“Shut up! I’ll kill you!” Claus wheezed out a yell.
The moment the words left his mouth, a strange light began to emanate from his sword. It would be hard to describe what it looked like, exactly, but suffice to say that it clearly held tremendous power.
As soon as the light engulfed his blade, Claus regarded me with a vicious smirk.
“You’re dead. Sacred slash!”
He swung his sword horizontally, and a flash of light suddenly flew at me.
I’d never seen power like that before in my entire life. I fell backward onto my rear, unable to stand. In fact, I couldn’t move at all.
I must be dead.
It took me only a fraction of a second to realize that, but the beam of light moved so fast that I couldn’t even follow it with my eyes as it whizzed right over my head, just barely missing me. It obliterated the room behind me into smithereens, transforming it into nothing more than a breezeway, and vanished into the distance.
I felt a strong wind at my back, channeled by the breezeway, as I broke out into a full-on cold sweat, chilling my body to the core.
My heart was pounding in my chest louder than ever before, including during the most strenuous periods of my training. I could’ve sworn it might leap right out of my mouth.
“Tch! Guess you falling on your ass made me miss. This power is too strong for me to master my control of it yet. But I won’t miss again, mark my words,” Claus said, sounding deeply disappointed, as he resumed his previous stance.
I... I can’t do this. There’s no way I can withstand an attack like that.
I was painfully aware that all of the swordsmanship and combat training that had been drilled into me would be useless against him. I was no match for his overwhelmingly powerful sacred slash.
My whole body began to shake violently, filled with fear at the prospect of facing a foe as merciless as Claus.
I’ll die if I stay here, I thought as I scrambled to get away. I knew I had only one viable escape route, and it wasn’t going to be pretty.
I was too paralyzed with fear to move normally, so I just thrust my entire body toward the stairs with enough momentum to tumble down them toward the front door. Knowing that it was the only way to escape with my life made the pain a bit more bearable, at least.
As soon as I began rolling down the stairs, Claus unleashed his second strike from the upper landing. The sound of the impact filled my ears, followed by the thumping of his footsteps as he ran down after me.
I felt like an absolute coward for running away like this, but I had no choice if I didn’t want to die here.
After what had happened here today, it seemed like a safe assumption that I wouldn’t ever be coming back. So, on my way out the front hall, I grabbed anything I could get my hands on that looked like it might be worth something and shoved it into my bag. Then I fled the home that I’d lived in my entire life, never to return.
I had nowhere to go, but I just kept running. I had to get away from Claus.
Once I’d run past the borders of Dezhil, my beloved hometown, I made a break for the nearby Patia Forest. I finally stopped when I reached a small spring not far past the edge of the tree line and slumped down onto the soft dirt.
My heart was beating so fast that I thought it might burst. I couldn’t help but fear that Claus might still be chasing me, but it seemed I’d managed to shake him off.
It was strange, though... I was basically a sitting duck with these injuries, so I was sure he would’ve caught up to me.
Then again, I suppose I outclassed him in terms of sheer physical capabilities. Just like I’d trounced him at the start of our face-off, when we were relying solely on our swordsmanship skills, I probably was able to outrun him too.
Still... That didn’t change the fact that my whole body hurt like hell.
I hadn’t felt the full brunt of it earlier because I’d been so focused on running away, but now that I had a moment to sit down and take a breath, the pain was starting to hit me. Everywhere I’d struck on my way down the stairs was now aching really, really badly.
When I assessed the damage, I found countless swollen bruises across my entire body. My right wrist was especially red and puffy.
Things were really not looking good for me. I’d just been chased out of my home, with nowhere to go, and now I was nursing some nasty bruises. I could sit here and catch my breath for a while, but I really needed to figure out what my next move was going to be.
Realistically, there was a good chance my family would send out a call for my arrest after the flagrant theft I’d committed on my way out. With that in mind, I’d have to be careful leaving the forest.
I’ll probably have to hide here until everything blows over...
“Please tell me I put some food in here,” I said, rummaging around in my bag.
It quickly became apparent that my fervent wish was in vain. I’d packed a few personal items, as well as the accessories and the pocket watch that I’d stolen from my mother and father, respectively. Other than that, all I had was a nearly empty waterskin and what could have been generously called a “handful” of beef jerky. Honestly, I could have probably finished what was in there in one sitting.
I’m not gonna last more than a week here like this, I thought in dismay.
If not for my injuries, I could have probably hunted some of the wildlife and monsters in the forest for food...but there was no way I’d be doing any hunting in my current state.
Despair was quickly sinking in. I even briefly entertained the idea of turning back around and begging my family for forgiveness. As soon as the thought came to me, though, I thought back to the ruthless stream of abuse my father had hurled at me after the ceremony, and how he’d kicked me out without a second thought. Hell, he’d even let my brother beat me to a pulp on my way out.
I pictured Claus’s face when he’d lashed out at me, taking out all his anger at our father for ignoring him his entire childhood on me. Unreasonable as it was, he’d been seriously prepared to kill me.
Going back home wouldn’t do me any good. At best, I’d get handed over to a guard, and at worst, Claus might kill me. I couldn’t fold here. I wasn’t about to let my father—or Claus—win this fight.
“I have to live...no matter what.”
Determined, I tore off the sleeve of my shirt and used it to make a crude splint with a stick I’d picked up, wrapping it tightly around one of my injured joints to keep it straight.
I was still in no shape to fight any monsters, but now I could walk, at least.
I needed something to eat, so my first order of business was finding something that looked reasonably edible. Back at the Heaven’s Blessing Ceremony, I’d assumed that I’d probably go my whole life without ever finding a need for my useless poison resistance skill...but now it was going to come in handy. I could probably eat whatever I wanted without worrying about any toxic effects.
Its usefulness might have been limited to wilderness survival, but at least here in the woods, I would be able to get a lot out of it. It didn’t matter that this was probably all it’d be good for, because right now, survival was the only priority.
As I steeled myself to spend several weeks in Patia Forest, I readied myself for a long journey. Growing up, I’d never been allowed past the periphery of the forest. But if I was going to find a suitable campsite to sustain me in the long run, I knew I’d need to venture deeper into the woods. So, off I went.
I spent several hours on foot, constantly surveying my surroundings to make sure that I wasn’t at risk of running into any monsters. The woods grew gradually more and more dense until the tree cover blocked out so much sunlight, it might as well have been night.