In front of Asan's face reappeared the text, reading which he involuntarily bit his lip.
[The Shadow mark has been applied to you.]
[They know about your presence.]
[Shadow Mark Stage - Initial.]
"Everyone stop immediately!" The Geographer's order echoed, and everyone in the camp obeyed instantly.
Asan, like the others, lowered their eyes to the mark and examined it closely. Its green border shimmered with black hues, giving an impression of something dark and unknown. But Asan felt a certain kinship with the mark, as if alongside the strange and incomprehensible energy within it was also a familiar darkness that Asan controlled. Just a little bit, barely there, but it was present. Attempting to call upon this energy, Asan's face contorted in a horrific, drawn-out pain that spread throughout Asan's arm.
The darkness inside the mark, though similar to Asan's, was incredibly dense and uncontrollable. The boy lacked the experience to handle such ancient power, so Asan abandoned all attempts and focused more on the surroundings.
The forest around seemed to have become much denser, and his field of vision had greatly narrowed, not allowing him to see more than a few meters ahead. All his senses felt dulled. These strange sensations involuntarily made his heart skip a beat and swallow bitter saliva. Fear. He was slowly becoming nauseatingly scared, but he pulled himself together and took a deep breath, overcoming the wave of panic that hit him. He needed to at least figure out where they were and how to get out of this strange forest. Meanwhile, whispers and chatter spread through the camp. People were clearly nervous, and some openly showed it, forcing the Geographer to spend time trying to calm the crowd down.
If these had been people from the camp they had lost… Perhaps everything would have been simpler.
"Time for such thoughts later, Asan…" Asan muttered to himself and finally noticed how all the sounds in the forest had ceased.
Only the voices of people could be heard around them. Even the wind, which had been extremely weak before, disappeared.
It was as if they were standing in a place frozen in time. This made the young man feel very uneasy, so he started turning around, trying to find a possible opponent or someone like himself. But... No one. The forest seemed completely empty, with only the people in the camp being the only living beings in the middle of it. But didn't System say that "they" know about his presence?
They are probably shadows, but even thinking logically, how could they defeat such monsters if they encountered them?
"None of this feels right. It's too quiet, there are no smells at all, Paul, what should we do?" Crane asked, standing close to Asan.
Asan looked at Paul and saw his usual, gloomy expression.
He brought his finger to his chin and started scratching his beard, looking rather wise. After a couple of minutes, Paul finally came up with something.
"I think we shouldn't panic so much. We haven't even seen our opponents yet, but the whole camp is already trembling. Perhaps the system's warnings are meant for lower levels and don't take into account our large group, but everything could also be different. In any case, I believe we need to calm down and keep moving" said Paul loud enough for the entire camp to hear.
The people visibly calmed down and began assessing the situation more soberly, trying not to spread panic. The Geographer clearly liked Paul's idea, so he nodded silently, and everyone started walking deeper into the forest.
They moved like this for almost an hour, encountering no enemies on their path, not even a single animal.
The strike group was distributed along the entire caravan of people so that, in case of an attack, the enemy would have no chance to hit any weak spots. Crane with Paul were at the front, Alice with Bridgite were in the middle, while the end was secured by Asan with Laszlo. While there was still time, Asan spent it trying to interact with the darkness inside the mark on his palm. Naturally, the attempts were futile, but he managed to learn something. This darkness was slowly spreading like a tumor with each passing minute. To confirm his suspicions, the boy opened the stats window and glumly looked at his Health points with mana points.
[characteristics]
[strength - 29]
[endurance - 36]
[agility - 22]
[perception - 17]
[intelligence - 21]
[wisdom - 16]
[Health points - 170/180] ( - 10 )
His guess about the influence of this darkness was confirmed. Perhaps, this is indeed the initial stage of the shadow mark that was reducing his Health points and mana by ten. The young man immediately shared his guess with the Geographer, who ordered everyone to check their characteristics. As it turned out, everyone had it, and if one also understood that this darkness was slowly spreading, the situation became very tense.
They were running out of time.
This greatly changed their plans, because while the need to hurry had been present before, now it was absolutely necessary. Even now, Asan could see how people's faces were slowly paling, and some started coughing, and they had only just entered the forest and received this damned shadow curse. What would happen to them after a few days?
"Who knows what our chances of survival here are?"
"Why did we enter this forest?"
"God, help me overcome this obstacle..."
The voices of the people were once again filled with panic and disbelief about the situation. The people were slowly undermining the stability of the camp, spreading panic that the Geographer and Half were barely able to quell. Each of them tried to argue that things weren't so bad and that they would soon get out. Asan looked irritated. The more the boy thought about it, the more he realized that these people were not as brave as they had been before, and that they were clearly weaker both physically and mentally.
Could he really miss his dead comrades, whom he had known for only a month? But hadn't he actually grown attached to them, hadn't he?
Surely?
"Everyone stop! Assault group, prepare!" Suddenly, Half's frightened cry was heard, to which Asan immediately reacted, summoning a sword he had picked up from the fort into his right hand.
Fully concentrating, the guy began searching for his opponent with his eyes, and after some time, he found him. Slowly emerging from behind the trees were humanoid creatures. Their dark bodies were transparent, occasionally shimmering with dark green, as if they were made of ectoplasm. The most terrifying aspect of their appearance were their orange eyes, which looked like two slits on their formless heads.
The creature moved unnaturally towards the column of people, but its path was blocked by none other than Laszlo, who stood directly in front of it, raising Flamberg in his one hand.
"Where are you going, scum?" he growled, pointing his blade right at the body of the shadow, which seemed completely unconcerned about the strange man and was moving straight toward his sword.
Asan didn't like this and suspicions began to arise in his head, but he couldn't warn Laszlo since the other shadows were already moving towards his side. Clicking his tongue, the boy also stood before them and tightly gripped the short sword in his hand. Thanks to the sparring sessions that became mandatory by Paul's decree, Asan learned basic sword techniques from Alice. These were simple stances and explanations on how to attack. Although he was stronger than her due to his powerful magic, he couldn't last even five seconds in a sword fight, which made him, for some reason, interested in martial arts.
Holding the sword in front of himself, the boy bent his knees and spread his legs for a comfortable position. Placing the blade next to his head, he raised the blade towards the sky, ready to deliver a slicing strike, giving it maximum force just as Alice had said. But the boy had one suspicion that all of this…
It simply won't work. One shouldn't forget that these are shadows, and shadows are formless beings that cannot be attacked. Shadows are immaterial, so the question of how exactly to attack the creature was sharply on the boy's mind, but as soon as the first creature got close enough, the questions became irrelevant because it was time to act.
The boy immediately slashed at the creature with all his strength, not even hoping to cut it through, but Asan was surprised when his blade actually managed to hit the creature and even kill it with one swing.
[Congratulations! You have killed "Lowest Shadow"].
This... Was unusual and easy? But what was even more surprising was that after killing it, the boy felt something change inside the mark, but since there was no time for a detailed examination, he continued attacking the other creatures.
Each member of the strike team was mercilessly hacking at the approaching monsters, except for Paul. He, as usual, was giving orders and trying to cover each one with his words. Asan was used to this, but the question stuck in his throat: why the fuck can't you attack in such a situation yourself?
Fortunately, besides the five people, Nelson and his knight unexpectedly joined the battle. Out of the corner of his eye, Asan noticed how both of them fought and couldn't help but frown. They were clearly not weak, unlike their people. The knight managed to kill several shadows with a single swing of his halberd, while Nelson turned out to have two knives under his armpit. Asan saw how skillfully he dealt with the shadows, delivering literally a few blows in just seconds, which looked somewhat unnatural given his large build.
He was big and muscular, about like Crane, but unlike the slow guy, Nelson moved at Asan's level, possibly only giving way to the flexible and nimble Alice, who, as usual, gave in to her inner fury and hacked anyone who got close enough.
After a couple of minutes, the attack by the shadows ended with a victory for the people. Were these really the same shadows that System had warned about, or were they just the weakest individuals, as they had been in the fog?
In any case, now Asan at least knew that shadows could be killed with steel, and that was already a relief.