Chapitre 34: Getting Stronger
After getting Silverpelt's agreement, I thought about what I will do when we attack. Then I realized something. 'I'm too weak to contribute much aren't I?' My werewolf form is much stronger than an average person, but we would be fighting trained knights. Even if they were comparatively weak, I probably won't be strong enough to fight many of them. Because of this, I asked Silverpelt when she planned on attacking the town. [Whenever you are ready, but the sooner the better.] After seeing the bloodlust in her eyes, I knew I had to get stronger as soon as possible. The only problem was, I had no way to do so. The only option I had was to try and ask Rontu for the 'way to increase my stats faster than normal'. However, he only offered because he apparently owed me a favour, so how could I get him to tell me that?
Shoving these thoughts to the back of my mind, I left the clearing and looked for somewhere to stay. Even though Silverpelt and Rondu were nice, I don't want to stay in a massive group of monsters; I would feel very unsafe, I'm sure that if I wasn't a werewolf they would have killed me on sight. Soon enough, I found a tree that had all of its bark stripped. I think it was struck by lightning but didn't die. I climbed up into the branches and lay down on the smooth wood with my hands behind my head and my backpack hanging next to me. After getting comfortable, I thought about today and what I should do next. As always, my thoughts went back to my parents. This time, however, I didn't cry. Instead I told myself I would get stronger somehow in order to pay them back.
As the sun was setting, I felt a strange sensation. It was similiar to how you would know if someone was looking at you, but slightly different. I looked away from my evening meal to see if I could find the cause. Immediately, I saw a white object flying through the sunset, constrasting to the darkening sky behind it. Quickly, I got up from my tree, grabbed my bag, transformed and ran in the same direction as Rontu was flying in. I had completely forgotten about it when I was talking with Silverpelt, but I have no idea where exactly Rontu lives and I have no way to get his attention and talk to him even if I have a way to get him to tell me how to get stronger, so I should meet with him now to find a way to contact him.
At one point when I was running, I thought 'What if he is just surveying the area, and isn't going to land?' luckily for me, after a few more minutes of flying, he finally landed. I was surprised at how slow he was flying, I could actually keep up with him. When he left me and Silverpelt, he was flying much faster. After he landed, I saw him change into his human form, but with his wings and tail out. Curious, I hid myself in a bush to see what he was doing.
Where Rontu had landed was in the middle of a track of devastation- trees had their bark rubbed off, shrubs were flattened and the grass was mashed into the ground. After he changed into his human form, he walked towards a clearing that had held a mighty battle. I couldn't tell if the clearing was 'cleared' in the process of the battle, or if it was always that way, but it looked ruined. The floor was strewn with blood, and the grass on one side of the clearing had been burnt to a crisp. Many dents from the battle scarred the ground; ranging from small gouges to metre long cuts and a scattering of impact craters. Rontu surveyed the scene before walking towards a depression in the ground. It was a few metres wide, 30cm deep and had a very strange shape. On one side - which was closer to the side with fewer scorch marks - it was a very uniform semicircular shape, whereas the other side was very uneven. From the appearence of the ground, I could tell it was some kind of explosion magic, but I had no further insight as I wasn't well versed in magic. After walking over to the irregular side of the explosion, Rontu squatted down and touched the bloody marks left there. My curiosity intensified, so I left the bush I was in to approach Rondu and ask a few questions. "Why did you follow me here?" Rondu said, disrupting my train of thought.
"Eh? How did you know I was here?" I asked, shocked. I was sure I hadn't made a noise.
This time, Rontu's beautiful face looked back at me. "The same way you knew where I was, no?" I hadn't processed it before, but his face does look beautiful rather than handsome. I wonder if he knows that his face isn't very manly?
Ignoring this off-topic train of thought I said "A weird feeling that someone is looking at you? Is it that reliable?"
Rontu's face twisted in confusion. "A weird feeling that someone is looking at you? Is that what it feels like to you? It's something all living beings should be able to do; at least all monsters can. It's sensing others from their auras; all living things emit magic energy passively - the stronger the being the more energy it gives off. If you try to, you can use this to detect what is around you. From what I understand, humans have very varied abilites when it comes to sensing auras. Some humans, even if a monster is standing right in front of a human and is augamenting its aura with its own magical energy, find it impossible to detect auras whereas, on the other hand, some humans have even better perception than most monsters."
'How did he say that all in one breath?' I thought. "Monsters really are amazing" I mumbled.
"Some monsters are, but there is a massive range of ability between monsters." Rondu replied while turning back to the battle scene.
'Oh.. He could hear me..' I thought, embarrased. So I tried to change the subject "Why did you change into your human form?"
"It is lighter, has smaller feet, and can get closer to the ground without destroying everything nearby, so it is much better for investigating something like this."
"Do you know what happened here?"
"Did you see the injured wolves that arrived in the clearing? This is where they fought, and it was all against one human."
"O-one person against four of those wolves? And they survived? How strong are they?" I stuttered, shocked by that person's strength.
"Shouldn't you be worried that you'll need to fight them?" he said, looking towards a large blackened spot on a nearby tree. "They've probably made it back to town."
'Uh-oh' I thought, thinking about what he just said. Silverpelt looked very angry, maybe I could use that? "Couldn't I leave the pack to fight them?"
"You could, but they are probably weakened right now. If you defeated them, Silverpelt would respect you"
If I got her respect I might be able to get help with something else as well. "Weakened? By how much?"
"Not sure, depends on if there is a skilled healer in town or not" Rontu said while looking at the sandwich I had in my hand. I had almost forgotten it was there, but I would never drop such an important item.
Taking a bit, I told him "You can't have any" I didn't know what dragons ate, but my sandwich definately tasted better than it. I could try bribing him with food, but I doubt he's that childi- "WHA?!" I went to take a bite from my sandwich, but it had disappeared from my hand.
"This is pretty good" Rontu said before giving my sandwich back to me. "That aside, why did you follow me?"
I gathered my courage and said "I want the other option you offered me as well; the 'way to get stronger' so that I can take part in the attack on the village"
"I'll tell you, but you'll owe my a favour, ok?"
'Why would he want a favour?' I thought to myself before agreeing "Ok."
He nodded to me before telling me "Actively extract the life force of enemies you kill."
"Do... What? How do you even do that?" I said suspiciously.
Rontu sighed and said "Everything has magic power in it, including monsters. However, I have seen a few that nullify magic cast on them to a certain extent. Opposite types of magic counteract each other, but when that happens it creates quite a spectacle, whereas magic near those animals actively dissipated. This means that magic is not the only type of energy in living things. After investigating for a few years, I found that there is another energy in living things but not in inanimate objects. I call it life force, and you can absorb it from other things and make it your own. Everything absorbs part of the life force of anything it kills. The stronger the being you kill, the more life force you get, boosting your power. However, if you actively drain it you can gain much more power." He was obviously very proud of his discovery, as he kept talking until my eyes glazed over, before poking me to get my attention and then talking again. Eventually he said he would 'get me an example' before disappearing.
A few moments later, he reappeared, holding a magic stone. It was a 5cm wide red sphere and was quite transparent. "You can also extract life force from magic stone, as long as the monster it was from was recently killed." he said, holding the stone out to me.
"How long is 'recently killed'?" I asked
"By the time the magic stone has cooled down to normal temperatures, the life force will have escaped."
Curious, I said "If life force isn't in the air, where does it go?"
"I never found out." Rontu remarked glumly. "Anyway, try to extract it. If I had to describe it, I would say its like magic power, but instead feeling like a gas, it feels like a liquid."
'How is magic power a gas? It can become anything you want it to be' I remarked silently before taking the stone. I didn't believe it would work, humans would have discovered this long ago if it really did let you get stronger more easily. Before I could try extracting anything, I saw Rontu move next to me.
"You'll never manage it on your own. Let me show you how to do it" he said, before touching my arm. For a split second, immense pain coursed through my body, then I felt something strange. [I have pushed a part of myself into your consciousness, sorry if there was pain. Telepathy is sending messages from one consciousness to another, so I used that idea to force my way in here. This is the best way to show you] he said. It was even more disoreinting than telepathy, I couldn't differentiate between my thoughts and Rontu's thoughts. After a few seconds, he started extracting something from the magic stone. I was hardly comprehending what he was doing. It was horrible because it felt like someone else was controlling my limbs, and I had never experienced anything like what he was doing. When casting magic, you draw most of the energy from the surroundings to cast spells, but what he did was take energy from inside the magic stone and my body and stitch them together. At one point, he separated part of the stone's life force and released it into the world. 'Why did you do that?' I asked to myself. [I'm not completely sure, but my instincts tell me that I shouldn't let you absorb it all.] he responded. 'This is very confusing' I thought to myself. [That's only because you haven't trained your mind much] Rontu remarked, ignoring my complaints.
After what felt like an hour of extracting life force from the magic stone, Rontu's consciousness went back to his body. What was left in my hands was blue powder, so fine that it fell between my closed fingers, scattering to the wind. As I watched it go, I realized that my body had changed. My vision hadn't changed much, but my sense of smell had gotten even better. I also felt a little bit stronger. 'What the hell?' I thought to myself, staring incredulously at my hand. My sense of touch also got sharper, and I could feel every fold in my clothes. "This is ridiculous..." I mumbled
État de l’alimentation hebdomadaire
-- Classement
Power Stone 
-- Power
stone