The Path of Ruin

The wolves snarled, staring at Kael, and slowly began to surround him.

Kael, however... at this very moment, slowly began to come to his senses. His upturned lips pulled back slightly and his expression turned ugly.

The curse had played with his body in such a way that, for a moment, it had even affected what he was thinking. But now... looking at the scene in front of him, he was all too aware that things were not so easy.

'Three wolves...'

If there was only one, it wouldn't have been a problem. After all, wolves were normal animals, not creatures. He could believe he had a chance even if there were two.

But three? Well, he couldn't be sure about that...

'There may be more hiding, too.'

He gritted his teeth, shook off the general aching and fatigue in his body, and gripped the dagger in his left hand even tighter.

He didn't panic, he didn't let his focus drift anywhere else. Likewise, he kept his eyes on the wolves. He was ready to react at any moment. He may not have been confident, the circumstances may have been to his disadvantage... but that didn't mean he was going to be scared and run away.

He couldn't run, anyway. If he wanted to survive, he had to fight, whether he wanted to or not. So he stayed where he was.

But, then, he realized that waiting was not really a good option. One of the wolves was waiting in the center while the other two were moving slowly to either side of him. Soon, they would surround him, encircle him, and use his blind spots to simply kill him.

The only way to prevent them from doing so was... to act before they did.

Kael clicked his tongue, took a deep breath, and prepared to strike. The wolves realized this quickly, their growls growing louder as they bared their teeth at Kael. It was as if they were trying to scare him, to make him back down.

But Kael didn't fall for it. With keen, determined eyes, he fixed his gaze on the wolf to his left... and then moved as fast as he could.

The wolves quickly grasped his intentions. The middle one and the right one quickly tried to retreat to the other's side. But... they hadn't reached him yet when Kael suddenly ended up next to his target! One, no... if they had only half a second more, everything would have been so simple... But, surprisingly, Kael was faster than them!

Still, there was not an extreme difference. And even if the others had been as slow as that short time, the target wolf was different, it had time to react... After all, it was the target itself!

Its jaws full of sharp teeth opened wide, its hind legs planted firmly on the ground as it lunged for the arm of the fifteen-year-old boy who appeared in front of it.

What should normally happen was simple. Either the arm of the boy in front of him would be caught between its teeth and the forest would be filled with a scream... or he would be forced to retreat.

But neither of them happened. The scrawny boy, who should have been an easy target, did not flinch in any way from its fangs... nor was he too slow to react. Not a single hesitation crossed his mind as the will to live burned like an unquenchable flame in his eyes. So, the dagger in his hand, perhaps one of the finest daggers in the kingdom, though wielded by someone weak like him, was swung straight into the wide-open jaw.

The wolf did not have time to retreat. Or even prepared to retreat in the first place. He did not know why, but the wolf had not avoided the dagger, and it paid the price.

Kael felt his dagger racing against the flesh. Drool dripped from the wolf's teeth and spilled onto his hand, but blood soon accompanied it. Still, he didn't stop, he didn't pull the dagger back or let it go. He pushed even harder, as hard as he could.

The dagger parted and parted the wolf's jaws... Finally, it reached its neck, and only then did Kael have to stop. The reason was simple... other wolves!

Kael stretched, he was in an awkward position, not knowing exactly how to swing the dagger, but he quickly recovered himself. He clenched his right fist and swung it backwards at the wolf to his right. Not content with that, he pulled his dagger out of the jaws of the wolf in front of him and attacked his left.

As the back of his fist met the head of the second wolf, he felt it being thrown back slightly. But the third wolf, unlike its other two companions, did not fall easily. It managed to dodge Kael's half-assed swing of the dagger, preparing to sink its fangs into his legs.

But then... it saw the bare foot that appeared before its eyes. Its world went black in an instant, all four of its limbs lost their strength and it crumpled to the ground.

Kael did not stop. He turned his focus to the wolf whose jaws he had sliced open, his eyes locked with the coldness of a serial killer. He had attacked it last, so it was the one who should have recovered the most. He wanted to finish it off. But... he paused, realizing something.

The wolf in front of him... was it shivering, or was it just him?

His cold brown eyes narrowed. He was seeing right, the wolf in front of him... was trembling.

"Really?"

Kael didn't know what to say. He had seen before how arrogant people, when confronted by those superior to them, would grovel and beg for their lives in a disgusting, slobbering way. But to see something like this in animals...

'You were trying to kill me just a few seconds ago...'

He let out a light, quick sigh. He drew his dagger, and without a second thought, attacked the wolf, who was trembling with fear. The wolf tried to retreat, but failed. The dagger landed between its eyes and sliced its face in two.

For a moment, Kael felt the feeling of exhaustion that had enveloped his whole body slowly fade away, the chains around his heart loosened. Thus, he was sure that he had killed the wolf in front of him... and yet, he did not stop.

Even if he had confirmed that it was dead, even if he wanted to observe what was happening now that he had given the curse a life for the first time, he did not wait for the wolf to collapse but turned around. He looked up at the wolf he had punched... and found its white fangs right in front of his face.

'Holy-!'

His body moved on its own. He raised his right elbow and, without thinking, swung at the wolf. The wolf's teeth sank into his arm, he even felt some of them rattle... But it was such a hasty attack that it lacked the strength to throw the wolf back.

He saw the wolf close its jaws and watched as some of its teeth dug into his flesh.

"Fucking dog!"

He swung his elbow down. At the same time, brought his knee up. He dragged the wolf's head to his knee with his own arm, using it to hit the wolf's head violently. But he didn't stop at once, he hit it twice... then three times. The wolf's teeth made a few wounds on his arm, but he didn't care. He struck a fourth time... and, finally, all the strength in the wolf's teeth disappeared as its body simply collapsed to the ground.

Kael felt a cozy warmth spread through his body again, he had fed the curse with a life once more... but just like the first time, he didn't even think about it.

He turned towards where the third and last wolf was supposed to be, this time ready for everything. He braced himself for any teeth or claws he might find in front of him again... but, this time, there was nothing.

Instead, there was a wolf moving backwards through the bushes, its whole body trembling and... almost groaning. It was ready to turn and run away at the slightest movement of his.

'Ah...'

Kael's body relaxed, his eyes softening slightly as he looked at the wolf in front of him.

However...

"You shouldn't have attacked me in the first place..."

He stretched the hand holding the dagger, and without a second thought, he threw it with all his might towards the wolf. He had no idea how to throw a dagger or a knife. In fact, he was sure he would fail... but he had no other way to kill or attack the wolf in front of him without it escaping.

The wolf turned and prepared to flee even before the dagger left Kael's hand... but it reached it anyway. It wasn't a perfect throw, yes. If it had been any more inaccurate, the hilt would have met flesh instead of the blade and it would have fallen to the ground as if nothing had happened...

But Kael was lucky. His dagger went right into the wolf's back, though not fully, causing its whole body to shake violently. It took a step or two as if trying to escape... but then, like its other two friends, it collapsed.

Kael's body warmed up again, just as it had with the other two. He could no longer feel any of the chains around his heart.

With a sigh, he approached the wolf's corpse, pulled his dagger from its back, and wiped it clean on the wolf's fur, although not quite successfully. Then... he waited for a while, doing nothing, his eyes fixed on the already darkening sky.

The forest was silent again. But... the metallic smell of fresh blood now filled his nose.

Still, Kael didn't care. His mind was elsewhere, his brow furrowed.

'I... I shouldn't be this strong.'

Well, he wasn't really that strong... He was only strong for a scrawny fifteen-year-old boy who knew nothing about combat. Even then, his reflexes were a step up from when he was a slave, as were his speed, muscle strength, and senses. It was as if... he had suddenly grown a few years older.

He was not complaining, of course. He preferred being strong to being weak, even if the change was minimal... But something was still unsettling him.

'Is it because of the curse?'

The whole point of the curse was to make him stronger constantly, after all. But... the effect was quite minimal, and to get it, he had to take a life, and this was the first time he had taken a life since he got it. So this was not the answer.

He raised his hands, looked at his palms. He remembered how his body had healed when he woke up in the palace.

Something had changed in his body. He didn't know exactly what, but... something had happened after he had killed the king and obtained the curse.

"Haaaaah..."

He lowered his hands, closed his eyes briefly, and inhaled as much fresh air as he could into his lungs. Then, decisively, he opened his eyes again.

'Well, I have to leave here first... The smell of blood might attract other wolves or creatures.'

Yes, his life was more important than anything else. He could solve the mysteries about himself later, he had plenty of time. At least... as long as he was alive.

'For now, I have succeeded... I have satisfied the curse and somehow survived, and I will continue to do so.'

And so, he began to walk away from the area. Under the endless darkness of the night and the blanket of silence, he moved forward, just as he had done so far. Yet... his mind was always on something else.

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