Chapter 2: Ambushed by Demon Beasts

The Caravan is now resting in an open field where they usually rest, it is now night time and they will spend the night here since travelling in the night is just asking for trouble, although this place is not a demon beast territory, from time to time demon beasts wander in this place and attacks caravans and travellers.

" Here " the old farmer who Kane works for handed him a bowl of soup to eat.

" Thank you, sir," Kane said respectfully with a smile on his face.

He starts to eat his soup this is the first meal he had today since he was so busy working in the morning to earn money to be able to afford a demon beast to bind with.

After eating dinner, the guards and the others are sitting around a fire to warm their bodies while some are on look-out duty, through the night the guards will rotate to do look-out duty.

While some of the guards and travellers are having a great laugh around the fire, Kane is laying down on a thick tree branch while using his arm as a pillow.

" I wonder if I have enough money to buy a Demon Beast," Kane said with a sigh, all he did the past few days is work to earn enough money to buy his own demon beast, and along with the savings that the former owner of this body he now has roughly 60 pieces of silver coins, a silver coin can last a whole family of five, two days worth of food, 60 pieces of silver coins is a small fortune for someone like him.

" Should I settle for a low-class demon beast with decent talent? " Kane starts to consider his options of demon beasts based on his budget.

Deep in his thoughts, various cries echoed through the forest.

" Everyone wake up and pick up your weapons, guards summon your demon beasts !" the guard's captain shouted alerting everyone.

Kane sat up immediately, he was just about to fall asleep when the guard's captain shouted.

He took out a small knife from his small bag.

He uses this knife on his job as a butcher, he stayed on top of the branch. Silently waiting, but what's weird is that he does not feel scared in the slightest, in fact, he feels excited instead. The thought of seeing a Demon Beast in action makes his blood boil in excitement.

Not long after they all heard a scream nearby.

" Aaarrrrggggh! " The guards didn't rush towards the sound and calmly stood in their place with their weapons in hand, they already know that it is too late for the guard who screamed earlier and that rushing to his location might lead to their death, the demon beasts might surprise attack them on the way or might lay an ambush, this decision of theirs shows their experience and how cold this world can be, that any moment anyone can die.

The night is silent and no one is making a move as if the world stopped, then suddenly a demon beast attacked.

" Everyone fight! " The guard's captain said.

They are now engaged in a heated fight with wolf-like demon beasts.

" Are they Grey wolves? " Kane recognized the demon beast that attacked them.

The Grey wolves are Wolf species Demon beasts that hunt in packs they do not have an element attribute and only rely on their physical prowess. Grey wolves are middle-class demon beasts and looking at the size of the grey wolves the weakest appears to be at tier 3 while the strongest is at tier 5.

The class of the Demon beasts indicates their potential while the tier represents their current strength.

There are five classes of demon beasts namely, low, middle, high, superior, and legendary class. And there are 12 tiers, the higher the tier the stronger the demon beast but the speed of reaching higher tiers and breaking through the bottlenecks of each tier depends on the class of the demon beast and its talent, plus even if two demon beast has the same tier but different class, the one with the higher class will hold the advantage.

The Grey Wolves continued on their relentless attacks, there are thirteen Grey Wolves and most of them are as tall as a human, with their size and strength they can fight on equal with the greater number of the guards and the members of the caravan combined, along with the demon beasts of the guards.

The guard captain summoned a middle-class tier 4 Steel Rhino it is the same height as the Grey Wolves it has a great defense and it looks like it is wearing steel plate armor, hence the name.

While the other guards summon their own demon beasts they have identical demon beasts.

Eight low-class tier 4 Sword Tusk Boars appeared on the battlefield.

" Steel Rhino and Sword Tusk Boars! "Kane became more excited seeing more demon beasts appear.

Steel Rhinos have excellent defense and a decent offence while the Sword Tusk Boars have a balance of offense and defense.

Seeing the formation of the Demon beasts on their side the caravan members start to feel at ease and calmed down.

The guards along with their demon beast and the other members of the caravan start to push back the pack of Grey Wolves.

The guards used their swords to slash and stab towards the Grey Wolves and their Demon beast also attacked, not long after a loud howl echoed through the surroundings they all looked towards the direction of the howl.

And they saw a two-meter-tall Grey Wolf.

" Tier 5 Grey Wolf! That must be the alpha "Kane said but there is no excitement in his voice, his smiling face disappeared, and is replaced with fear.

Kane is not the only one affected by the presence of the Alpha Grey Wolf.

" Snap out of it, it is just the effect of the skill called wolf howl, calm yourselves" the guard's captain shouted and the first to recover are the group of guards under him.

But the grey wolves used this moment to their advantage they start to attack again and they slowly gain the advantage, some caravan members starts to run away and it caused their formation to weaken causing the death of three guards.

This caused the guard captain to curse, the demon beast of the dead guards start to fight in a frenzy over the death of their master, they disregard safety and fought to the death. Though they managed to wound their opponent they were killed by the grey wolves not long after.

the death of three guards also caused the death of some caravan members.

Then the guard's captain summoned another demon beast it is also a Sword Tusk Boar but it is a Tier 6 one.

The tier 6 sword tusk boar easily killed two tier 4 grey wolf with ease by stabbing them with its two sword-like tusks. Despite having a lower class with its high tier it easily overpowered the other Grey Wolves, when the Sword Tusk Boar was about to kill another grey wolf, the Alpha Grey Wolf appeared and save the other Grey wolf. The guard's captain along with his middle-class tier 4 Steel rhino and low-class tier 6 sword tusk boar is now in a fight with the alpha grey wolf while the rest of the guards are dispatching the rest of the grey wolves.

Kane is still on top of the tree branch, not daring to enter the fight, not only is he a weak 15-year-old, but he also has no fighting experience.

After half an hour a bloodied muscular middle-aged man came back riding a steel rhino and with them is a sword tusk boar dragging the dead body of a Grey Wolf.

When the guard captain returned after killing the Alpha Grey Wolf the last grey wolf was killed by one of the sword tusk boar.

" Count the dead and tend to the wounded, also who here knows how to butcher animals? " The guard captain asked.

" Me, I work in a meat shop back in the village, " Kane said not far away.

" Great, can you help us with these demon beast corpses, you will get your cut when we reach the town and sold them off " the guards captain said.

" Start with these tier 5 Alpha Grey Wolf " the guard captain pointed at the corpse of the dead Alpha Grey Wolf

Kane approached the corpse, he crouch down and used his knife to cut the body but to his surprise, his knife cannot pierce through the skin of the dead demon beast.

" What? " Kane said while he stared at his knife.

" Here, use these " The middle-aged guard captain handed him a dagger with a black colored sheath.

Kane pulled out the dagger and it revealed a shiny silver dagger, one look and you will notice that it's sharp.

" Wow " Kane said as he stared at the beautiful dagger.

He then tried to cut the skin but this time there is no resistance as if he was just cutting a normal animal at the butcher shop, Kane started to work his way on the corpse of the grey wolf without saying anything.

The guard's captain left him alone to talk with the Caravan leader.

Kane used the dagger to skin the grey wolf completely, he then folded the fur neatly on the side as he cut the body of the grey wolf, he removed the organs and put them in a separate place and he starts to cut up the meat of the grey wolf, he also removed the fangs, not long after he finished cutting up the alpha grey wolf, he moved to the other demon beast corpse.

...

Inside the tent of the caravan leader.

" How many died " an old man with a monocle.

" Three guards died also their demon beasts, and six caravan members, while the others only received light injuries," the guard's captain said.

" Okay then, after we finished cleaning up this place we will start travelling immediately " the monocle old man said.

" Yes sir," the guard's captain said and he left the tent.

He came back to where he left Kane and to his surprise, he is already done with his job, the fur and skin of the grey wolves and the three sword tusk boar are neatly placed together categorized by tier.

The useful bones and meat are also neatly categorized. All the useful parts of the demon beasts are harvested by Kane and are now placed in a separate carriage.

" I'm done already sir " Kane stood up straight when he saw the guard captain.

" Good job, after we sell these, I will give you your part, "The Guard captain said.

" Thank you, sir," Kane said, he was about to leave when the guard captain suddenly spoke.

" By the way what is your name kid? "

" Kane sir " he answered.

" Go get some rest, we will leave immediately after we clean this place up," the guard captain said.

Kane then left.