the small pile of food when she brought it out, happily digging in as the adults watched. One turned and gave her a thankful growl.

‘This feels so weird,’ she thought, gesturing to Loran as she tried to explain her actions. ‘It’s not complete words or anything, but is this much emotion being shown by their body language?’

At this point, she wouldn’t be surprised if the Skill was directly reading their minds.

One of the wolf cubs, the one sitting on Loran’s back, was ignoring the food and continued to lick at his cheek.

“Hey, I need to get him home now,” she said slowly, not sure how well the Skill could work with words. “I need you to get up now.”

The small wolf looked up at her before going right back to licking blood off Loran’s face.

“Alright, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

She reached under Loran’s body and heaved upward. The cub fell with a surprised yip as Maxie maneuvered Loran’s body over her shoulders. With his limp body positioned as well as she could get him, she began making her way back to the village, only to stop after a few seconds when she noticed the wolf cub following after her.

“Aren’t you going to stay with your family?”

Looking back to the other wolves, Maxie watched as one of the adults looked at her, then the pup, then to what was left of the food before barking at the others and following after her.

Maxie’s eyes widened as the wolves gathered around, looking up at her expectantly.

“...” She turned to look at Loran’s unconscious face. “What the hell have you been doing out here?”