Heavenly Forest Wolf 12 Chapter 12 - A Staggering Opponen

The following day, Zaro decided to spend his time hunting creatures with stronger cores and from his experience, they were usually boars and occasionally forest rabbits. He also could spend time searching for plants around the forest that contained a concentrated amount of essence.

There was never a shortage of creatures, in fact, there were so many creatures that he just couldn't always choose which ones he wanted to hunt. Similarly, there were plants everywhere and there were so many fruits, flowers, and vegetables that he couldn't decide which ones to eat but also, he worried about them being poisonous or not.

As a result, he decided to stick with a carnivorous diet and began hunting for creatures. The easiest way was to detect creatures with the use of smell. He could roughly guess how many creatures were in a direction and occasionally he would be able to identify what kind of a creature it was.

This time Zaro decided to pay attention to the tracks left by the different animals as he was trying to find a specific animal that seemed to be only in the area he was in. Judging from the prints left on the ground he guessed it was some sort of a deer or caribou.

Its hooves were everywhere but he just couldn't locate the exact spot which it was in. He smelt the tracks and tried to identify the whereabouts of the creature. It almost felt as if it could detect danger or just the presence of a hunter in the area and always maintained a safe distance.

Zaro began his hunt, he went towards every smell he couldn't identify but they always just ended up being boars, rabbits, reptiles, or rodents. Although they contained essence cores, they were simply too small and most of the boars he found hadn't even matured yet so they were comparable to rabbits!

Determined to find a deer, countless hours had pa.s.sed but he felt like he was nearing his target, after constantly inspecting and comparing hoof prints, he had slowly understood which ones were fresh and those which weren't.

That's when suddenly, he detected something unfamiliar, it was a strong smell and it was coming from an area which he had never been to. During his time in the forest, he mainly continued in a straight line and settled around a certain part due to the orc fort and the bush trap.

This area was unfamiliar and felt like a completely different forest, with different flowers and fruit scattered throughout it. He proceeded cautiously and soon heard some different noises and movements around the same area that he detected these creatures.

However, once he got close, they also retreated some distance away. Trying to figure out if it was because of him, he paused and proceeded a number of times and found it to be true! These creatures had some sort of a sixth sense, they could detect a threat nearby and safely back away.

Zaro hid his killing intent, camouflaged and picked up the pace as he approached them. The Herd had suddenly become alarmed and confused at the same time. However, Zaro no longer had any intention of backing down! He charged forward without hesitation and soon locked his eyes on a stag standing at two meters tall and crying out to the herd.

It had long and majestic antlers, its body was bulging with muscles and its eyes were so striking that it made Zaro's heart sink. He spent so long trying to find this terrifying stag and then realizing that he couldn't do anything against it...

He dropped his head and decided that he would be satisfied with just seeing the creature, once he decided to go back, he noticed the stag approaching him. Alarmed, Zaro was just about to hide and then run but was stopped by the stag's voice, "Hold it!"

Zaro froze in his spot and co-operated with the stag as he felt for some reason he could not escape from it? Turning around slowly, he then noticed the emerald core sitting nicely inside its chest.

"You have been following us for some time now and you have caught me off guard several times... I must commend your incredible tracking ability, however, you have been pestering us for a while now and I do not wish for this in the future," he said in a strong soothing voice.

"Eh... what do you suppose we do?" Zaro asked nervously.

"I am giving you the option to leave this entire forest, head towards the plains and if I find you here... I will kill you for being a threat to my family!" he raised his voice with the last words.

"I cannot leave just yet, I am waiting for a friend-"

"A friend?! There are more coming?!" he snapped at Zaro and smacked his hooves against the ground.

"No, no, no! He's a scavenger hawk! He goes by the name Sevilus!"

The stag went silent but kept looking into Zaro's eyes and after pondering for a moment he spoke once more, "Sevilus... is an old friend of mine... where will you meet him?" he asked curiously.

"Tomorrow if not today evening!" Zaro exclaimed immediately.

"This may sound unreasonable... but I wish to join you temporarily until we meet Sevilus."

"Yes! Of course! Wait! What? No, please I wish to be alone!" Zaro said awkwardly.

"Do not cry, I will not do anything to you, I simply want to meet an old friend..." the stag turned back and said something to one of the members of his herd and then called out to Zaro, "Lead the way young one!"

Dropping his head, he would now have to be baby-sitted by a stag... there was no way that the stag would allow him to hunt other animals. Swallowing his pride, Zaro began chewing on plants on his way back to the area he met Sevilus at.

When they reached the area, the sun was about to set and the stag which remained silent the whole time couldn't help asking "Shouldn't you be eating meat rather than plants?" A tear fell down from Zaro's eyes and he cried on the inside "You're telling me I didn't have to eat all those plants?!"

"Haha... just the appetizer before I find something good... haha..." he said embarra.s.sed, "We're here anyway, this is the spot where I met Sevilus.

"Did he not tell you when he would meet you?" he asked curiously.

"He's not been doing well recently and told me he was trying to evolve into the emerald stage..."

"Sounds like Sevilus... always trying to better himself..." he chuckled slightly.

"So... how do you know him?" It was quite odd for a hunting-type bird to be old friends with a stag so the question didn't sound unusual.

"He saved my life back when he was still at the ruby stage a few years back... we ended up meeting occasionally but he was busy looking for something back then."

"It takes a few years to get to the amber stage?!" Zaro ignored the other half and was surprised when he heard this.

"Not exactly... it depends on how well you progress during the awakening stage, Emerald is simply his limit and with it being so low, developing the core takes longer."

"That's relieving, so then-" before Zaro could finish his sentence a screech could be heard from some distance away.

"Sevilus!" the stag shouted with happiness.

Zaro looked up at the evening sky and noticed a large bird, with a familiar face but a completely different body! His feathers became much more defined and beautiful, his beak was as sharp as ever and his eyes a lot more intimidating.

Sevilus laughed to himself when he noticed the odd image of a wolf and a stag standing side by side, "only that kid can be in those positions..." he descended from the sky and landed a short distance away from the two.

"Oh! What a pleasant surprise! Crown! I can already tell how you two guys met." he laughed to himself.

"It has been too long, friend!" The stag rejoiced when Sevilus remembered him, meanwhile, Zaro rolled his eyes as he got the feeling of Déja vu.

"Alright, alright... ahem... Sevilus do you have my core yet?"

"Ah of course," Sevilus tossed something that looked similar to a package but wrapped awkwardly in large leaves. Zaro tore off the leaves like a child tearing off wrapping from a Christmas present and almost cried when he saw his ruby core.

"Oh, this one has an 'IV' printed on it! It's a bit stronger than the one I gave you!"

"Was the only one I could find, that means that the only thing I owe you now are a few answers to some questions and we are even."

The stag looked up at Sevilus and tilted his head to the side, "What did he do for you to deserve this?"

"Gave up a ruby core he hunted by himself to aid with my evolution," when he said this the stag felt s.h.i.+vers running down his spine, could it be that this pup was much stronger than he expected? He gave Zaro a brief glance and inspected his claws and fangs for a second.

Noticing his reaction, Sevilus quickly said, "Oh but let us talk with one another, how have you been?!"

While the two spoke to one another, Zaro used this time to consume the core and extract every bit of essence that was inside of it. He focused extremely hard and felt a strong flow of pure essence expanding his core tremendously!

After repeating this technique of extracting essence, he was slowly getting much better at it with time and was almost losing no essence at all while purifying most of it at the same time! This one core could be compared to three days of pure hunting in the past which made him tear up slightly due to all of the lost essence.