Yun arrived at the same time as Winoa, but stayed and sat with Louisa instead of rushing off. The two of them knew they would not have much chance to be alone together much over the next few years, so they decided that they would enjoy the time they had without others bothering them as much as they could.
Originally Louisa had been opposed to the way their relationship had progressed, but she idolised Yun. He was like a god to her, which made their life all the more painful. Yun, on the other hand, had accepted Louisa with open arms. Originally he had simply liked the woman because her natural scent was pleasant to him, but after he reached Sainthood and began teaching her it evolved into much more than that. Yun was a White Tigerwolf, which meant he was vastly different from his companions in two respects. First, he was originally an animal who had gained the ability to transform thanks to Laurence and his Book. Second, he matured far, far faster than any of his companions thanks to not actually being human. His actual age may have only been seven, and he may have looked like a fifteen year old boy, but in actuality he was an adult. The only reason he took the form he did was because of his brother.
After ten minutes they separated themselves from each other. Louisa often got lost looking into the depths of Yun's eyes, but today they could not afford to. They were in unfamiliar land, so every second counted. There was truly very little time for the lovers to frolic, but they managed to cherish every second they got.
Yun grabbed the meat that was left in the fire pit while Louisa put the fire out. It was unlikely they would stay for more than a day, so she had no qualms with quenching the flame. If someone needed the pit then Cleo would have no trouble relighting it, and Louisa did not wish to set a building alight, letting whatever killed the people in the town have a beacon to lead them back towards new life.
They cleared up the camp in short order before finally moving out and beginning the search like the other two groups. Unlike the other two groups, Louisa followed Yun’s nose rather than picking a direction and hoping for the best. The nose of a Tigerwolf was peculiar, as not only could it detect scents of almost all varieties, it could also pick up the ‘scent’ of discharged mana. Unlike other cultivators, mana pathways that were active, Yun’s scent capability could tell him when the mana was released into the air and for how long, allowing him to hunt with greater proficiency. Even in the town that they were in, where their own mana was so stilted, he could follow the route from the mess that was the origin point in the middle of the town to wherever the creatures left the town. If they left the town.
For the entire time that Yun had been in the town, he could feel that there was something wrong with the scent of mana in the area. A lot of it had gone, but some of the paths had returned to the town. It was like whatever had caused all the damage had gone through the town a second time, but they had muddled themselves up within the exit paths. There was no way to easily tell if the routes were of five creatures or fifty without checking each path out individually. Which is what Yun ended up having to do.
He walked with Louisa to the nexus of the event and took in a deep breath of the crisp, cold air, letting the broken up streams of mana in the air flood through him. He shuddered before following a path out of the town. After five minutes of walking he turned around and walked back to the town to pick another path. This one was clear.
Again and again, Yun picked up a scent. He followed the scent until it left the town, making sure that it did not loop back. It was quick work, as most of the creatures walked in a straight line out, causing as much damage as possible. The few who did walk back into town took slightly longer to vet before he could clear the place. Some would burst through buildings, and some of the most damaged buildings were caused by creatures that had come back for prey before turning round and leaving again. There was no definitive route that the creatures left in, but the paths all slowly seemed to direct themselves westwards, with the majority of the looped pathways coming from the eastern side of town. The only exception was one of the last routes that Yun had to check. The route left through the eastern side of town and turned back at the five minute mark, just like the rest of the easterly oriented creatures. He walked with Louisa back into the town and followed the route all the way towards a bar near the western side of town. There was no solid door into the building, just a hole where the door would have originally been, with shattered wood and glass strewn away from the scar that seemed to puncture the building as a whole. There was a thick slab of wood that crossed the room making up the bar itself. It was still intact, but there were two massive dents in the edge nearest to Yun. Yun could only imagine what happened, but to him it seemed like the creature had used the bar counter as a springboard to leap at a target, perhaps the bartender, and had smashed through the back wall, leaving a hole in the wall the size of two men.
Following the trajectory of the creature, Yun leapt through the hole and was confronted with a hole full of rubble. On every side there was a room that had lost its wall, and in the middle was a small hill made of stone, wood, roof tiling, carpet and metal. Yun frowned and sniffed the air again, carefully walking over the rubble and looking for anything odd. He avoided the centre of the mound, and was about to leave when he saw what looked like a stone glove poking out of the tip of the hill. Looking at the surrounding material he stepped over, summoned his needle-blade, and prodded the glove.
It did not move. Staring at the glove for a moment with a frown plastered on his face, he turned round and walked back to the room with Louisa in it. He was stumped. The path that the creature had taken ended here, and he had assumed it was something to do with the stone glove. That had not panned out as he had expected, so he returned to his partner with the intention of continuing his hunt. He climbed through the hole, and as he was just about to hop back into the bar he heard a crack and a crash behind him. There was a rumble and a series of crunches as Yun turned round to see the hill that he had walked round fall apart to reveal a man-like figure ascending from the detritus. Its thick, stone arms broke free of the piled up rubble and began working on releasing its legs from the weight that trapped it in the ground. As it struggled, Yun motioned at Louisa and she retreated through the door of the bar, letting him deal with the threat by himself. He watched curiously as the stone creature climbed out of the ground, slowly at first, but as his body freed itself from the rubble it became quicker and quicker until finally it was able to stand up.
It stood at almost double Yun’s height, and triple the boy’s width, with thick chunks of marble forming most of its body mass. There were extremely thin lines of mana that stretched over the ‘skin’ of the creature, all culminating at where its face should have been. Instead of the face, there was simply a smooth surface, making the creature look almost entirely alien to Yun, and worrying him immensely.
After a moment of being free, the creature leapt forwards and smashed into Yun, sending him flying back through the bar. He smashed into the far wall, through a window and straight into the street, before sliding to a stop in front of Louisa. Immediately she touched her pointer ring and began broadcasting to their team.
“Everyone, help! Yun and I have found something and it seems to be violent. With the mana acting so strangely in this area we need to work together to get rid of it!”
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