Chapter 5 - Rin

I perk up as something catches my attention. Rem is still driving even though it's almost sun high and we've been on the road for hours. Miles like the kid he always is even for his experience is napping away in the cart. Switching to a kneeling position I take a closer look at the way we came on the road.

A shadow of something lean darts through the trees on my left about five tens feet back. I reach back for my bag before hesitating.

"Fuck," I whisper, "use my rifle and we get compromised."

With an agitated sigh I pull out my longbow and notch an arrow. As I wait to get a clear shot I see another movement to the right side about the same distance back.

"Miles!" I mutter loudly to wake him, "get out your crossbow we're being stalked again!"

"Huh?" Miles replies waking up, "oh shit yeah, what is it this time?"

"I don't know yet, but no powder weapons"

I don't dare take my eyes off the targets and feel Miles get into position next to me.

"I count one… two… three… four… eight total creatures, four on each side. If I didn't know better I'd say they're waiting for us to reach the full pack that might lie ahead," Miles says.

"Fucking shit, can you tell what they are?" I reply.

"No, not yet at least."

A rustle of trees right beside us on the left, alerts us and spooks the horses. I turn quickly while Miles faces the other direction. If this is a trap then always check your back or risk being blind-sided. Hunter training one o' one. Rem calms the horses before pulling out his trusted dagger.

Then the trap sprung, eight wolves with black fur come charging up the road while a wolf on each side of the cart lunge at Miles and I. We launch our arrows straight into the two lunging wolves' throats. Rem yells out a warning as he sees more wolves running past us in the trees,

"UNDER ATTACK! LEFT FLANK! RIGHT FLANK! PREPARE TO FIGHT!"

With the warning called out people armed themselves with bows, swords, spears... whatever they had on them at the ready. Miles and I take turns to reload watching the other's back. After only three seconds we launched arrows at the approaching wolves behind us. It took both our arrows just to take down one as they became aware they were not getting easy food today. A wolf lunges at Rem.

"Die fucker!" Rem yells slashing its throat open. Golden coloured blood pours all over him as the body falls away under the cart.

In the distance we hear Sora calling orders as battle rages at the front bringing the caravan to a standstill. Miles loosens another arrow, taking out a wolf coming for Rem's backside.

"Where the hell are they coming from!" I yell as ten more wolves pour onto the road.

"I don't know!" Miles yells as he pulls out his whip. The sheer amount of wolves is too much for the slow steady hits of the arrows at this point.

I switch to my shortsword as well stabbing at the wolves in flurry while dodging the ten footer frost enchanted whip. Rem at this point has also given up and joined us on the cart as five remaining wolves prepare to lunge at us.

"Magic?" I ask Rem under my breath.

"No point in hiding it!" he yells back. Rem's blade I see out of the corner of my eye glows with a blue light before lightning crackles as the dagger rips open the side of a wolf.

I respond in kind by making my own blade glow green and cleanly giving the wolf attacking me a cut down the side and punching it off the cart with my other hand. Other carts are also quickly whittling down the wolves attacking them.

"Over there!" Rem calls out, indicating down the road behind the rear of the caravan. I look over and sure enough there it is, the pack alpha.

"Oh you've got to be kidding me, a fucking dire wolf?" I protest, "Miles it's on you, we'll give you cover."

"On it!" Miles replies before turning invisible. The lurching of the cart is the only sign that tells me he jumped off the cart. Rem sends a long ranged lightning strike off his blade into the wolf obstructing Miles' way. All I see is a faint blue glow before that same wolf has frost spread across its two front legs, causing it to trip. A wolf tries to take advantage of my distracted state, but I quickly duck and pop up driving my blade through its lungs and heart, absolutely covering myself in blood.

"I think that's the last of the pack," I say, shoving the body off me.

"Hurry! we need to give Miles backup!" Rem says jumping off the cart.

As we rush forward, we see Miles has a long gash in his left arm as he swings the whip at its max length to stay out of reach of the dire wolf in his right hand. I switch to my bow again and fire two well placed shots between the shoulderblades. As I see Rem reach for his favourite weapon, I say,

"Don't, only Hunters are allowed firearms you'll give us away!"

"Fine," Rem replies, "Shatter!"

With that word the air around the dire wolf turns into a weird form of glass and shatters covering the area in thin air blades before dissipating. Miles takes advantage of the surprised dire wolf and with his left arm drives his rapier down the throat effectively killing it.

Rem and I reach Miles a few seconds later. At that moment all of our right hands on the backs glow for a second. Rem and Miles's are red while mine is green, due to our adventuring classes.

"Looks like we got an increase in adventure levels," I say out of breath.

"Hell yeah!" Miles says, pumping his hands in the air.

I look back at the caravan, it seems the rest of the wolves have either died or run off sensing the death of their alpha.

"Come on, let's get this dire wolf 'cleaned'," Rem says, taking his dagger and carefully cutting the pelt in precise spots.

"Yeah sure," I say, pulling out my own dagger, "Miles, can you get the 4 glass bottles and fill them up with the gold blood of the smaller wolves? Thanks"

"Yeah sure," Miles replies, already headed that way.

About an hour later the entire caravan recovered and had a meal before heading out once again for the land of ice and wind.