Erwin, with a few recruits, did not follow any of the four strong candidates and headed out on their own.

Their first encounter with a monster was a simple glacier hare. It was alone, but the sudden appearance had surprised them as the glacier hare suddenly lunged at them.

The glacier hare was about to stab a young recruit with its horn. The young recruit was so surprised that he stumbled backwards and could not defend himself. Many of those who saw the scene thought that the young recruit would get a hole in his abdomen.

It was at that moment that Erwin blocked the strike with his shield. The glacier hare was stronger than he expected, and he was not in a proper stance, making him stumble backward.

The glacier hare was stunned for a second as his horn was shaking a little.

"Now's our chance, attack!"

When the group heard Erwin's shout, the recruits acted and surrounded the glacier hare, and started attacking it. Due to its momentary pause, the glacier hare was unable to evade the incoming attacks and was stabbed from different angles.

Blood hissed where it hit the cold earth, steaming faintly in the winter air. One recruit lost his grip on his spear; another nearly caught a wild kick in the ribs.

But panic slowly gave way to rhythm. The first blows were sloppy, desperate, then came the second, then the third, cleaner, more certain. The hare screeched once, a shrill, unnatural sound, and collapsed under the weight of the stabbing frenzy.

For a long moment, no one moved. Then, heavy breaths fogged in the cold. A boy still clutching his sword stared at the blood on his blade as though it might crawl back up and bite him.

"We… killed it," someone whispered.

Erwin exhaled, lowering his shield, arm still numb from the impact. "Yeah," he said, more to steady them than himself. "We did."

Unlike the four main candidates, who easily subdued the monsters they fought, which were larger and more powerful. This group of recruits faced one of the weakest monsters found in the North and won a clumsy victory.

"I don't think we can survive three days here if we don't work together."

A murmur of agreement passed through the group. No one wanted to say it out loud, but the truth was sitting heavy in their chests. One mistake, one stumble, and they'd end up like the hare cooling at their feet.

Erwin looked at each of them, one by one. They were like him, a person who had never been to the battlefield. Some of them were just young men who had just started their adventure. Others were blacksmiths like him, or farmers who just wanted to chase their dreams.

Despite all that, they did not back down, they did not cower in fear, and they continued to move forward.

Erwin planted his shield in the ground and gestured to the carcass. "Drag that thing off the trail. We can't eat it, and its blood will draw worse if we leave it here. Far enough that it might distract anything hunting by scent."

The group did not question Erwin's orders as two of the sturdier recruits did as told, hauling the glacier hare's limp weight into the underbrush, dropping it among thick roots, and covering it with loose branches.

"Next," Erwin said, adjusting the strap on his arm, "since we'll be staying here for three days, we need to either find or create shelter. There's also the problem with food. This forest is abundant with monsters that we cannot eat."

One of the recruits glanced at the treeline, where the shadows bled thick between the branches. "You think we can even find animals that aren't monsters out here?"

"Maybe," Erwin said, though the weight in his voice betrayed the doubt behind the word. "I did see a few birds while we were walking. We also need to find a water source. Those are the three basic things we need to survive three days. Shelter, food, and water. We must work together if we are to survive here."

A few nodded, still pale but steadier than before. The panic had cracked, and through the break, something more useful was starting to grow, resolve.

"We'll split into pairs," Erwin continued, scanning their faces. "Two will search for water. Two will scout quietly for anything we can hunt that won't kill us. The rest will start looking for a place to build shelter. Somewhere off the main path, somewhere we can hide the light if we need fire. Don't go too far, and we'll meet here in half an hour."

The recruits exchanged uncertain looks, but no one argued. The fear of wandering alone in a monster forest outweighed hesitation. Erwin's presence had lessened the fear.

He was a surprisingly steady leader. Maybe it was the years of guiding apprentices at the forge.

The group did as Erwin proposed, formed pairs, and headed out.

***

Snow crunched softly under boots as the pairs drifted away from the clearing, the hush of the monster forest swallowing them in uneven gulps. The deeper they walked, the louder their own hearts seemed to beat.

For a while, nothing moved but the wind through the needles and the occasional creak of ice shifting on heavy branches.

The water team found what they were looking for first, a thin, stubborn stream forcing its way between frost-cracked stones.

It wasn't clean, not really, but it didn't smell wrong, and when one of them tested it against his tongue, it tasted like water.

They wanted to follow the stream upward, but they knew not to go too far. If they stray too far from their companions, they might die from a sudden monster attack.

The food scouts weren't as lucky. They came back with nothing but a few chewed scraps of bark and a grim report: no sign of birds, no nests, no small animals scurrying from their path.

Instead, they saw something rather frightening. A few trees were bent to the side, and the ground that was filled with snow had two huge pits. It was obvious that something rather large had passed by the area.

The scouts hadn't lingered to measure the pits, but the memory of them clung to their skin like cold sweat.

They hurried back, their boots biting deep into the snow, every step haunted by the feeling of eyes in the dark.

By the time they returned to the meeting point, the sky had dulled to a bruised gray, light bleeding away faster than they wanted.

Erwin was already there, crouched beside a half-built lean-to of lashed branches and snow-packed walls. He looked up at their faces and didn't bother asking if they'd found food.

"What happened?" he asked, his hand on the hilt of his sword.

One of the scouts swallowed. "We didn't find game. We found... Signs. Something f*cking big. Trees bent like saplings in a storm, and the snow there was a huge pit that looked like a giant's footprint."

When the people in the makeshift camp heard the description of the scouts, they felt their hands trembling and their stomachs churning. Some of them held their rune-etched stone, contemplating whether they should crush it and leave.

For a heartbeat, no one spoke. The only sound was the crack of ice as the wind pushed against the trees, groaning like something alive.

Even Erwin started to hesitate. He was expecting a few fights with small monsters or some bandits, but he was not expecting to see a true monster.

'Am I really going to turn back now?! Didn't I already know that going on this adventure, chasing this dream, would be dangerous? Running away at the first sign of real danger, did I treat this like some sort of game?... No! I either continue chasing my dreams or die doing so!'

Erwin's wavering resolve had solidified; his passion was now burning brighter than before. As for his companions, he was not going to say anything to them. They too needed to decide for themselves whether to continue on or stop now.

After some time had passed, those who were wavering placed the stone back into their pockets.

"So what do we do now?" One of them suddenly asked.

Erwin looked at the speaker, then at the rest of the recruits. Their faces were pale, but their eyes no longer darted to the treeline every other breath. Fear hadn't left them, but something greater had pushed them forward.

"We can only stick together and do our best to avoid whatever it is that made those footprints." Erwin decided to take charge, since the other recruits were with him seemed like they didn't know what to do.

***

Lucen, who was watching in his room, was quite impressed. Despite none of the members in the group being outstanding, they were helping each other in a way that covered their weaknesses.

'There's also that unknown monster that made those footprints. I'd better check it out to see if that could be a problem.'

Lucen used his scrying orb to check every area in the forest that had runes in it, but he did not see any monster that was big enough to create such tracks.

'Maybe it already left the forest.' Despite thinking that Lucen still felt something was wrong. 'The tracks say otherwise, but something that big can't just vanish.'

He once again swept through sections of the forest and saw different kinds of monsters, but none of them was what he was looking for. It was then, for the briefest moment, that he saw something flicker in the darkness, but it quickly disappeared.

He looked at the area again and the surrounding areas but found nothing.

"Tsk, can't get this irritating feeling in my chest. If there's a monster that's actively avoiding the detection of the Scrying spell, then it's really dangerous... I'd better ask Sir Thalos to check it out, just in case."

***

Somewhere in the frozen dark, something massive was still moving, and now it knew it was being watched.

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