Six - Direwolves

When the direwolf died, Leylin felt a wave of energy spreading from some unknown place, it pushed past his body and before he knew the world suddenly took a different color!

"What's happening!?"

Not only did the world change colors, even the people around him suddenly stopped moving. Realizing this, he tried to move only to discover that it wasn't possible. Before he could decide what to do, the familiar blue glow of the system appeared once more in front of him, but this time, against his will.

[Warning! A quest has been issued!]

[Quest: Holy Trial (1)

Description: No meal comes without a cost, deep within you lies something coveted by those hiding deep in the dark. The Direwolf King might even regain control over his fate if he were to devour you! Don't let him!

Objective: Kill the Direwolf King without any assistance and devour his heart.

Reward: 1 skill point! (Allows you to increase the level of one skill for free!)

Failure: ??? ]

[Do you accept?]

[Yes/No]

Looking at it carefully, he didn't find anything odd with it,. although the interrogation marks in the failure section did make him gulp, the greed in his heart clouded his judgement. Recovery was already so great at level 1, what if he acquired the next level?

In his mind, he could see himself acting like Piccolo, regrowing his limbs as if it was just a common thing to lose them. Moreover, if recovery could help him heal injuries, what if it could make him immortal at some point? Just the idea was enough to incite him. No matter what, he had to complete this quest!

"Yes!"

As he said so, the world regained its colors and everything went back to normal.

"Everyone, stay close! Girls in front while the boys protect the rear! No matter what happens, go to the carriages under the protection of the knights and the lord magus!"

George, as always took the lead and relayed his orders. Leylin, of course, did as his friend asked. There was no point in trying to run away alone now as they had already been ambushed.

As they ran down, the cries of pain echoed on the battlefield. The knights standing on the carriages even increased their grip on their swords. The gray line that seemed to engulf the borders between day and night was a scene that seemed to have come out of a nightmare.

Hundreds, even thousands of wolves might be surrounding them. Angelo, one of the knights, and also the one with a scarred face, couldn't help but grumble in annoyance, looking at the few carriages with a luxurious outer appearance a few meters away, he knew in his heart that it was finally time for the screening. Still, he couldn't help but feel a sour taste in his mouth. Mages are always proving one thing, that they are mostly horrible people.

"Prepare for battle! Gather the carriages and make a circle formation with them in the center, we will protect every angle."

The other knights nodded and started moving.

Meanwhile, the cries of despair of the kids could be heard from afar. Although they hadn't gone too far before the attack, many wolves had sneaked up on them and mamage to kill a few.

Bessita together with her group of ten was also running away from the plains and towards the carriages. Ourin and his goons protected the rear as they desperately fought against the monsters while trying to keep their pace.

By the time Leylin and the other kids arrived at the carriage, 4 kids had already died!

"Behind us!" Hearing the Knight's orders, the kids quickly entered within the circle made up from the carriages and watched from behind the knights as they pushed back the pack of direwolves.

Looking at the gigantic wave of beasts doing their best to pass the meat grinder that was the wall of knights, George and Leylin couldn't help but stare at each other.

"At this rate, the knights definitely won't be able to hold on! We will have to step in and help." George said as he held his sword firmly in his hand.

"True... but don't be thinking about yourself as a hero, we must be smart and do rotations, each boy in the alliance must keep guard for thirty minutes before being allowed to retreat to rest!"

Hearing those words, George smiled. "Sure, I agree. Everyone, you already heard it! For now, me, Leylin, Yarfuan and Roderick will stand guard. Kassa and the others will wait and switch with us after thirty minutes!"

After that, he also gave orders to the girls, they would be responsible for nursing and giving them things like food and water so that they could keep fighting if the battle lasted a long time.

As the knights waved their swords, drawing lines of blood in the air, one of the wolves finally managed to pass the blockade!

"No! Stay away!" A less fortunate son of a duke, with his fat body and lack of training, wasn't even able to take a step back before stumbling on his own feet and falling on the ground. Before the kids of the Northern Alliance could do anything, the wolf had already munched on his fat belly and was devouring his stomach right in front of them.

The girls and the boys with weaker hearts couldn't stand it and puked right there. Fortunately, someone still had a head over his shoulder and acted while the wolf was distracted, beheading him in one clean fell swoop.

Gulping, Leylin looked away and focused on the area in front of him. The moment a wolf stepped into their territory he acted immediately.

"They are coming!" Leaving this warning behind, his legs tensed as every muscle and tendon worked in tenden to increase his speed. His movements were so fast that some of the kids only saw a flash and blood was spilled on the ground.

"What was that!?" Hearing their exclamation, Leylin only smirked. The techniques described in the Grand Knight's Inheritance contained some deeply profound things that didn't require one to ignite his life force to use. The book calls it Power Dash, it was so novel that it could shortly increase one speed by 0.5, basically adding half the strength of a person into his movement speed.

Leylin wasn't the only one though, when a wolf approached George, he used an over head strike against the beast. Flexing the muscles on his legs, back and arms, he effectively used almost 30% of his body's muscles to deliver a powerful attack that directly split the head of the wolf in two as it fell down to the ground.

Power Slash was another technique that relied on a complex level of control over one's body to achieve a great boost of power in one or more actions. According to the book it could increase the power of an attack up to the strength of three people at most! Meaning that George's last attack had almost being 1 time stronger than his current actual level of strength.

If Leylin didn't know, he would have definitely linked those techniques to those of an actual martial artist, it was definitely worth the title of top tier Grand Knight technique.

After a few hours of fighting, everyone had tired looks on their faces. Leylin who was just about to sit down in order to rest was even forced to stand up again as a new wave of wolves appeared!

Suddenly, many cries of surprise and fear came from the kids.

"W-what is this! Why is it so tough!?" Ourin, who had almost the peak physique of a preparatory knight was shocked at the defense of the bigger wolf!

The new ones with a darker shade of gray on their fur were about twice the size of the common wolves and also a lot stronger too! Somewhat from instinct, Leylin could almost be sure that they were around three to four times stronger than a normal human.

As Ourin struggled to remove the sword from the superficial layer of skin from the wolf, he wasn't able to react quick enough before getting hit on the chest!

The claws of the wolf were fierce and even sharper than their swords. Leaving three bloody gashes on him, it was unknown whether or not Ourin had survived.

At this moment it was Kassa who cried out. When he swung his sword he wasn't even strong enough to damage the surface of the beast. Just as it was about to lunge at him with its mouth wide open, a cry came from behind followed by a large gust of wind!

"Double Swipe: Shockwave!" As Leylin cried on top of his lungs, the life force inside him was stirred slightly. The blade acquired a milky white glow to it as a cross-like shockwave of energy flew towards the creature. The moment it hit the larger wolf, it cried in pain as the energy cut through its body, but it didn't end there, the specialty of the Shockwave was the kinetic energy gathered in it. The moment the shockwave disappeared, the wolf was launched five meters into the air before falling head first on the ground outside of the blockade made by the knights.

Gasping and shaking from fear, Kassa could only give him a thankful glance at this moment.

Not caring in the least, he looked around and sure enough, the magi had decided to act.

Standing up from the small circle they had formed outside of the encirclement made by the knights with the carriages, they couldn't help but complain.

Although the wolves ignored them out of fear, it was still bothersome.

"Damn it! There's too much negative energy here, can you guys do it? The spell model will lose stability if I do it."

Hearing that shameful excuse, an older member of the crew frowned in anger and replied impatiently. "Tsk, forget it then! I won't waste my time discussing with lazy trash like you!"

Raising the staff on his hand, he was about to chant something but was stopped by the beautiful Lady Angelia.

"Don't kill them, rather, separate the leader from the rest."

Frowning, the old man had no choice but to comply.

"Filth bests! Your punishment won't be light!" Waving the staff the magi chanted his spell.

"Zelanar Kethum Prozia!"

"Secondary Energy Firewall!"

The moment those words were spoken, Leylin felt the whole area around him got hotter, when he looked at the source of the rising temperature, he discovered a ring of fire descending from the sky, it even caught the largest wolf of the whole pack by surprise, trapping him inside what looked like a tempest of fire.

Before he could react, he heard Lady Angelia finish her own chanting and before he knew a powerful gust of wind had lifted him off the air!

"S-shit! What's the meaning of this!"

"Dear junior, remember to thank your senior sister later, I'm so kind and caring that I shall give you the opportunity to fully ignite your life force."

Cursing on top of his lungs there was nothing he could do as he was thrown inside the pit of fire created by the magus.

Staring at that scene, George couldn't help but feel fortunate. If he knew that Angelia was a crazy bitch, he wouldn't want to get laid with her. Snickering a little, he couldn't help but give a worried glance towards the flames. "Don't die, you bastard."