CHAPTER 11

Chapter 11

The morning was crisp, and the fresh forest air enveloped the group of four as they gathered in front of the northern part of the forest. Adam, the group's leader, made sure everything was ready and that everyone was prepared to leave.

"Have you got everything you need?" he asked, addressing them.

"Yes," they all replied.

Then Jenna spoke as she took what appeared to be small glass vials from her bag. They were of different colors.

"As for the magic potions, I managed to procure only five low-grade ones: 3 are healing potions, and 2 are for mana recovery," she said, showing the potions to everyone.

Adam nodded and said:

"Clarisse, take the mana potions, while Jenna, Arnold, and I will split the healing potions."

With that, they exchanged potions. Seeing that everyone was ready, Adam, with a nod of his head, gave the command, and the group set off to enter the forest.

The area they wanted to explore today was towards the inner borders of the Spirit Forest's periphery, a part of the forest where more rank F beasts could be found, and in rare cases, even some rank E.

It was an area where not many low-rank adventurers like them would attempt to hunt, but they were in a group, and as the saying goes, in desperate times, desperate measures are called for.

[N/A: I know, the saying is a bit different, but I had to adapt it to their situation :)]

They walked for a while, paying attention to their movements and any movement in the forest, and they were ready to face any threat.

During the walk, they encountered various non-evolved monsters. Some of them fled when they approached, while others were killed by the group. They also encountered an unlucky Thorkas rolling around, and they hunted it mercilessly.

They didn't try to hunt down every monster they encountered because they would have lost too much time and would have risked having to postpone the lizard hunt for another time, as they had limited carrying capacity for materials.

Finally, after some time, they arrived at the agreed-upon location. The area was covered in sand and earth with small rocks scattered here and there, the ideal habitat for the earth lizards they had come to hunt. They positioned themselves nearby, prepared their weapons, and began searching for prey.

They split up and searched in different positions, always keeping a certain distance from each other so that if one of them needed help, they could respond promptly.

Clarisse, being a mage, had a greater affinity with the surrounding mana than her companions. She remained attentive to perceive any signals she could receive from it. After a while, she noticed a change in mana coming from her right. She decided to investigate that direction and, after a few steps, saw ahead two earth lizards fighting each other.

She didn't know if it was a territorial dispute or common behavior for these creatures, but it didn't matter. The important thing was that she had found her prey, and moreover, two of them.

She called the others, and after a short time, the group joined her to examine the two beasts. The lizards had some small bruises here and there, but it was better that way. They could hunt down both in this state.

Adam asked the others to get into position.

"Everyone in formation. Jenna, you'll target one of them, injuring it, and the rest of us will take care of the rest. Clarisse, you start preparing a spell, and as soon as Arnold and I intervene, you'll help me bring down the injured lizard, while Arnold will stop the other lizard so that it doesn't interfere. Clear to everyone?" he asked, and everyone nodded. Seeing this, he prepared himself, ready to rush towards the lizards at any moment.

Once ready, Jenna, the group's archer, aimed at one of the beasts. Her arrows might not be lethal to rank F monsters, but they still inflicted a lot of damage. She calmly took aim, waiting for the right opportunity to strike, and she didn't have to wait long, because the opportunity came right after.

As soon as the two beasts separated and were ready to clash again, she released the arrow. It flew swiftly towards the lizard on the left, bridging the gap of a few dozen meters that separated her from the marked lizard. The arrow pierced precisely into the eye of one of the lizards.

It howled in pain, while the other lizard stood stunned for a moment. Adam, the knight, and the bald man with the large shield wasted no time.

Adam and Clarisse rushed towards the injured beast, which was writhing, while the man with the shield intercepted the other earth lizard and restrained it.

The lizard, seeing its attackers, tried to charge at them but was stopped by Arnold's shield, giving enough time for his companions to injure and kill the other lizard.

In no time, Adam and Clarisse overpowered the injured lizard. It tried to react, but it was hit by cuts and fireballs, and without a chance to react to the attackers' attacks, the lizard died.

Adam and Clarisse didn't take time to catch their breath.

Quickly, they moved towards the other lizard, which was being tanked by the bald-headed man and attacked on the sides by Jenna. The beast was one meter tall and two meters long. It had small wounds from Jenna's arrows on its body.

Seeing that its companion was dead and that the other two attackers were coming towards it, the lizard decided to flee.

Adam, realizing immediately what the lizard was thinking, shouted to Jenna and Clarisse to attack it and not give it time to escape, while he took advantage of this time to approach the beast quickly.

"It's trying to escape. Jenna, Clarisse, hit it with everything you've got. We can't let it get away."

Clarisse and Jenna didn't need to be told twice. With determination and precision, they launched a barrage of attacks against the beast.

The lizard, seeing no way out, emitted a loud howl. The howl was loud, but it didn't last long.

The bald-headed man threw himself at the lizard with all his weight and hit it with his large shield, knocking it over.

Jenna, Clarisse, and Adam didn't waste any time, and they filled it with attacks. In the end, after a few more seconds, the second earth lizard was defeated.

At the end of the hunt, Arnold approached Adam and expressed his concern.

"Do you think it called its companions with the previous howl?"

"Most likely. We need to hurry. Let's take the remains of the two lizards and get out of this area," said Adam.

They paired off, and they dismantled the bodies of the two beasts. Adam and the bald-headed man seemed to be experts in this. In no time, they managed to separate the most important parts of the two beasts. Meat, some bones, and most importantly, the two mana cores.

Seeing this, Clarisse's eyes gleamed with excitement.

It had only been 2 hours since dawn, and they had already hunted down 2 rank F monsters. If they continued at this pace, they would have a great harvest today.

She, like the others, couldn't wait for evening to arrive so they could return to town to share the earnings. After almost 30 min, they finished retrieving materials from the lizards. They put them away carefully and prepared to leave, but then they heard noises coming from one direction.

They turned to look in the direction from which they heard the noises. They expected some other monster to arrive after the last lizard had let out that howl, but they didn't expect this.

What they saw when they spotted the source of the noise sent chills down all their spines.

A few dozen meters away from them, they could see another earth lizard charging towards them.

The peculiarity of this lizard, compared to the ones they had just hunted, was that this one was at least twice their size.

What they were seeing at that moment was an E rank lizard.

Adam, understanding the seriousness of the situation, issued a command:

"Run, it's an E rank lizard!"