Limits

Chapter 61

I tried to modify the first diagram for a long time before I noticed that it was already well into the night. Shelly was sleeping besides me and the fire was dying out. I put out the fire and went to sleep. I decided I would continue tomorrow when I got the chance.

At the beginning, it seemed to me that it would take no more than couple of hours to modify the 1st diagram but I was greatly mistaken. Although I knew the anatomy of human body very well, my experience was still shallow.

The next day, together with Shelly we moved on towards the north. I found out from the map that the village I came from which was Freemount Village was located to the south of empire and not far away from the sea. The map in the bag that Nick gave to me, depicted much more than the map I received before traveling to the Grasshill Village.

The map covered the area of about one month's travel on horseback. That was a huge radius of land and it didn't even depict the Endros Imperial City. This meant that it must've been much further. On the other hand it showed 2 cities in that vicinity. The first city was the one Nick mentioned to me. It was Terent. Terent was located at the western part of the map and it was about 13 days of horseback travel from my location.

The other city was called Darun and it was located at the north east part of the map, about 21 days of horseback travel from where I was. I didn't know the sizes of the cities but if a village could have 200-300 households then a city must've been much much bigger.

We traveled at a normal pace, neither walking nor running. If we were to travel to Terent, it would take us about a month of time at the current pace but I promised Nick that I would avoid cities and villages before I could master my skills. With that in mind, I did loads of stops on the way towards north to train in the Art of Medicine, the Art of Stealth as well as the Art of Hidden Weapons.

The Great Forest was rich in ingredients to concoct poisons as well as medicines. Whenever I had an occasion to gather some herbs, I would make medicines, poisons and antidotes in order to practice my medicine making. While we were on the move, I practiced my stealth skills. I had no one to run away from or hide from but that didn't mean I couldn't practice.

The Great Forest contained many obstacles and hard terrains therefore I practiced my Art of Stealth constantly while on the move. Of course, I still couldn't figure out the "avoid the light" thing. I gave it loads of thoughts but how was I supposed to avoid the light?

I already learned from the fish how to camouflage myself and due to that experience, I added another skill to the art which was to copy the aura of people. I looked for inspiration in animals but not every animal had such skills. I found the fishes by sheer luck, hoping to find similar skills in other animals was like hoping for the rain on a desert.

The last art that I knew was the Art of Hidden Weapons. I already knew how to manipulate and control 4 puppets but now the last step was left. I needed to now use my both hands in order to control extra puppet. It might seem easy but in actuality it was quite difficult. In order to control the 5th puppet I needed 1 finger from both hands, yet which fingers should be used?

I tried couple of combinations and none worked out for me. I would need to find a perfect combination or just accept one and grind my skills to such an extend that even something not suitable for me would become suitable. Of course, I prefered to do the 1st option which was to find a suitable method or combination that suited me.

I left that in the back of my mind as I still needed to properly master the control of 4 puppets. Only when I was able to control those puppets freely like my own hands, I would think about the final part of this training.

While I was lost in my thoughts, I suddenly felt something pulling on my pants. I turned around and said "What is it Shelly?". Shelly didn't have to make any responses as I already noticed something was wrong and Shelly was very alarmed about something. I quickly took a look around us and found that we were surrounded by a pack of bears. Not just one or two but 6 of them and at the very front was a bear with black fur that was a bit bigger than others. I assumed it was the leader of this pack and therefore the strongest of the whole group.

I didn't wait for them to do anything. I learned my lesson already. In the forest you either kill or you are the one being killed. If it was one bear we could go our separate ways but being surrounded by a group of bears while their leader stood proudly at the front, it was obviously to attack us.

With a swift movement, I threw few daggers at the normal bear and because of the great force as well as sharpness of the daggers, the bear that got hit by them never had a chance to survive. One was down and 5 left to go. I quickly threw more daggers at another bear while moving towards the one that already died. I would need my daggers because searching through the bag was not feasible at the moment. I had about 15 daggers on me altogether and so I would need to either reach into my bag or collect the daggers already used.

I decided to collect because I would also train my collection skill while fighting a real battle not a simulation with puppets. Shelly didn't stand there either, it launched forward at its fastest speed towards one bear and rammed into it. Due to the speed Shelly possesed and the weight it gained not too long ago, the bear flew couple of metres into the air and fell down while crying in pain. It didn't die but it was not possible for this bear to fight anymore.

I decided not to finish it of with my daggers as I would have to retrieve them and besides I was already on my way for the first daggers I threw. The leader of the bears didn't expect for 2 bears from his pack to die almost instantly while one being unable to fight.

"ROOAAAR"

It roared very loudly and pounced towards me. I was the greatest threat to them as I could kill with one move while Shelly could only disable them. Although the black bear started to pounce at me, I was able to retrieve my daggers and evade the attack of the normal bear that pounce at me from the nearby location. I didn't throw my daggers this time but used close combat to engage the normal bear. With couple of quicks slashes of the daggers I held in both of my hands, the bear was also severely wounded and crying in pain.

The black bear arrived and lifted its paw to strike at me. I already learned how to read patterns and this bear might be stronger than its counterparts but it was not much more intelligent. It was still a wild beast and its behaviour was easily calculated. I dodged the attack to the left and slashed with my dagger.

"RIIIP"

The black bear's hide got slashed and red blood started oozing out. The bear cried in pain and swiped its paw at me again. Meanwhile Shelly attacked another bear and also disabled it. Shelly saw me being busy with two bears so it decided to help. I avoided the paw that was easy to read and continued my attacks in close combat.

I found out that, I preffer close combat more than throwing stuff. Close combat contained more thrils but was also much more dangerous. I thought 'If I could master both, that would give me some advantages in the future when I face stronger opponents'. I slashed my daggers while shelly rammed into the wounded bear that also tried its attacks on me. The bear didn't survive this time. The sight was weird to behold because when Shelly rammed into that bear, it not only flew through the air but also huge amount of blood sprayed from the wounds that bear had due to my attacks.

I thought 'That is weird, I wonder why this happened. Maybe it was a skill that Shelly learned?'. Not thinking any further on that for now, I attacked the black bear with full force. The black bear didn't last a long time. Although it was more sturdy as well as stronger than normal bears, it was still a bear and it died not long after.

The other two bears were taken care of by Shelly when I was still fighting the black bear. After the fight, I did expand some of my energy but with my estimates. I could probably take on 6 of such black bears with Shelly.

I said to Shelly "Good job, we shall rest here and eat some meat. There is loads of meet so I will roast as much as you want for you". Shelly nodded its head in satisfaction and brought the dead bears closer.

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