Nina and Kirk fought the pack of hellhounds the sorceress had just summoned. Those creatures kind of looked like oversized Dobermanns, but their mouths were X-shaped, consisting of four jaws. The creatures looked terrifying and ferocious. Their eyes glowed red, and their jagged and serrated jaws were adorned with rows of cruel, pointed teeth. Those creatures seemed to be designed to tear apart anything unfortunate enough to cross their path. Their X-shaped mouths lent them an appearance of relentless hunger and ferocity.
When Nina saw the nude sorceress summon those creatures, she’d felt a chill creep up her spine. However, as it turned out, despite the hellhounds’ malevolent appearance, they weren’t all that hard to kill. When she, Kirk, and Michael made their way out of the elite dungeon, her friends had given her some mana potions they’d found. Since none of the two could use magic, they gave her all the mana potions they had on them. So Nina could use her magic at full strength again. She dealt with one of the hellhounds running at her with a fireball. The magical projectile slammed into the creature’s body, setting it aflame instantly. The nauseous scent of burning fur and scorched flesh filled her nostrils. The monster whimpered in pain as it ran in circles as if chasing its tail. Its agony didn’t last long as the creature died in mere seconds.
The other two hellhounds had gotten dangerously close to her. She had a dagger in the sheath strapped around her ankle, but she wasn’t all that good at close-range combat. Her main weapon was offensive magic, so she cast a spell to slow down the two hellhounds and then killed both of them with bolts of electricity.
Unlike her, being a swordsman, Kirk couldn’t keep the hellhounds at bay with magic. Several four-legged evil creatures attacked him from different directions, but he dodged their X-shaped mouths and counterattacked the monsters with his blade. Being an experienced fighter, he was doing pretty good, and Nina allowed herself to glance in the direction where the sorceress and her men had disappeared into the foliage.
There was no sign of the attackers now. Nina was worried sick about Michael. They’d first lost Kwan and now Michael too. Unlike Kwan, however, who had most likely been killed by now, Michael was still alive. Nina and Kirk had witnessed the sorceress touch his head with her crystal-capped staff, and then Michael had seemed to become her obedient servant. The sorceress’s magical staff obviously had an ability to hypnotize people. That was probably why the rest of her men so dutifully and silently complied with her commands. So it meant that unlike Kwan, Michael could still be saved. They only needed to find the sorceress and kill her. But before giving chase, they first had to deal with the rest of the hellhounds.
Just as Nina came to this conclusion, she heard Kirk yelp in pain. She instantly turned to look at him and saw he was still fighting the hellhounds. His left thigh was profusely bleeding from a nasty bitten wound. Favoring his injured leg, he no longer could move as fast as before. Nina mentally scolded herself. Instead of indulging in her musings, she should have been helping Kirk. She shouldn’t have taken it for granted that he would be able to deal with the rest of the hellhounds all on his own. This world was extremely dangerous, and even a small mistake could cost you your life. She should’ve known it by now.
And unlike Kwan and Michael, Kirk wasn’t just a friend to her. She loved him more than life. If something happened to him, the grief would be too intense to bear. If Kirk got killed, she might as well kill herself too. Without him, there wouldn’t be any reason for her to go on in this cruel and harsh world.
Gritting her teeth in anger directed at herself, she held her hands out at the hellhounds surrounding Kirk. She didn’t employ any of her offensive spells, though. The creatures were too close to him, and she was afraid she could accidentally hit him instead of the monsters. She couldn’t slow them down either, because the magic would affect Kirk too. So she settled on using healing magic on him for now. The wound in his hip began to close, and the bleeding stopped. His agility returned to him, and Kirk was no longer in pain. He didn’t thank her, didn’t even glance in her direction. It didn’t bother her, of course. She knew that with the hellhounds surrounding him, he couldn’t afford to turn his attention away from them even for a second.
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Nina waited for the right moment and then launched a bolt of electricity at the hellhound that was the farthest from Kirk, killing the vile creature instantly. At the same time, Kirk attacked another creature, swinging his sword in a downward arc and slashing the monster across its neck. There were only three creatures left. Nina and Kirk dealt with them without much trouble.
After that, they quickly looked around to make sure there were no more hellhounds left.
“Come on,” Kirk said, pointing in the direction the sorceress and her men had disappeared. “They went that way.”
For the next several minutes, they followed the tracks left by their attackers. The sorceress was flying, but her men left so many footprints that it was very easy to spot them even though her Tracking skill wasn’t all that high.
Then the tracks suddenly stopped.
“What the hell,” Kirk muttered looking down at the ground. He examined them for a minute before speaking up again, “The men just came to a stop here and then seemed to just disappear. What happened here?”
“The sorceress might’ve used a teleportation spell,” Nina guessed.
“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Kirk said with obvious disappointment in his voice.
Nina knew what he was thinking. If the sorceress had actually used some sort of teleportation magic, she could be anywhere now and they had no chance of finding her and rescuing Michael. She felt bad for losing Kwan and Michael, but she was glad Kirk was still with her. If it had been him who got enslaved by the sorceress, Nina would’ve been beside herself with anguish. Nina suddenly realized she was glad it’d been Michael whom the sorceress decided to hypnotize first, but she immediately felt ashamed of such a thought. Michael was her friend. Who knew where he was now and what the sorceress was planning to do to him next.
Kirk spoke up, bringing her back from her reverie.
“He said it was the sorceress who’d been chasing him and Kwan the other day,” he said.
“Yeah.”
“Do you think she’s been spying on us all this time?” Kirk asked. “Or did she accidentally stumble across us?”
Nina gave the matter some thought before replying. The sorceress and her men were hiding near the entrance to the elite dungeon, waiting for them to get out. She’d known they’d gone in there beforehand. So, this meant that after Kwan and Michael escaped from her, she must have used some spell to find them. She’d discovered their camp and since then had been keeping tabs on them.
“My guess is that she’s been spying on us all along,” Nina said. “I think she may also know where we live. Though if it’s the case, I’m not sure why she didn’t attack us earlier.”
“Probably because our camp can be easily defended,” Kirk said. “It’s basically a secure fortress.”
“Yeah,” Nina said thinking about the pointed logs surrounding their camp and the tall guard towers rising high above the sharp-tipped logs.
“Alright, let’s go,” Kirk said.
“Where?”
“Home.”
“Is this a good idea, though?” Nina asked with worry in her voice. “I mean if she knows where we live, is it safe for us to return home?”
“If she knows where we live and didn’t attack us before, she probably won’t do it now. She waited for us to be out in the open before she decided to attack us. It means that she knows she’ll fail if she tries to attack our camp. We will be safe. Besides, all our supplies are stored there, and we have nowhere else to go.”
Nina agreed with his point.
“What about Michael, though?” she asked. “We just leave him behind, huh?”
“Do you know where the sorceress took him?”
“No.”
“Me neither. The forest is enormous, and she could be anywhere. We could wander around the trees for months without finding her. I feel awful for being unable to help Michael, but we have no means of finding him. We have no choice but to return home.” Kirk made a brief pause. “However, if the sorceress decides to attack our camp, she’ll most likely bring Michael along, and we’ll get a chance to undo what she did to him.”
Nina nodded. “You’re right. Let’s go home.”