Lucian Leaped from tree to tree, in almost every direction he could see the carcasses of dead beast giving the forest a haunted and chilly appearance. He stopped to inspect the carcasses of the beast which was almost entirely intact aside from the gaping hole in its torso showing all of its organs and intestines had been removed.
It looked like the work of a human or a creature with intelligence seeing that all the dead beast had similar wounds. 'These guys were at least B rank and it looks like they didn't even have a chance of fighting back.' Lucian thought to himself as the bad feeling he felt seemed to intensify.
'To make things worse I can't shake the thing following me and there's another presence observing me from an even greater distance.' Lucian thought to himself as he teleported from by the beast carcass and onto a large tree before he began moving again from tree to tree.
Just as Lucian began moving again a soul piercing howl rang through the forest that could be felt through the ground reaching all the way to the city. Jason stood up as he looking in the direction that the howl came from. It was slightly to the right of the direction Lucian had taken so he decided to go see what it was.
Hearing the menacing howl broke althea's concentration causing her to lose focus and her ability to stop for a brief moment. In that same moment she could feel the cold began going down her spine and chills form on her skin as if death had just locked on to her.
She quickly reactivated her ability and changed her direction going away from the how in an attempt to lose her tracker, but it all seemed in vain as if her ability to cloak herself had been seen through with the howl or as if a mark had been placed on her.
She put her hand to her mouth, "Tena, can you alert the GM that this Quest is at least high A rank possibly S rank that roar was way above my level I can't gauge it properly." She spoke into the golden storage ring device she had been given by the house spirit.
'Don't worry about it, look for opportunities to grow stronger this is a rare and unique situation for you and the boy.' The voice of Tena sounded in her mind like a voice transmission.
'Maybe the reason the house spirits gave us these rings is to act like some kind of body guards... but they probably wouldn't act unless were on the verge of death or about to be crippled.' Althea thought to herself as she remembered how the Light family matriarch had just dropped them in a forest surrounded by dark panthers.
When the howl had sounded it stunned Lucian for a moment causing him to fall to the ground as he was jumping from one tree to another. With his current level of strength and ability it wasn't the fall that hurt the most is was the abrupt and almost forced disruption in his concentration.
He wasn't proficient enough with using his spatial abilities in this manner to abruptly stop without causing damage to himself. A mind-numbing headache invaded his mind while it felt as though his head was throbbing.
"F*%$" Lucian cursed loudly as he got up slowly rubbing his temples. 'It's not like my presence was concealed anyway, I am still being followed by something and watched by another its probably best i save my energy, why the hell are they so obsessed with sending us on death missions?' Lucian thought to himself as he put his hands behind his head before he started walking on the ground in the same direction while spreading out his spatial awareness.
Jason had moved through the forest like a shadow appearing over where the howl originated withing moments. He arrived at a gigantic cave entrance at the foot of a mountain almost 20meters tall and 60m wide. The ominous aura and killing intent emanating from the cave was enough to even make him take a cold breath before proceeding further.
He walked at a slower pace entering the cave, as he carefully analyzed the energy he felt. The cave was pitch black, but the energy was much different from outside the cave. As soon as he entered the threshold, he could tell that the killing intent and murderous aura were mainly to deter people and beast from entering.
He could immediately faintly feel the presence of an otherworldly treasure just the faint feeling of its existence he could feel as though it were pushing the capabilities of his strength to the brink of the next level.
As he walked further into the cave the murderous aura seemed to multiply with each step even suppressing him. 'Damn it... I'm really going to have to bring those two here so this can be handled by them..' Jason thought to himself as he began to understand this was something he could not contend with. He quickly fled backwards out of the cave in the direction of Althea since he had already sent one of his shadows after Lucian.