Saving private Lya! [2]

The Stellar Forest was massive, and it was well-known that the farther one ventured from the academy, the stronger the monsters were. Luckily, the blue dot on the map that hovered next to me showed me that Lya wasn't actually that far away.

At the same time, I could see that the red dot was unfortunately not moving in the right direction, a dot that I could quickly infer was George.

[Timer: 0hrs 48min 24s]

'I still have time.'

There was still almost an hour until Lya would, presumably, die in the hands of the corrupted monster, but somehow, that still didn't feel like a lot of time to prepare everything. Because the most complicated part about this mission was that the completion requirements were for the hero to save Lya from the demonspawn.

At a first glance, it might not seem that complicated. Didn't I just have to make sure Lya survived? That was what I thought at first as well, but after pondering a bit, I couldn't help but feel like the mission was oddly specific, mentioning the demonspawn not once, but even twice.

In other words, I couldn't help but assume that the mission had a presumption of Lya actually getting attacked by the demonspawn, and only after that could I complete the mission by making George save her.

So, even though I wasn't certain, I strongly believed that just making George go to Lya now wouldn't count as a successful mission, as that might make it so she never got attacked in the first place.

'But I still have my weapons prepared...'

Feeling the contents of my pockets, which consisted of a couple of papers and a pen, I hoped that these weapons would allow me to manipulate George's movement.

The only problem was that I had to make sure he didn't somehow find me while I was doing this.

****

[George's Pov]

"Huff... where..."

Running through the forest, I hadn't dared to stop and think about what was actually going on. The only thing running through my mind was the line of text I had read on that paper.

'-Do you want to know the truth behind your parents' deaths?'

I already had suspicions regarding my parents' deaths, as there were a lot of things that just didn't add up. So how could I possibly allow myself to miss this chance, even if I knew I could be running toward my own death?

Not even the bumpy ground filled with roots could slow me down right now, as I kept running forward, hoping to see something, anything, that would lead me to where I had to go.

Yet, no matter how I peered through the thicket of green all around me, I didn't see anything. Until...

"Grrr!"

Out of one of the many bushes, a gray-furred wolf had appeared, showing his teeth as a means of putting fear into the heart of its victim. A dire wolf, just a normal zero-star monster that was everything but rare.

From its size, I could quickly deduce that it should be just about as strong as the dire wolf that attacked me on my way to the academy. And similarly to that time, this one also lunged forward with the intent of ripping my throat out.

"Go away, you fucking dog!"

'[Heavy Blow]!'

*Swish! Thud!*

A big pool of blood quickly started soaking the dirt ground underneath my feet as the wolf lost its head in the middle of its lunge. Now that I had been able to rest up and eat properly, a zero-star monster was far from being my opponent.

Without even caring about retrieving any of the materials which could be sold for money, I began to run once again, still making sure to keep my eyes open as much as possible.

If it wasn't for the fact that my mana pool was still pretty small, I would have used the scan spell instead but that would just be a waste of mana. The effective range that I could scan was only a circumference of about twenty feet and as I had to use more than 15 mana points, I couldn't afford to do so.

'Huh...?'

My spine suddenly tinged, and thanks to that gut feeling, I turned my eyes upward just in time to see something falling right at me. Taking a step back, some weird, whiteish object fell in front of my feet.

*Thud!*

A rock covered in the paper had somehow fallen from the sky, and as I still remembered the 'letter' that I had gotten before, I didn't hesitate to unravel it and look at its content.

'What the fu...'

It was the most shitty-looking map that I had ever seen in my life, looking more like the doodle of a five-year-old rather than something I could use to navigate the forest. However, it wasn't as if I had much of a choice.

So, with the map in my hand, I desperately tried to follow the directions it gave me, something that slowed me down a lot, but it was still better than wandering around aimlessly.

****

[Alex's Pov]

'Shit! Isn't this worse than just letting him wander around aimlessly?!'

The red dot on the map had now slowed down considerably, enough to make me question if he was even going to make it to Lya in time.

'At least he is on the right track now...'

It hadn't been hard for me to keep up with the hero even before I gave him the map, as I could just use the map to move around a lot more efficiently than George who had just been running around. This also meant that I knew that if push came to shove, I could probably reach Lya in just a few minutes to save her.

[Timer: 0hrs 28min 41s]

Taking a seat on a nearby rock, I knew that there was no point in taking anything out in advance. In the worst case, I would just have to try something similar to how I had saved George earlier. Hiding in a bush and launching some rocks to buy time for the hero to arrive.

"Man... isn't this too much for the first week?"

I had barely been able to get to know this world, and I was already out here in the Stellar Forest, pretending to be some kind of mastermind that manipulated everything from the shadows. Even to the point where I was now wearing this shitty paper mask that was more or less just a blank sheet of paper with cutouts for my eyes.

In the case of me having to show myself, I had at least put on a different colored hoodie than the one I was wearing when I saved Lya the first time, but I still felt like it was very unlikely that she wouldn't recognize me this time.

"I just wanted to stay in bed, is that too much to ask for? Just one day..."

*Rustle!*

Suddenly, on the other side of the small grove that I was in, one of the bushes shook a bit. And a moment later, a fur-covered being walking on all fours walked out of it, baring its teeth at me in an attempt to intimidate me.

"Grrr!"

Which worked wonders as my heart started beating two times as fast as normal in an instant.

'Fuck!'

The dire wolf looked at me while making its intents very clear through its narrow eyes, but still decided to inspect its prey a bit more before attacking. A decision that at least gave me time to do something about it.

'Rise...'

While making sure that I didn't make a move in an attempt to buy more time, I connected my mind to the three rocks inside my open backpack. These rocks were proof that I hadn't forgotten that I might be ambushed, but it was still difficult to wrap my head around that this was actually happening.

However, as the wolf bent his forelegs, there was no time for me to process it anyway.

"Groo!"

It felt like time slowed down as the monster flew forward through the air, raising his clawed paw in preparation for slicing my flesh and ending my life. Weirdly enough, my heart slowed down instead of speeding up.

The blood in my veins felt colder than ever and every single action now felt incredibly natural, as if I already knew exactly how to deal with the wolf in front of me.

So, without even standing up from the rock I was sitting on, I connected my mind to the mind of the monster. As soon as I felt that a connection had been made, everything just turned into a blur.

'Mind Spike'

"Awoo?!"

*Thud!*

While still in the air, the wolf suddenly lost control of its own body, and instead of its claws arriving at my body, it simply fell to the ground, clutching its head with its paws.

Without even blinking, my body had already raised its arm, commanding the rocks that were floating behind me to do my bidding.

'Kill'

Flying forward with even less emotion than I, the rocks knew very well what I wanted them to do.

*Crack!*

"Groo!"

All of the three rocks made an impact with the furry being cowering on the ground, creating some disgusting, cracking sounds as they destroyed its bones.

"Awoo..."

The wolf whined and whimpered due to the pain, but as it was not yet dead, I didn't hesitate to re-establish my connections to the rocks.

*Bam! Bam! Bam!*

Not caring about the blood that started flying into the air, I launched them over and over at the monster until, finally, its eyes lost their shine.