Still reeling a bit after the unexpected encounter, I appeared at the top of the mountain. I didn’t know the odds of meeting another traveler during the final challenge of this planet, but they had to be tiny, even if the encounter was apparently orchestrated to some degree. A chorus of howls emerged from the forest, loud enough to still be heard way up the mountain, probably signaling the start of the hunt. I looked down at the forest, wondering what the crazy traveler was up to, and couldn’t help but hesitate a little.
Coming into this quest, I had been ready to sweep the competition and move on. I was even looking forward to seeing what kind of monsters could make it down here while flexing my superior strength for a bit. Yet, that one short conversation had felt like an ice bucket being poured over me, taking the fun out of the challenge. My emotions were in flux as I tried to come to terms with what had just happened and would need to happen soon. Not counting the travelers that saved me from becoming voidling food, this was the first proper encounter I had with another traveler. I couldn’t even properly talk to the group that saved me.
I took out the business card I’d been given after that fateful encounter and stared at it for a long while. I couldn’t read what it said, but fairly soon, I should be able to find out. I wanted to properly thank them, since they literally saved my life in an inescapable situation. But if I wanted to do that, I needed to kill another traveler. Sure, that guy was fucking nuts, talking about slaughtering the innocents like it was his dearest Christmas wish, but it still felt wrong somehow. Killing the guy wouldn’t be much different from taking out a monster, which I’d done thousands of times by now, especially since he very clearly was a threat to other people.
Yet, I couldn’t quite put my finger on why I was hesitating.
I kept thinking about it for a bit longer, but was eventually pulled out of it when a colorful wolf burst out of the forest. It was the blue one, running towards the lake. Shortly after, the pink one appeared, booking it into the grassy plain, followed by the green wolf bounding up the base of the mountain. It would seem that they had split up to search for me, which was a big mistake. I stored the business card away and steeled myself for the fight to come. No matter what my thoughts on the situation were, Caedus needed to go, for more than one reason. Shelving my emotions for a therapy session in the future, I shifted my mindset back to combat readiness.
I don’t know why they thought splitting up would be a good idea, but I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. If they were nice enough to split the party, I might as well take advantage and take them out one at a time. The ability to teleport would give me an unbeatable edge, at least until they got wise to my strategy and teamed up again. For now, the green wolf was running up the mountain looking for me, so I’d prepare a little surprise for it. I gave it some more time to separate from the pack before I made my move.
I teleported behind the wolf, a full array of javelins at the ready, and immediately started my barrage. Displaying a crazy reaction time, the wolf managed to get a skill off, which was apparently some kind of evasive skill. All of my jevelins went through its body like it wasn’t even there, the explosions likewise having no effect. I momentarily stopped firing, waiting for the skill to run out with some slight annoyance. My attack would no doubt have revealed my position, attracting the rest of the pack. I was confident that I could take out the lone wolf decently fast, but every second wasted gave the pack more time to catch up and help.
Before the skill ran out, though, the green wolf let out a quick bark that oddly echoed through the area. I was immediately suspicious, but nothing could’ve prepared me for the black wolf appearing in mid-air right next to me, already mid swing. I had barely a moment to regret underestimating the wolf by not putting up my shield spell when glowing, unnaturally long claws impacted me, sending me crashing into the ground. I impacted the mountain hard, a substantial amount of HP going missing as I writhed in pain. The claws had gouged my side, four gaping wounds decorating my body.
I immediately rectified my mistake by casting shield, wary of follow-up attacks, while profusely thanking my crystal symbiotes. Without the armor they provided, I might have been bisected just now. Just as expected, the next attack crashed into my shield. The wolf looked through the transparent force field, stopping it from ripping me in half, with a crazed look in its eyes. I could not spot a hint of the man I’d just talked to, now fully replaced by a bloodthirsty monster. Looking into Caedus’ eyes made me feel a small amount of fear, and I teleported away to buy some time and readjust my plans.
As soon as I was gone, reappearing by the lake, the feeling of fear vanished, making me believe it was caused by a skill rather than my actual feelings. Thankfully, I had some mind protection in the form of a passive, which probably alleviated quite a bit of the fear effect. I suspected that without it, I’d have flown into a full-on panic, which would’ve put me on the back foot. I shook off the momentary confusion, getting my head back into the game. Yes, the wolf was “just” a tier eight, like the other monsters down here were, but he was also a traveler. Just like me, he no doubt had received copious opportunities to grow stronger beyond our tier, and I should treat him as such.
This wasn’t another fight against a barely sentient monster, but against a beefed-up, intelligent murder machine.
I didn’t get a lot of time to gather my thoughts before I spotted the blue wolf coming at me. It was bounding along the lake shore at a crazy speed, giving me only seconds to react. All of a sudden, the wolves' reason for splitting up became apparent. The whole point was to shut down the advantage I gained from teleporting by setting up their own teleport network. Granted, their version had a lot more limitations, but the whole thing seemed well practiced, making it quite effective in the end.
A void rend split reality apart, a plethora of void javelins hot on its tail, but once again, the wolf used some sort of evasive skill to dodge everything. That was annoying, but not unexpected. I was already cobbling together another void rend for what was no doubt about to follow. Predictably, an echoing bark summoned the alpha already in the middle of an attack. This time, though, he was greeted by my own spell, reality getting torn apart once again. The black wolf was in the middle of an attack, and couldn’t react in time, the shift in reality seemingly cutting him in half before the rip in space violently readjusted itself.
I’d already jumped backward through a void portal, just in case, and was observing the result of my attack from a safe distance. The spell had hit point-blank, which was absolutely devastating, yet I couldn’t rule out that Caedus had an ace up his sleeve. To my surprise, the black wolf seemed entirely unaffected by my spell, whipping about to face me in the distance. The secret of his miraculous survival was revealed immediately, though, as the blue wolf got a nasty cut down its entire length where my spell would’ve hit Caedus. This almost crippled the blue wolf, but it wasn’t dead yet.
Some kind of damage transfer, most likely. I’d read in the asphons library about monsters possessing skills like this, mostly the ones roaming around in packs or primitive societies, such as goblin kings, harpy queens, or the alpha of a wolf pack. Seeing as the blue one didn’t die immediately, the skill must either have a mitigating effect or the damage was spread over the entire pack. Honestly, I didn’t know which one would be easier to deal with, but I did know that it was annoying.
For now, I decided to stay put. The secondary wolf was limping along, and while the other ones might also be hurt, I couldn’t know for sure and didn’t want to bet on an uncertainty. My poison domain expanded in an attempt to switch up tactics. The wolves had proven to be nimble and hard to hit, so perhaps a slow but steady approach was the way to go. I loaded both of the wolves up with poison, keeping Caedus at bay via a minimized void javelin volley. Going all in on the tactic, I started fueling another poison mist, spread poison caltrops around the area, activated both my poison and ancient void aura, and used poison bombs as area denial, making Caedus’ approach almost impossible.
To the wolf's credit, he wasn’t getting hit with a lot of spells, displaying a level of speed and maneuverability that I’d only seen from some high-level asphons so far. I was so focused on Caedus that I’d failed to pay proper attention to his blue friend. As such, a small blue projectile managed to snake into my personal space, exploding into roiling smoke on impact with my shield. Not wanting to deal with an unknown smoke, I decided to teleport away. The spell matrix snapped into place with practiced ease, but instead of teleporting me like usual, the matrix exploded in my face, sending me skittering over the dirt. Unfortunately, the explosion had taken place within my shield, so another chunk of my HP got shaved off.
Note to self: Don’t cast spells in the suspicious smoke.
I didn’t have time to be properly annoyed at having a spell fail like that, since Caedus was on me pretty much immediately. His mouth was wide open, a giant, ghostly version of his snout overlaid on top of it, which snapped closed around my shield. He clamped down with force and refused to let go, which caused a frighteningly fast drain of my MP. I could barely spot a spell matrix appearing for a split second before a rain of icicles started hammering on my shield as well. With a curse, I cast teleport once again, the earlier explosion thankfully blasting me out of the smoke. I reappeared about a kilometer away, high above the lake, and snapped open wings to glide.
That little stunt had cost me quite a bit of mana. Not enough to make me worry, but if things continued like this, I might have a problem. I looked at the two wolves on the shore, who had apparently not figured out where I’d gone yet with annoyance. I couldn’t help but think back to the short conversation I had with Caedus, and how he apparently knew about me before descending. Did that guy actually know about my abilities and had planned counters beforehand? Things were going a bit too one-sided for my tastes, so that had to be it.
I wish I could formulate some crazy plan to counteract their strategies against me, but I’d never been one for tactical thinking. But if there was one thing I was good at, it was using overwhelming force. And it was starting to look like I needed to apply more of it.