24 Mission Report

John, Steven, and Mike must've made quite the scene as they rushed through the barrier 15 minutes later and ran to the Hunter's Club at full speed. Like the Tamer's Club, they had a high level medical facility for their members and it was closer.

Rushing through the back entrance, John didn't realize Mike had passed out until he put him on a medical bed and started stripping his clothes and removing weapons. Steven frantically hit the button to call nurse and a moment later a young man ran into the room yelling, "What's wrong?"

"Rank 7 level 4 Panther slammed into him, several broken ribs and multiple lacerations. He passed out at least 10 minutes ago." John said as he backed up and gave the doctor room to work.

"I need help in here!" The man yelled before continuing John's work at cutting the clothes off Mike's chest and asking, "What type of Panther? Was it poisonous?"

"Night Rush, they aren't poisonous but it might have used Dark Mana when it slashed his chest."

"Got it, now get out of here!" The doctor yelled as a couple nurses rushed in carrying a crash cart and surgical instruments. "He's got multiple broken ribs, a punctured lung, and Dark Mana infiltration. Get a light attributed healer in here now!"

The door to the room slammed shut, cutting off any other words and John was surprised when a strong hand grabbed him by his shirt and dragged him out of the hallway and up a flight of stairs. "Why in god's name did you go out of the safe zone?" A male voice accused them as he threw Steven and John into chairs and they found themselves looking at a middle-aged man with an awesome mustache bisected by a jagged scar running down his right check, through the center of his lips, and the left side of his throat.

"We didn't, Sir!" Steven said as he stood up hastily after realizing who this was.

"Sit down!" The man boomed as Ms. Winslow walked into the office and stood next to the man as he turned to look at John, "I'm Carl Johnson, the adviser for the Hunter's Club," Turning to look at Steven he said, "and this is Ms. Winslow, adviser of the Tamer's Club. Now you two are going to tell us everything that happened, and why three of this year's top students ran out of the forest covered in blood!"

"Sir..." Steven started from the beginning with grabbing the missions to running out of the forest, the two raised eyebrows at the description of where they were when they ran into the Panther but stayed silent until they heard the part about John yelling to climb the trees when he heard it was glowing.

"How did you know?" Ms. Winslow asked, eyes boring into John's.

A bit sheepishly, John looked down for a moment before saying, "My parents bought me the Encyclopedia of Beasts and Monsters. The Night Rush Panther is in Volume 11."

Both of them looked a bit surprised when they heard that, "Your parents were able to get a copy of the Encyclopedia?"

Nodding his head, John was surprised at the looks on both of their faces. "It can't be that big of a deal can it? It's just a book."

Ms. Winslow's face grew red in anger, "Just a book?!?! Are you kidding me!"

She looked like she was about to rip John's head off when Mr. Johnson put a hand on his arm, "He doesn't know."

Sighing, she shook her head in defeat and sat down on Johnson's desk, ignoring the papers she sent tumbling to the floor.

"What happened to the Night Rush Panther?" Mr. Johnson asked, turning back to Mike and Steven.

Steven pulled the monster bag off his shoulder as he said, "After throwing Mike on top of the tree, John climbed up the same branch to help hold him while I scrambled up another tree. The Panther flew by just a second after I climbed the tree. These black, glowing blades exploded from it as it picked up speed but it came to a stop just a couple hundred feet past us. John yelled to open fire, that it would be slowed down for a while after using the ability. Mike started shooting as fast as he could despite his injuries while John and I ran to it. In the end, I killed it by jumping off a tree and landing on its neck while under 5 times gravity."

Steven kept pulling monster after monster out of the bag, not realizing that he was ruining the carpet in the office but neither Mr. Johnson or Ms. Winslow seemed to care as they waited for Steven to pull out the massive Panther.

"I can't believe it." Ms. Winslow said, her eyes going wide as she saw the body. Until that moment, she hand't believed that three freshman who'd just gotten here a couple weeks ago could've managed to kill such a powerful monster.

Turning to John she asked, "How did you even know it was there?"

"Snakey sent me a message of panic and pain, and I just knew where she was somehow. I turned and shot without thinking. I didn't really see what it was, but it dropped Snakey and I found some blood and black fur when I picked her up. After that I knew we had to get out of the forest as fast as possible."

Mr. Johnson listened as John spoke, closely examining the bodies of all the dead monsters. "Most of these were shot by a rifle, with the rest being crushed."

"Mike's an amazing shot and Steven is nearly impossible for monsters at our level to hurt. So, Snakey scouted as we moved, and we stood lookout as they fought. I killed a couple monsters with my pistol before they could sneak up on Mike, but I left the most of the fighting up to them." John said.

Mr. Johnson sighed, pinching his nose as he closed his eyes. "Are you able to show us where you were attacked?"

Steven stood up from where he was crouched on the floor, pulling out his phone and activating the map app that we all used. It had this amazing feature where it could track where we'd been, and how fast we were moving. Loading it, he hit playback and showed Mr. Johnson the phone as he said, "You can see that it was here that we picked up speed, we didn't start sprinting until here when it attacked us for the first time and Mike was injured. Here is where we jumped to the trees."

"You tracked it too?" Ms. Winslow asked John.

"Yes, and so did Mike. We all made sure to have the map running at all times just in case we got separated from each other."

"Show me." Mr. Johnson said, and when it was identical to the Steven's he cursed, "FUCK!"

Ms. Winslow walked over to John and said, "I'm going to take John back to the Tamer's Club to have Snakey looked at, I can feel a bit of Dark Mana in her. You can call the administration, it shouldn't take long to have her fixed up if they need to speak to John."

"Got it, you stay here." Mr. Johnson said, pointing at Steven as he picked up his phone and the last thing John heard as he was whisked out of the office was, "Why did this have to happen on my turn? Couldn't it have waited a few goddamn years!"

"What's going on Ms. Winslow?" John asked, wiping the drying blood off his face.

"Is any of that yours?" She asked, ignoring the question as she walked him out the back door of the Hunter's Club.

"No, I was carrying Mike so I got covered in it."

"Good, run as fast as you can to the Tamer's Club." She ordered and John took off without a second thought, the words resonating in his mind as if he couldn't possibly disobey. It wasn't until he reached the Tamer's Club that he realized what'd happened. Ms. Winslow had used a special ability that extremely high-level Tamer's learned called Soul Order, as far as he knew only people who had surpassed the Soul Formation Realm could use it. That thought made John's face pale a bit as he realized that Gallandwell High was far more powerful than he'd realized.