Hana began to strike the flint against a larger rock, the sharp clack-clack-clack echoing across the hill. She worked with a grim focus, her hands steady. She didn't have the luxury of admiring the scenery for long. In her mind, the clock was always ticking.
Caspian sat on a nearby boulder, watching her work. He looked bored, but there was a strange shimmer in his eyes. He didn't understand why a female would want to get her hands dirty with rocks when he could simply incinerate anything in her path, but he liked the way she moved—efficient, lethal, and completely unimpressed by his status.
"You are a strange female," he rumbled.
"I'm a survivor," she corrected, finally breaking off a sharp, triangular shard of flint. "There's a difference."
She stood up, holding the makeshift blade. It wasn't a masterpiece, but it was sharp. It was a start.
"Now," she said, looking down into the dense valley where the shadows were longest. "Let's find something that needs saving—or something that needs killing. I need those points. And the faster we get them, the better."
She couldn't wait to get off this one million.
As they began their descent into the deeper parts of the forest, the wind shifted. It brought the scent of damp earth, crushed flowers, and something else—something metallic and sickly sweet.
Blood.
And not dragon blood. Something lighter. Something desperate.
Hana's eyes sharpened. "Change of plans. Something's dying down there."
"Probably just a snack for a predator," Caspian said, stretching his arms and yawning.
"No," Hana said, her survival instincts humming and her eyes glinting. "It's a mission."
Hana followed the scent toward a dense cluster of red-barked trees. The smell of blood was stronger here, mixed with a faint, cloying aroma that didn't belong in a predator's den—like wilting flowers and sweet sap.
She pushed aside a heavy branch and stopped.
In a small clearing, resting against the roots of an ancient tree, was a fox beastman.
He was smaller than Caspian, but his fur was a striking, vibrant shade of dusty pink, like dried rose petals. Eight of his tails were splayed out in the dirt, but the ninth was a mangled mess of white bone and torn, darkened flesh.
As they approached, the young man with messy, soft pink hair and fox ears twitched painfully. When he turned his head, Hana noticed he was strikingly handsome, but his face was deathly pale on seeing Caspian.
"A trespasser," Caspian growled, his golden eyes glinting with a predatory light.
The air around the dragon began to shimmer with heat. His obsidian scales glowed a dangerous orange as he stepped past Hana, his claws extending.
"A Pink Fox. They are the worst pests—cunning, useless, and always causing trouble. I'll do the forest a favor and turn him into ash before he can rot on our soil."
"Wait—" the fox rasped, his green eyes snapping open.
He didn't look at Caspian. He looked straight at Hana, who seemed not to care at all what was going to happen. His eyes landed on the mark on her shoulder, and for half a second, furrowing his brow.
Then, with a shaky breath, the fox scrambled backward on his elbows, dragging his ruined tail behind him. He looked small, terrified, and adorably 'harmless' compared to the towering dragon.
"Great Female... please," the fox whimpered, his voice smooth but trembling. He reached out a pale hand toward her, his eyes welling with tears that looked far too perfect to be real. "Don't let the wicked dragon kill me. I was only looking for a place to hide… I have nowhere else to go. I'm so weak… and… and so very cold."
Caspian snorted, a puff of smoke escaping his nostrils.
"Weak? A Pink Fox is never weak; they're just lazy and manipulative. You're a snack to me now."
Hana watched them both, her face a mask of indifference. She didn't care about the fox's tears, and she didn't care about Caspian's territorial pride. She was about to tell Caspian to hurry up and finish it since they didn't have time to be loitering around when the blue screen flickered into life.
> [URGENT MISSION: THE FALLEN SCHEMER]
> Objective 1: Protect the Pink Fox from the Fire Dragon's execution.
> Objective 2: Prevent the permanent loss of the Fox's ninth tail.
> Reward: +2,500 Karmic Points.
> Failure: -10,000 Points and 24 hours of 'Agony' Debuff.
Hana's eyes twitched at the word Agony. 10,000 points deduction and physical pain? Absolutely not.
She had come this far already and was even carrying a lizard's child in her womb; there was no way all of that would go to waste.
Just before Caspian sank his claws into the fox, she yelled.
"Caspian, back off," she commanded.
Caspian froze, his head snapping toward her. The orange glow in his scales flared brightly in confusion and anger. "What? Hana, this thing is a low-blood trickster. He'll bite your hand the second you turn your back. He's probably trespassing to steal eggs!" He scowled. "Dragon eggs."
"I… I would never," he stuttered.
"Well, I don't care if he's a saint or a thief," Hana said, stepping between the dragon and the fox.
She looked down at the pink-haired man. He was currently huddled at her feet, looking up at her with a wide-eyed, pathetic expression, wrapping his eight good tails around himself like a blanket.
"He's worth twenty-five hundred points. You touch him, and you're the one I'm going to use for target practice."
Caspian's jaw dropped. He looked at the unique pink fox, then at Hana, his tail lashing out and shattering a nearby rock.
"You're choosing this… this pest over my judgment?"
"I'm choosing my life over your ego," she snapped, looking at the rock his tail just shattered.
This beastman… he was quite dangerous.
She didn't want to get on his bad side and have to beg for mercy, but she also knew that wouldn't happen. After all, the one smitten through their 'bond' was him, not her.
But just in case, if he ever turned on her, she would be ready to pierce his heart with her makeshift spear.
Hana knelt beside the fox, who immediately leaned his head toward her knee, acting like a kicked puppy.
"Thank you, Great Female... you are as kind as you are beautiful. My name is Raiden. I am but a humble, broken servant to your mercy."