Following tracks in the forest after sundown was not easy at all, even if the tracks were those of a limping wolf. When she caught up with Zack, he had clearly lost the track. She, on the other hand, could still more or less follow the trail to their objective. Before advancing further, though, she stopped Zack to make sure they were on the same page regarding the upcoming fight.

“Zack, we need to talk about what are we going to do once we find the thief and wolves.” Gale told Zack. “We need to have a “victory condition” for possible negotiations. You understand what I’m talking about?”.

“Yes, Gale, I’m not stupid.” Zack replied annoyed and impatient. “My goal is for the thief and wolves to leave our village and recover the stolen items (minus the food, I guess). What I really want to do is to fucking destroy the master of the wolves, though”, he continued visibly angry.

“We might not need to actually fight here, and probably for the best, even a single human and three wolves could be bad for just the two of us. But let’s talk fighting: your sword is cool and all, but it has no real sharpness, it’s closer to a club. What can you do with your earth magic?”, Gale inquired, thinking of being the frontliner this time.

“Well, I can make small cracks and protrusions on the ground and summon and send flying boulders more or less the size of a barrel. I also have a much stronger spell, but it’s very slow and takes a long time to cast, probably unlikely to be useful in a fight.” He answered, listing all the things his solo training had given him.

“Ok then, I will be the frontline of the attack, using my speed and sword skills, and you can be the backline, covering me with your magic and disrupting the enemy’s pace. OK, follow me, I can see the trail.”

They continued in the forest for five more minutes, zigzagging around and following the wounded wolf’s trail. They could finally see their destination; it looked like some kind of camp in a clearing in the middle of the forest. There was a green tent between two trees, and a small campfire in front of it. Two wolves were laying close to the fire, while the third one was laying in front of a man that was imposing his hands on top of its wounded leg, with a green light coming out of the wounds. The man, likely in his mid-thirties, looked ragged and badly equipped, probably a traveler with little money. He was tall, thin and had some kind of metal diadem on his head, with three protrusions on it. He also wore some ragged white kind of coat, Gale could not really identify what it was. Inside the tent they could make out some bags of items, likely the stolen loot.

Zack immediately entered the clearing, and loudly addressed the thief. “Thief! We come from the village! Return the stolen goods and leave this place at once, or we might be forced to chase you out!”, he loudly declared. Gale also came out to the clearing, annoyed that he had completely ignored the proper negotiation she had insisted on. She had started to ready her sword and shield.

“HAHAHAHAHA, do you think a kid like yourself with a badly fitting armor and a dull sword can make me do anything?? And who’s with you, you hired an adventurer? A beginner is nothing to worry about either!” he loudly answered, clearly underestimating the pair in front of him. “If you really want to recover your items, kid, come get them!”. He whistled and the three wolves, including the mostly recovered wounded wolf, stood up and positioned themselves in front of their master. Zack and Gale readied themselves in the opposite side of the clearing.

Gale took a step forward, while Zack took a step back. She entered a battle stance, positioning herself sideways with the shield in the front hand while keeping the sword on her back side. This was a more easily defended position from attack from the front or sides. Zack, on the other hand, put his hands on the ground, trying to open a rift once again and trap the leg of a wolf. This time, the three of them jumped forward and spread, ready to start an attack.

The wolves charged the pair from the front, left and right. The front wolf jumped again and tried to bite Gale, but she hit its jaw with her shield and took a step back. Meanwhile, the wolf on the right also tried to attack Gale, but had to dodge a big boulder launched by Zack. The third wolf tried to attack Zack, but he just ducked and the wolf flew past him.

The front wolf tried again to bite Gale, but this time, instead of deflecting the attack she narrowly dodged it by stepping sideways and raising her sword, and made a loud shout after which she beheaded the wolf swiftly in a single strike. Zack was quite surprised she could behead a wolf just like that, in such a smooth motion.

“AAAAAGH, FUCK YOU!! COME BACK TO ME!” the thief shouted, causing the wolves to come back to his front. The wolves were clearly angered, but the man was even more enraged. He then pushed his hands forward, each having a metal rod, and small electrical pulses started flying from them to the metal equipment of the wolves. “NOW I’m serious, you bitch! You and your little rockhead pet are going DOWN!!”, the man shouted.

“A lightning magician!”, Zack told Gale. “That’s how he coordinates the wolves with himself and each other! He sends them instructions through the spikes in the equipment!”. Gale got worried, his control of the two remaining wolves was probably going to increase quite a bit now.

The wolves spread again, surrounding gale from each side. Before they could react, a strong current went from each of the thief’s hands to one of the wolves, only to converge later to Gale standing in between them.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGHH!”, she shouted from pain. Her legs gave out and she kneeled on the floor, her vision blurring and her hands trembling. She had a very hard time not letting go of her sword and shield. Zack needed to act fast, he knew this was very dangerous for Gale. He decided to cast a dual spell: he created a head-sized rock and send it to one of the wolves, while moving the ground beneath the thief. The thief lost his balance and the wolf had to dodge, so the connection was lost and attack finally ended, allowing Gale to start to recover.

“I’m getting tired of you two idiots!! Enough, I’ll show you what is the true power of a trained magician!!”, the thief shouted. He called the wolves back, and pushed his hands up on the air while casting a spell. A magic circle appeared on top of his hands, flashing a yellow light, and he started chanting something. Zack knew that this was going to be a strong spell, requiring intense accumulation and shaping of magical energy through a magic circle. He got really worried now. Gale was not in a condition to run away at full speed, and the wolves were still there, vigilant. They were most likely not going to dodge the attack.

Suddenly, there was a loud crack in the trees behind the thief, getting closer by the moment. A few seconds later, a huge gorilla-like thing appeared from the forest. It was more than three meters tall, had a very muscular body with huge hands and thick arms and legs, and on its head were multiple misshapen eyes, not evenly distributed. It echoed a thunderous roar, making the wolves jump backwards towards Gale and Zack, and the thief to flinch and stumble. The magic circle was interrupted while his face filled with terror.

“This… the lab… it escap-“, he started saying, but was cut short. The monster raised its huge arm and swung it down on top of the thief, immediately crushing him with a disgusting SPLAT sound. When it lifted its gigantic hand, the remains of the thief were hardly recognizable.

Gale felt her fear rising fast. There was no way they could defeat this thing. They needed to run, even if she was not in perfect condition. The monster did not seem to be very fast, so maybe she could make it lose their tracks when she finished recovering from the electric shock. She could already move her legs and arms somewhat.

“Zack, we have to run!”, Gale shouted to Zack while starting to flee. Zack, on the other hand, did not move. “What are you doing?!”, Gale asked in a panic.

“We cannot run! The village is close by! What would happen if this thing got close to them?! We have to kill it here!”, Zack shouted, his arms trembling from fear and tears starting to form I his eyes. The wolves got closer to Gale and Zack, growling at the monster. They seemed to want to kill the thing that killed their master too. Gale, on the other hand, did not know how they were going to accomplish this.

Zack turned around and looked straight at Gale. “Do not worry, I have a plan. I can use my most powerful magic, but it will take time to chant and I need an unmoving target. If you can distract it for a couple of minutes, I can one-shot it!”, Zack said. Gale was not very sure, but decided to believe in Zack anyway. Was she going to be able to work with the wolves? They were certainly used to coordinate with humans…

Meanwhile, the thing had been busy. With a loud breaking sound, it ripped off a tree with both hands, and then proceeded to tear off the branches and roots. With this, it now had a massive two-handed club, which it could wave around. Now it was much more dangerous, and was looking straight at its new targets.

“GUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”. The ground a shook with its mighty roar, and the birds flew away in a long distance around the clearing. Zack started immediately to chant his magic, a big light brown magical circle forming under him on the ground, and planted his hand on it. One of the wolfs jumped forward trying to attack the monster’s head, but it swung the club fast and hit it square on its flank, sending it flying towards the far end of the clearing, making a visible splatter upon landing. It was very much dead.

Gale looked at the other wolf, and it looked back at her. Then, they turned and faced the beast. The wolf was much more mobile than her, while she had the potential for much more damage, so it needed to be the distraction. The wolf clearly understood something similar to that, since it ran close to the monster and started circling it around. Even if it had a lot of eyes, there was still a blind spot on its back, and it could not reach the wolf with club anyway back there. Gale was slowly approaching it, trying not to be noticed. Obviously, the monster was also looking at her, but every time it tried to properly focus an attack on her the wolf would bite its hand or leg or foot, so it was forced to focus on the wolf once again.

Gale got close to the gigantic monster in time to watch it narrowly miss the wolf: it had decided to stop and attack in the opposite direction the wolf was running in circles, so the wolf almost came straight to its death. After tumbling out of the attack, the wolf was able to jump on the arm and bite the head of the monster, damaging some of its eyes (most of what composed its head). This enraged the monster, that hit the floor two times with its club and made another mighty roar, extending its arms to show dominance.

This was Gale’s chance. “Zack, footing!”, she shouted to Zack. He did not really hear her, but was looking at the monster from the roar, so he caught Gale’s intentions. He pushed forward one arm for a second and a small mound of land lifted in front of Gale. That was enough for her to jump running towards the monster, raising her sword. She came down straight besides the hand of the club, and was able to slice the hand clean off with the momentum of the fall. Zack was really surprised again; the monster had such a thick arm, and she was able to cut through it just like that.

With its hand off, the monster went crazy with rage. It started jumping and swinging its arms wildly. In this enraged state, the situation got much more dire. Gale knew that she and the wolf were not going to last much, they needed to end the fight as soon as possible.

“Ready!”, Zack shouted. Now she needed to stop the monster for a few seconds for the attack to work, which is easier said than done. She had an idea, but it was quite risky. The monster was clearly focused on her, so she decided to try to trick it into making a wide attack that would give her an opening. She got some distance and started taunting it with her hand. The monster saw and went to attack her. Still, instead of a charge like she was expecting, it jumped forward with its arm raised and then then fell on her position traying to smash her like it had done to the thief. But she noticed and dodged jumping forward a long distance, after which she used the ground to jump the other way and appear behind the legs of the monster, where she sliced its knees. The monster wailed and dropped to its knees, to which Gale shouted to Zack “NOW!!”.

Zack released his attack, and a similar looking magic circle appeared under the monster for a moment, right before a tall, wide spike made out rock came out of it. It pierced the monster starting from the crotch and coming out right besides it head. After a couple of final spasms, the monster died, its internals organs destroyed, covering the spike and surrounding ground with its blood. It made quite the disturbing sight.

But they had won. THEY. HAD. WON. “WOOOOOOOOOOO!!!” shouted Gale, echoed by Zack a few meters off. They looked at each other and ran to meet, where they hugged tightly. In the heat on the moment, they exchanged a deep kiss full of their adrenaline. They had killed a huge monster and saved the village! They were euphoric, laughing and jumping while hugging.

When the high of the moment died down, they got quite embarrassed from their kiss and avoided looking at each other for a few second, both red with embarrassment. After regaining their composure, they decided to lay down for a while in the clearing, it was quite late in the night. They slept for a little while, but woke up still in the night and decided to discuss what to do next. They could now take the stolen loot back to the village, even if there had been quite a few unexpected situations, but what about the wolf? Since it had helped them fight the monster and was trained, Zack thought that it was better to bring it back to the village. Also, they would report the events to the mayor, and then to Astidia for an investigation, specially about the monster tuned statue a few meters off.

They grabbed the four bags of stolen goods and started going back, each carrying one on their non-sword hand, and the wolf carrying two on its back, tied together. “So, Gale, I wanted to ask you something for a while now. How are you able to do those things?” Zack asked.

“Which things?” Gale responded, not understanding.

“You know, like jumping more than two meters when slicing the hand of the monster, or cutting the hand clean off, or jumping forward four meters when the monster jumped at you and immediately come back two. I’ve never seen anything like that!” Zack said, clearly impressed by her prowess.

“I--- I did what? It just kinda happened, I guess? I just did.” Gale answered, now confused and surprised by the events Zack was describing. She had not noticed that those distances were so big, or that the cuts were so hard to make. Was she more skilled than she thought?

Finally, they were reaching the edge of the forest. They could see the faint blue light of the sunrise in the prairie. It must have been later than they originally thought. Wait, blue? That cannot be right… They looked at each other, their blood running cold, and ran full sprint towards the village.

­****************************************

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaa…..”, the child screamed as he died fast under the holy blue flame of the sacrifice, such was the mercy of the Lord. With this, 17 sacrifices have been acquired in this village alone. Raig, a 35-year-old mid-class wind mage in the order of the Origin of Faith, dressed in a leather armor and carrying a bow, was beyond pleased. He had been chosen as a recently promoted member to participate in one of the teams completing the holy task of acquiring the 100.000 human sacrifices needed to summon The Lord and create an eternal paradise in earth. It had been his idea to attack swiftly the small farming villages far from the capital to slowly acquire their quota without much suspicion. This was already the 9^th village, and so far, things had gone smoothly.

He was also quite glad about his two companions, the 43-year-old holy flame mage completely covered by his robe and hood, and the 45-year-old high-ranking official of the order, covered in a thick magic armor and wielding a big shield and sword combo. He was one of the 10 Holy Paladins, and being in his presence was quite the honor. Thanks to his tremendous prowess, no village was able to even begin putting up a fight. They were going to finish in no time with any difficulties. He was sure their Lord was pleased.

Still, they were missing a target, according to their records, after finding the tomb of one of the villagers. The success of the plan hinged on leaving no witnesses, so they needed to be thorough. Still, even as all the ruined buildings burned in their holy blue color, they had been unable to find him.

Suddenly, they heard a loud shout. “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!”, a young-looking man shouted from the end of the forest. He seemed to be accompanied by a big wolf and what looked to be a young adventurer. Was he the missing villager? In any case, they both had seen them, so they needed to die.

While the adventurer collapsed to her knees, clearly overwhelmed by the discovery, the man and the wolf rushed forward, as he shouted “I’M GOING TO FUCKING MURDER ALL OF YOU!!!!!”.

A fight was about to start, so their leader walked forward to face the enemies. The man created two big light brown earth magic circles on his hands, and launched forward two boulders the size of barrels, one to Raig and the other to the magician. Their leader simply stood his ground and created two earth walls in front of each of them, tanking the boulders, which shattered and fell to the ground. This time, the man created a two-handed massive circle in front of him, and launched a piercing conical rock, the size of a man, towards the holy paladin. In this case, he created a deep blue magic circle in front of him, which gave a blue radiance to his hands. When he put them forward, a viscous substance appeared from them, which he used to catch the rock and lightly modify its trajectory, making it land besides him, without harming anyone.

Raig readied his bow and arrows, and with an azure magic circle covered the two arrows in his bow with wind magic, in this case a spin-piercing spell. He was ready to fire when needed, providing support to his leader. The leader, meanwhile, casted two extra earth magic circles: one spell grabbed the leg of the man, making him fall on his face, while the other moved the paladin towards him. In this moment, Raig launched his two arrows towards the wolf, who was about to help the man, piercing his head and chest and immediately killing him.

The man tried to his the paladin with his strange black sword, but he just deflected it with his shield, and slashed at the man with his sword. The man fell to the ground, unmoving, so the magician rushed forward. A sacrifice is only valid if the cause of death was the holy flame. Once again, he casted the dark blue circle on his hands and launched the flame, which almost instantly ended the life of the man. Only the adventurer was left.

Suddenly, a strong shockwave went through the prairie, slightly pushing the men and grabbing their attention. The woman was standing in a savage looking position, with the knees spread, one hand forward and the other raised with her sword, bent on her waist. She looked like a beast about to pounce. Her azure hair was slightly floating, and the ends of her hair were shining in a deep red color, just like her eyes. She radiated an immense pressure of violence.

Raig and the magician took a few steps back, reading their respective spells, while the paladin stepped forward and covered himself in a deep blue magic spherical shield, surrounding him completely. In a flash, a second shockwave was felt as the woman jumped forward and appeared in front of the paladin. She raised her sword and brought it down.

BOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!

A tremendous pulse of wind rushed the village and made Raig cover his face with his arm. As he looked again, he found a deep cut in the ground in front of the woman, all the way to the house in front of her, also cleft in half. On each side of her he could see the vertical halves of the corpse of the paladin, his shield having exploded, and his magical armor cut as if it was made of butter.

“IIIIIIIIIIH”, shouted the magician. This made the woman turn to him, and with another mighty jump appeared in front of him. Raig was completely paralyzed from fear and could only watch the carnage unfold. The magician raised his hand to launch a magical attack, but she was already besides him. With a swift motion, she first slashed his arm off, and then horizontally cut his chest. Once again a powerful gust assaulted Raig, and when he looked again the two halves of the former magician had been sent flying.

Finally, she turned to him. He could only watch in silence, as she appeared in front of him, as she readied her fist and covered it in wind and fire, and as said first approached his face. He started praying in his mind “Oh, lord, have mer-“ .