Chapter 29: The Trek Through Thunder Mountain (2)
There was a bellowing roar before a beast dashed forward with a ferocious growl. This beast was around a meter long and had tiger like legs, but bulging, ape like arms. Four dagger like eyes held a stubbornness as the beast once again attempted to strike its opponent with one of its ape-like fists.
Its opponent, a small silver shape twisted and elegantly dodged this fist that made dust fly into the air. The small beast followed this by leaping in an arc and landing softly on the ground with her soft paws, completely avoiding another strike from the attacking beast. Her silver fur was graceful in the light of the sun that peaked through the orange and red leaves above.
The little kitten hissed before singing a chant which caused a metallic and earthly substance to weave around her lithe body. In a matter of seconds a flexible but sturdy silver armour graced her body.
The two beasts, one small and one big began to walk circles around each other, waiting upon the right moment to strike. A few meters distance from them, other conflicts were also being held. The Wilderwolf soldier's were trading blows with similar looking beasts while Jonathan and Uncle Kil were fighting a beast each that while also looked similar, were not at the same time.
The most striking difference between these two beasts and the other beasts which they resembled were their white fur, which gave them an elegant air compared to the brown fur of the others. These two beasts were also noticeably taller as well.
Meanwhile, the little kitten and her opponent's stand off came to a sudden end when the ferocious beast charged forth, its front arms creating cracks in the ground as it pounded forward.
'How frightening!' The little kitten couldn't but yelp in her mind, this was definitely the most physically powerful beast she had faced so far. Despite this, her eyes quickly corrected themselves, changing from a look of apprehension to one of determination.
'This is a Early Stage Major Magical Beast, The Tiger Ape!' The little kitten said in thought. 'Will my Celestial Claw spell cut through its tough skin?'
'Only one way to find out!'
The sound of a young and harmoniously beautiful voice rang out once more and the little kitten chanted the Celestial Claw spell. With quick steps, her small frame danced around the Tiger Ape's charge and with a ferocious swipe of her claws, four white lines shot out from her outstretched paw and dug into the Tiger Ape's brown fur.
Blood spilled into the air and a loud cry could be heard escaping the beast's gaping mouth. The Celestial Claw had dug in quite deep into the beast's backside. Yet, when the little kitten landed and inspected the damage she had caused, she could already tell that the wound she had dealt was already in the process of being healed.
'Right, Major Magical Beast's have improved recovery rates...' The little kitten tutted. 'This is going to be a battle of attrition!'
Aura filled claws danced in the air and the sound of fist meeting ground and trees could be constantly heard resounding around this area of the forest as the two beasts continued their fight for several minutes more. Thankfully, the little kitten seemed to be inherently agile and had little trouble dodging the Tiger Ape's slower movements.
The most damage she received was residual waves of Aura bursting forth from a few of the opposing beast's punches. This only caused a nipping damage and a few shallow cuts. Meanwhile, the Tiger Ape had suffered from continuous attacks of the Celestial Claw spell and despite his acute recovery rate, could not keep up with the new wounds it was receiving every other second. Eventually, its body could not keep up and collapsed to a still. It had died from its piling wounds.
'Finally!' The little kitten let out a long and exhausted sigh. 'I'm all out, I couldn't have lasted another second!'
Sitting down to rest her aching muscles, she breathed heavily and her throat was in pain from the constant chants she had to speak. She could not wait to learn how to preform these spells without chanting, it would not only make performing spells faster, but would also save her poor throat from aching so much!
With one last long breath, the little kitten was able to recover to a normal breathing rate and took this time to observe the other fight's around her. She found that there were quite a lot of Tiger Ape's lying motionless on the floor and she was just in time to notice Uncle Kil's right fist striking right through one of the white Tiger Apes' chest!
Soon after, she also found that Jonathan's pray had also been struck dead with a series of ice spikes that were stabbing into it from practically every direction; these glacial spikes sprouted from the earth below, the trees and even the leaves. Pierced by a few dozen spikes made of ice, the beast's eyes had quickly turned dull and lost all its lustre.
Finally, through the combined work of the Wilderwolf Soldier's, the last few remaining beast's were cleaned up in an orderly fashion, their teamwork on full display.
After extracting all their gains, Uncle Kil pushed everyone to hurry onward as they were losing track of the other groups. Time moved slowly once more as everyone ascended Thunder Mountain step by step. Every now and then, they would encounter beast's unfortunate enough to run into them and other times they would find themselves coming to the aid of a few other groups who had encountered more trouble than they could chew.
As the hours passed with constant struggles, eventually, dusk came and the moon rose into the night sky, glowing in its usual dazzling silver gleam. Around the same time, the large party of Magician's and Magical Beast's had finally arrived to their first destination.
This place was not even a third of this large mountain, only reaching the apex of the first and lowest point out of the five pointed tops of Thunder Mountain. The autumn forest opened up and a large cliff could be seen as far as their eyes could see, swirling into the distance. One could see the autumn trees dangling above the cliffs and heading into the distance up the mountains once more.
Directly ahead of all of them, they could see a large, several meters high cave opening that dug into this cliff to an unknown distance. Around the outer rim of the cave, one could see runes curving in an arc around the cave's entrance.
"So this is the first checkpoint." Jonathan noted as he gazed upon the sight in front of them. In his hands, he held the little kitten who been using the last few small moments of peace to continue her cultivation and rest her aching body.
"Alright everyone, if there are any Rune Master Magician's out there, I would like you to aid me in activating the cave ruins!" Mist Step spoke out in a loud and clear voice. Discussion broke out in the many individual groups before a few people began to walk forward to stand in front of him.
Mist Step lead these people to the cave entrance while Hidden Blade lead everyone else into the cave proper. Inside, the little kitten noticed a line of unlit torches gracing the walls before they were suddenly lit alight in quick succession by Hidden Blade with the casual flick of his index finger.
Looking inwards into the now lit up cave, the little kitten could now see that the cave continued on for a while before opening up to a huge open area. As Jonathan walked into this open area she found that this space was massive. Reaching around 200 meters in diameter.
Soon, people were dragging out their belongings out of their Magic Pocket's and setting up their tents once more, preparing for the nigh ahead.
Looking back to the cave entrance, the little kitten also noticed those people who are known as Rune Master Magician's standing around the cave's entrance, their fingertips glowing in a visible azure glow as they danced about, seemingly interacting with something that she could not comprehend.
"Everyone, settle down for the night and make sure not to leave this cave, not that you can anyway." Hidden Blade gave off his last order before entering the largest tent that was the same one from before at the bottom of Thunder Mountain.
Suddenly there was a gleam of azure light and looking at the source, she found that the cave entrance now how some kind of azure see through barrier covering it. She also saw Mist Step and the few Rune Master's nodding their heads and speaking amiably before walking towards the encampment.
Day One was completed like that with no incident.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone