Carrollton yelled in amazement, "What the hell?!"

Hannah stood beside him, still in shock at what she had just witnessed. "How did-"

I interrupted, "I don't know. We should find the others. If the warp gate is like you said, then searching for it would be futile."

Hannah nodded in agreement, looking frightened.

My tone turned even more serious, "Lead the way, Hannah, I'll watch our backs."

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Fortunately, we quickly found the others. "Is that thing dead?" Hannah asked as she rushed over to Chark.

Chark swung his hammer over his shoulder. "Yeah. It's dead and it disintegrated itself with its last attack. It probably just wanted to take us down with it, the bastard."

She let out a sigh of relief. "And where is Richard?"

"I'm over here," Richard called at the mention of his name. He was sitting down on the ground, his back against the trunk of a tree, sipping from a canteen. Melian was next to him, looking exhausted.

"Well, I'm happy that you were worried about me, Hannah," Lizzy said sarcastically, walking up and peeking her head out from behind Chark.

Ignoring Lizzy, Hannah rushed to Richard's side. Chark chuckled, and Lizzy sighed. We followed suit.

"What's his status, Melian?" I asked.

"He'll be fine. He just needs a few days of rest before we can move again. We all could use some rest," Melian replied.

"I agree," Richard said. "It's a blessing we made it out with just this. You guys have really toughened up over this trip." We all smiled at Richard's praise.

"Now," Richard said in his usual tone when giving orders. "We're going to have to set up camp here tonight. I doubt any beast will come after the one we just took down, and we should be okay for 2-3 days. Lizzy and Carrollton, gather firewood. Chark and Hannah, set up the tents." He looked at Melian and me. "You two deserve to rest, so just sit back and relax."

A couple of hours later, everything was set up, and Chark had meat grilling over the fire. Lizzy and Carrollton were surveying it closely and arguing about what part they called 'dibs' on. Hannah was sitting with Melian on a log next to the fire, and they seemed to be talking and laughing.

That left Richard and me sitting silently next to each other, taking in the delicious aroma of the food. Eventually, he broke the silence. "I want to thank you for coming back and saving me. You could have easily run and saved yourself, but you chose to come back and fight for a man you barely know. If it wasn't for that, I probably wouldn't be alive right now. So, for that, I am truly thankful."

"Whether it was verbal or not, when I asked to join your travel party, I agreed to fight as a team. It wouldn't be right to run and save myself. So there is no reason to thank me; I was just performing my duty," I replied.

He laughed. "Nevertheless, you saved me, and I will repay you one day, Walker. You can hold me to that."

I smiled as well, but he couldn't see it because of my dark cloak. "I'm not complaining."

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"It's ready," Chark called out. "Everyone come and get your fill."

Everyone gathered around the fireplace and grabbed their food. We all indulged in the warmth and comfort of the fire.

"Now that everyone is here and ears are available, I have to tell you what happened when we got separated from you guys," Hannah announced. "Carrollton, Walker, and I saw a Guardian Golem."

Lizzy and Melian gasped, and Chark stood up in shock.

"Are you kidding me?" Richard asked, just as surprised as everyone else. "Those things are just legends to adventurers."

"It's true, we really did," Carrollton chimed in.

"Well, what happened? Did it try to attack?" Chark asked.

"Not really," Hannah glanced up at me for a moment and didn't speak, causing everyone to turn their attention toward me. "Walker walked towards it and touched it, and it sort of just collapsed and fell apart in a way. I swear I thought I was dreaming."

"What?" Richard asked. "So, Walker took it down? Walker took down a Guardian Golem?" Richard turned to me, a huge smile on his face. "That's an achievement if I've ever heard one."

"Did you happen to see the warp gate?" Melian asked.

"No, we didn't. We decided to leave and come find you guys," Hannah said.

"It was for the best," I said.

"Yeah," Richard agreed. "I wouldn't know the first thing about using a Warp Gate." He turned to me. "But if this story gets out, almost every adventurer in Ara will know your name, Walker."

Everyone shook their heads in agreement.

"You'll be famous!" Lizzy said excitedly. "And I'll be known as the girl who traveled with the great Walker!"

I could've sworn I saw stars glimmer in her eyes as she said this.

"About that," I cut in. "I'd rather keep that between this party. As all of you can probably tell, I'm not much of a social person, and it would just make things complicated."

Richard smiled. "I had a feeling that would be the case. We understand. Not a word will slip."

Lizzy looked as if she deflated in disappointment at the news. Everyone laughed at her antics, and we all eventually finished up our food and headed to our tents.

As I lay there, I stared at the roof of the tent, just thinking. The odd feeling I had when the golem was near, and the more the feeling raged on when I saw it, was even more peculiar. I had never felt anything like that before. A sense of familiarity almost.

What was it? And when I touched it, why did it just collapse? What did this mean?

If they were truly that rare, what were the odds that we would see one? It just made me wonder. What if it wasn't a coincidence?

‘You sure have a lot to find out,’ a voice chirped in my mind. A voice I hadn't heard in a while.

I instantly sat up in surprise. ‘Rye!’

‘What's with the women? Is it your mating season?’ he asked.

I looked to my left to see Melian sleeping soundly. There weren't enough tents for the entire party to have one each to themselves, so we had to compromise, and somehow Melian ended up being my tentmate.

‘Absolutely not. You've just missed a lot.’

‘Well, fill me in,’ he said, his voice blended in with a morning yawn.

‘Before I tell you all that, will you be okay? You've been asleep for a while, and I need to know if the Soul Amplification use has had any bad effects on you.’

‘No, I'll be fine, Fal. I just needed to regain mana. Heck, I feel stronger now. I feel the more often we use the soul amplification, the more I'll learn to stay awake.’ Rya said, his voice filled with vigor.

‘Okay, buddy. We will go a little at a time from now on. Just until you get the hang of it.’

‘Alright agreed. Now tell me, I am dying to know about your mate.’ He chuckled.

‘She's not my mate. Don't call her that again.’ I said, my telepathic voice deadpan.

From then I began filling him in. Telling him about Melian and who she was, then the party, and even about our fight and the Guardian golem we ran into today.

‘And all this happened while I was asleep.’ His voice turned glum,, ‘it seems I’ve missed all the good entertainment.’

‘Yes, you have.’

‘By the way, how did you do that rumbling that you did earlier?’ He asked

His question left me confused, and I had no idea what he was referring to.

‘You know, the shaking thing with your mana core? It woke me up for a second but eventually stopped. So I fell back asleep, but you know when something wakes you up, it's hard to fall back asleep, so here I am,’ he explained.

‘How long ago did this ‘shake’ thing happen?’ I asked.

It took me a moment to realize that he was talking about the feeling I had in my body when we encountered the golem. However, it would be impossible to confirm my suspicion.

‘Well, I'm not entirely sure how I did it, but I have a few guesses as to what caused it. Just let me know if you ever feel it again,’ I replied.

‘Will do, Captain,’ he chuckled.

‘Now be quiet. I need to get some rest for the journey ahead,’ I said as I snuggled up in my sleeping bag.

‘But I just woke up. Not fair,’ he protested.