Wild Gourmet: Chapter 18

He stood over the body and caught his breath. His armor had held up well enough to save his life, but barely. Three long tears ran across the chest piece where the wolf’s claws had raked him during the roll. Underneath, his skin was gouged. The wolf hadn’t made direct contact with him, but the force in its claws was so overwhelming it had cut him with his own protection.

He still had to feel thankful. The system said the armor was much more durable than his own skin. Without it taking off the worst of the potential harm, he would have been opened up like a gutted fish. Like the bear, this wolf was not something he should have been facing this early in his leveling journey. This had been a serious threat, something he should have faced with a well-ordered party or at least a better plan.

I need to be smarter about this. Somehow.

He gave himself a moment to breathe and recover from the damage to his chest and arm as he examined the ground around the watering hole. The wolf had been an advanced, dangerous foe. He wanted to learn to recognize its tracks, both for the potential of leveling his tracking skill and sheer self-preservation. If he had been the least bit injured or tired when this fight kicked off, he doubted he would have survived it.

Once rested, he pulled his daggers free from the wolf, cleaned them, and rearmed himself. The throwing had worked just fine, all things considered. It wasn’t perfect, and he knew most of the fault there was his. He was beginning to get the feeling that while his knife-work skill did help him with throwing the weapons, it did so grudgingly. It was neither anywhere near as good as he hoped or anywhere near as bad at helping him chuck blades as he should have expected.

He didn’t light a signal fire for this particular kill. He needed to head back to the town to regroup, and he was close enough that he didn’t feel that leaving the wolf to possible scavengers made sense. This was a kill that seemed valuable. He didn’t want to lose that value to cruel chance.

Looks like I’m carrying you, bud. Brand scooped up the giant carcass and threw it over his shoulder. Let’s hope you are worth it.

It turned out he didn’t have to carry it far. The sound of the fight had apparently been audible from a significant distance, as evidenced by heavy footfalls approaching fast before Brand ever got out of the thick reeds on the riverside. He grabbed for his weapon, then relaxed as Neil’s voice rang out.

“Brand? Are you OK? We heard something terrible. Howls.”

“I’m fine.” Brand pressed through the last layer of plants to where Neil stood, spear leveled. “Just ran into something.”

Neil pushed through the reeds and stopped dead at the sight of the wolf. His mouth opened, then closed, then opened again.

“That’s an ashwolf.”

“I know.”

“How did you kill an ashwolf?”

“I threw knives at it and then stabbed it. Sort of a lot,” Brand readjusted the weight of the wolf on his shoulder. He might be strong, but it was a bulky thing to carry without discomfort “I can’t say I recommend the experience. When this guy bit me, it hurt.”

“Brand…” Neil shook his head. “I don’t get it. I’ve been practicing my class for weeks longer than you have and I’m just now getting strong enough to patrol around the wall. That would have ripped me to shreds.”

“I got lucky, I think.” Brand motioned for Neil to follow then pushed forward towards the gate. There was still a good distance to go, and the wolf was getting heavy. “With my class, and this fight. With everything, really.”

Neil seemed to half accept the explanation, but continued to stare. Brand let him, but eventually also decided to put him to work.

“Help me get this back to town,” Brand said. “I want to cook it tonight, and I’m not leaving it out here for scavengers.”

“Are ashwolves… good? Good eating?”

“No,” Brand said. “But I’ll do my best.”

Between the two of them, they managed to get the wolf moving toward town at a reasonable pace. The boy was stronger than he looked, and his guard class apparently gave him the endurance to make the arrangement work longterm.

“Did it hurt you?” Neil eyed Brand’s armor. “Seriously, I mean.”

“Not badly. The armor took most of it.”

“That’s good.” Neil shifted the wolf’s weight on his shoulders. “They are supposed to make me armor, soon. As soon as they get the hides, Luisa said.”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“Use this one,” Brand said. “Unless Luisa has a good reason not to. It should be pretty good, right?”

“Really?” Neil sounded perplexed. “I can’t pay you for it.”

“You are paying me for it. You watch the gate, right? I can’t be there all the time. Guards get wages, Neil. You know that, right?”

Neil’s silence seemed to indicate that if he had known it, he hadn’t thought about it much. Luckily, the explanation seemed to quiet any objections he had left on the matter. Brand liked that. It was objectively true that the time would come when a pack of monsters would assault the gates, and guard classes were built for just that purpose. It was honestly odd that it hadn’t happened yet, and he wanted Neil ready for it when the time came.

Brand didn’t stay long in town. He and Neil carried the wolf straight to the crafters’ workshop, where Shou and Luisa regarded it with the kind of focused, hungry intensity he was learning was common for crafters. The two of them began circling the carcass and talking in low, excited voices before he had fully set it down. Luisa had her hands on the fur soon after, and he was wholly and entirely forgotten.

Saved by materials lust again.