Jackson pulled a blue Beast Crystal from the skull of a small animal with a dagger embedded in its chest, it was about the size of a small dog and resembled an armadillo, it had tried to ambush Jackson while he was walking from one of the trees above him. Unfortunately for it Jackson had turned around fast enough to meet its eyes as it was descending, [Gaze of the King] activated instantly as its body froze in time instantly.
He naturally didn't waste the opportunity to pull out his knife and move to the side only for the creature to resume falling and become confused after realising its prey had disappeared from beneath it. In its confusion it hadn't noticed Jacksons' dagger stabbing towards it and had subsequently lost its life.
He was somewhat annoyed at the fact he'd wasted another one of his uses of his talent for the day but this encounter had just proved how easy it was for you to meet the eyes of your enemy in battle, whether intentionally or unintentionally it happened and it was just something he was going to have to learn to avoid.
He sighed as he crushed the Crystal, 'Hopefully I won't end up needing it later..' He thought silently as he felt the energy of the Crystal begin to surge through his arm, "Huh?" He let out a surprised cry as he realised that something was different this time, the energy didn't spread across his body and disappear like the last two times.
Instead it surged towards his brain and curled itself into a ball as it nestled itself in his mind, the feeling was extremely strange but it was painless and even felt pleasant.
His heart began to beat faster as he read a new set of words that appeared in his mind the moment the 'ball' had settled and stopped resonating energy.
[Skill Acquired!]
[Skill: Wind of the Wanderer]
[Activation of this skill will result in an 1.5 times increase to the Agility Rating and will remain active for five minutes.]
[Skill Cooldown: 10 Minutes]
It was mediocre in comparison to the skills he'd heard about while living in Mayson, in fact it might even be one of the weakest agility enhancing skills he'd ever heard of but that didn't matter to Jackson as he grinned with satisfaction at finally gaining his first skill.
He glanced at the corpse of the beast and decided to bring it with him after some hesitation, it was light enough that when he picked it up it barely impacted his movement as he started to race through the trees, he still had plenty of time left in the day to cover ground as the sun had only just begun to peak in the sky.
Jackson hesitated as he dodged between the trees with minimal effort, if he activated [Wind of the Wanderer] he could cover more ground at a faster rate but if he lost control and crashed into a tree by mistake he'd end up both hurt and would have to wait ten minutes before he could use the skill again.
However, he was curious as to how fast he would go if he activated it right now and naturally curiosity won over logic as he willed for the skill to activate in his mind. He felt a surge of power come from the ball in his mind as it spread across his body before converging in his feet and letting off a constant stream of power that made him move even faster than he had before.
The trees began to slightly blur together as he raced through them at a newfound speed. Of course, this 'blur' effect was only because his speed was almost reaching the point where it was becoming difficult for his mind to process the world around him as he moved.
Despite how fast he thought he was moving it was still a fact that his agility was only on par with an F+ Rating, with the enhancement from his skill it was at most comparable to someone with an E- Rating so it was still within the limits of what his E+ Intelligence could handle for the time being.
Five minutes quickly passed and the skill deactivated not a second too soon or too late.
The thrill quickly died down as he had to readjust to the sudden drop in speed which almost caused him to crash into a tree from his own carelessness, fortunately he had regained his footing fast enough to avoid it or else he probably would've ended up using the corpse he was carrying as a pillow to cushion his fall.
He continued to run without faulting or strain as his endurance continued to carry him otherwise with how fast he'd been running he'd have long been out of breath before reaching this point.
"¡Ponte en posicion!" A voice from the distance forced him to come to a stop almost simply from the shock, he couldn't determine the language from how faint it was but it was definitely a human that was unquestionable, this fact only became further affirmed as he got closer to the source and heard more voices and the sounds of battle.
¡Mátalo!
He soon found himself approaching an open plains, finally having left the forest after so long as he reached the source of the voices he'd been hearing for the past couple of minutes. Just a few tens of metres away there was a group of Hunters holding various weapons ranging from spears to swords as they fought against bear-like creatures that towered above them.
There were at least thirty Hunters in the group but they were still slowly losing as more of them were either killed or wounded by the bears with just a simple swipe of their claws. It was obvious that they were severely outmatched compared to their opponents as several corpses littered the grassy surroundings and yet the beasts only had minor wounds ranging from light cuts to simply missing patches of fur that'd been cut off instead of their skin.
Jackson could tell that if it continued like this it would eventually end up with the deaths of all the Hunters, "Can't let that happen.." He mumbled as he began to think about how he could help, he could obviously use [Gaze of the King] but with how they were barely scratching the beasts he doubted that they'd be able to kill it even if it was frozen for a second.
Not to mention they'd have to deal with the remaining five even if they succeeded and using his talent past the amount of 'free-passes' he was given in a day wasn't an option for him.
He even considered getting involved himself but he doubted he was stronger than any of the Hunters there, it was even likely that he was much weaker than them. Rushing into the middle of the battle would only result in him getting killed, "The only way any of them are going to survive is if I use that way."
The idea that he'd come up with was that if he froze one of them they'd have just enough time to rush past it, anyone who was too slow would end up using their lives to slow them down and let the others escape, it was cruel but it was the only scenario where he could imagine anyone coming out alive.
Crrr...
A branch snapped behind him that caused him to freeze.
"Awooooooooooo...."
A long drawn out piercing howl came from somewhere close behind him, the howl hung in the air for several seconds before fading to silence. Slowly, Jackson turned to see a pack of wolves staring him down, he quickly avoided meeting any of their gazes so he didn't accidentally freeze one of them...
