“Help! Help!” inside of the student hunting ground, a young couple were holding each other and running away from a wild boar with protruding fangs in its mouth, hardened and fiery bristle on its back and red, bloodshot and bulging eyes that looked like they would fall off anytime.

 

“Try sending a signal again.” the boyfriend in the couple said: “I’ll distract it.”

 

“Okay, hold on.” the girlfriend lit up a small red fireball in her hand and threw the fireball in the air, while the boyfriend raised his hand crossbow and aimed at the boar’s head. The girlfriend hurled the fireball up at the sky, and at the same time the boyfriend fired his hand crossbow and an especially loud bolt shot at the boar.

 

The boar sniffled and roared, releasing some kind of eerie and even haunting soundwave from its mouth and throat. The loud crossbow bolt was knocked to the side and lost almost all of its strength, and the fireball was impacted by the soundwave in midair and somehow got distinguished without a sound.

 

“Fuck! Help! Help!” the boyfriend yelled: “Help! Is someone here?!”

 

“Help!” the girlfriend also yelled, while struggling to conjure another fireball.

 

A crescent-shaped fiery energy blade shot to the boar’s side, and before the boar could react, the energy blade already struck it on its waist and sent it tumbling to the side and left a bloody and deep wound. The boar screeched in pain, and was still down on the ground even after taking a few moments trying to get up on its feet.

 

“Are you okay? What happened?” a blonde girl wearing combat boots and leather jacket, with a bright orange and translucent axe and a shield with exactly the same color as her weapons.

 

“Careful! That Shape Shifting Boar’s on something strange! ” the girlfriend from the couple warned the girl in combat boots and leather jacket: “It can make some kind of magic breaking sound!”

 

“Please, can you send a distress signal? We’ve exhausted all of our power.” the boyfriend asked.

 

“Okay.” just when the girl in a leather jacket was about to send a fireball upwards, the injured boar unleashed another soundwave.

 

When the soundwave struck, Caroline sensed that her Xuanli was being corroded and her power of mind and will was being shaken and consumed by an eternal source. But she was soon able to shake off the effect and regained her composure.

 

Seeing that its soundwave attack did not take effect, the boar shook its body, its hooves became claws, its legs became longer and its tail became longer and grew a curved spike at its end, like that of a scorpion.

 

Caroline bashed hershield with her axe, and an orange bright red shockwave exploded from her shield. And before the boar could stand up fully, the shockwave already struck its whole body and tore up the ground it was on. While the boar was screaming in pain and tumbling on the ground from the impact of the shockwave, Caroline rushed towards it and swung her axe downwards.

 

The became longer and its blade became bigger but no less sharp in the process, after a short squeal, the boar’s head was separated from its body, with orange and red fire charring the wound and barely any blood was spilled.

 

“Okay.” Caroline turned around, walked to the young couple’s side and handed them her flask: “Drink a little, it helps.”

 

“Thank… thank you.” the boyfriend took the flask and handed it to the girlfriend, while Caroline threw a bright red fireball up in the sky.

 

“What happened? Why did you send the signal while you’re already here?” in less than half a minute, a tall man in a hunting ground ranger’s uniform cloak appeared on their side.

 

“The Shape Shifting Boar chased us here.” the boyfriend from the couple stood up and apologized: “I’m sorry, this is our fault, please understand that this is none of her responsibility - we asked her for help.”

 

“The boar seems to be on something.” Caroline nodded at the couple then turned to the man in the hunting ground ranger’s cloak.

 

“Understood. Please stay here while I take a look. If there’s anything unusual we’d need to report to the academy.” the man nodded and rushed to the corpse of the Shape Shifting Boar.

 

“Are you two okay? ” Caroline asked as the couple handed her back her flask.

 

“Yeah… thanks to you. If not for you we’d be in grave danger.” the boyfriend shook his head and said: “By the way, my name’s William, William Jacobson. This is my fiance’ Rose.”

 

“Thanks for saving us, if there is anything we can do to repay you...”

 

“It’s okay. ” Caroline nodded and took a look at the direction of the man that just came to their assistance: “Excuse me, I think I need to take a look at the boar - something feels quite wrong here.”

 

Caroline didn’t wait for the couple to say anything back and headed to the side of the corpse directly.

 

“You did this?” the man was examining the severed head of the boar and asked: “This is quite a chop, not many students can do this.”

 

“Thanks. My master trained me well.” Caroline knelt down and carefully scooped up some blood from the boar: “This foul smell - it’s poisoned?”

 

“Yes. The only question is what.” the man frowned and took out a dagger: “We may need to look at its stomach. Do you know how to gut it?”

 

“Yeah sure. Let me know what you wanna do.” 

 

“Okay, I will cut its stomach open, you help me hold the cut open, be careful of the smell and acid.” the man infused his power into the dagger, and the dagger started shining in dim silver blue light.

 

With her Xuanli protecting her hands, arms and face, Caroline held the two sides of the belly of the boar open while the man slid his dagger down the boar’s stomach to slice it open. Hot, moist steam with a pungent smell and looked as if it had a light green color released from inside of the boar’s stomach. The inner content of its stomach spilled out, and the first thing Caroline noticed was some small but unmistakable chunks of mushroom.

 

The man in a cloak also noticed the chunks of mushroom, as he picked a small piece up using his dagger and carefully smelled it: “Kekugora! This should be forbidden! How...”

 

Just this moment, a few more staffers of the hunting ground came to the scene.