It takes about fifteen minutes before I notice any reaction from the bear. It doesn’t come personally but sends a large group of undead, about thirty of them, that then split up into groups of five or six and start patrolling the areas where we killed the undead earlier. They never roam too far from the border of the bear's territory, so I keep watching them.
Eventually, they settle into more buildings along the border and wait, replacing the undead we killed earlier.
“Well, that was anticlimactic.” I say to the other two, who are tense and ready for a fight or flight. “All that happened was that more undead were posted as guards.”
“Eh, we still got a reaction, even if it’s not the one we wanted.” Daniel responds. “We can pretty much confirm that the bear is able to control a pretty sizable horde if that’s how many it sends just to reinforce a small part of its border.”
“So what do we do?” Corvax asks. “The sun is close to setting, less than two hours, I think. I won't be as good in a fight once the sun sets.”
“Let’s head back to the tower for now. We can come up with a plan for the bear and poke around more in the morning.” Daniel states, to which both Corvax and I agree.
I lead us back to the wall, and it only takes about an hour now that I can remember the city layout a little bit. Once we get back to the tower, Corvax goes inside while I lead Daniel to the other tower, the one that I looted earlier. I show him the screen I tore apart and all the mana-conductive metal wires that were hiding behind it.
“This is good material, Ray. Good find.”
He starts using his skill to collect as much of the wire as possible, and I even open a few portals on the inside of the wall so he can collect the metal that was outside of his skill's range. We work until the sun sets, and then decide to head back to our tower for the night.
We managed to collect several pounds of wire that we can easily repurpose, and that is only scratching the surface of the treasures that tower holds. I didn’t even show him the pedestal room hidden under the basement yet, where at least another several pounds of the valuable metal hides. I also want to try to salvage at least one of those screens, but that’s all for later. We have what we need for now.
Back at the tower, all three of us sit down and enjoy some more deer steaks, making small talk while we eat. Corvax tells us more about his home planet and his people, which gets pretty depressing after just a little bit. The Skrill, who have enslaved Corvax’s species, the Traxi, are ruthless slavers. They force all of the four-armed people to work in mines, almost never allowed to see the sunlight on account of how potent it can be if properly utilized. Apparently Corvax is like a baby in terms of actually harnessing the sun's energy. He tells us stories of old heroes who could scorch entire forests and heal hundreds of people at once.
We tell Corvax more of Earth, and it becomes even more obvious just how isolated he was kept on his planet. The Skrill seem to have slightly more advanced technology than Earth, based on what little machinery and technology he has seen in his mines. Corvax seems especially interested in Earth’s movies and T.V. shows, which makes sense, as the only storytelling he has ever experienced is just by word of mouth. I make a note to try and find a phone or tablet or something with some movies on it from one of Earth’s initiates.
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We finish our meal in good spirits, with Daniel and I making a list of our favorite movies for Corvax to watch if he ever gets the chance. After we eat, we all split off to do our personal training. Corvax practices with his axe on the roof of our tower while Daniel makes some more projectiles in preparation for our bear hunt. I spend my time solely focusing on cultivating my [Beast mana-heart], trying to find better or more efficient ways to grow it.
I have little luck in trying to find a more mana-efficient way of cultivating the little crystal growing in my heart. It seems like it is just supposed to be a slow process. Maybe someone out there has figured out a better method, but it escapes me tonight, so I stop my experimentation after a few hours and decide to go to sleep. With my spatial perception I see that I’m the last one awake, and checking the time I see it’s a few hours after midnight, so I decide to sleep until Daniel inevitably wakes me up in a few hours.
I sleep for about five hours before Daniel predictably kicks my foot, waking me right at sunrise.
“I’m so glad that leveling up has reduced the amount of sleep I need.” I say as I rub the sleep from my eyes.
Corvax comes down the stairs and joins us, his axe resting on his shoulder. “Good morning! I can feel that today will be a bright day, lots of sunshine!”
Ugh, I didn’t expect both Corvax and Daniel to be morning people. This sucks. I guess it makes sense. He is probably up and down with the sun, given his… talent, I guess? I wonder if he could still absorb light from the moon, given that it’s still sunlight, or maybe it counts as moonlight then. Who knows?
“Let’s eat some breakfast and let Ray wake up a little bit, then we can discuss how we want to tackle the bear hunt.” Daniel announces as he takes out some of the smoked deer from yesterday.
We only saved enough fresh meat for the two meals we had yesterday, as we have no real way of preserving fresh meat, so we smoked and dried the rest. The meat from the two deer should last us at least a few weeks, maybe less than that with how big Corvax is. He eats enough for about two to three people. We quickly finish our dried meat and creek water and move on to the topic of hunting big-ass bears.
“We could try and bait it out by going deeper into its territory like we accidentally did the first time and take it out at range.” Daniel says.
“Or we could just thin the horde a little bit. If we kill enough of its minions, it might get pissed enough to come after us.” Corvax adds.
“I agree with Corvax. We should at least thin out the horde before we move any further in.” I say. Daniel is too headstrong sometimes. If we rush this, we could easily get trapped again.
“Okay,” Daniel says as he nods his head and paces back and forth. “That’s probably smart. We thin the herd today and go in for the kill tomorrow.”
“We should also stay on the lookout for good ambush spots while we are in the city, somewhere we could possibly lead the bear that gives us the advantage in a fight.” I say while I get up from the floor.
“Well, there’s no time like the present. Let's go piss off a bear.” Daniel says with a worrying amount of excitement.
Less than two hours later we are back at the border of the bear's territory after finding a few potential spots nearby to fight the bear at. The number of undead seems to have reduced in the area, back to only a couple undead in every fifth or sixth building. In just a few minutes all of them are killed with the same rift warfare that has worked so well for us this far.
About twenty minutes later when the reinforcements come in to check out the area, they are all wiped out before they get a chance to split up. Daniel just used a few of his widespread shots, and the group of over thirty undead was turned into meat paste and shattered bone. I notice that a few of the undead are of slightly higher level, all the way up to level five, which makes this the first time we've come across an undead over level one.
The next zombie shows up about half an hour later, slowly shambling its way forward in a weirdly focused manner that makes it obvious it's being controlled. Just a few seconds later, another undead enters my perception range from a different alley, and then another and another, all from different directions.
“The new undead are coming in scattered, from all different directions.” I relay to my two teammates.
“What are they doing?” Daniel asks.
“They are searching the area, all staying scattered. Some of them are also leaving the border in small groups of two or three.”
“I don’t have the mana for that many shots if they stay scattered like this. Let’s change our strategy. Ray, you lead us through the alleys, and we’ll take them out by hand.”
I shrug my shoulders and point to a nearby alley. If we keep killing all the undead from a distance, the bear might just retreat further into the city. Going in might bait it to come out, and it’s much more fun to fight up close. I worry Merrick and Daniel may be rubbing off on me a little, making me a little more reckless, but I ignore it. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.