Alaster and Liena remained crouched at the bottom of a small, wooded depression—a wrinkle in the earth where the colossal roots of a millenary oak twisted toward the sky like gnarled wooden fingers.
The ground was a crunchy carpet of copper-brown dead leaves, mixed with a dusty, grayish soil that clung to their clothes with every movement. The morning heat, already pushing toward 9:30 AM, began to filter through the dense canopy. A light mist rose from the areas where the dew had not yet fully evaporated.
Alaster kept his body pressed against the rough bark, peeking barely half his face over a thick root to keep watch on the open sky.
Beside him, Liena held her knees to her chest. Her hands, usually so steady with a dagger, trembled imperceptibly as she mechanically wiped the sweat from her forehead, pushing back the strands of red hair clinging to her temples. Her blue eyes, normally fixed and decisive, darted across the leaf-strewn ground. She was mentally tracking the time with the precision of an hourglass.
"Do you think it'll leave soon?" Alaster whispered, his voice barely audible, never taking his violet gaze off the clearing outside.
Liena let out a short sigh—a ragged exhalation that stirred up a wisp of dust.
"It should..." she murmured, forcing her voice to remain calm. "We've been stuck here for exactly ten minutes. Wandering monsters of this caliber don't usually get bogged down in such a low-level hunting ground unless they've detected a large prize. But this damn thing keeps circling... as if it knows we're down here."
Suddenly, a gigantic shadow crossed the clearing, eclipsing the sun for a fraction of a second. The birds in the grove went completely silent. The hiss of the wind caused by the beast's membranous wings reached them like the echo of a storm.
"Why doesn't it burn us out from the sky?" Alaster inquired, frowning as he recalled the classic descriptions of winged reptiles from Earth's games. "If it had fire breath, it would have already scorched this entire grove to flush us out."
Liena let out a dry, humorless laugh as she adjusted the leather straps of her light armor.
"Wyverns don't breathe fire, Alaster. You're confusing a hunting beast with a true dragon. And even if it were a dragon, they wouldn't use fire on prey this small; it would ruin the meat. Wyverns are physical hunters."
The halfling rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand before continuing.
"Their method is to dive-bomb from the sky like hawks, or swoop low to shred hiding spots using their foreclaws and their tail-whip. If it catches us in open ground, it won't need more than a second to tear us in half."
Liena curled into a fetal position. She hugged her knees tightly, burying her chin between her arms. The terror, contained until now by her scout's discipline, began to overflow.
"I never... I never thought I'd die like this," she confessed, her voice breaking. "I've dodged traps in pitch-black dungeons, I've survived goblin ambushes on the road... but this is Rank A. A Level 100 monster in a Level 5 foraging meadow. This isn't fair... it doesn't make sense."
Alaster turned to her, noticing the damp glint of tears beginning to slide down the halfling's pale cheeks. His logical mind, accustomed to seeking solutions under pressure, evaluated the situation immediately.
I can't let Liena crumble like this. I have to do something. But what? Run? he concluded. It wasn't the most creative idea, but it was what he had.
"Then let's run," Alaster proposed, his voice firm, trying to project confidence. "We'll look for reinforcements. If we sprint at full speed while sticking to cover, we could reach the gates of Sibar in about two hours. We're both fast enough to cover the distance. Once we're there, the guild will dispatch a high-level team in a matter of minutes."
Liena raised her head, looking at him with tear-filled eyes in a grimace of despair and resignation.
"We can't run, Alaster. You don't understand the geography of this area. This grove isn't part of the great continental forest where we could circle around under the trees; it's just an island of vegetation in the middle of the open prairie. A green patch barely a few hundred meters across. If we leave the cover of these branches to race toward the city, we'll be completely exposed. It'll see us before we've taken ten steps."
Seeing the panic mirrored in the halfling's features, Alaster reached out and placed his hand on her shoulder, squeezing gently. The warmth of his touch seemed to stabilize her pulse.
"Then we'll change the strategy," Alaster said, looking her straight in the eyes. "We don't have to run now. We just have to wait for nightfall. In the darkness, without the sunlight giving us away in the field, we'll be able to escape on foot without its aerial vision detecting us. It's only a few hours of patience."
Liena blinked, absorbing the elf's words. A small, trembling smile appeared on her lips as she wiped her tears with the back of her gauntlet.
"No... that's not a bad idea," she admitted, letting out a more relieved sigh. "Night reduces the effectiveness of flying predators that rely on light. You're quite smart for a newbie, Alaster..."
The elf nodded and turned back to look at the sky through the branches, searching for the monster's silhouette.
Liena, however, remained static, contemplating the High Elf's masculine profile. The golden light filtering through the leaves illuminated his perfect features and light blue hair, creating an almost unreal contrast in the middle of that desperate situation.
Wow... Liena thought, feeling a strange heat in her cheeks that had nothing to do with the morning weather. It would be much more exciting to be alone with him in a forest if it weren't for the fact that we're probably going to be killed at any moment. Well... at least if everything goes wrong, I'll have a handsome corpse by my side forever.
A small, nervous giggle escaped her chest at her own macabre thought.
SHOOOM!
A sharp, metallic whistle tore through the prairie air, immediately followed by a deafening roar that made the sandy floor of the depression vibrate. The sound came from the southern sector of the patch of trees.
Liena and Alaster froze, eyes locked in the direction of the blast.
"What the hell is Arya doing?!" Liena exclaimed, turning completely pale as she leaped to her feet, bracing herself against the root. "Is she trying to enrage it?!"
"Is she attacking the monster?" Alaster asked, sharpening his senses to process the echo of the combat.
"It makes no sense..." Liena muttered, teeth gritted. "Arya has years of experience as an adventurer. If she's attacking it like that instead of maintaining stealth... it's because something went wrong. Dammit!"
The halfling crawled through the dry leaves until she reached Alaster. She tried to peer through the dense mass of the tree canopy, but the distance was too great; the action was unfolding about eighty meters to the south.
"Alaster, your eyes... can you see the monster clearly from here?" Liena asked urgently.
Alaster stood up fully, utilizing the innate visual acuity of his new race. His violet eyes focused on the silhouette of the reptile, which was now performing a sharp bank in the air, descending toward the treetops to the south with renewed fury.
"I see it perfectly," Alaster confirmed, describing the scene in real-time. "It's hovering over the southern grove. Its rows of teeth look like short swords, and its scales reflect the light as if they were made of tempered steel. It's roaring loudly."
"Look at its back," Liena ordered, gripping his sleeve tightly. "Near the base of its neck... does it have a horn that's noticeably longer than the rest of the spines running down its spine?"
Alaster focused his vision on the beast's back as it beat its wings to brake its descent.
"Yes," Alaster said, his expression serious. "It has a huge central horn at the base of its neck. It's twice as big as the others."
Liena let go of Alaster's sleeve, taking a step back as the little blood she had left in her face evaporated.
"If it has that horn... it's an Alpha," the halfling sentenced, her voice trembling with horror. "Alpha Wyverns don't hunt alone. That means it's just holding us here... It's waiting for its pack to arrive and surround the forest."
Liena looked at Alaster in despair.
"We can't wait for nightfall, Alaster... If the others arrive, they'll enter the grove on foot to hunt us down. But we're too weak to flee in open ground, and even less capable of killing it... This is the end."
Alaster looked at his own hands, feeling his heart rate accelerate. The idea of accepting a predetermined end sparked a flame of rebellion in his mind.
"No," Alaster said, clenching his fists tightly. "I'm not going to let myself be killed here without a fight."
He closed his eyes for a fraction of a second and opened his mental interface to check his remaining mana resources:
Current Mana: 660 / 660
Ice Lance is useless against scales with the density of steel, he analyzed quickly in his mind. Physical impact would bounce off or barely scratch the surface. But fire magic... burn damage is continuous and cumulative.
He calculated his options at lightning speed.
If I manage to set it on fire bit by bit with multiple impacts, the heat will weaken the joints between its scales. Each [Fire Arrow] consumes only 10 mana points. With my current reserve, I have enough for over 60 consecutive shots. And thanks to my intelligence attributes, I calculate I can project and fire about two arrows per second... more or less. It's a tremendous advantage not to have to recite a four-second chant for every projectile.
Alaster planted his feet firmly on the dry earth, spreading them to balance his weight, and began to concentrate his mana. The air around him began to fluctuate from the incipient heat.
Eighty meters away, in the southern grove, the situation was a chaos of shredded leaves and muffled screams.
Arya stood behind the trunk of a thick pine, visibly gasping. Her arms moved with impressive speed, pulling arrow after arrow from her quiver, drawing the string, and releasing the projectiles toward the sky in a frantic rhythm.
Each arrow left with a violent whistle, but upon striking the Wyvern's chest, most bounced off with a sickening metallic clang.
Jinneth came running from the dense undergrowth, gasping for air, her clothes covered in twigs.
"I got the wagon to a safer spot among the rocks to the west!" the baker shouted, drawing her short sword with trembling hands. "Arya! You have to fire something stronger! Use your magic or your rank skills!"
"And what do you want me to fire at it, kid?!" Arya snapped without stopping, sweat running down her neck. "A branch?! I'm an archer, my damage depends on my gear!"
"You're Level 95!" Jinneth screamed, desperate, covering her ears as the monster roared again from the sky. "I'm a Level 12 warrior—if I get close, that Level 100 thing will turn me into mush! But you should be able to pierce its wings! Why aren't you doing any damage?!"
Arya released another arrow that barely managed to scrape a wing membrane before turning to Jinneth, eyes bloodshot.
"Because this isn't my main bow, damn it!" the elf roared. "It's one of the cheap ones I use for gathering missions!"
Jinneth stood mouth agape in the middle of the woods, ignoring a gust of wind that almost blew her hair off.
"Why would you bring that trash on a mission?!" the young girl shrieked.
"Why would I bring a fifty-gold-coin bow with armor-piercing runes just to kill Level 5 rabbits?!" Arya retorted, repositioning to fire again. "It's a waste of durability! Use your head, Jinneth!"
Before Jinneth could respond, the sky above them illuminated with a brilliant, orange hue.
SHOO, SHOO, SHOO, SHOO!
A continuous barrage of igneous projectiles began to cross the sky of the grove, ascending from the northern sector. They were standard-sized fire arrows, but they were released with such a regular and rapid cadence that they looked like the traces of a machine-gun burst.
The projectiles struck in a chain against the Wyvern's flanks, erupting in small orange sparks against its green scales.
Arya stopped moving, watching the trajectory of the impacts with squinted eyes.
"Those are basic fire arrows..." the elven archer murmured, recognizing the signature of the magic. "That must be Alaster."
"Alaster is fighting!" Jinneth exclaimed with a mix of pride and terror. "We have to help him!"
"He's wasting his time!" Arya cut her off, grabbing her by the armor to prevent her from doing something reckless. "Those are Common-rank arrows. No matter how many he fires in a row, he won't have the power to pierce the scales of a Rank A Alpha in a single hit. He's just drawing its attention."
The Wyvern, enraged by the constant tapping of flames that were beginning to heat its back, let out a sharp screech. It folded its wings and dived in a brutal swoop straight toward the area of trees where Arya and Jinneth were.
"Move!" Arya screamed.
The two girls ran with all their might toward the denser interior of the forest. The monster passed a few meters above their heads; its massive wingspan ripped the upper branches from the pines, causing a rain of splinters and pinecones to fall onto the undergrowth.
The creature had to pull up sharply at a steep angle to avoid crashing into the thicker trunks, regaining altitude above the treetops.
In the middle of the flight, Jinneth stepped on a wet root, lost her balance, and slipped, falling to her knees on the carpet of dry leaves while looking toward the sky in panic.
"Be careful, kid!" Arya snapped, turning around quickly. With her free hand, she grabbed Jinneth by the shoulder of her armor and yanked her up, dragging her behind a thick trunk.
Arya checked her quiver with a grimace of frustration.
"I'm running out of arrows and I'm barely tickling it," the elf said, wiping sweat from her eyes. "That damn beast has over eight thousand total hit points. With all my shots I've barely chipped off a thousand HP, and its wings look intact... If we don't slow its mobility, we're—"
BOOOOOOM!
A deafening detonation, with the power of a thunderstorm, shook the entire eastern grove. A gigantic sphere of concentrated fire, bluish at its center from the high temperature, impacted squarely into the Wyvern's left flank just as the beast attempted to gain altitude for another hunting pass.
The explosion was so massive that the expansive shockwave bent the treetops within a fifty-meter radius.
The monster let out a roar of pain. Half of its left wing and part of its torso were covered in dense fire that wouldn't be extinguished by the wind. The creature, destabilized by the impact and losing control of its trajectory, lurched toward the eastern sector, roaring in fury as it tried to shake off the remaining flames.
Jinneth stood up slowly, eyes wide, hands resting on the pine trunk, contemplating the trail of black smoke the reptile was leaving in the sky.
"That..." the young baker stuttered, feeling the residual heat of the explosion on her face. "Was that a fireball?!"
Arya felt her legs give out and she collapsed to the ground to rest, letting her cheap bow drop to the side, exhaling a long sigh as a smile of relief appeared on her damp face.
"That was Deinderatrix," the elven archer stated, looking toward the east, where the Wyvern continued to move away amidst howls. "The witch is finally making her move."