XXXV. The Nail

He tried to say something, but only confused groans came out of his mouth expressing the pain he was feeling.

Dag walked closer.

He kept feeling the power in his muscles, the effect of Call Of The Berserkr was still active, but it would fade after a few more minutes and he would be without energy.

He had to finish his opponent at that instant.

The man on the ground turned, with his back on the terrain.

Dag placed one foot on his chest, holding him still.

The man continued to pant, asking for mercy and waving his hand as if he wanted to beg Dag to stop.

"I know who you really are. I know where you learned that skill," Dag said.

He put his face up to the man's face, keeping his foot firmly on his chest.

"I will exterminate you one by one, Lies Of Loki will cease to exist," Dag continued in a somber and convinced tone.

He wielded the sword with two hands vertically on the Renegade's head.

The man kept screaming and panting in fear. His only eye was completely injected with blood.

"For Brann"

Dag opened both hands, dropping the sword that only thanks to the strength of his weight pierced the man's cranium, driving it into the ground like a nail in the wall.

After a few seconds, he pulled the sword from his enemy's head.

He looked at the other: a headless corpse lay a few feet away from them in a bloodbath.

Thalos was still there, beside him.

The wolf came up as if to ask Dag for comfort.

"You were good, Thalos" he said.

Thalos kept staring at him with a serene air as if nothing serious had happened. He had his snout completely covered in the blood of the Renegade who had just tried to hit his master with two arrows.

Dag felt sad. He wasn't used to killing in cold blood and with so much anger. But at the same time, he felt a sense of pleasure, of enjoyment.

He felt that by killing that Renegade who was part of Lies Of Loki had somehow done justice to Gridd and Asa, avenging Brann's death.

But it still wasn't enough.

The real enemy was somewhere on the planet, he didn't even know if he was still alive. He was a man or a woman, a faceless and ageless character.

The descriptions Asa gave when she told him of Brann's death were detailed but not enough to identify the real culprit.

Dag had only one certainty now: he would find Brann's killer and brutally kill him.

To do so, though, he would have to be stronger.

Level 1 skills were not enough, as were level 2 skills.

He had to improve his fighting style, becoming even stronger than his master and in need of a title.

Somehow, his readmission to the Orn Temple must have been possible, convincing Magni that he was worthy of it.

The icy wind continued to blow through Dag's long blonde hair as he thought about his future.

The effect of Call Of Berserkr was now over: his arms began to get heavy and his legs began to give way as if he had walked continuously for miles.

He came back into the house. This time he also brought in his trusted friend Thalos.

The wolf passed through the circumspect door, but once he noticed the heat that emanated from that place, he lay on the ground and fell asleep exhausted.

While he was on the ground near the still-lit fire, he continued to lick from his snout the blood of the man he had killed just before.

Dag left the sword by the table.

It would have burned the corpses, which otherwise could have attracted ferocious animals that populated that mountain. But not at that moment, it was too cold and he was too tired.

Call Of Berserkr had significantly increased his physical abilities, but it was a skill that had to be used sparingly. Using it in the middle of a fight against multiple rivals could be a double-edged sword.

Dag took off his shirt and took off his pants.

The wound on his thigh was still bleeding. He had to clean it and bandage it otherwise he would have got infected and it would have been a problem that would hinder his daily workouts.

He entered the second room of the farm, where in addition to the food that was almost finished, there were all kinds of things: hunting tools, barrels, and buckets of various sizes, other tools of which he did not know how to use them.

Wandering through a shelf, he found jars containing medical herbs and ointments of various kinds and tissue bandages.

He medicated his leg, smearing a yellowish ointment on the open wound, after cleaning it with a wet tissue with water.

He had already smelled that medicine once Asa cured Eirik who injured his hand by cutting wood in the woods.

He tossed the narrow wound.

Luckily the dagger that had pierced his leg was not very deep. Within a short time, it would be healed.

He put the drugs back in their place and returned to the main room of the farm, making sure that he had left the door behind him well-closed: Thalos despite proving to be a reliable friend was always a wolf, and could raid his stocks Food.

The wolf slept blissfully in front of the chimney and Dag did not feel like kicking him out.

After extinguishing the fire, he put on clean clothes and went to bed.

Two days later Magni would return and Dag would tell him about the Renegades ambush. His master would have been proud of him.

As he was about to fall asleep, he heard a flutter of wings coming from outside: a crow began to croak and rested on the window sill next to the door.

Dag turned in that direction, looking at the window.