Chapter 32

My chest continued to heave as I tried to calm myself. The blood and viscera coating my body continuously pushed me to activate [Bloodlust], so it took conscious effort to keep calm and not plunge back into the wolfstag's corpse. Instead, I roused myself, got up, and began to try to look around at what was left of my pack. It was difficult, with every movement of my tail being accompanied by agony, and since I needed my tail to balance myself, every movement was, at best, harrowing. Regardless, I drew myself tall and went to calculate our losses.

Took had stumbled her way back into the clearing, hurt but not injured. She favored one of her legs, but it didn't seem to be broken, just slightly hurt. A faint trail of warmth trickled from her mouth, and upon further inspection, she had taken a solid chunk out of her tongue with her own fangs either when she'd been thrown or when she'd hit the ground after being tossed away.

Brutus had two lines of deep punctures from his spine all the way down his ribs and stomach, and his hip seemed to have borne the bulk of the attack, but it seemed that he'd miraculously evaded death, barring infection. He would walk with a limp/stumble/weird hop thing, but his hips hadn't been completely broken, so there was hope for him yet.

Treel, Foire, and Vefir seemed to mostly be ok after Vefir roused himself and began walking around. He still was unsteady on his feet, but after taking that level of punishment from magic and blunt force directly to his head, I counted that as a win.

On the other hand… The nameless female was long dead to the wolfstag's initial attack. Percral was nowhere to be seen. I wondered if somehow he'd been eaten by the wolfstag, but nobody had seen him since the fight began. And then, there was Oncli, who wasn't moving. He could twitch and slightly adjust himself, but he hadn't regained consciousness since being smashed by the mass of the wolfstag's antlers. On top of the brute force, he'd taken more of the electrical current than any other of us, and it hadn't been localized. 

"Oncli. Wake up." A brief stirring.

"Hey, Beta. Wake. Up." Nothing.

"ONCLI!"

A moment's wait, then, a quiet groan. "Alpha… we… won?"

I looked at the wounded troops surrounding me. Our survival rate belied the difficulty of this hunt, yet we had been successful. "Yes."

After a moment, a quiet click of amusement could be heard from Oncli's mouth.

"Can you get up?"

"Can't… be… lazy," came his response, and with some assistance, Oncli was able to rise to his feet. His arm hung loose, apparently broken, and he winced with every step, but Oncli was able to drag himself towards the den with Treel's help. The rest of us, minus the missing Percral and his dead follower, began to drag the body back to the den. It was painful under the best of circumstances, and I was nursing a broken thumb, cracked ribs, and a clipped tail. I couldn't help but grumble under my breath about how much it sucked to be doing this kind of labor with an injury like this, but after glancing at the nearly crippled Oncli, I held my tongue.

I continued to hold out hope that Oncli would have some sort of evolution tonight and gain some level of healing like I had from so doing, but I couldn't guarantee anything. Regardless, if he rested for a day, I hoped he would be able to move of his own power, and not be a drain on the pack. I didn't want to think of what I might need to do if he did end up that way, since I wasn't willing to make exceptions to the rule of no parasites. Yet… I liked him. He had a sense of humor and brought a levity to the pack that no others had.

Pulling myself from my musings on what to do if my chosen Beta was permanently crippled, I instead focused on my [Status] that had been flashing since the wolfstag had finally died.

[Quest completed. Growth achieved. Quest board updated. Status updated.]

[Status:

Name: Ashlani

Race: Young Keelish Bloodletter Alpha

Current quest: Hunt 3 elemental Wolfstags. Reward will vary depending upon the evolutionary level of prey. Base reward: Strength, Agility, Magic +2.

Titles: none

Stats:

-Constitution: 14+1+2=17

-Strength: 17+1+2=20

-Agility: 17+1+2=20

-Intelligence: 12+1+2=15

-Magic: 0+1+2=3

Skills:

Bloodlust

Exceptional Individual (Cannot Evolve)

Innate Leadership (Cannot Evolve)

Pack Tactics

Evolutionary foresight (Cannot Evolve)

-Adult Keelish Bloodletter Alpha: Survive 60 days. Progress: 7/60

-Young Bloodletter Brood Alpha: Gain the loyalty of all surviving members of the brood. Progress: 18/49

-Young Magicblood Alpha: Requires magic generating organ. Note: racial designation will change depending upon the developed magic generating organ.

Other evolutions possible, but not currently foreseen. Progress further, and such possibilities will be presented to you.]

The first thing I noticed was that the bonus [Stats] I'd received were lower than those I'd received from the Martanimis Python, but a Voltaic Wolfstag was much more dangerous than a slightly large nonmagical snake. 

[There are multiple factors that lead to differences in Stat growth bonuses from Quests, the most notable being the difference in Stats and the individual level of contribution. The System User was significantly weaker than the Martanimis Python, and additionally, the System User had far and away the greatest level of contribution in the completion of the Quest to slay the Martanimis Python. In comparison, the System User received much more assistance in the completion of the Quest to slay the Adolescent Voltaic Wolfstag, and the comparative difference of Stats between the System User and the Adolescent Voltaic Wolfstag was lesser.]

That… wasn't an adult?

[No. The creature you recently slew was an Adolescent Voltaic Wolfstag, in the final stage before true adulthood.]

I truly had bitten off much more than I could chew, and this new [Quest] wasn't doing me any favors. There was no way there were any other wolfstag packs nearby, unless they were somehow directly subordinate to the Voltaic pack. Such a thing was infrequent, though not unheard of, and only happened when a branch of the pack developed the lesser version of the elemental capability, and they would then suborn themselves to the original pack. So, maybe there was a weaker pack of Mistral Wolfstags nearby… but it was almost certainly a vain hope. 

Then, looking at the numbers of my loyal followers, it seemed like Percral had somehow gotten himself killed, given that my follower count was two lower than it should have been if one didn't consider his absence and the death of the unfortunate female, with the addition of the total numbers of the brood having reduced by two. 

Finally–a new evolution presented itself, and it mentioned the possibility of how to use magic as a keelish. 

Finally indeed.