Chapter 6: Chapter 6 – To The Victor

 

"As you can see, I need clothes. A shirt, and pants. I also need salt. Wolf meat is rather flavorless. Hm, I should probably get a backpack. Or maybe a cart." She thought for a moment.

"If you bought a backpack, it would take half of what you earned. If you bought a cart, it would take twice what you earned." Rirn said and watched as Aila rolled her eyes. "Food is cheaper then crafted goods."

"I guess that makes sense. Do you have canvass or burlap sacks?" She asked.

"I do. A sack of salt is ten silver. The ready made clothes, in your average size, will be ten silver coins each. A wheel of cheese is five silver, as it's crafted by a cheese maker. If you had a cart, you could fill it with grains and vegetables for fifty silver. Most would be root crops, and coarse grain, like cornmeal." Aila thought for a moment.

"Well, I have tools at home. I'll see what I can do. I'll take the clothes, the sack of salt, and two wheels of cheese."  She needed salt for flavor, and now that she could eat, she wanted cheese.  Meat and cheese were considered staples so she didn't feel like it was a frivolous purchase.  Since wolves seemed to deliver themselves to her door, that also meant she would be able to hunt for food quite easily.

If anyone on that world were to hear her thoughts about how easy it was to get meat, they would get a headache, or pass out from the rapid increase in blood pressure.

When did it become easy to kill a flame wolf?

 

* * *

 

Aila saw the people that followed her out of the corner of her eye. She could sense them easily, which made her a little bit cautious. There were five in total, all with swords, and two with bows. She stopped before she got to the forest.

"It's not even that much silver." She turned and put the sacks down. "Are you sure you want to do this?" There was a disgusting smile on the face of the man in the middle.  He was the largest, and the current leader of this mercenary band.

"It's not just about the silver on you. It's also what we can sell you for." His laughter was the wrong thing to do. With a flame core and fire elements as her sole basis of cultivation, her temper was red hot, and without the balance of other contrasting elements, like water.  Her eyes started to glow red as her anger shot through the roof.

Aila didn't hesitate, as some books, and movies she watched showed her that the heroes often waited for the enemy to set up, or get ready. Once she could no longer see in two dimensions due to being too dizzy, she could no longer watch, and had to imagine those battles.

She pulled her sword out of her bundle, and before they could react, she had already ran straight at one of the archers.

The archer paled as he saw her eyes glow. The leader didn't say anything about their target being a cultivator, and a high level one at that. Her speed was so far above their group, he automatically knew he was dead when she targeted him first.

On their world, cultivators had ranks and realms. Each realm of power had seven ranks within it. The middle levels required more spirit essence the higher they climbed, but to assault the sixth rank, one needed twice as much spirit essence just to get through the door. One also needed to be prepared to have even more available as if their rank rose high enough to pierce the barrier between realms, they could shoot through to the next realm in advancement.

There were associated costs, and risks, but everyone wanted to be stronger. The first realm of Spirit Refining was the basic guide that helped a cultivator to advance throughout their lives.  Spirit Refining cultivators were common, while Foundation realm is where most people stopped.  Core realm was the peak in this area, but very few could climb to that height.

Aila was so fast, he knew she was above the Foundation realm, as no one could react. She blew right passed the archer.  He thought he was safe when she didn't strike him, but the archer felt some pain before his vision went black. His head fell onto the ground before they reacted, but that was already too late.

Aila was on her way to kill the second archer before they even turned their head.

 

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"They weren't even able to block one strike." She rolled her eyes. "Did they think that someone who killed a flame wolf was an easy target? Or that because I'm a girl, I wouldn't be able to kill?" Her eyes closed.

"I've seen a lot of death. It was a companion most of my life. It was an end to suffering for those too sick to live." Her eyes opened again, firm determination buried in their depths. "Killing to stay alive, and not have someone try to sell me as a slave. I have no problem with that moral choice."

Aila would not become sick from killing those people. Some deserved death, and if she didn't kill them, they would either try to kill her, or they would enslave her, after they had their way with her. She looked at each body, and sniffed the air.

"Ugh. Is bathing illegal here?"

 

* * *

 

After Aila stripped the bodies, she took them a few hundred feet away from the area she used as a trail, and left them in the forest. After that, she didn't give them a moment of thought. They didn't deserve real estate within her mind.

She bundled up the armor, the better quality clothing, and the weapons, while she left the poor quality and patched clothes on them. Once she got it back to her home, she shrugged.

"To the victor go the spoils. I'm sure they would have celebrated and drank themselves stupid if they won." Her mental fortitude, the ability to withstand trauma, had not risen. It was already extremely strong. She watched hundreds of patients go through the cancer wards, some didn't look sick at all, but in a few days, they died of some complications to the surgeries that were performed in an emergency. Others were horribly sick, like herself, and suffered a long time before they died.

She could handle the simple trauma of protecting herself from bandits, and villains.

After she set the spoils in the area she stored her goods in, Aila took her ax and went to chop some wood. She needed a proper ladder. If she stayed in this area for any length of time, she would make a set of stairs.

"What the hell!" Just as she was going to cut down a tree, the tree moved out of the way. She frowned and looked at it carefully. She didn't try to chop it down again, but examined it closely.

"Hey!" She ducked as a wooden claw was swiped at her face. She growled. "I didn't know you weren't just a tree!" That didn't seem to matter as the 'tree' unhinged itself and took a slightly more humanoid form, without a discernible gender, and eerily thin.

It started to swipe and try to claw at her body. Aila had apologized, and stopped herself from attacking, but this creature didn't seem to care. She was now an enemy, or was always an enemy, in the eyes of the 'tree'.

"Fine!" Her eyes glowed red, and even though she heard a squeal of fear, she didn't stop herself again. Her ax split the 'tree' down the middle, and where a chest area would be if it was a human, she saw a green round piece of wood that looked like a ball of liquid sap.

"Oh. So tasty looking." Her eyes glazed over, and reached into the chest. She pulled out the sap, and swallowed it.

"Ai!" She squealed a little. "I did it again! What is with me now? And what is the color green supposed to signify?" Soon, her belly felt the tyrannical nature of the energy, but that suction force pulled it away, along with that tasty ball of sap.

"Oh!" She whispered contentedly. The surroundings changed right before her eyes. "The trees sparkle." She whispered. She extended her hand and touched the 'tree', or wood nymph, murmured softly as it soothed her mind, and thought about the warmth that she felt when she sucked in the flame elements in the air. The green sparkles in the wood nymph flowed into her body like she was the ground for a lightning rod.

"So comfortable." Like with the flame elements, these were sucked away, which left a curious and cautious person behind. The wood nymph dissolved into dust.

"Oh wow." Her eyes now looked at the forest around her. "The entire forest sparkles green." She grinned, and turned her head.

"Oh. Hello, pig."

 

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