Noctem

Morning came yet the rain hadn't stopped, nor did its intensity decrease even for a bit. Eren let out a little yawn as he stretched out his body.

Although the sound of the heavy downpour outside the cabin was deafening, he could still make out the grunting sound of his student in the rain.

"It seems the kid found a place or something to vent out all his frustration... Hang in there, child.. soon you'll know everything, when you're strong enough to protect yourself." He muttered softly, then lingered for a moment.

He felt something was extremely wrong, there were traces of mana, vile mana in the surroundings, he quickly wore his tunic and left the cabin.

Appearing in an instant, Eren's body went cold and his eyes widened in shock for a brief moment before he glared coldly at the beasts surrounding them.

Nox was currently battling an enormous beast which looked like a saber-toothed tiger with a large stinger like that of a scorpion as its tail, it's body was malformed and revolting, it had several insect-like creatures burrowing out of its body but it didn't seem to mind it, rather it was more like the insects were its minions.

It thrust its tail forward attempting to impale Nox through the chest and poison him. Nox let out a tired exhale, gasping for breath while watching as the stinger shot towards him with frightening speed. When the stinger was close enough, Nox ducked to the side, barely avoiding the lethal sting of the beast, then stabbed its stinger.

The hard metasoma of the beast didn't even crack and Nox's attack couldn't seem to pierce through the hard stinger no matter what he did, after all there was a limit to what a wooden sword could do, not to mention his attack powers were weak, he was only able to defeat the previous monsters that attacked him before this monstrosity of a beast joined the party.

His wooden sword which he used to strike the beast, shattered from the force of the impact, while the beast remained unharmed the same couldn't be said for Nox.

The broken splinters of the wooden sword grazed him on his face, a little higher and he could have lost an eye. This caused Nox to involuntarily shut the eyes the wooden splinter almost hit.

It was common knowledge that during a battle, one should never take their eyes off the opponent, a little moment could completely change the tide of the battle and decide the victor. Even beasts knew this and the beast Nox was currently fighting was no stranger to it either.

Without a moment of hesitation it used its tail to swipe Nox away causing the effeminate boy to slam his body on a huge tree.

Nox yelped as his back collided with the tree, he coughed up a mouthful of blood, a pained grimace marred his face and his vision became crimson.

Blood dripped from his forehead, covering his eyes and obscuring his sight but the rain quickly washed it off. He gritted his teeth as he struggled to stand up.

He looked at his teacher, who was currently dealing with beasts that were a lot higher in rank than that of the sabertooth scorpion tiger. There were at least fifty beasts surrounding them and each of them was as strong as the saber-toothed scorpion tiger or even stronger.

His teacher didn't seem to have much trouble dealing with them, but their numbers were still overwhelming and because of Nox, he couldn't conjure a wide area attack spell to get rid of the beasts so he was stuck to dealing with them one by one.

Nox returned his gaze to the scorpion tiger, his vision was blurry but he could still make out the unclear silhouette of the beast approaching slowly. It seemed this beast in particular loved toying with it's prey.

' Da.. Damn it. ' Nox cursed inwardly as the beast drew closer.

****

He had been training, no he wasn't training he was simply swinging wooden sticks, his teacher had drilled a lot of instructions into him about the technique he was trying to teach him, while there were various words to describe it, only one word stood out.

Graceful! The training technique Eren had taught Nox was calm and elegant, unlike most swordsmanship it felt more like a dance, the swings were light and sharp and its strikes were quite fast.

But yesterday he had been practicing the wrong way, swinging his sword in a crude manner, with just a single thought on his mind.

' kill'

After hearing the cult of d'rauh was involved in the death of his sister, Nox became overwhelmed with the single thought of killing. Unknown to him that he had been oozing a palpable bloodlust which attracted some beasts from the cursed forest.

At first they were only about two of them, they didn't seem that much of a threat so nox was able to kill them, but not without sustaining numerous injuries.

He noticed that his wooden sword wouldn't be able to pierce through the skin of these abominations so he aimed for the softest part of the beast, the eyes.

He was quick and small, that was the only advantage he had against them, he blinded the eyes of one of the abominations and led it towards the other. They pounced on each other till one of them killed the other, and when the victor had finished off the other, Nox took his chances and killed off the beast who had emerged victorious.

His teacher had taught him that if one was lacking in skills and power then someone such as that should make up for it with his wits.

It was a bit surprising though, Nox hadn't really stayed long with the eccentric wizard, but the few days he did, he had learned many useful things.

After finishing off the beast, which was left standing he exhaled, staggered to his feet and turned around to take in the view of the two beasts lying on the forest grounds but then something approaching caught his eyes.

A little bit distant from him, were several beasts which the ones he killed wouldn't even hold a candle to them.

One by one they slowly emerged, staring hungrily at their prey.

He killed a few more and did his best to survive because he knew that it was only a matter of time before his teacher would arrive.

He had done his very best, staying alive was his priority before anything else, he had done his best but now.. he was tired.

****

It felt like the forest was trying to put him to sleep, just like the first time he had gotten into it. A cold, very chilling feeling suddenly enveloped Nox. Goosebumps rose on his skin and his heartbeat quickened.

" T..This feeling, it feels like.. that thing—the mist wraith."

While he tried to calm himself, stealing his mind, he poised a strike, calmly waiting for the sabertooth scorpion tiger to approach him.

When the beast had gotten a bit closer, Nox ran to meet it head on, or so he tried. What happened the next second was so fast that Nox's mind wasn't able to process it. He was thrown into the air towards the tail of the sabertooth scorpion tiger by a beast that closely resembled a buffalo.

Nox felt the sensation of a hard sharp substance, piercing through his skin, he was so shocked that he didn't even let out a sound.