Chapter 1: Caverns

Shit. I expected to teleport with him to wherever he was teleporting. I guess he was right when he said that the circle can't teleport us together. Once again, I was fooled by one of Alex's script.

My guess is teleporting long distance takes a lot of energy, so when more than intended people teleport, teleportation fails or teleportation distance decreases.

What's done is done. Now I need to know where I am. From the looks of it I'm in a cave. And I'm sensing quite a few life forms in here. This place is dark. I can see in here thanks to my tree, but if it was someone else, that someone wouldn't see anything.

This place is actually devoid of light. Nothing is getting in. And that makes it impossible to see even for animals with night vision. But even I can't see the ceiling of this caverns.

That means ceiling is at least hundred meters tall. In turn that means this cavern is gigantic. Now, where to go. Which direction to head. East, west, north or south.

Anyway, let's head to the direction where I'm getting the most life signals. There might be someone who can answer my questions. So, north it is.

I start to walk heading north. After walking for about ten minutes I come close enough to see the life signals I was getting. Frankly, did not expect this.

Those life signals were coming from a freaking skeleton wandering around aimlessly. Hehe. Only thing they are carrying is rusted short-swords. Usually skeletons like those have some kind of flame in their eye-sockets for eyes. But those ones have nothing. Just darkness.

But most compounding thing is that I'm getting life signal from those skeletons. If I sensed mana from them, that would have been obvious, but life? That is strange.

Is it because they weren't raised from the death by a necromancer? But came to life naturally. For example, this cavern is a place where a crime family dumps their corpses and those died with strong enough hatred came back to life.

Ooh. This is pointless. Let's just check if they are hostile. After coming to conclusion, I inch closer to the wandering skeletons carefully.

Right now, I'm about hundred meters away from them. Ninety nothing. Let's get closer. Fifty, still nothing. Thirty, still nothing. Twenty-five, skeleton closest to me looks to me and…

SCREECH.

Screeches loudly as if announcing what to others. As soon as it finished screeching, it runs to me waving it's sword around pointlessly. And as soon as it gets in range, I kick it across its bony spine and fails to crush it. While I was pondering why I failed to crush its spine, it swings its sword down on me.

I spin right to dodge it sword and throw a straight across it's jaw with all my might. Strangely, I still fail to hit homerun with its skull. This skeleton is way too sturdy. While I was struggling with single one, others start to appear around me and close in on me.

Now, what to do. I active my gears and try to hit it again with my charged gauntlet.

BOOM.

My punch lands on its head with a micro explosion. After dust settles, I see the freaking thing is still fine. While I was in a shock, I suddenly feel a something on my right and jumps upward to dodge it. As I look down while jumping, I see another skeleton stabbing where I was with its sword.

Okay, this is a conundrum. Let's try out the next course of action. I start to prepare my second technique as I start to descend.

BOOM!

And I land on the ground with a resounding boom. Yes, I'm sure this did something to the skeletons. As I stand up dust clears, and I look around to confirm the skeletons death while not expecting to be disappointed.

Yep. Freaking skeletons are in a tip top shape. And they start to attack me as soon as they got up. Shit. I dodge their clumsy swords and take a distance from them.

I tried to punch and kick them whenever was possible, but still failed to hurt them. Then I suppose I got to use the next.

After getting out of the skeletons' encirclement, I summon my wolf and get it to stall the skeletons while I prepare to unleash my fourth technique. I sit cross-legged on the ground and focus inside. First, I get my mana to exit my body.

After I got out, I will it to spin around me. As it starts to spin I will it to go even faster. After a while it starts to kick up a whirlwind around me. After that I pump in more mana to make it take a shape of an eastern dragon.

It doesn't have to be a shape of a dragon. Ark intended it to be a just a whirlwind. So, the dragon part is me. Because this technique resembled a certain jitsu from a certain anime.

Even though I come up with it just because I thought it would look cool, but while coming up with it, I came across an interesting side effect.

When I will my whirlwind to take a shape of a dragon, that gets rid of the eye of the storm. That safe part of a storm in the middle. So, as my dragon collides with my target, they have no hope of escaping. Hehe.

As I finish preparing, I will my wolf to get out of my way and send my dragon right into the middle of the gathered skeletons.

BOOM!!!

"HAHAHAHA, take that you fucking bo…"

Shit, they are still fine even after that. This is getting annoying. Only thing my dragon did was throw them away. I'm running out of option here.

"Is there anything you can do, Fenrir?"

As a final resort I try asking Fenrir. My shadow starts to wriggle, Fenrir comes out of it and looks to me. Good, it seems he can see in here.

After coming out, he looks to the approaching skeletons and spews a black fireball from his mouth. It hits the skeleton and throws it away. But after landing, that skeleton simply stands up like nothing.

I see a look of curiosity in Fenrir's eyes. I expected him to be frustrated, angry even after failing to get rid of a skeleton. But, on the contrary, there is a sense of wonder in his eyes.

Well, I suppose that is reasonable, he is a baby after all. After confirming his fireball won't work, he closes his eyes and starts to concentrate. After a few seconds, something a shadow starts to cover his body and starts to grow.

It stops after growing up to three meters. Now that I looked at it after completion, it's a wolf's silhouette made out of some kind of dark energy. I guess this is one of his traits. But, which one.

My guess would be Avatar of Darkness. As soon as his avatar finishes, he pounces on the closest skeleton. He bites the skeleton's skull with an intention to crush it but fails. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't crush the skull.

After that he throws the skeleton onto the ground and breathes fire on it to melt it. Still useless. He keeps trying to break the skeleton but keeps failing for some unknown reason. While he was experimenting with his traits, other skeletons come and start to surround us.

At this moment I suddenly remembered a certain saying. 'Best way to win is not to fight at all.' So, for now strategic retreat.

"Fenrir, come back."

He looks at me after hearing me and his avatar vanishes. And before I know it, he is already in my shadow.

After that I run toward the place where I feel sense least amount of life signal.

"See ya, suckas."