Valerie could only sit completely still on the ground, staring at the man with wide eyes.
Her eyes were completely glued to the pair of triangular ears covered in gray fur and the thick tail lying limply behind the man’s body.
Her breath suddenly caught in her throat.
Her brain screamed orders for her body to get up immediately and run as far away as possible from this mythical creature, but damn it, both of her legs felt stiff as if nailed to the earth!
“What should I do now??” Valerie whispered in a panic to the silence of dawn.
She turned her head back, toward the path of her escape last night.
The sound of the morning wind rustling between the giant pine trees only made her heart more anxious.
And sure enough, far behind the hill, the echoes of the bastard hunters’ voices who had been chasing her since last night were heard again.
They weren’t giving up, instead they sounded like they were moving around toward the slope where she was right now!
“Hey!” Valerie called out in a hoarse voice, daring herself to get a little closer.
The half-wolf man still didn’t move.
The torn wounds on his large back were still bleeding fresh blood, soaking the gray moss beneath him until it turned a deep red.
The creature’s breath sounded very thin, leaving a painful little clicking sound with every gasp.
“Please…
wake up!” Valerie said while gently shaking those wide shoulders.
There was still no answer.
Her touch on the ruined leather coat fabric felt incredibly cold, like ice.
Valerie bit her lip.
She knew that if she left this wolf man lying here, the hunters back there wouldn’t just catch her, but they would also end this creature’s life without hesitation.
Her sense of humanity suddenly overcame the fear that had been twisting her stomach.
“Ah, damn it!
I can’t just leave you like this!” Valerie said, annoyed at herself.
She started sliding her scraped and wounded hands under the man’s armpits.
God, this man’s body was so heavy!
When Valerie tried to pull him backward, her arm muscles immediately screamed in pain from exhaustion after running all night.
To make things worse, her thin silk slipper shoes slipped on the wet ground, making her fall into a sitting position right next to the man’s head.
“Not now, please…
my legs, come on, please cooperate!” Valerie muttered while gritting her teeth, enduring the sting in her palms.
She stood up again, planting her feet as firmly as possible on the ground.
With one strong jerk, she dragged the large body slowly through the fern bushes.
Every inch of movement felt like deadly torture for her already weak muscles.
Cold sweat mixed with the remaining morning dew dripped from her forehead, making her vision a bit blurry.
“THERE ARE DRAG MARKS HERE!!” A sudden shout echoed from the top of the slope, making Valerie’s heart feel like it was about to jump out of her throat.
“Check the bushes under that big rock!
Quick!” answered another voice that sounded much closer than before.
“Shit!!
They are so close!” Valerie held her breath, speeding up her movements without caring about the pain in her feet anymore.
Right behind the wall of the huge rock covered in old moss, she saw a narrow gap leading into the darkness, a natural cave hidden behind the thick forest vines.
“Hang in there, idiot!!!” Valerie whispered to the unconscious man.
With the last of her energy almost completely gone, she pulled the man’s body into the cave’s gap.
Luckily, the cave tunnel went downward and immediately made a sharp right turn, automatically hiding their position from outside view.
As soon as the man’s entire large body successfully passed the cave’s entrance, Valerie immediately collapsed right next to him.
Her chest rose and fell quickly, scraping for the thin air inside the stuffy stone room.
“Search more carefully!
She couldn’t have flown!” The hunter’s voice now sounded right outside the cave wall, only separated by a few meters from where Valerie was hiding!
Valerie immediately covered her own mouth tightly with both hands that were dirty with black soil.
She closed her eyes, praying in her heart to death that the armed men outside wouldn’t realize the existence of this narrow gap.
The sound of her own heartbeat sounded so loud in her ears, racing with the sound of heavy boots stepping on the pile of dry leaves outside.
“The trail ends here, Boss!” said the hunter outside in an annoyed tone.
“Impossible, the blood is still fresh!
Search around here!” replied his friend, sounding like he was walking back and forth right in front of the stone gap.
Valerie glanced at the wolf man next to her in horror.
Blood from the wounds on the man’s back began to form a small puddle on the rocky cave floor.
If the smell of this blood got caught by them, or if those men just randomly checked the vines in front of the gap, her story would be finished this morning!
“Maybe she went down toward the swamp below,” the first voice muttered, sounding like it was starting to move away from the stone wall.
“Let’s go quick, before the fog blocks our vision!” answered the second man.
Their footsteps slowly faded away, going down the hillside slope.
Valerie only dared to let go of her hand from her mouth after making sure the situation was completely safe.
She let out a long, trembling breath, then leaned her back against the cold and mossy cave wall.
The darkness inside this cave at least gave a temporary sense of safety that she really needed since her crazy escape from the city.
“Phew…
safe,” Valerie hissed, leaning her head against the stone wall weakly.
She turned her head back toward the foreign man who was now lying on his side on the cave floor.
In the dim dawn light that slightly penetrated the entrance gap, the man’s face was clearly visible for the first time.
His jawline was really sharp, with a few small scars around his cheeks.
His messy black hair partially covered his wolf ears which now looked limp, no longer moving actively like when they were outside earlier.
“Actually…
what kind of creature are you anyway?” Valerie asked the darkness of the cave, knowing that her question wouldn’t get an answer.
She got closer with stiff knees, looking closely at the torn wounds on the back of the man’s cloak.
But wait…
the wound looked very strange.
This wasn’t like a normal sword slash or wild animal scratches that she had ever known on earth.
There was a kind of purplish charred residue on the edges of the wound that kept oozing dark fluid, ruining his expensive leather cloak fabric.
“This looks really bad…
disgusting but terrifying,” Valerie muttered, trying to touch the edge of the destroyed cloak.
Suddenly, the man let out a soft, strained groan from his throat.
His large body tensed a little, making Valerie shocked to death.
The girl immediately pulled her hand back, watching every little movement of the creature in front of her with a high level of alertness.
“Hey, can you hear me?
Don’t rage, okay!” Valerie called out in a very low voice volume.
The wolf man still didn’t open his eyes.
His breathing got even more erratic instead, a sign that his condition was getting more critical because of losing too much blood.
Valerie knew she couldn’t just stay quiet if she wanted this man to stay alive until this afternoon.
“Oh no, I have to find something to plug this wound!” Valerie said in panic, then her gaze went down to her white silk dress which was already torn everywhere.
Without thinking twice anymore, she pulled the bottom part of her dress skirt, ripping it with all her strength.
Sreeek!
The silk fabric tore into a few long pieces of cloth that were clean enough.
This fabric could at least be an emergency bandage to hold the heavy bleeding on the man’s back before she could look for water or medicinal plants in this strange forest later.
“Sorry if this hurts, hold on a bit!” Valerie whispered before pressing the silk cloth pieces hard onto the open wound on the man’s back.
“Ugh…!!” The large body beneath her suddenly shook violently as the cloth touched the wound, making Valerie feel terrified for a second, but luckily the man remained unconscious.
Valerie kept pressing the cloth with both of her trembling palms, letting her beautiful white fabric change color to dark red within seconds because of the blood soaking through massively.
“Please, don’t die here!
I already went through a lot of trouble dragging your heavy body, you know!!” Valerie muttered with a wrinkled forehead, continuing to hold her position over the foreign man’s body with the remaining strength she had.
Inside the silence of the stone cave isolated from the outside world, dawn slowly changed into a cold morning.
Valerie continued to keep watch beside the foreign creature, ignoring hunger, exhaustion, and the fear that plagued her human body for a life gamble that she didn’t even know the end of.