Red frowned and ignored the man’s remarks. “Let’s be quick.”

The knight laughed again and walked ahead. This tunnel was surprisingly big, well over three meters tall and five meters wide, meaning the both of them could walk through it with no concerns.

Illumination, however, soon proved to be a problem as they walked further away from the lightning filled sky.

Reinhart looked back at Red. “Should we light a torch?”

The boy hesitated, but still nodded in the end. “Even if we alarm any other monsters, it’s better than being blind.”

The knight hummed in agreement. He pulled out a torch from his backpack and soon lit it up using his fire steel. The tunnel ahead of them was illuminated under the warm orange light.

This also allowed Red to inspect the footprints on the ground. There were a lot of them, but considering this was an exit point for their lair, it was impossible for the boy to determine how many lizards there might have been in this tunnel.

“Found anything interesting?” Reinhart asked.

Red shook his head. “Nothing. At the very least, I can tell you there’s probably no Lesser Ring Realm monsters waiting for us at the end of this tunnel… I think.”

Although he couldn’t tell the number of monsters from the footprints, he could determine that all the tracks were of similar size, which meant there was not a bigger lizard monster waiting for them in this den. Or so he hoped.

“Good.” Reinhart nodded. “Then let’s move on.”

The duo continued to move ahead. It didn’t take long, however, for them to notice something strange.

“Is that a light?” Red asked the man.

“Seems like it.” Reinhart nodded.

Indeed, they noticed a soft blue glow radiating from around a bend in the corridor.

As they continued forward, the glow intensified. Finally, once they turned around that bend, they saw the origin of the light.

There were floating motes of blue light danced in the air, emitting a weak radiance. On their own, the glow was too weak to illuminate anything, but clumped together by the dozens, they were even stronger than Reinhart’s torch.

“… What the fuck is this?” Reinhart wondered to himself in a daze.

Red was also no less surprised. Still, he tried to keep his composure and monitor his surroundings. However, the tunnel seemed to lead even deeper around a bend, with the number of the motes of light increasing.

Reinhart waved his torch at the floating orbs. However, the object simply passed through them without making contact. Unsatisfied, the knight tried using his hand. There was no reaction.

Reinhart frowned. “Seems like they are incorporeal.”

“Is that supposed to be bad?” Red asked, noticing the man's sour expression.

“Not really. I was just hoping to take some of them with us.”

“Oh… That would have been useful.”

“Either way, I suppose we don’t need this anymore.” the knight put out the torch.

After they were done examining the strange motes of light, the duo continued to walk ahead. Red also tried to touch and interact with the floating orbs, but like what happened with Reinhart earlier, his body and other equipment simply phased through it, so the boy had to give up.

The number of motes of light kept increasing the further they walked, and at one point there were so many of them that it became hard to even see the path ahead. Both Reinhart and Red hesitated at this juncture, but they weren’t about to give up because of this obstacle.

After a few more minutes passed, the duo noticed the surrounding tunnel open up. The motes spread through this area more sparsely, and their vision of the path ahead was no longer blocked. What they saw in front of them, though, once more gave them pause.

It was a large chamber, chock full of the same blue motes of light. Red’s gaze followed the increasing density of the orbs until his eyes came upon something standing in the center of the chamber.

It was a tree, about five meters tall. Veins of blue light extended under its trunk, moving all the way up to its branches where hundreds of vibrant azure leaves were hanging. The motes themselves seemed to be emitted by these leaves, which released a new faint orb every so often. Something else caught Red’s attention, though.

Plump, round objects were hanging off the end of a few branches. They were glowing even more vibrant than the leaves and were emitting motes of light with far higher frequency. It took a second for Red to recognize what these things were.

“Fruits.” Reinhart gave voice to his thoughts. “This is a spiritual plant.”

Red had figured as much. “Do you know what it is?”

The knight, however, shook his head. “I know a handful of them. Never seen one like this, though.”

The boy hadn’t been expecting the man to know about it, so he wasn’t disappointed. Still, his gaze was eventually drawn to the area surrounding the tree.

‘More lizards.’

He had been too distracted by the spectacle in front of him to notice this at first. However, the figures of the monsters started to become clearer through the orbs of light. The beasts seemed to be either sleeping or lazing about, though.

“How many can you count?” Reinhart asked.

Red frowned. The monsters weren’t within his detection range yet, so the boy couldn’t rely on his crimson sense to make a judgement. He tried to use his vision to count the beasts, but that wasn’t a simple task through the motes of dancing light.

“I see at least 10.” Red said.

“Sounds about right.” the knight nodded and scratched his beard in thought.

“How do you want to deal with this?”

“Hm?” Reinhart looked at him with a gaze full of amusement. “Do you really plan on taking them on?”

“Is there a point in asking?” Red frowned.

The knight smiled. “I suppose not.”

The man drew out his longsword and looked over at Red.

“Do you know what a choke point is?”

…

A few minutes later, the two of them had settled on a plan. Red was going to wait at the back of the tunnel, while Reinhart would drag the monsters over to him, where they would stand their ground and kill until there was nothing left. The boy wasn’t too confident in the plan of action, but it was the best they could come up with at the moment.

Red stood crouched, bow at the ready, waiting for his enemies. It didn’t take very long for him to hear it. A cacophony of roars echoed through the tunnel, reaching him all the way over.

The boy held his breath, waiting for his targets to show up through the motes of light. The first to appear around the corner, however, was Reinhart, and Red almost shot the man out of instinct.

“Get ready!” the knight yelled at him and ran over to his position.

They had picked the narrowest part of the tunnel for their stand and had even moved some rocks over to block the way, all so the creatures couldn’t overwhelm them with their superior numbers. Reinhart stood behind one of these rocks and looked back the way he came, sword at the ready.

Red continued to hear the roars of the beasts, quickly approaching their positions. He nocked an arrow and pulled back his bowstring. Then, as soon as the first lizard appeared around the corner, he let loose.

It hit the creature in the leg. The monster roared in pain and tumbled over. Its companions coming from behind, however, didn’t stop. They trampled over their fallen brethren and continued to charge forward.

The boy let loose another arrow. This time, he couldn’t even see whether he had hit anything. The tide wouldn’t be stopped. They spotted Reinhart standing on the other end of the passage, and let out a deafening roar of anger.

The first lizard reached the blockade. It sought to climb over the rocks, but it was met with a swift stab from Reinhart, falling backwards. The other monsters climbed over their wounded comrade in a frenzy. The second lizard tried to bite at the knight while the man was still pulling his sword back, but a well-placed arrow from Red pushed it back.

Reinhart laughed, while stabbing at the next lizard in line. “Nice one, kid!”

The boy continued to cover the man, shooting any of the beasts which Reinhart wasn’t quick enough to dispatch. However, there were too many of them, and the knight was soon forced to step back from his barricade. In fact, Red sensed more than ten of the monsters with his crimson sense. Their estimate earlier was clearly off-base, and there were probably even more lizards hidden behind crevices and places they couldn’t see in that chamber.

‘I need to be quicker.’

Red reached back to pick out another arrow from his quiver. However, his hand grabbed nothing but air, and the boy suddenly realized in alarm he was out of arrows. It was the first time this had happened to him, so while he was aware of the possibility, he was still taken by surprise at the thick of battle.

Without his support, Reinhart was pushed even further back.

“Some help, please?!” the man used his wild swings to keep the snapping jaw of the creatures at bay, but his strikes were not finding much purchase.

Red shook off his surprise. He dropped his bow without hesitation and unsheathed his cleaver, dashing forward to join Reinhart in melee.

The knight heard his approach. “My left!”

The boy adjusted his trajectory. Just as he was a few steps behind Reinhart, the man suddenly pulled back and to the right, avoiding a lunge from the frontmost lizard. Red took this opportunity and hacked at the creature which had overextended itself.

His weapon made a huge gash on the beast’s snout, causing it to falter in pain. Its companions, however, continued to climb over its body to reach the humans.

“Now back!” Reinhart said.

Red dashed back and the knight charged forward, beating the encroaching lizards back.

“Right!”

The man stepped aside, and the boy hacked at another lizard, this time taking a leg with him.

“Back!”

They changed positions, and yet another monster fell at their hands as they retreated down the tunnel.

“Left!”

“Back!”

“Right!”

…

Reinhart dictated the rhythm of the combat, and Red followed it with precision. The man held the lizards back for a moment, and when he let the pressure off, Red would step forward, and the monsters would practically walk into his weapon. Then the boy would step back, and Reinhart would advance to hold them at bay again.

The monsters, too blinded by their rage, continued to fall for the same trick, and more of them fell at the duo’s hands.

Red, however, wasn’t keeping count.

All thoughts were seemingly emptied from his mind, and the only thing leading the boy were the combat instincts ingrained into his body. He fell into a battle trance.

It was a strange sensation. He knew one slip-up on his part could mean death against these monsters. And yet, Red felt confident. His attacks were precise, his dodges measured in centimeters - and yet not at one point did the boy feel fear. He was confident in his own strength. It was almost intoxicating.

Red reared his blade up, preparing for another swing. Reinhart’s instructions, however, didn’t come. The boy looked at the man in confusion, but then his gaze wandered to the tunnel ahead of them. Then Red snapped out of his daze.

The only thing that remained were corpses. All the lizards were dead.

Reinhart raised an eyebrow once he saw Red’s raised weapon. “Are you going to stab me next?”

“Huh?” Red was confused, before he noticed his own stance. He lowered his cleaver. “Oh, I suppose not right now.”

The knight smiled. “You really exceeded my expectations this time around, kid. I was half expecting I would need to use a talisman to deal with those monsters.”

The boy shook his head, still coming out of his previous focused state. “Let’s just move on.”

Reinhart laughed, but offered no retort.

The duo walked over the lizard bodies littering the corridors. They counted fourteen corpses. The monsters had fought to the very last, and Red was curious about what the knight had done to anger them to such a degree.

The man seemed to almost be able to read his mind. “I just smashed their eggs.”

That would certainly do it.

Soon enough, they were back at the large chamber, and the duo stared at the glowing blue tree once more.

Reinhart looked over at Red. “So, who’s going to touch it first?”