Chapter 96

In the dead of night, a group of five wizards, among whom were three men and two women, with panic on their faces, ran through the dense jungle. 

"Damn it! How could they find us there?" one of them exclaimed angrily, clenching his fists tightly, not daring to turn around, because the "road" was already very difficult, one awkward movement, and one could easily get tangled in a vine or stumble over some ledge or branch.

"Shut up, cretin! Don't attract more monsters!" a pair of flaming blue eyes with long eyelashes dug into his back, promising a very unpleasant sensation if he did not listen to her. 

The rest did not waste time arguing, and without looking, waved their wands behind their backs, sending weak air waves that threw back the four-legged shadows pursuing them, but not for long, because they quickly returned to the ranks, and this time with a much more evil growl.

The red-haired man looked angrily at the girl following him, and this was the last mistake in his life, because the next moment he stepped into the mud that appeared after the recent rain, and slipped almost out of the blue, hitting his head on a nearby tree with fruits like apples. Although at the moment it was already deep night outside, but almost everyone instantly determined what kind of tree it was, and, without thinking twice, immediately rushed away from it. 

[Note: Same kind of fruit that Severus collected.]

After all, among the hunters there was one saying: "Having fallen into a sweet trap, alas, there is no turning back." And in a second, spiders rained down from the tree, almost instantly swallowing the unfortunate "screamer". 

The rest did not even pay attention to the loss of one member of the "team" and continued to retreat, and deep down they were glad to get rid of the red-haired man in this way, because the monsters chasing them also froze for a few seconds, giving them a slight head start, which they did not hesitate to take advantage. 

"What's going on with these monsters today?! How could bloody wolves even be near our hideout when their territory is twenty kilometers to the south?! the dark-haired lady was indignant in her soul, leading this "campaign", because she had been leading people around the outer part of the "Magic Jungle" for more than twenty years, and this is not counting the ten years when she explored them alone, but this morning was too strange: black crocodiles that have left the swamp and hunt on land; lizards wandering aimlessly around; the red monkeys, which normally are not averse to leaving stones, were frightened by something that day and did not even react when one of the members of the group accidentally entered their territory. 

And although she offered to go back or accelerate in order to quickly get to the safe zone, but it was because of the red-haired man that they had to be delayed. 

Therefore, when he died, even though the woman was completely calm on the outside, she still gloated a little inside. Certainly, everyone in the group knew how to apparate, but it didn't work in the jungle, the same applied to portkeys*, which is why the Magic Jungle was called one of the most dangerous places in the world. 

Mostly only desperate people or overly confident wizards looking for easy money most often decided to enter the forest, and those who simply wanted to study the flora and fauna would not even dare to step a foot inside. 

One of the two remaining men slowed down a bit and caught up with the woman. 

"Any ideas?" he asked calmly, while not a muscle trembled on his face, although inside he felt panic, cause he understood that in this situation openly demonstrating this feeling was not a good idea, because first of all it was necessary to save his own skin, and panicking now will only make the situation worse. 

"It's still forty kilometres to the safe zone, we'll soon run out of steam before we can reach it, we can only hope that along the way we can meet someone and group with them, so we will have a good chance to survive of those dogs," the other man growled with a touch of irritation, turning around for a moment and pointing his wand in the direction of the sound of footsteps, 

"Aerea Laoreet Mollis!" he exclaimed angrily, and a powerful air wave escaped from the wand, hitting a large white fruit tree, from which spiders flew straight towards a huge pack of wolves.

"Idiot! Why are you…!" the woman almost shouted in a rage, but she managed to lower the volume of her voice at the second word, which turned from a scream into a hiss. 

The Wizard merely snorted in response." This will stop them for a while." 

"Moron ..." and the lady very quickly began to move away from him, the rest also noticed her manoeuvre and, without thinking twice, followed her, in this short day she saved their lives more than once, so they used to trust her and watched almost every action, especially at this dangerous moment. 

Of course, such a gesture did not escape the eyes of the one who sent the spell into the tree. "What are you… AAAHGH!" but before he had time to finish, something sharp pierced his back, and after that he felt weakness in his whole body and simply fell to the ground with his face twisted in horror. On the back of the man stood a large spider, which furiously plunged sharp poisonous "paws" into him. 

All that the wizard felt was a terrible pain all over his body and weakness, he could not even scream anymore and after a few seconds he died of poisoning. And the queen of spiders only looked angrily in the direction of the rest of the people, but did not pursue them. 

And the magical wolves did not suffer at all from the rain of spiders, because the latter did not even bite them, and even at the time of the fall they very quickly clung to the branches and leaves with the help of a web, and those spiders who nevertheless fell on the wolves quickly climbed back onto the trees. And they bypassed the corpse of the man from the side. It was a kind of symbiosis, which brought almost no benefits to both sides, except for non-aggression. 

It was a strange union that the woman accidentally found out about five years ago from her colleague, which is why she called that man an idiot, while still regretting that she had not warned them about this in advance, even at the moment when the bloody wolves appeared on the horizon.

"W-we're going to die…" another witch muttered with panic in her voice, still hearing the howl behind. 

"It's okay, maybe there is still hope." the woman leading them tried to console her, already realising that they were unlikely to survive today. 

"I ... I did not dare to confess to you for a long time, but ... perhaps these are the last minutes of our life ... I love you!" The man at the side turned towards her and after a bit of nervousness, started speaking.

"Louis! Damn you! Couldn't find a better time?" She narrowed her eyes unkindly and looked at the man who smiled awkwardly at her, taking out a wand from which an air stream escaped, rushing into the wolves catching up with them and throwing them back a couple of metres. 

"But isn't it better late than never?" Louis said with a smile from the side.

"Go to hell with those jokes!" 

"Patricia, if we can survive, can we get married?" The woman's right eye trembled, and she really wanted to hit the idiot in the face, but now was not the time for this, and the witch, to be honest, was even a little glad,

"If we do get out, I'll not only marry you, but I'll even quit this damn job!"

"I will remember it! And do not try to deny it later! I'll tie you up and take you to the registry office!" Louis laughed out loud and looked at the slightly embarrassed lady... 

At that moment, one of the red wolves, slightly larger than the others, opened its mouth and exhaled a stream of flame that rushed towards the group, which in a moment completely swallowed them up. And when the flock finally got to the place where the flame had landed, all they saw was just an empty place. And the smaller wolves looked angrily at the one that completely burned their dinner. 

The bigger wolf, in turn, growled in their direction, releasing a trickle of flame, from which the rest of the wolves quickly dispersed in a panic and began to search the surroundings 

... At the same time, almost ten metres away from them, in front of a small fire, a young man was sitting, stroking a long snake wrapped around his neck on the head, while watching the house elf, who was preparing food.

"May I congratulate you on your upcoming wedding?" Severus drawled with a smile, looking out of the corner of his eye at the three frozen wizards. 

Just at that moment, when that wolf had appeared five metres away from them, the trio had turned pale, but, to their surprise, the wolf simply passed by, and then ran back to the main group. 

"I've set up some barriers so they won't be able to detect us, you can relax."

"Master., your supper," a tray appeared in Nellie's hand, on which there was a plate with a knife and fork, and a few seconds later a lizard steak and a glass of juice appeared as well.

"Thank you, do something for them too."

"Yes!" and a large cleaver appeared in the hand of the little house elf, with which she went to the body of a monster lying nearby. 

"Wh-who are you…?" Patricia finally spoke up, coming to her senses after a recent chase and meeting with an unknown wizard, half of whose face was adorned with a mask. 

"A simple treasure hunter."

"Why did you save us?" 

"For the sake of information," he answered calmly, cutting a small piece of steak and feeding it to Nagini, who also looked at them with a bit of interest.

Nellie came back with three more pieces of meat and started cooking again.

Hearing his answer, they looked at each other, and the man nodded. "We'll answer all your questions if you'll let us stay here until morning."

"No problem, don't stand there, sit down, I won't eat you." And, nevertheless, having listened to him, they cautiously approached closer and sat down on the opposite side of the "suspicious type", while cautiously looking at the snake, the colour of which immediately made it clear that it was very poisonous. 

"Since the moment I entered the jungle, you are the first people that got in my way, do you know what is the reason?" 

"This is most likely something to do with monsters…" Taking a deep breath and trying to calm down, the dark-haired woman continued, "…many of which have left their habitats. I have a hunch that a new monster has appeared here, much stronger than the ones on the outside of the "Magic Jungle". It could well have escaped through the hole in the barrier from the inner one, since this place is at least three thousand years old, but these are just my assumptions. As for the people, most likely, they have already left the forest or they are hidden in a safe zone, and in the worst case, they are no longer in …" she did not finish, but even so it was clear what Patricia was driving at. 

"Obviously, I'll have a few more questions, but let's have dinner first," and just at that moment, trays of steaks appeared in front of everyone on the ground… ________________________________________________________________________

.

.

.

Thank you for reading, please vote with power stones.

You can read more on p@treon.com/lucifer09