Ay noticed that the town had some guards patrolling. Actually, there were a lot of them. The sun was going to rise soon, so the number of guards was off. Having guards patrolling was already out of the norm for the elves, given that they didn’t have visitors ierritory and crimes rarely happened.

  It was only natural sio punish crimes, Elves would have to apply longer sentences or harsher ones, otherwise, the criminals wouldn’t take those punishments seriously.

  Putting that aside, Ay avoided the guards with ease by jumping to the top of a close building and then jumping to the one. She didn’t make any noise when he leaped or when she nded. It felt like she was truly weightless.

  Ay moved around from roof to roof in order to check all the pces, but without getting inside, she couldn’t tell much. She had the skills to ihem, but she couldn’t check all of them.

  ‘Was that just my imagination?’

  Ay still felt like something was off, but she couldn’t say what it was… it has been three days since she had slept, so she couldn’t help but think that she was tired and that was slowing down her judgment.

  After closing her eyes and then thinking for a short while as she rested her mind and body a bit, Ay soon realized that something was missing iown… sidering how much poison it could be obtained in the closest byrinth, the smell of it was weak iown.

  ‘We should have kept tabs on this pce for a while…’

  Poison or potion making wasn’t the main form of business in the area, from what Ay had heard, magic trees appear here quite often and when those trees eventually lose a branch or two, the craftsmen in the area would use them to Fletch the Elven arrows. It was a rather unstable source of ine, but since few people could make it and the arrows were pretty valuable, it was enough for the people in the area.

  The materials of the byrinth were a bit less valuable, since elves didn’t value poiso es to fighting. Even if they were focused on using bows as their main on, poison was siderably too cowardly. The creatures in their byrinth were also rather creepy looking, so until retly, they only kept tabs on things to a certaient.

  ‘This information is outdated… the elder ged five years ago, afterwards. I o find a pce where they might store the poison for at least a day and then check what they are doing with it.’

  This was going to be hard given that the sun was rising… heading to the house of the elder seemed like the best option, but it would be hard to not be noticed, she had a feeling that the guard in that pce wouldn’t be only made of some elves.

  It was hard to track the smell of poison, since all things were stored in magic bags. The best option would be to wait for the group to e and theurn from the byrinth, following the guards would be a good idea too, but soon things will get out of hand ohey realize that someoacked the guards there and the roup of elves that had e with Rowan.

  For Ay and the other dark elves, capturing people and f them to give them information wasn’t possible… for ohey didn’t want to kill their fellow elves, even if they were seen as lesser beings by them. For ahey had to keep their existence hidden, uhey wanted hundreds of elves marg to their byrinth. Their beor, Nylian, was no longer around to cover for them… and his grandson didn’t seem like he would walk in his footsteps.

  In the end, the only thing Ay could do was to wait and observe. They no longer had the advantage of their total sneakiness. The elves in the area didn’t know that the dark elves were involved, so they wouldn’t act against them immediately. They would py it safe and make sure that whatever they were doing, it would remain hidden.

  In the end, Ay’s pn worked… soon the news about the unscious guards and the new group of elves being found spread around and everyone began to move. Some, not as willingly as the others, but the whole town began to move. Among all that, Ay caught the glimpse of a certain elf leaving the residence of the elder and then headi of the town by himself… it was ahat Regulus had seen before and even from Ay’s perspective, looked very suspicious. She decided to tail him.

  … …

  ‘She is takiime… I guess she took my words to heart.’

  It has been two days since Ay left… I had po this byrinth in a day, but this was the third since I started expl it, since everyoheir kicks by getting in my way. These people o get some hobbies.

  At first, I thought that the lesser chimeras were multiplying by themselves, but soon I realized that it was impossible… they were part of the byrinth and spawned by it as well, but they were essentially monsters with different body parts of other monsters. It was impossible for them to reprodud even if they could, their offspring wouldn’t be something like them.

  “I need a hobby too, sihis thought keeps b me.”

  “Awoo, awoo!”

  “Who are you to say anything? You chase your own tail.”

  “Squeak! Squeak!”

  It looked like G didn’t like my words. Regardless, two days without being bothered agai me a bit on edge… it made me feel like once I leave the byrinth, the rgest elf army known in the world would be waiting for me outside.

  I roag the final parts of the byrinth, the air growing heavier with every step. The once-overwhelming presence of the tless lesser chimeras that had swarmed us was now reduced to silence. We had fought through them all, a, despite all we had overe and the strength we had gained along the way, an uneasy knot of doubt sat in my chest.

  The soury worry was clear. My arm was still a gring weakness. it was far from healed, barely even halfway through its recovery. Every movement reminded me of its frailty, and the searing ache made it impossible to wield my bow with the ease I relied on. My bow, which had always been my on of choice, felt more like dead weight noainful reminder of how much I’d lost in flexibility and range.

  Oher hand, I had to rely a lot on G and she also had gotten quite stronger… At some point, she began to devour my reserves of meat since she began to grow again insanely fast. She was als at the bodies of the chimeras, but she always calmed down when she saw me looking at her suspiciously… eating that was simply no good, no matter what.

  “This doesn’t make any sense… you ’t just grow fifty timeters in two days.”

  “Awooo! Awooo!”

  G probably could be used as a mount now, or even pulling a small vehicle. Since I was going to work on making potions from now on, I would hat much assistao move as well. G had too muergy, so I was sure that she wouldn’t mind, as long as she had a few kilograms of meat to eat every day… Was that actually a good trade? It should be as long as it makes me gain time.

  While I was thinking about that, G mao defeat some more chimeras by herself and therance of the final boss chamber in this byrinth finally appeared before us. The final boss should be a Minotaur… quite the odd creature given that we faced chimeras until now in this se, but I had a theory as to why it was the case.

  “Let’s take a break before challenging the final guardian.”

  “Awooo! Awooo!”

  I wao be doh this pce the boss was defeated, so I began to work on taking the poison of the tails of the final chimeras we defeated. While I could use both hands for doing simple and not strenuous work, I used my head io help with that. By tying the tails with a single rope and tightening their base and putting them upside down, I could make the poison fall by itself. It was a bit of a slow process, but it worked when it was doh dozens of them at a time. It also gave me room to take a breath.

  Given how strong G had bee, a simple strategy would work here. Perhaps I could also fight the Minotaur with a single arm and sword, I should have gotten stronger enough to do that. My sword skills needed some polishing as well… Instead of just using them to surprise enemies or use them when I am bored, I should at least be skilled enough to defeat tougher oppos with them.

  It was an odd time to think of doing that… I checked my left arm by closing my left hand a few times. I didn’t feel any pain, but it felt sluggish… I wao sigh, but this much recovery on such a short notice was already impressive enough. I could no longer see the stitches of mana in my arm, but the scar was still pretty fresh… it retty simir to what the chimeras had…

  ‘Why would a byrinth spawn these kinds of creatures? The ice phoenix said something about this, but…’

  The words of the ice phoenix were: Labyrinths and dungeons are simir to living beings. While they don’t have proper bodies and a single sciousness, they emerge when the spiritual energy of many beings gather in a single spot… was that the will of those spirits that decided to spawn the chimeras? If yes, why? I think that the answer would be pretty worrisome, so perhaps I shouldn’t think too much about it.

  ‘I wonder if the rifts are like the dungeons and byrinths as well… in that case, would that be the will of the dead to make other beings e to this world.’

  There were a lot of types of mohat one could find in those pces, but not outside… It made me question the will of the dead. It wouldn’t be funny if their only goal was to keep increasing their will or something.

  WritingMaeGun