In the forest at noon.
The ground was filled with blood from corpses that had every single bone broken. The various beast had come out and dragged the corpses from the rumbled out, only to start feasting upon them.
Those beasts greedily devoured those corpses that once were the predators of this whole territory of the forest.
Though most of them came to relieve their hunger, among them was a three meters tall bear with a missing eye that was destroying the corpse altogether instead of eating them,
Compared to the other beast, he was influenced by the flowing mana which made him gain greater intelligence and a stronger, bigger body.
Many of the beasts who were to meet that bear would either try to escape or die trying.
Once he realized that fact, he knew that he was the strongest of all in this territory.
Alas, it was naive.
Once the bear met the golden-eyed wolf, for the first time it experienced defeat.
Ever since the battle against the golden eyes wolf happend and miserably lost one of his eyes.
It knew that its dream wasn´t ever going to happend.
But once he saw the terrifying wolf being chased down by a dark beast, he finally found hope.
It wasn´t stupid enough to go and try to help the dark beast kill the wolf.
If the wolf itself is running away from that thing, it means it´s something beyond his capabilities.
Instead, he went towards the intense smell of blood from the direction where those two came running from.
Following that he met a whole graveyard of lying three-eyed wolves.
Guessing what happend, the wolf and his pack fought the black beast only to lose in the end.
Once his small brain finally came to that conclusion it laughed maniacally.
If the golden-eyed wolf were to be gone, then he would be the next overlord of this whole territory!
Imagining the bright future awaiting him without the wolf, he decided to have some fun with the corpses of his nemesis pact.
Though he didn´t know why they were under some rumble and why some pole with a metal stick was stuck in a wolf's body, it didn´t care.
After he was done, he would be the next king of this place.
But as if he was devouring and cutting the corpses into small pieces, five small figures appeared from his side.
Being in the middle of a feast, the bear failed to notice them.
"[Fireball]..." one of the figures raised her staff and after a few words, a small ball of fire appeared and shortly shot towards the bear.
Though the ball was small in size, once the fireball made contact with the bear, it exploded and engulfed his whole body in flames.
"Gwaagh!" Surprised, the bear fell to the side and screamed for a moment before glancing at the one who did result in such a pain to the new king!
Taking a good look at the small figure, it ran towards it with pure rage.
Who dare such an insect harm me!
The other figure with the staff walked forwards and pointed their staff towards the enraged bear.
The next moment, a huge circle appeared 2 meters away in front of the bear.
With the momentum the bear built up, it wasn´t able to stop moving from the circle.
Nonetheless, it didn´t care about his small light.
But as it stepped into the circle, the whole ground in the circle moved 180 degrees to the left, making the bear fall face forward from the sudden change of footing.
As it was about to stand up and devour those two small stick-holding figures, a bulgy man was in front of his face with a mace over this head.
"Haah!" Swinging the mace down to the bear's head, it completely crushed his skull together with the delusional dreams that it had.
"Is it dead?" One of the female magic casters asked that cast the huge circle.
"Yeah, it was just a huge bear." The bulgy man said as he looked at the burned fur of the bear.
"Did you have to use your fireball on that? By this state, that damn fatty fur is worthless."
The other female caster said with a pout on her face.
"Hmph! It´s not like we are after this thing! Isn´t that right, Serras?"
Glancing at the red-haired man, he nodded solemnly before this focus went towards the pierced spear in a wolf's.
"This is..." Running towards the spear, he picked up before yelling out loud from triumph.
"Guys! We found it!"
"Huh?" The bulgy man and the two female magic caster said confused.
The shorter man with leather armor that had many knives around him, frowns in comparison.
Walking towards Serras, he asked with a quiet voice.
"Serras, could that be a trace of our target?"
Nodding, Serras showed the spear to his colleagues.
"Look at here, that´s the Berum's army mark and those weird letters must be runes!"Giving the spear to the short guy, he pulled a paper with a drawing of a dark helmet.
"The bounty commissioned by the army mentions that a dark gray plated guy stole from the armory of the army itself!"
"You guys might not remember this guy, but once I went to Gerak´s smithy to ask him about wherever he learned to make runes, I saw that guy seeking business with that cursed dwarf!"
Hearing Serra's explanation, the other four fell silent for a moment,
Looking at his confused party mates, Serras said seriously.
"I have already checked and it turns out Gerak went missing the next day the bounty came up together with that Rue Danzel guy. Though the bounty doesn´t say it, I am under the suspicion that he was the runesmith who created the chaos in the auction a few months ago..."
As the light of understanding fell to the group, the short man said with a thoughtful expression.
"If your suspicion is truly true, then the gold that we will receive would be more than three times the bounty amount..."
The other three upon hearing that had their months a gab.
Nodding, Serras said.
"That´s why I mention searching around the area where people are smuggled out! That guy must definitely follow Gerak to get out of Bernes! And that spear by itself is the proof that they were here!"
Nodding to Serras, the short man glanced at the ground before kneeling.
"Though it´s hard to see, there are still some traces of a battle. If I were to guess there was a battle going in here hours ago."
Pointing in the direction where the traces were going, the short man said.
"The freshest traces are this way."
Taking a glance at the map that she had in her bag, the female magic caster that cast the circle said.
"In that direction is the road towards the borders..."
With greed in their eyes, they followed after the traces.
****
Right outside the forest at night...
"Jeers!" Hitting their wooden cups with each other, the liquid fell to the ground.
Having traveled for a whole day with worries to be caught, the mercenaries could finally sit down and relax with a beverage in their hand.
And among those cheerful men, there was one with a dark gray armor sitting in a rock while staring unemotionally towards the group.
"..."
Danzel who was bored out of his mind open his status window to pass some time.
The moment he opponent it though, he turned his head around to look at the duo approaching him.
'Sigh...' Sighting internally, he asked.
"What do you guys want?"
Serran who noticed the annoyed tone that Danzel had, was about to apologize before turning back with Hannes.
Unfortunately, he was a step behind.
"Hey there Danzel! I bought you some soup that our guys made! I got to tell you that this thing is delish!"
"Thanks..." Taking the soup in his hands, Danzel felt quite awkward.
I can't even eat...
The duo sat opposite Danzel, with Hannes happily eating his soup without care and Serran glaring at Danzel.
Danzel who wasn't able to eat for obvious reasons noticed the casters glaring.
"If you got something to say, say it or stop staring at me..." He said with his cold voice.
"Well, do you mind if I were to ask a question?" Serran said slowly, afraid to offend that scary man.
Shrugging his shoulders, he replied.
"It's not like anyone is stopping you to make that question. Wherever I answer it or not I am not sure..."
"Well... I guess that's true..." Serran said after slowly nodding at Danzel's words.
'As long as the question doesn't go far it's alright to ask, huh' Serran thought, completely misunderstanding that Danzel meant it literally.
"I would like to ask you the reason for leaving Bernes and moving to Nercana." Serran said.
"Well...let's just say that the business in Bernes didn't go as smoothly as I hoped it would."
'Though calling it smoothly would sugar-coating it. I wonder what the army did with me stealing their weapons and killing those slavers.'
"I see...then could I ask-"
Standing from the stone, Danzel walked past Serran while giving Hannes back the soup.
With the latter eating the soup happily.
"I will answer your question later, I will go...train my mana in the forest. Don't come looking for me."
Leaving the stained Serran, Danzel opened his status window.
"Time to advantage...." He mumbled as his figure disappeared through the forest.
