System Change

The group continued killing the level 50+ Horned Boars for a few hours. It would take mere seconds for Clay and Thomas to slay one of the monsters once Clay began tanking the beast. With each kill, their cooperation increased.

Thomas alternated using his skills to kill the beasts. He would use Soul Spear for one, Flurry for the next, then the third would take a little extra time as both of his skills were on cooldown, but the boar would die nonetheless. After that, he would use Flurry again because its cooldown time was less than that of Soul Spear.

Alicia was rendered relatively useless after a few kills. She occasionally had to come in and heal when Thomas was fighting with just regular attacks. Noticing the situation, she saved her buffs for when Thomas’s skills were all on cooldown. After every fourth monster, the group would take a short break.

Thomas’s hesitation at working with a noble slowly dissipated throughout the day. At one point, Clay had announced that his storage ring was almost full, and Thomas even offered to use his so they could continue.

Even Derek had begun to wonder if the Clay and Alicia duo were actually going to make a move on Thomas. Perhaps, because of his show of strength, Thomas had forced them to change their minds. However, Derek was still able to catch the occasional tension between the duo when Thomas wasn’t looking.

Something was going on. Derek suspected they were trying to work themselves up for the task. If nothing else, their hesitation and delay in their plans, if they actually planned on doing something, had caused Thomas to lower his guard significantly.

Finally, after hours of watching the group mechanically slay Horned Boars, it happened. Thomas had just used Flurry to kill a beast, and Soul Spear was still on cooldown. Thomas turned to walk back towards Alicia.

With Thomas’s back towards Clay, the noble locked eyes with Alicia. With a serious look, he nodded at the woman. Alicia quickly shifted her gaze from Clay and looked towards Thomas with a glint in her eyes.

“Are we all ready?” Clay asked. “I’m going to go get one more monster, then I think we should call it quits for today.”

Thomas turned around and smiled. “Sounds good to me. I’m getting tired, anyway.”

With Thomas’s back turned, Alicia nodded at Clay while speaking. “Yeah, me too. If we hurry, we can have a good dinner when we get back. What we had for lunch can’t be called food.” She giggled.

With that, Clay ran into the forest to look for their last prey.

Derek realized that Alicia didn’t bother casting any buffs on the two this time. Surprisingly, Thomas noticed it, too.

“Ah, you didn’t buff our defense or speed.” Thomas said.

“Oh… I was thinking about dinner and I forgot. I’ll cast them when Clay gets back with the monster.” She replied.

Thomas nodded at her. It was a valid excuse, and it didn’t seem like it made the boy suspicious.

Derek sat forward from his perch on the tree. If something was going to happen, it would happen soon. Either just after, or during, the next fight.

Soon, Clay came running back from the treeline. Another Horned Boar was chasing him, just like all the others. The teen slid to a stop and turned around. Thomas ducked right in behind him, just as he had done many times before.

It was odd. Clay had been able to keep more distance from this beast than he had the others. Derek frowned.

The new monster broke through the treeline and entered their hunting ground. As the boar rapidly approached the tank, a smirk appeared on his face. Derek had an idea of what was about to happen. The question was whether he should intervene and stop it from happening, or let it play out some. Either way, he would interfere before the kid died or got hurt too badly.

And, just as Derek thought would happen, Clay dove to the side just before the boar hit him. If the boar kills Thomas, nobody would be able to say anything.

Thomas’s eyes went wide at Clay’s actions. A yellow glow fell over his body almost instantly and he moved his spear up from his side to block while trying to dodge to the side. Unfortunately, he was too close to Clay when the teen dodged the rampaging boar.

Derek was impressed by Thomas’s quick thinking. Haste was a skill that the boy hadn’t used in front of the others yet. It didn’t save him from being hit, but allowed him to take a step and partially block the attack and avoid lethal damage.

Thomas’s spear swung in front of him, slightly parrying the tusks of the boar. That, combined with the step he took, caused the boar to miss hitting him center mass. Instead, only one tusk made contact. It tore into the side of Thomas’s abdomen and came out of his back.

His quick actions caused the boar to miss most of his vitals. It was possible that his kidney had been damaged, or maybe his spleen, but at least it missed his heart and liver. A health potion would be able to heal other organs, but the heart could have been an instant death.

The boar raised its head and swung Thomas into the air. Thomas flew to the side before crashing to the ground. Derek, watching from the side, examined the boy with Identify. Afterwards, Derek smiled. The boy had ‘injured’ and ‘bleeding’ status effects, but he wasn’t even in critical condition. That meant that he still had a good amount of health left.

Plus, Thomas was already moving with a red vial in his hand. He rolled to the side, unstoppered the vial, and drained it all in one gulp. The results were visible as the dripping blood slowed to a stop. The bleeding status was removed and soon his injured status would be too.

Luckily for Thomas, instead of chasing after him, the boar turned back to Clay. Clay was the one who initially provoked it, so he still held its attention.

“Damn it!” Clay cursed as he took a charge to his shield. He summoned his sword and raised his free hand. With a quick motion, he pulled it down and yelled, “Take care of this!”

The six hidden guards jumped out of their hiding places and charged forward. Clay had to hold the Horned Boar’s attacks for an extra ten seconds, but the boar couldn’t break through his defense. Soon, the first guard arrived and, with a slash of his sword, the boar was beheaded.

Clay dismissed his shield and scowled at the guard. “Took you long enough to get here.” He scoffed. Then he turned and walked over to Alicia, who was standing with a frown. “Even with all that work…” He shook his head and sighed. “Well, I guess it really doesn’t matter.”

At this time, Thomas had made his way back up to his feet. The health potion had done a great job healing him, but there was still a wound on his side. The potion couldn’t completely heal him in such a short time.

Thomas glared at the duo standing in front of the newly arrived guards. “Why?” He asked.

“Why?” Alicia laughed. “Why would someone of your status have something as precious as that?” She pointed at Thomas’s hand. “Who asked you to go around flaunting a storage ring? If you want to blame anyone, blame yourself.”

Thomas’s gaze grew colder. A single tear ran down the right side of his face, but he didn’t whimper or and his voice didn’t break. “Just over something like this…” He raised his hand and fiddled with the ring with the other. “Everything we did… the weeks running missions and spending time with each other. All of it was just because you wanted to steal my ring!” Thomas yelled the last part before breaking into laughter.

“He…” Thomas’s laughter continued. “Was right.” He managed to say in between bouts of laughter. Finally, he calmed down. His eyes were red, and more tears seemed to have rolled down his face. “I should have listened to him. He gave me so many warnings about you.” He glared at Alicia.

Clay frowned and turned to Alicia. “Who is he talking about?” He asked.

Alicia shook her head. “I don’t know. The only person he ever talked about was his friend with the pet bunny, even then only barely. I never met him, so I don’t know why he would talk about me.”

“I guess there’s no way for me to get out of this alive, then?” Thomas’s voice broke the duo’s discussion.

As Derek was watching everything play out, he noticed one of the guards frown when he heard Alicia speak about the man with a pet bunny. It looks like someone may be able to connect the dots. He thought.

Clay shook his head. “Why couldn’t you have made it easy on us and been killed by the boar. If you would have died to the beast like you were supposed to, we would have been able to bring your body back and you could have had a proper burial. Now, you’re just going to have to disappear.”

Thomas resolved himself to his fate and withdrew a backup spear from his storage ring. It looked like he knew that he couldn’t outrun the guards. He didn’t plan on going down without a fight. Thomas lowered himself down into a combat stance and got ready.

“Guards!” Clay yelled. All but one of the guards withdrew their swords from their sheaths. Clay gave the single guard an odd look. “Bradley!” He called to the guard.

“Y-young master.” The guard spoke. This was the guard that seemed to have put together Derek’s identity. “Maybe we should stop.”

Clay scoffed. “Stop? Why should we stop?”

Instead of answering Clay, the guard, Bradley, directed his next words towards Thomas. “Your friend. The one who gave you the warnings. Is his name, perhaps… Derek Hunt?”

Thomas twitched when Derek’s name was mentioned. It was more than enough for everybody there to see that the boy recognized the name.

Seeing the boy’s reactions, the guard spoke again. “Young master. You mustn’t do anything rash. If this boy truly knows Mr. Hunt…” He stopped. “The master… he has been trying to establish relations with the man…”

Clay furrowed his brows. “Even if that is so, the damage is already done. And that’s IF he actually knows this man you’re talking about. All the more reason to make this kid disappear.” Clay smiled and asked Thomas, “You didn’t tell anybody what you were doing today, did you?”

Thomas didn’t reply, but that was enough to know that he hadn’t.

“Good… Guards! Kill him!” Clay commanded.

Before anyone could move, a loud clapping sound rang out from the edge of the treeline. Derek had jumped down from his perch and began his approach. Everyone’s gazes shifted to him as he stepped out of the forest.

Thomas shuttered and let out a long breath.

Derek smiled and looked at the boy. “You fought well today. At least you’ve been keeping up with your training.”