The sun beat down on our faces, aside from mine; the necklace of mine was slowly digging into my collarbone; I was grateful it protected me from the sun, but it had its downsides.
If I wore it too long, it would sap my vampiric strength, bringing me back to the vegetable I am. So, today I wore one of the pearl white cloaks in my closet. Additionally, I tried to match it with this top I wore.
Yukina was close by me, she was enjoying walking normally; I could see a small, subtle smile as she looked around. I hope that stays that way, she's already having a tough early life.
I smiled as well, and turned my head to the path ahead. For safekeeping, I held a beautiful ruby sword in my hands, I remember getting this countless years ago. It had an unbreakable blade, and it enhanced my physical strength when wielded.
It's overkill, but I need to use it just in case. Mister Shaun was quite interested in it at first glance; although, I disallowed him to take a closer peek.
It really was not important to our mission; this trek was tiresome. I've been through this mountainous range many a times, but I cannot comprehend the possibilities in this place; stories have foretold of avalanches, mudslides and rockslides.
Furthermore, the amount of monsters that can appear. Yukina and I had to be on high alert at all times, only our animal ears can warn us of impending doom… just like now.
I held my arm out to stop the group, and to my left were more bears that were sneaking around. One giant one was breathing heavily, albeit quiet for its size. It was an evolved form of an ice bear.
Its fur was a deep blue, lining its eyes were crystals of a light blue color; paired with its white pupils and blue eyes, it did fit the name of an evolved ice bear.
The ground rumbled as it charged towards me.
Oh well… looks like we'll have to keep fighting. It wasn't my first rodeo doing this, I sucked in my breath and held it.
Before it could ram into me, I put [healing touch] on myself; just as it was about to strike me, I jumped above it.
I knew I was going to get hurt in this, I just needed to minimize it…
I thrust my sword down, dark blood spewed out from the giant cleave I did against its body.
Way too shallow…
I only scratched the hide of this beast. Its skin was as hard as ice, but that could also be an advantage to us.
There was no roar of agony, it merely kept lunging forward; in the next instant twirling around at me when my two feet struck the ground.
I could keep jumping over it, whittling it down, but…
I rolled out of its course, the rest of the group was faring decently.
Just need to kill this big fatass bear…
Every time it charged, I maneuvered out of the way; either by rolling, ducking and jumping. This bear was mighty, but stupid.
It was barely changing its fighting moves, constantly trying to ram into me.
Must be a newly evolved beast…
On its fifth desperate charge, I readied my blade.
As it got close, I twirled, and swung my blade. There was no resistance, my sword dug deep into its flesh.
This time, it let out a deathly roar. Fur, flesh and bones couldn't resist my sword cutting through them.
Looks like I was overthinking, huh?,
The bear was unable to support its weight, and fell to its side with a loud thump.
Just to end it, I stabbed my sword into its thick head. It took a total of two, then I rushed towards everyone else.
James was struggling to hold Shaun up. His sweet blood was intoxicating my senses, but I forced those cravings down into my stomach.
There were two bears left, but they were pretty powerful. The four left were on the ground, cuts all over their bodies.
In the end, I did not need to do much; Verd cut one directly in half, Yukina had summoned four rotating earth pellets that struck the last bear's vitals. She loves that spell huh?
Once everyone had gotten their bearings, the journey had continued. We still had a while before reaching our destination.
"Master Shen, you've been through this, right?" Yukina hobbled alongside me, whilst asking
"Yes." I responded with a nod, plus a confirmation.
"How long do you think it would take to get through here?"
"A week to two, seeing our current rate, it's the latter."
We're only on the second day, everyone looks worn out. It's a mystery how James and Melinda made it through here by themselves. With all the caverns, valleys and territories.
"Huh…" Yukina turned her head to the rocky terrain ahead of us. Glad to see her seem happy when walking now. "By the way, can I ask you some questions?"
As a result, I tilted my head. So unmathew like. "Go ahead."
"How did you get that sword?" Yukina pointed at the weapon in my hands. "It looks pretty cool."
I wouldn't call it 'cool'... To her question, I shrugged before explaining, "I got it two hundred years ago. I was hunting other vampires, and stumbled across a dungeon. After clearing the dungeon's master, he dropped this."
By this, I raised the sword. And she's ready to ask more… haah.
"I'm assuming it has special effects?"
"Yes."
"Oh."
"Keep asking, I can tell you have more questions."
"Do you have any more?" She asked, her head tilted further.
"Hm…" Yukina raised her hand to her chin. "With the rate we're fighting, what level do you think I'll get to?"
"Hm?" That's an odd question.
"I mean, I'm currently level sixteen. And we keep running into bears…. I might be able to get to level nineteen." Yukina explained, her train of thought was definitely Mathews.
"Do you have an experience boost passive?"
"Hm? Yes, how did you know?"
"It's a buff that all reincarnators get." I stated whilst stretching my hand out. "You can go ahead and check."
"Oh… Damn I thought I was special…"
Yukina swore again under her breath; then she crossed her arms and closed her eyes. "At this point, I think this world despises me."
"It does, did you just realize that?"
Yukina's furious look instantly switched to shock due to my response. She easily turned to being offended, and held her body tighter.
Finally, she went quiet and rarely asked questions. Eventually, she fell back to the group.
We kept running into small packs, finding dire wolves, which to my shock ignored Yukina. They just scanned past her, and went for the ones behind her.
As the sun was nearing evening, there was a rather large pack of direwolves. A maximum of three dozen.
By this time, the group got so used to fighting these creatures.
"This will be our last group!"
"Thank god!" Yukina exclaimed before anyone else responded.
The group silently celebrated as these big furry wolves rushed towards us. My first kill met my blade, before it could wrap its mouth around me, I sliced up.
My blade easily cut its skull in twine;
Each wolf that met with me was sliced in half, or into multiple pieces. I made sure to avoid every drop of blood, I didn't want to stain my outfit…
Ahem, record kills so far; Me, Verd, Jin, Shaun, Yukina. James was on pure support.
Twelve wolves were slaughtered by me, eight by Verd, six by Jin, five by Shaun, four by Yukina.
The thirty-sixth one ran away once its pack was slaughtered. Diverging from that, there is a cave up north, not far from us; in fact, I can see it now.
Conversely, I felt something nagging in my head. Furthermore, it kept tearing at my neck; something's wrong, seriously wrong…
No, no, no!
Above us, I heard a deep sickening rumble… it was sickening, and I felt my long unfunctioning stomach flip. The ground was violently shaking, and a loud, horrifying rumbling was calling to us from the right.
Both Yukina and I snapped our heads to it, above, chunks of ice, and mounds of snow were barreling towards us.
"YUKINA! USE YOUR-" I tried to scream, but everything went black; I felt myself being crushed by thousands of kilograms of snow and ice.
Fuc-! Stay conscious!
Repeatedly, I used my healing spells; I heard every bone in my body clack, snap and creak. My mind was being overwhelmed with agony, but I forced myself to stay awake.
Shit- It felt like an eternity, but I stopped moving; but I felt an intense burning on my side; my body was burning- when I dug myself out, I was in the sun; my necklace was gone, this was not good…
I had to hurry and grab a jacket out of my spatial storage. Once it was on, I took a look at the damage…
Damn it…the damage was not good. It was horrendous, and revolting… My left side was completely skeletonized. The ones in my hand were charred black.
And it was not just my arm, it was my left side; I couldn't feel anything, my eyesight was split in half.
This is going to take a long time to heal…
Although being a vampire has its perks, such as strength amplification, and the curse of immortality, the sun was my bane. With how much my body is exposed to the sun, the worse my healing capabilities on myself were.
Metaphorically, and in reality I have to rebuild my lost parts. I need to regrow nerves, muscles, veins, flesh and my skin.
This is… great…Yukina reacted just in time… She'll be fine…
I had to start circulating my mana; making it flow into the bone marrow of my bones, firstly needing to make the bones stronger before I could move.
If I tried walking now, my leg bones would crumble. Just as I brought my mana to my feet, I casted a healing spell.
Thankfully…
Due to being by myself, I had to be weary of my surroundings as I kept my spells going. Conversely, there wasn't any need to be weary; I was thrown far away from any cave, or territory.
I was in a deep ravine, from my mark on Yukina… we were far, far apart. To the point it would be better for me to wait for her at the other side of the mountain.
Meanwhile the group, I'd have to search for when I could. Very well, I knew the chances were extremely low, at the worst… Everyone else was dead. Shaun, and Verd were guaranteed survivors.
Jin's a possible, that man had surprising endurance; whilst James, he's a low chance at surviving, alongside the wives. Even if they survived the initial avalanche, the amount of beasts wouldn't let them live.
Once my bones slowly turned a healthy looking color— pearl white, I took a step on my skeletonized foot, reinforcing it with mana. Otherwise, I'd just crumble to the ground if I didn't have tendons holding everything together.
Now, it's time for me to get going; first task was searching for bodies. Yukina will be fine— she just found a cave to rest in with Verd's kids.