Vita looked through the dire wolves brain. Balto's brain, to be exact. Going through someone's memories is a challenging task, even if they belong to an animal. There is only surface level memories Vita can look through, everything else is blocked off by something that works like that godforsaken mana stuff. Whenever Vita tries to do something with the memories that are older than a day, nothing would happen. Almost as if he didnt exist. Sure, Vita can look through the brain cells and kinda guess what is going on, but the fact that something in this world is actually stopping any attempt at reading these wolves older memories is just irritating to the core! Or rather, the cell core.
'Maybe I should strangle- I mean, get another cell to educate me on the workings of this world.' Vita slowly moved away from the skull area and went back to the stomach. As a non-bitch, Vita will and can solve this problem one day!
"Wow, my head hurts!" Balto lowered his head and whimpered. Some bug innards fell out of his mouth and landed on the ground with a moist smack. Radolf got closer to the half-chewed bug in front of Balto and took a deep sniff. He quickly jumped away from the pile and dunked his noise in the river.
"Bwah, Balto! How can you eat that stuff! I thought it was fine because I didnt smell anything, but that stuff is straight up deadly! I think you should stop eating it!" Radolf exhaled hard with his nose to get both the smell and water out. Balto looked at both Radolf and the meat with a confused look. It didnt smell bad to him, why did Radolf not like it?
"What do you mean? It doesnt taste bad, are you sure it's bad for me?" Balto took a good whiff of the meat, but still didnt smell anything. Radolf shook his head hard
"Maybe when you were ramming that tree with the goblin on it, you hurt your head so much that it actually broke your nose!" Radolf said with a grave face. But he quickly changed to a light laughter when he saw how quiet Balto got.
"Hey, Balto Im joking. Haha, you should see your face!" The light laughter continued for a bit before he noticed something. Balto was looking at something behind. Slowly, he turned his head around to see a silvery figure just as big as Balto.
"So. Radolf, Balto, what are the two of you doing so late. You dont usually stay up so late, Radolf. I can understand if Balto is used to getting less sleep than the rest of us, but would you mind explaining?" Duke stood there with the same sleepy look on his face, but this time he was standing up properly. Balto didnt seem bothered, but Radolf was nervous. It was rare for Duke to be seen moving because he only did so during the night. Before he got to explain himself, Duke interrupted.
"Forget it. Since the two of you are up and have clearly eaten, I guess helping me should be the best for the both of you. I imagine Fridolf would be quite angry if you ruin her sleep even more, Radolf." Duke walked towards the pile of bug meat, sniffed it, exhaled out his nose and looked at Balto.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
"You sure you should eat this?" Now Balto looked a bit annoyed.
"What, it smells ok to me, why shouldnt I eat it?" Duke shook his head and walked along the river. Balto and Radolf looked at each other before following after. If there was one thing Radolf knew, it was to never wake a mother up if she was sleeping.
The three dire wolves walked away from the bones of that one big and round bunny and that rock-like bug. Now and then, Duke would mark a certain number of trees. Whenever he marked a tree, Radolf and Balto would act as lookout in case something jumped out at them. Little was said, only Duke pissing on trees and nothing more.
After a while, Duke stopped and looked back at the two. A scent was in the night air.
"Be careful, there might be goblins in the area." Radolf and Balto took in the smell and noticed the scent as well. It was quite a strong smell, meaning that goblins could be near. They walked slowly, following the scent. The scent led them further north, closer to the old territory of the Gavir clan. They continued until they were stopped by Duke. The leafs were moving.
"The wind is carrying our scent, we should go back. If we continue, the goblins might notice our scent instead." But before they could do anything, a ball of fire flew out from the trees and hit Balto!
A group of goblins came charging over to the dire wolves, with all kinds of crude weaponry in their green hands. They all charged over to Balto who was busy screaming in pain. The light of the fire was lighting up both the dire wolves and the goblins. Behind the goblins, a much taller hobgoblin stood! A small fire was still burning in its raised hand.
"GEGOGE" It screamed and threw another fireball aimed at Balto. The first one hit him on the side, but this one hit him right on the head, blinding him for the moment. The goblins reached Radolf and swung their weapons. But before they got their knifes, clubs, spears and claws into him, a silvery flash sent their heads flying. Duke, with goblin blood dribbling down, stood there looking at the remaining goblins and the hobgoblin.
The hobgoblin locked eyes with Duke. The night was almost completely silent if you ignore the burning Balto who was currently screaming and rolling on the ground trying to get the fire off. As the two continued to stare at each other, one of the goblins freaked out and screamed. This caused the other goblins to scream out as well. But before they could run anywhere with no dire wolves, the hobgoblin burned the first screaming goblin and pointed at Balto.
"Gogege!" The words of the hobgoblin calmed the group down as they looked on the dire wolves. Only the silvery one was dangerous, while one was on fire. The hobgoblin raised its hand again, and fire started to spread from its fingertips and up to its shoulder. Duke took in a deep breath before letting out a deafening howl. The goblins charged forward again, but this time the dire wolves charged as well. Back at the camp, Beowul opened one eye while Ulva poked her head out from underneath the tree stump. Both ran to where the sound came from. The only one not helping was Balto, who was still trying to put the fire out.
Far in the distance, a group of dire wolves hidden in the dark raised their heads. They shared short glances before moving as well.