Chapter 341 Volume V - Chapter 59: Duel for Leadership
I turned my eyes toward the lush green sky, looking for any spots that were starting to darken. But there weren't any, and wouldn't be for a while. At least not until a few minutes later.
I sighed lightly, lowered my eyes again, and this time looked at the fire in front of me. Thanks to my mastery, it was easy to start a fire. All I needed was wood, and there was plenty of it in the plain.
The fire was warm, almost comforting. Even more so considering how many days I had been deprived of heat. Not that it mattered much, given one of the skills I had... but the presence of fire was still more comforting than nothing.
But I didn't dwell too long on this fire, I turned my eyes to those standing behind it.
Sue had her eyes narrowed. She was looking at the pieces of bone burning on the fire, thoughtful.
Adrian's eyes were on the sky. Every now and then, he would look at the mountain ranges in the distance, think about something for a while, and then turn back to the front.
He didn't do that before. It was something he started doing after he woke up. As if... something had happened while he was unconscious.
But I didn't question it, I didn't think it was necessary. Because if it was really important, he would have shared it with us. He knew that for us to survive, we had to share everything about this dungeon with each other.
So it was not something that occupied my mind too much. On the contrary, I was thinking about something else entirely. Or rather... I found myself thinking about it.
Adrian is literally doing everything he can to keep not only himself but all of us alive. But me and Sue... I don't feel like we are doing anything.
Yes, Sue's really good at cooking, and she's noticed a few things that we haven't noticed. And me... I usually decide what we're going to do, I kind of lead our group.
But Adrian could have survived without those things. Maybe he would be in a very different place now. There are definitely some things that we made it easier for him. But... wouldn't he actually be more comfortable without us?
He's constantly pushing his limits to keep us alive, I can see it with my own eyes. The flow of mana through his body is so... chaotic that he must be suffering for that alone. He keeps his face mostly expressionless, yes, but I can see he's holding back.
If we hadn't been there... would it have been different? If we hadn't met at that station in the first place, if we hadn't spent so much time at the mall or chosen that restaurant... we wouldn't have to deal with all this, or rather he wouldn't have to... would he?
That's what frustrates me. I... feel like more of a 'burden' than I've ever felt in my life. I can't even participate in fights where I can at least do something, even if I'm not as strong as him. At night, I'm useless because of my insanely high charm stat and the awakened mana.
I... I feel like I'm more of a hindrance than a help.
And how does Sue feel? She's an ordinary person, someone who didn't have much to do here in the first place. She must be feeling it much more acutely than I am, right?
Minutes passed with these thoughts, time continued to pass.
After a while... one of the green dots in the sky suddenly went black. The ground trembled violently, as it always did. The distant river began to shimmer with a dazzling light. One by one, the mana in the atmosphere awoke.
As night fell on the dungeon again, this time we were in no hurry. We didn't even have a sense of panic, we just... watched the plain transform. We just waited as the glow of the river slowly took its place in the sky. I additionally protected myself from the mana around my body, creating a special flow in my body to avoid collapsing in pain.
Soon after, the first howls came. The wolves slowly began to wake up as night fell on the dungeon.
But they didn't make our heads spin and our ears ring like they used to. On the contrary... they were like a beautiful melody. I could even say they were relaxing.
"Here we go, huh..."
Immediately after Adrian's words... the darkness seemed to ripple. More red dots than I could count suddenly appeared everywhere. Black blurs enveloped the whole place.
The wolves formed a circle around us. Countless creatures, each with at least C grade, surrounded us with their frightening appearance. They weren't even interested in camouflage, every one of their bodies was visible. Not a single one of them was looking in my direction or Sue's. They all had their eyes on one person, Adrian, who was lying on a rock.
A smile appeared on Adrian's face. The wolves in front of him retreated in a coordinated fashion, clearing a path. And from this path... a single wolf slowly approached him with slow steps.
It had more scars on its fur than the other wolves, its red eyes seemed to glow with more fury. But it was calm, cold. They were looking directly at Adrian.
"As you guessed, it wants a duel."
After his words, I asked him in a whisper as I glanced at the wolves that surrounded us on all sides, leaving us nowhere to run.
"And if you don't accept...?"
I don't want him to fight if he can, I... I don't want him to push himself any harder. But looking around me, looking at the wolves... it seems as far away as I want it to be.
And indeed, Adrian's lips curled even higher. He answered my question in a way that contrasted with the situation he was in.
"Isn't it obvious?"
I clenched my teeth, my fist, but... there was nothing I could do.
It took great concentration to constantly protect my body from the awakened mana in the atmosphere. So... I literally had no way to fight. Once my concentration wavered, I would get dizzy, my vision would blur and my balance would slip.
Adrian took his usual spear from his bracelet and leaned on it, trying with difficulty to stand up. His body trembled with every movement of his muscles. He was in pain, but he did his best not to show it on the outside.
"Are you... sure you can fight?"
Adrian was barely standing, leaning on his spear, and he didn't even look at me. He just kept looking at the wolf who wanted to duel him. The smile hadn't disappeared from his face, but his eyes twitched involuntarily sometimes.
"Don't worry, I won't die.
He paused for a moment, then spoke again.
"Just... trust me."
He approached the wolf, using his spear as a longer-than-normal walking stick, never breaking eye contact. He kept getting closer until they were only a few inches apart, and then he widened his smile.
"I accept the duel."
At his words, all the wolves raised their heads upward. They all howled at the same time, in unison, toward the sky. Then each of them retreated back for meters. They opened up a huge space for Adrian and the wolf.
"But not here, I have friends."
At his words, the wolves waited a moment. Only when the wolf in front of him squinted his eyes and glanced briefly at the other wolves did each of them start moving again, forming a huge arena.
They shifted so that we were outside the circle. They did this to keep us out of the arena. But... so that we were inside the wolves forming the outside of the circle.
There were no wolves in front of us. But on either side of us, behind us... they were everywhere. The wolf closest to me was only a few centimeters away. If I moved a little bit, I could accidentally touch its paw.
And yet the wolves didn't really care about us, they acted as if we didn't exist. I hadn't made eye contact with a single one of them.
Adrian briefly tore his eyes away from the wolf in front of him. He looked at Sue and me, but it was brief. He did nothing more than glance at us, his entire focus back on the wolf in front of him.
The wolf and Adrian turned their backs to each other and moved some distance away. When they were a few meters apart, they both stopped and turned back to each other.
The wolf suddenly tensed. Tilting his head slightly, he pressed his front paws into the earth, his back paws the same. He opened his mouth, bared his teeth at Adrian, and growled.
Adrian simply let out a deep sigh. He simply pointed his spear at his front paws into the earth, his back paws the same. He opened his mouth, bared his teeth at Adrian, and growled.
the wolf in front of him, and then... he closed his eyes.
I squinted, I focused on the mana swirling around his body, I wanted to see what he would do, what would happen.
What I saw... was that all the chaos in his body had gotten worse.
The unstable mana swirling inside him became even more unstable. But... as it happened, it stopped. Adrian's face went sour for a moment as he was forcibly ordering the mana in his body. But he didn't stop there.
The mana in his body reached toward his spear, at the same time, lightly enveloping his body. Not only that, it spread around him. Even to the wolf.
I saw blood oozing from his lips and nose. It was impossible not to see his hands trembling as they held the spear.
I clenched my fist again. I felt useless once again.
He's pushing himself even harder... he's doing what he's been doing since the day we got here. He knows he's in mortal danger, he knows he might even be crippled. But... he does it anyway.
Why, then?
Okay, we may be friends... but we don't really know each other that well. We're not as close to him as he is to Julian and Aiden. To Sue and me, Adrian... he's just a friend in a group.
I know he's someone who cares about the lives of those around him. He's shown his desire to help those in distress many times. But... are we really worth dragging him to his death?
Why is he trying to keep us alive when his own life is at stake?
During these thoughts... out of the corner of my eye, I saw a change in the center of the circle.
The tip of Adrian's spear began to glow slightly. And seeing this glow, his opponent didn't stand still any longer and moved. But it didn't attack him directly, on the contrary... it disappeared into the darkness itself. Its whole body quickly disappeared, except for its red eyes. Soon, its eyes were camouflaged too.
Adrian still hadn't opened his eyes. He hadn't even changed where he was pointing his spear. He just... stood where he was, like a statue.
Only a second later, the air behind him rippled. A black claw, aimed at his back, cut through the darkness of the night. But Adrian, again, did not move.
The claw came closer and closer. I watched it all in slow motion. I tried never to lose hope.
When there were only a few inches between the claw and Adrian... I felt the urge to jump up and run toward him. But I didn't. To do something like that... it was just ridiculous. No matter what, if Adrian was going to lose this duel, we were going to die here. Me trying to protect him would have no effect.
Besides... he said to trust me before the duel. Now that I think about it... Did he say that on purpose?
I kept my eyes on him, holding my breath, watching what was happening. I... trusted him. I chose to wait. And the moment I chose that... Adrian finally moved.
His body moved so abruptly that it was as if I had literally blinked. He moved his foot to the side, twirled his spear in his hand, and changed the direction the tip was pointing, all the while dodging the wolf's claw in a truly millimetric way.
The wolf's claw only touched part of his clothing. Adrian's spear, however, was heading toward its torso, as if he had known from the beginning where it was going to strike. The glow at the tip of the spear intensified.
Time, which felt as if it had slowed down... suddenly sped up before my eyes.
The wolf didn't even have time to dodge the attack. In an instant, Adrian's spear penetrated its body, which was not even out of camouflage. But that wasn't the only thing that happened.
Adrian swung the spear behind him and turned it again at a strange angle. The wolf's black body followed the spear that stabbed into it and flew through the air.
Adrian lifted his spear into the air, then swung it in that direction, putting all his weight on one foot. The body of the wolf impaled on his spear hit the ground so hard with this movement that the ground shook for a moment. Cracks even appeared under its lifeless body, which instantly met its death.
The next second, after looking at his body again... I stopped holding back.
I jumped to my feet and ran toward him. I reached him just as his spear slipped through his fingers and fell to the ground, just as his knees gave way. I quickly put my arm around his shoulder, supporting him to stand.
That's how I felt how his whole body was actually shaking. The amount of blood coming from his mouth and nose was so much that it was like a faucet that hadn't been turned off completely.
Adrian could only mumble one thing in his half-consciousness.
"W- wolves... will go... D- don't worry..."
Immediately after his words, he became completely unconscious. All his weight fell on me.
Each of the wolves that surrounded us howled into the sky again, just as they had at the beginning of the duel. Then each of them disappeared into the darkness, into the night itself, as they had come.
A few of them appeared in front of us and disappeared again, taking the body of the dead wolf with them.
The crater filled with rocks... fell into absolute silence in just a second.
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