A chilling wind passed through the forest.
David instinctively wrapped the woollen clothes around him tightly. But he still shivered and realised that the holes in the old cloth he was wearing was doing little to prevent the winter cold from biting his skin.
'So these are the old good days that the modern people are missing.' He held in the urge to roll his eyes at the internal thought. Atleast he had proper electricity and a warm room waiting for him as he would return back to his house on Earth. People here had none of them.
"Maybe the civilised cities would have something better to wear." He muttered inconspicuously as he recalled the poverty in which his clan survived.
Called as barabarians and hated by the more civilised people as a deadly curse, they never allowed any trade with them. Not only that, the people from the neighbouring kingdoms had even seized all their fertile lands for themselves.
As a result, his people had long been surviving on hunting and gathering fruits alone. But population increased. And so did the need for more food.
Two hundreds years back, an alliance had been formed between all the barbarian clans. Together they would launch waves of strikes on the border lands of these kingdoms.
Eventually, they had even successfully overthrown a monarch from his throne. But then came the moment that went down in history as a tragedy. As it so happens that the head of the Jae Clan had already conspired with the nobles of the kingdom.
And in few days, all the heads of the major clans leading the alliance had been killed. The Hermann clan were just one of the victims in the conspiracy.
All of the remaining people who had been alive somehow escaped to this vast forest. Not finding the courage to trust each other anymore, the clans separated and the once great alliance had come to an end.
While the Jae clan went on to establish the Jae Kingdom in the south.
Deep in the forest, David thought of this all. In a way, he was distracting his mind from the cold. All these information he now knew had been passed through generations.
There were no written records of such among the barbarians. But he did once hear that the people of the Windsor Kingdom had a detailed record of the events that had taken place all those years back.
Windsor Kingdom wasn't always aggressive. Once they had been the most neutral side and had served as the source of the most authentic knowledge.
But as time passed by, they realised that they were falling sharply behind most of the kingdoms. Both in terms of wealth and development.
And thus, the infamous slave system came into life...as more and more people were forced into slavery to make them work indefinitely for them.
The results had shown. Where once there had been no houses for people, it was now said that every citizen of the kingdom had basic necessities with them. This was also the reason why there has never been a mutiny against slavery.
Because people were happy. And slaves? They didn't have any rights, so did their voices even count as one?
"But at what cost had the development come?" David thought with a bittersweet smile.
At that moment, a twig splintered as a sharp, cracking noise reached his ears.
After a moment of hesitation, David walked to his right from where the sound had come. He peeked through the few young trees.
On the forest floor lay the alpha direwolf. The fury greyish skin was now stained with dried blood and fresh blood droplets were mixed with the dew covered morning grasses.
"So here you are." David slowly and with calculated steps approached the fallen direwolf. It weakly opened its eyes, the pale iris unfocussed and dimming in life force.
It pressed the paws on the grass as it tried to get up but was unsuccessful. Understanding it was powerless, it released a whimper. Probably in protest.
Meanwhile David watched it all with an amused face.
"If I want, I can kill the powerless you. But...would that really be worth it?" He seemed to ask the last question more to himself than to the direwolf as he ontemplated something.
"An alpha....with a Hivemind Pathway. So you possess sheer level of intelligence since only they could truly achieve this pathway. So I wonder why should I kill you?"
He crouched on the ground as he let his hands fall on the direwolf's fur. If was tender and fluffy to his touch and the wolf didn't even resist him.
More like it didn't have the power to resist him and could only swallow its defeat.
"But don't you worry, wolfie. You are not dying here..." David suddenly smiled.
An intelligent species like the direwolf was known for it's loyalty and unity. If he saved an alpha here, what were the chances it might be grateful to him?
"What are the chances that you might end up as my pet?" His smile turned into a smirk as his hands hovered over the gaping hole in the direwolf's chest.
As his fingers approached the area, the direwolf whimpered and tried trashing around albeit quite weakly.
Seeing that, David moved away his hand. The alpha immediately stopped trashing as its tired eyes closed, it's breath becoming shallower.
David was no doctor, more specifically a vet. He had almost no knowledge when it came to such stuffs. And definitely not for something as critical as the direwolf's injury.
But fortunately for him, this was not Earth.
He placed his hands on the belly of the alpha. It opened its eyes again, rotating the head ever so slightly to look at him.
It watched as David closed his eyes and concentrated, trying to visualise himself.
He activated Vision as the world again changed into a myriad of whites and reds. Red for the life sources and white for the mana in the air.
Anything else didn't have a mana signature and as such, weren't visible in his skill.
He focussed deeply as he felt the mana from his head and toes move downwards and upwards respectively. Slowly they reached his forelimbs.
He opened his eyes and with a gentle touch, started forcing his mana into the alpha direwolf's body.
As if on cue, the wolf started feeling dizzy as it couldn't even open it's eyes. Within minutes, it lost all its consciousness as David finally stopped transferring his mana.
He himself felt a little weak as well but he persevered and watched the direwolf's body through his Vision.
The mana he had inserted inside the wolf's body suddenly started turning into green wispy smokes. Then astoundingly, the blood stopped draining.
The next moment, the injuries started closing as the green smoke rushed towards all the organs that had been injured.
The alpha direwolf was healing.
David sighed and rose from the ground.
'The alpha direwolf isn't a normal creature. If it has enough mana, it can regenerate all it's body cells. That's also the reason why it was probably alive even after a fatal strike.' He thought inwardly.
'But it requires mana to use the skill, and given that it was still alive, one can guess that the direwolf has used up all its mana in keeping itself alive.'
With a pause, he continued. 'And that is where I come...with my source of unused mana.'