Journey through Wilderness

Time to get a move on. He decided to leave the city and put his bad mood

behind him as quickly as possible.

After walking east along the road into the forest for a while, Lule checked to

see if anyone was nearby, before deliberately straying off the road. It was still

early in the morning, so the forest fog made everything difficult to see. Kyle

leisurely started to run.

But as soon as he started to run he saw some figures ahead of him blocking his path. It was a horde of goblins. Kyle took out his daggers and enhanced his physical abilities. He cut down goblin's heads before they even realized anything. Their eyes wide opened in shock.

Even one step outside of the city walls exposed you to the risk of being

attacked by monsters and carnivorous animals; that risk rose exponentially

once you entered the forest proper. That's why he was extremely cautious in his journey. He met many monsters during his journey. Kyle avoided most of them but he still had to engage in fights with many of them. He finally realized why the jorney through wilderness was considered so difficult. If not for his endlless supply of magic essence he would have been exhausted by now.

Many days passed on his journey. Kyle travels during day and camps during night. Through halfway of his journey Kyle was camping again. He looked ahead. There was a large tree that was so large that it was breaching through clouds. "It seems to be getting bigger and bigger as I am getting close to it." Kyle said in awe. He was seeing this tree from the starting of his journey. It was helping him to navigate directions. Not to mention he was a getting a special feeling as he looks towards the tree. And it was getting more and more intense as he got near it. It was one of the reasons that he decided to get more and more near it.

With a weary sigh, Kyle looked up at the sky. He couldn't see that far, even

with the campfire and his night-adjusted vision, but he could spy a sky full of

stars through the gaps of the trees.

With his sleepiness completely faded, Kyle warmed himself up by the campfire

and boiled some water to drink. The flames flickered, illuminating his face. As he prodded the dying embers with a stick, a soft wind brushed gently against his

body.

Hm? Kyle turned in the direction the wind blew from.

There stood a single silver wolf; it was huge — easily several meters from

head to tail.

Just when did it get so close?!

Kyle grit his teeth, then jumped to his feet, drawing his sword from its

scabbard. The silver wolf in front of him showed absolutely no signs of the

ferocity expected from a beast; its presence was incredibly weak. Despite its

wolf shape, there was something unnatural about it — almost like it didn't exist.

Kyle fixed his eyes on the silver wolf, unwilling to let it out of his sights. It felt

like the moment he let his eyes drift, the wolf would disperse into nothing.

Suddenly, the silver wolf began to glow; a torrent of light spread throughout

its surroundings. White flooded Kyle's vision, making him shut his eyes

involuntarily.

Oh, no... it's got my sight — just as that thought passed through his mind, Kyle felt multiple presences appear around him, one after another.

They were hiding! Are they demi-humans?! How did they know I was here?

Despite his surprise, Kyle calmly analyzed his current situation. But even as he

was doing that, the demi-human group continued to approach.

Time was up — he didn't have any more time to think.

Kyle lightly stomped on the ground, flooding essence into the surrounding dirt.

The dirt around the shelter rose out of the ground, forming a wall where he was slepping . He could tell the attackers were slightly confused by the way they

stirred in response, but they weren't naive enough to let their guard down just

like that.

Kyle's vision had yet to recover, but he could tell they had completely

surrounded him. He sensed that one of them was rapidly approaching him,

which prompted him to dodge by jumping to the side. As soon as he proved

that he could respond to the surprise attack even while blinded, the air around

the attackers intensified at once.

Kyle raised his defenses even more.

He might have managed to evade the first attack, but his vision was still

blurry, and he didn't have a read on the opponent's strength — anyone could

tell that this situation was bad. His only saving grace was the fact that they were

aiming to capture him alive... probably. After all, there were countless other

ways they could have approached him if they intended on killing him.

Which meant that negotiation should be possible.

With that in mind, Kyle opened his mouth — but the first presence who had

attacked him clicked their tongue impatiently and launched a second attack.

"Hey, wait a minute!" Kyle called out in a rush, but his opponent showed no

sign of stopping. Left with no other choice, Kyle prepared to activate another

magic-mimicking abnormal ability, keeping the intensity of the situation in

check.

It wasn't an offensive technique: it was an imitation of William's magic techique

that allowed him to pour his essence into his surroundings and detect reacting

essence, much like a sonar. His true aim was to use it as a temporary substitute

for his lost vision. He'd be able to detect the numbers and positions of his

opponents.

"Uzura, stand back! This guy is using some kind of spirit art!"

A girl standing on the edge of the circle surrounding Kyle — who appeared to

be the same age as him, with long silver-blonde hair and wolf ears poking out of

her head — shouted in a language Kyle didn't understand. In response to the

first girl's voice, the boy named Uzura— who appeared to be in his midtwenties and sprouted beautiful dragon wings from his back — froze in hisapproach.

"It's all right... it's just a art that detects nearby ode!" Another girl in the

circle — also similar in age to Kyle but with magnificently long, emerald-gold hair

and somewhat rounded elf ears — immediately chimed in.

"He shouldn't be able to see yet, but it would be wise to assume he knows our

numbers and positions now. Good grief..." a short boy standing next to the elf said with a sigh.