One Last System

If someone were to map my movements on some kind of schematic, they would surely realize how weird my attempts at escaping were. Because instead of just trying to get as far from the source of the problem as I could, I kept zig-zagging, turning right only to turn left and only slightly increasing the distance.

'The most important thing is to not let them get a jump on me,' I thought, using a moment of jump when I was airborne to take a look behind me.

Just like I thought, the monsters were hot on my tail. Even though they all looked like slightly oversized rabbits, I dared not to take them lightly.

This kind of perception, flawed by what I knew from the earth, was my greatest flaw. The flaw that I was aware of and I actively sought to eliminate.

In the end, those were the monsters, predators, and hunters. Not some adorable bunnies that girls could receive as Christmas presents.

'Fuck,' I thought when I was too late to turn my eyes back in the direction I was moving in.

A random tree branch appeared out of nowhere and slapped me right across my face. It was thin and glib but still managed to break the rhythm of my moves.

The monsters didn't miss this chance to attack.

Two of them were in a position to leap on me. One went for my torso while the other attempted to injure my leg.

I swung my spear, hitting the lower one with the blunt butt of it. Right now, using the blade would only slow me down.

'FUCK,' I quelled my scream when the other monster managed to get to me and bite into my side. It was too close to use my spear on it.

Keeping my eyes forward on the path, I reached out with my left hand and grabbed the bunny by its neck. Tearing it away from my flesh instantly proved to be a bad idea... But it was the only thing I could do to prevent the situation from getting even worse.

I smashed the monster in my head against the random tree I was passing by. With my hand freed, I instantly brought it down to my injury.

'It's gonna be a pain in the ass,' I thought, fighting off the heavy pain while feeling my blood trickle between my fingers.

The bunny managed to tear apart quite a chunk of flesh from my side. It was an injury that even an influx of mana from the rest of my body couldn't fix on the spot.

Normally, a wound like that would mean the end of my escape and an effective end at the teeth of the other monsters. But with my cultivation at its finest, to a degree, I could ignore it.

'This is the clearing Lucius was talking about,' I thought a moment later when I finally managed to get to the open area. But instead of entering it for the sake of greater freedom at using my spear, I kept to the woods.

After just over a week of my training, I felt more confident at moving around with more footsteps than in an open field.

By the time I made a second circle around the clearing, my wound finally managed to close itself under the healing touch of my mana. The process was slow, and my wounded part was still hurting like hell, but at least I wasn't losing more blood with each passing second.

"Lead them in!" A shout came from somewhere in the forest. Due to how thick it was, I couldn't even point out the exact direction it came from.

But it didn't matter.

'Finally,' I thought, taking a sharp right turn and rushing towards the middle of my clearing. My left side kept hurting like hell, but for now, I had no other choice but to ignore it.

'I need to endure,' I thought grimly as I dug my feet and turned around, right in the nick of time to face against the three of the fastest bunnies.

This time, I didn't hold back.

I ensured my stance was stable before grabbing my spear with both my hands. I aimed the blade towards the approaching monsters...

And I started stabbing.

'Use the right hand to push the spear and the left one to pull it back,' the teachings of the pathfinder rang in my ears.

Each of my stabs was pretty weak. This was the form of attacking that I practiced only a little, making it pretty weak and incredibly inaccurate.

But in my situation, it didn't matter if I managed to pierce the bunny or just shove it away with my attack. After all, I only needed to stall for time!

A small noise reached my ears.

Normally, I wouldn't pay much mind towards it. We were in the middle of a massive forest after all! But in the midsts of a heated and pretty challenging battle, with more bunnies coming out from the forest with each second, my senses were ramped up to their limits.

I only heard Lucius approach. I couldn't even cast a glimpse of it with the corner of my eyes, even though I was facing the exact direction he came from.

Slash.

A small axe in his hand split the first of the bunnies in half, slamming into another one and pushing it aside.

"GO FOR IT!" he shouted, finally freeing me from the burden of just stalling.

I furiously drove all the spare energy I could afford through my spear. I then changed my position to the one I was more comfortable with.

"Die!" I shouted as I pressed my attack, driving my spear through the nearest of the bunnies.

I leaned my body to the side, allowing its weight to take me off the line of attack of another bunny. Even though we were now properly retaliating, the fight was nowhere close to its end.

Bit by bit, we managed to cull the number of monsters. No matter how hard I tried to push myself to the limit, Lucius still did most of the work.

In my defense, I was injured. Pretty seriously at that. But I wasn't going to use this reason as an excuse.

About a quarter of an hour later, I finally lowered my spear and fell down to my knees. My body was covered in bruises and small cuts, the testimony of all the attacks that almost managed to get to me. On the other hand, Lucius wasn't injured... but even he was panting, struggling to regain his breath after the fight.

"This is a huge haul," I managed to utter after taking a moment to rest a little. "With this..."

"Don't waste time," Lucius said, raising his head to wipe the sweat off his forehead. He then brought his ax down and beheaded the nearest of the bunnies. "Take the stones as quickly as possible. We need to ditch soon," he ordered, grabbing the stone from the bunny's corpse before moving to the next one.

'He is always in such a rush to gather the spoils...' I thought, forcing my spear into the ground and pulling out my knife. When it came to extracting the spoils, this small blade was far more useful than the lengthy spear. 'What is he so worried about?' I thought, shaking my head in displeasure.