The Master of Uradan

Rohan felt like crying. A small fire crackle as he was sitting beside it. He didn't know anymore how much time he had taken to light this damn fire, but he felt like he had accomplished the goal of his life.

He took out the meat of the rabbit and pierced it with his dagger, before holding it near the heat. The meat was slowly cooking, spreading to the surrounding an intoxicating smell. Rohan didn't know if some beasts would be attracted because of that, but he couldn't think of any solution to hide it.

Thus, he decided to cook all the meat he had for it to be rationed for the next few days. The next meal would be quite frugal, but he didn't really have a choice.

He had discovered some fruits on his way, but he had no idea if it was edible. None of the plants he could find here was described inside the botanic book he had read and learned during the previous months. This felt like he was in another world, but it could simply be that Rohan was extremely far away from the Barren Lands and the south part of the continent.

Maybe he was near the north. In any case, for Rohan to be in this forest even though he was inside a mountain before losing consciousness, the only explanation he could find was teleportation. Or the Intermediate Warrior had carried his unconscious body until he found this forest, but it was a bit unlikely.

This time, Rohan was lucky as no beast pounced on him. The meat was rapidly cooked, and Rohan enveloped a large part with large leaves before putting it inside his bag. It would be cold later, but it should be edible.

He stood up and quickly went out with a piece of meat in his hand. The lingering smell would still attract something in the end, and Rohan didn't want to be here at this moment. Running through the forest while eating the rabbit meat, he took back the path toward the large footprints.

It had completely lost its power and the beasts were now completely unfazed with it, but Rohan didn't care. Although it wouldn't protect him from encountering any dangerous beasts like the monkeys, it was at least an obvious path.

Without it and with the sun struggling to show itself because of the trees, Rohan didn't know if he could continue to walk in a straight line without losing himself at some point.

The next few days were virtually all the same, albeit Rohan had encountered strange creatures along the way. He had even seen a deer, or at least it was what he had believed to be the moment he had tracked it.

He had followed it for a few hundred meters before suddenly, the beast had turned around and looked deep inside his eyes. The first thing he had seen was the third eye on its forefront and a terrible headache. The instant after he looked back at the beast, it had already disappeared without noise.

He couldn't be sure, but Rohan had run away at high speed at this time. Such a strange magical beast that could move without noise or leaving any traces inside this forest even though he was tracking it was quite scary.

Rohan had also hunted another rabbit, making up for the lack of food, but unfortunately, he couldn't find a water source. He could only walk forward, hoping to hear or see a river. There was still some water inside his gourd, but he knew that he couldn't continue this way.

Each night, he was only sleeping a few hours, while all the others were used to increase his power. Along with the mana cores filled with mana, as well as his red mana, the creation of the vortex was so smooth that Rohan believed he could finish it in less than a month. Sadly, his number of cores wouldn't be sufficient for a month.

He would have no choice but to hunt some magical beasts if he wanted more of those cores. Even if the crystal cores were exclusively found inside the monkeys, even a normal core would help him to increase his rank, so any magical beast would do.

Rohan was thinking about the past few days and his future plans as sweat flowed on his front. He was currently lying against the soil with plants hiding his body. He didn't dare to move a single muscle, as he looked at the strange beast moving there. Indeed, it was this deer with three eyes.

Was this beast following him or was he lucky enough to meet it a second time? He didn't know, and the numerous actions he could choose to do appeared on his mind one after another.

He could try to hunt it, stay here until it decided to get out or flee with high speed. He slowly moved his hand, centimeter after centimeters, lowering it toward his bag. The leaves around him rustled slightly, forcing Rohan to stop. He observed deeply the beast that was munching on some herbs. It shouldn't have discovered him. Or at least he believed so.

Rohan put his hand inside his bag without any noise, and as slowly as ever, he took out one of his two daggers. His sword wasn't useful to hunt, and just unsheathing it would compromise his position anyway. The blade of the dagger was only a bit longer than his hand, and against a magical beast, it would hardly tickle it if he didn't aim for the brain.

The worst was that with the way he was currently lying against the ground with all kinds of plants surrounding him, as well as a few dried leaves inside his noise each time he was breathing, he couldn't throw his weapon at all. His next movement should then be extremely perfect.

The deer lowered its head to sniff at the ground to eat the best grass. Its eyes were fixed on the floor, and taking this chance, Rohan stood up with lightning speed. The instant he got up, the deer also looked at the warrior. There was no fear in its eyes. It was as if it was waiting for this and its third eye shone as it stared straight at Rohan. Not good.

His mind exploded with excruciating pain as if a loud bell reverberated from the inside of his head. Even though he felt dizzy, Rohan didn't stop his movement. He controlled his mana inside his right arm and threw the dagger with a Strengthened Blow. The projectile pierced through all foliage and flew toward the beast.

But this one was nowhere to be seen. In the slight second when Rohan had been distracted by the terrible pain, the beast had simply disappeared in the air.

With a loud shoc, the blade he had thrown was deeply sunken inside a tree. The force of the blow was intense as even the handle sunk inside the tree, deforming the iron.

Rohan quickly rushed forward and looked at his surroundings. Like the previous time, there was no trace of the beast being there at all.. The grass it was eating was indeed there with a few teeth marks on some of them, but there was no trace of footprints. What was this beast?