As soon as Avaln opened his eyes, he knew he wasn’t safe.

The first thing he felt was a sharp pain coming from his lower lip, and soon remembered he himself had bitten it not long ago, in order to get a last push to finish the blue book.

The second thing he noticed… was that he didn't know where he was. A thick, moonless darkness covered everything around him, leaving him objectively blind, yet thanks to the fresh, humid smell; the cold grass beneath his feet, and the sound of leaves rustling against each other, he surmised he was in a forest.

He quickly recalled a concept he heard a few moments before: essence corridor. He suspected such a spell had something to do with his sudden change of location.

However, that was not the cause of his worry.

He could feel it crawling inside his skin: a sense of danger around him, as if he was being stared at...

As soon as he had the idea, he heard a wild squealing to his left, accompanied by the sounds of hooves galloping in his direction, at an increasing speed. A shiver ran down his spine as he pushed his legs against the ground, rolling to the side.

A gust of wind brushed his sides, and he catched a glimpse of a compact shadow with long horns and about half his size, running past him.

As he regained his footing, more squealing followed. The creature was probably disappointed for not having hit anything.

Two thoughts crossed Avaln’s mind then.

First, based on what had just happened, he was facing a wild beast. By the sounds it made, he inferred it was probably a boar, and the horns he saw were in fact its lower fangs.

Second, he suddenly realized he had never been in a fight for his life before. Much less alone, and while completely in the dark.

Could he run?

He immediately dismissed the idea. Running away while blind against an enemy that was faster than him was complete lunacy.

Could he climb a tree?

Again, same problem. Even if he could feel by touch, if he were to fall…

He shook his head, and soon the sound of more squealing and hooves galloping in his direction erased the possibility of the boar leaving him alone.

He heightened his senses, took a deep breath… then rolled in the opposite direction from last time. Again, the wind brushed his sides, this time a bit stronger than before, showing he had dodged by a hair.

However, his gaze chanced on another of the boar’s features…

It possessed red eyes.

Avaln may not know much about the world, but even he could surmise that boar wasn’t normal. He quickly tried to recall the little he knew about creatures outside of Greenleaf…

“Demon boar?” he muttered. The beast squealed, almost answering.

Demon boars were known to be extremely aggressive and stubborn. Once they locked on to a target, they would do their utmost to kill it. They were also extremely fast in straight lines, which is why they prefer to tackle their victims to death.

The only reason Avaln knew about their existence was because… they were not recommended as an adventurer’s first hunt. In the ten years he’d been trying to finish the blue book, he had chosen only a few other activities: one of them being to inform himself about the first steps an ordinary person needed to take to become an adventurer and start refining their own essence.

To do so, two things were necessary: a foe they could slay, and an affinity towards absorbing essence.

While the first one was quite easy, the latter was the one that determined your future as an adventurer, and some guilds even had their own techniques to absorb essence. Greenleaf probably had one.

While researching, he found a book which especially warned aspiring adventurers not to choose a demon boar as their first hunt. There was widespread misinformation about their nature, as many just thought them a more aggressive boar, especially among villagers in smaller settlements...

A squealing pulled Avaln out of his thoughts, as the sound of galloping prepared him for another tackle, which he dodged by rolling to the opposite side again. This method was the only one he could think of so that, in the middle of such darkness, he wouldn’t encounter any obstacles to his movements.

They were in a stalemate, or so it seemed. Avaln knew that wasn’t the case.

Even if demon boars were only a variant of normal boars, they were creatures influenced by demonic essence. As such, not only were they specifically carnivorous, but were also considered 2nd order beasts, with a strength equivalent to a Nascent Essence third stage adventurer.

If a normal person about to hunt their first monster were hit by a demon boar’s tackle, they were likely to suffer serious injuries, which would mean their death given the beast’s vicious nature.

Shit, just my damn luck. He couldn’t help thinking.

A normal person would receive serious injuries… but he was even weaker. While an aspiring adventurer would have usually reached the Nascent Essence realm second stage at the very least before attempting a hunt, he was still at the first stage.

He had been able to resist Roland Hallen’s punches because the brat, despite his refinement level, was weak and didn’t want to kill him.

But that demon boar was definitely stronger, and had no doubts about how deep it wanted to stab its fangs.

Another tackle, this time faster. It seemed the beast was growing impatient, and began to throw its whole weight behind its attacks. Avaln managed to dodge once again, as a cold drop of sweat ran down his cheek.

It was just a matter of time. In fact, he was already surprised to have been able to survive for so long already, and could only think that his above average essence circulation had enhanced both his soul and body, granting him keener senses.

Still, while in the dark, he couldn’t move. In a way it was a blessing, because the demon boar was being overcautious and only dared to try to tackle him, unaware of how helpless he really was, as it could only locate him through smell and sound. The area, also, must be unfit for the boar to circle around him. Yet, on the other hand…

Once.

If he were to be hit once...

Everything would be over.

In the time it took to brew and drink a cup of tea, Avaln lost count of how many times he had rolled away. His heart was pounding against his chest, his breathing was erratic, and he was desperately holding on to his sense of direction.

All the while, his mind had been darting from idea to idea, trying to find the best way to escape from his current predicament… to no avail.

He shook his head.

Despite the great gift he had received, he was still too weak.

He shook his head again.

He heard the squealing, and the hooves, and the grass being stomped beneath them.

A sudden idea popped in his mind, as his mouth curved into a fearless smile.

His hands began probing the ground, until he luckily found a rock. The demon boar was almost in front of him, but he didn’t roll this time. Instead, he focused his gaze until he found a couple of red dots staring at him, and jumped.

In the middle of the air, he threw the rock against one of them.

The beast released a loud squeal as it lifted its fangs and landed a blow on his left leg, disrupting his momentum and causing him to meet the ground right behind it. Avaln managed to cover his head as the force of the impact managed to make him bounce off the grass and roll ten steps before he stopped.

His leg felt hot, and soon realized the demon boar had actually wounded him, albeit given their difference in strength, he could consider himself lucky.

As he checked his condition, he heard a painful squeal somewhere in front of him.

His lips twitched slightly.

It worked. He confirmed.

The demon boar had a strength two minor realms above him. Such a difference meant that someone like him, with no training nor weapon, could not deal any significant damage against it. The worst problem was that he could not even see anything in order to escape...

So his only option had been to use the beast’s strength against itself. And he aimed at the only thing he could see…

It’s eyes.

Such a strategy would not work against a more intelligent enemy, but the boar had only one pattern of attack, in which it used all of its weight and speed, so the rock not only had Avaln’s meager strength behind, but the beast’s added on top of it.

And his plan had worked, albeit at the cost of his mobility.

However, he cursed under his breath the next moment.

He had expected to deter the beast with that blow somehow… but he underestimated its vicious nature. Right there, he could hear the sound of galloping approaching in the distance. It seemed his attack had only served to enrage it.

So it’s you or me now uh? Avaln realized.

He tapped his surroundings, desperate. After a breath, he found a stick…

And a tree right behind him.

He cursed under his breath once again, and he managed to stand up by supporting himself against it.

He would not fall here.

He would see her again.

Sgithe.

It was then that he realized something.

Somehow...

He saw a dark ball of essence galloping straight at him.

He clenched the stick in his hand, gritted his teeth, pushed the fear out of his heart in one breath... and jumped, ignoring the slicing pain coming from his wounded leg.

The demon boar hit the tree, almost pulling it out. Upon seeing this, Avaln kicked the trunk… and landed on top of the beast.

“I am not... “ He grabbed the boar’s neck with all his might, to which it began thrashing about, trying to get rid of its new load. “DYING HERE!”

His fist went white, and stabbed the stick in its only shining eye.

Hot thick liquid seeped from the wound and covered his hand, as the beast released painful squeals and ran, and turned, and rolled, and hit the tree in front, desperate to kill its prey.

Avaln twisted the stick, and stabbed it even deeper, causing the demon boar to stand on its hind legs out of pain, and in that breath of suspense, he released its neck only to use both hands and dig the whole makeshift stake into the beast’s head.

Another squeal, a few steps in which Avaln fell from its back… and a dull sound followed.

The demon boar finally died.

He stared at the inert dark ball of essence, wondering what he was actually seeing…

Seventh sense?

But soon Avaln’s line of thought was interrupted by the pain of his new injuries on top of the one on his left leg. His state right now was even worse than the last time Roland had beaten him.

He felt his conscience slipping away… and he knew that if he passed out there, he’d never wake up.

“In order to access your Tower of Babylon, you need to concentrate and perceive your essence flow.” Sgithe words resounded in his mind out of a recent memory.

He forced himself to sit, and closed his eyes.

Not daring to lose focus, he felt the dark mass of essence not far from him, then directed that attention to himself, soon catching a glimpse of his own essence. It was of a grey color, and seemed to circulate in a clover-like shape.

“Once you’ve found your essence flow, you need to insert your conscience in it by allowing its course to take you. Don’t force it. Let go instead.”

He let go.

Avaln didn’t know this, but letting go of one control over their conscience was an incredibly difficult thing to do. However, due to his incessant tries of reading the blue book the past ten years, he had gotten familiar with such a feeling.

He had constantly exercised keeping his conscience and letting it go when turning a page became too painful.

As such, as soon as his conscience touched upon his essence, he found himself in the middle of a library, facing a now small blue book.

Sgithe had explained to him that the only way he had to manage his Tower of Babylon for now was with its help. If he were to attempt to do it himself, he’d suffer a backlash and most surely damage his soul.

Worse case scenario, he might become a hollow husk.

That’s why Avaln approached the blue book and placed his hand over its surface instead. Albeit limited, the book was capable of providing him with the information he required.

And he was in a dire need of knowledge right now.

Soon, the book glowed, and a drop of ink from one of the shelves floated up to it, flowed into Avaln’s fingers and went inside his avatar.

After an infinite, relative breath inside his soul, he opened his eyes out in the world again.

The darkness was still just as thick, but he soon realized that it didn’t matter to him anymore.

He had fully awoken his seventh sense during his life or death encounter with the demon boar.

He could feel the black mass of essence a few steps away from him. He could feel the grass surrounding him and the tree behind. He nodded, and with great struggle, he crawled to the demon boar’s corpse, knowing full well it was already dead, for his essence no longer circulated, and had begun to slowly flow towards the ground.

He there had two options:

he could absorb it and refine his own essence, which would certainly be beneficial for him…

Or he could use its essence to heal himself.

The latter was the knowledge he had asked of the book. Not specifically, but like an index, the book had sought what most closely resembled what he thought of. And what it gave him was a discipline akin to spellcasting.

To cast a spell, one needed to use their own essence… or living essence that no longer had an owner, which was the case of the one in front of him right now.

Avaln closed his eyes, extended his right hand, then carefully began drawing a certain encircled figure in the air. His hand hesitated a few times, and even erased what he had already drawn. Once he felt as satisfied as a person on the verge of death could feel, he also drew the same figure over his chest with his left hand.

The figure was a rune, much like the ones Sgithe had used.

Soon after, the black mass of essence began to be absorbed by the rune in front of it, then was converted to a green coloured essence that flowed towards Avaln’s chest.

After a long breath, his grimace began to ease. The pain of his leg slowly subsided, and so did the bruises and broken bones of his torso and arms.

His breathing became calm again, and he soon exhaled a sigh of relief.

Half a stick of incense later, Avaln’s injuries had mostly closed, while his bones were completely fixed and the demon boar’s essence had also disappeared entirely.

However, he didn’t think for even a breath that it had been a loss.

A smile of delight formed in his face as he stood up, probing his surroundings with his recently awoken seventh sense.

Finally…

He finally began walking forward again.