Chương 47: Not Yellow

He returned to Igrette, who was still lying down. He could see that the snow around her had shifted, though, and it was obvious that she had been sitting up, probably ready to come to his aid if he needed it. But in the end, he didn't need it, and all she had done was sit up, so Jonny didn't bring it up. He told her about what happened, and she breathed a sigh of relief when he described the beast.

"A wolverine," she said.

"Solitary scavengers. We don't have to worry about more of them, at least for now."

"That was a wolverine?" asked Jonny.

"Yes. Relatives of badgers, but usually larger and stronger. Carnivores, but usually not hunters."

"Huh." I thought that wolverines were yellow…

"Are you hurt anywhere?" asked Igrette.

"Just a little scraped up on my knuckles," said Jonny.

"But I'm fine. I told you, I'm strong. You don't need to protect me. You just heal up, and I'll keep us safe." He wished that he was as confident as he sounded.

"Alright," she said, clearly not believing him. Jonny gritted his teeth and turned away, determined to get back to his training. If he wasn't strong enough yet, he would just have to become stronger. It was simple. But it was not easy. The rest of the day passed, and then the night, and the next day, and the next night, and while Jonny got marginally stronger with each passing day as his body adjusted to his mana, internal gravity continued to elude him. Igrette improved, but only by a little.

Under Jonny's orders, she only ever got up to go to the bathroom, and spent the rest of her time laying on the stone table, absorbing mana and using it to heal. Jonny was glad that she was at least able to do that on her own, because he wouldn't have known what to do otherwise, but he was also worried that even that little movement was worsening her health. If it was, she didn't tell him about it. She seemed resigned to her fate. She hadn't given up entirely, but she acted as though her death was inevitable.

Her time spent healing was not for her own survival. It was so she could fight one last time to protect Jonny when he needed it most. And despite Jonny repeatedly telling both her and himself otherwise, he was starting to have trouble believing it. Every day that passed where he was unable to understand internal gravity magic was a day he knew could be Igrette's last. If something he couldn't handle tried to attack them, that would be it.

He would try to fight it off and fail, and then Igrette would step in at the cost of her life. Jonny grew more anxious with each passing day, despite how uneventful they were. Four days passed, and the only other magic beast they saw was the same cloud hawk, descending to feed on the frozen corpses of the deer and wolves. Jonny had grown accustomed to seeing it descend in a cloud of mist, and had even gone out to watch it a few times, just to take a mental break and let himself unwind between training sessions.

It had been wary of him at first, but now it feasted before him without a care in the world, always taking a piece of meat with it as it left. Its babies must be very hungry, he thought idle as he watched it fly away with yet another wolf head. Half of both the wolf and deer corpses were entirely headless now, with the cloud hawk now returning multiple times per day for more.

He knew it probably only took the heads because Igrette had conveniently severed them, and the full corpses were probably too big, but he also found himself thinking amusing thoughts about what its nest must look like. At this point, it could probably have made a nest out of the skulls if it really wanted to. And barring that, there had to be a pile of skulls all around at this point. Wait, do they even form nests in trees? He thought about it for a few seconds, then marked it down as another thing to ask Igrette.

Unfortunately, as he had found out, she was not the internet and did not have an answer for every question, and sometimes, when she did have answers, they weren't fun ones. For example, when she asked about whatever magic she used to move through the bedroom without making a sound, she confirmed that, unfortunately, it was external magic. On top of that, she didn't know any proper stealth spells that relied on purely internal mana. If he wanted something like that, he would have to figure it out himself.

The list of things that he would have to figure out himself was ever-growing. So many things that Igrette knew about, or was even aware of, relied at least partially on external magic. Weapons were basically completely out of the question for him, since there was no material in the world that was strong enough on its own to stand up to even ordinarily infused steel, let alone the more mana-receptive metals, like mithril.

His body would eventually be stronger by itself than any other material, and using a weapon would actually be weaker than just punching. You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. That was, of course, assuming that he could figure out internal gravity magic, or the even more difficult mass magic. Which he assumed he would, but he couldn't help but feel doubt creeping into his mind when weeks had passed and he still hadn't the faintest clue of how to make it work.

He watched the cloud hawk apparently finish its meal, then grab yet another wolf head before giving him a stern look and flying away. With a sigh, he stood up and stretched and returned to Igrette's side, ready to get back to work. It was the fifth day since the wolverine appeared, and when nothing showed up again, Jonny started to wonder if anything would. The winter wolf packs generally had set territories that they roamed about, and since that pack had been in this area, there probably wasn't another one nearby.

The wolverine was a solitary predator, and most bears were at least in some form of hibernation. Winter was dangerous both due to the weather, and how aggressive some magic beasts got around their mana wells, but they also didn't tend to move around much. Especially the ones powerful enough to take and hold mana wells. Maybe we'll be able to stay here for the rest of the winter, he thought. The thought competed with the knowledge that if that wasn't true, Igrette was dead.

He knew they had to leave before something bad happened, and part of him said that they had already stayed too long, but the other part of him hoped that maybe, they could stay even longer. Every day they stayed was a day that Igrette was able to restore her mana and heal her body, and every day away from the mana well was a day her reserves began to dry up. Igrette had explained to him that despite the fact that they were on a mana well, her reserves actually still weren't replenishing very quickly.

Despite the density of the mana in the area, she was a sixth layer warrior. Absorbing enough mana to fill her mana pool would take more than a week if she wasn't expending nearly all of it to heal herself. Jonny had never really thought about that aspect of getting stronger, and it only reinforced the importance of mana absorption in his mind. It also made him want to prioritize his mana stealing tests higher.

He had a vague vision of a future where he could punch someone or something, and during that brief moment of contact, steal their mana, keeping himself going indefinitely as long as he had things to hit. It would also help alleviate the issue of only being able to take in mana through his lungs, which was much slower than the skin absorption that everyone else could do. On the morning of the sixth day, they finally had their next unwanted guest.

Igrette pointed it out to him, and Jonny went to investigate in the direction of the deer corpses. What he found there was another wolverine. It was larger than the first one, but it was also limping, and when it turned, Jonny saw four long claw marks on its side. They were fresh, too. Jonny fought it, and while it was certainly older and stronger than the first, its injury limited its mobility to the point that the fight was easier. When he finished, he studied the wound with a frown.

The claw marks had all come from the same attack, but they were quite far apart. Whatever had attacked this wolverine had paws almost the size of the bear that Igrette had killed. It was a miracle this wolverine had even survived the encounter. More worryingly, the wound was fresh. It wasn't still bleeding anymore, but its fur was matted with blood, and the inside of the wound still looked sticky and not even close to healed. Whatever had hurt it, it was close.

Not imminently, or the wolverine would have been fleeing, rather than scavenging, but close enough to be worrying. When he returned to the mana well, he started preparing the wolf pelt. Nearly a week in the cold had been bad for its flexibility, but it still bent enough to be usable. Igrette was doing her strange sleep mana absorption, but she awoke when he lightly pressed on her shoulder.

"What is it?" she asked.

"We're leaving," he said.

"Why?" He explained the wound on the wolverine, and she grimaced before agreeing with his decision. Getting even a week out of this mana well had already been a lucky break, and trying to hold on any longer in hopes that whatever hurt the wolverine wouldn't come this far was just begging for trouble. Igrette let him pick her up in a princess carry and lay her down on the wolf pelt, and a few minutes later, after Igrette made sure that he had put the glass deer antlers on the pelt with her, they were off.

They went the direction of the wolf corpses, opposite the direction of the deer, in hopes of avoiding whatever had hurt the wolverine. It was not quite the right direction to reach their destination, but it wasn't that far off either, and with no deadline, they could afford a slight detour if that detour saved their lives. As he pulled Igrette past the field of frozen corpses, he noticed the cloud hawk there once again. It saw him too, and when they made eye contact, he gave it a slight nod.

It did not nod back, but he could have sworn he saw a glimmer of acknowledgement in its eyes before it turned back to finish its meal. Later that day, as he pulled Igrette through the snow, he watched it fly overhead, nothing more than a small, barely conspicuous cloud heading for the higher peaks off to his right. The rest of the day was as uneventful as the previous ones had been, as was the night. Their speed was slow due to Igrette's immobility, but they stayed safe.

Since she had nothing better to do, Igrette acted as Jonny's lookout, using her much more well-developed mana sense to help them avoid potential danger, both living and inanimate. Since they weren't focused on speed like they had been before when they believed they were being pursued, she was much more cautious, and they could afford to take their time and go around obvious groups of stronger beasts instead of going through and just having her kill them if they got too close.

Two more days of travel passed, and Jonny's stress and paranoia slowly faded. This was sustainable. They were moving slowly, but Igrette wasn't exerting herself and worsening her wounds, and he didn't need to fight anything he couldn't handle on his own yet. Even if he couldn't figure out internal gravity magic, they would be fine like this. It might take them quite a long time to get out of the mountains, but it was doable. Then, on the morning of the third day. Igrette did not wake him up like she usually did.

They had opted into a sleep shift, where Igrette would keep watch during the night while she focused on healing herself, and she would sleep when they found a good spot for Jonny to stop and train during the day. Except this time, when Jonny woke up, she was asleep. That was already unusual, and his worry only deepened when he examined her and found that she was red-faced and sweating. He touched her forehead and found that she was burning up.

She did not wake up even at that, so before shaking her awake, he took a risk and reached for the coat covering the wound on her stomach. He peeled it back gently, revealing Helen's bandages beneath it, which were stained black with blood, and he didn't have to look any further to see the problem. Peaking out from the edge of the bandages, he saw a black blood vessel crawling up her stomach. … Shit.