The member of the expeditions looked dismayed, one carrier had been slain by the wolves, another had flown further into the ruins, and about half of the guards were injured, Marc included. The guards were hesitating about what to do, not knowing where to begin.

Marc shouted “Gather the corpses of the wolves inside the ruins! Josh bring me one of the corpses, I’ll absorb its blood to heal myself. The rest of you take some bandages and treat your injuries.”

Edward wasn’t injured, he checked his backpack to see if he had any bandages inside but his rucksack and all of its content were in very bad shape. The wolf had bitten deeply into it, there were holes in the bag, and the bandages he found were having those holes too. On top of that, his bag was decorated with a good amount of wolf saliva.

The backpack is dead, long live Edward. This thing save my life if my arm had been bitten it would have been turned into meat paste.

Edward then proceeded to tend to the injured. Luckily they were mostly suffering from light cuts, the leather jackets had served their purpose, protecting them from the bulk of the attacks. Edward disinfected the bandages with some alcohol before putting it on the injuries.

Meanwhile, the other guards were bringing back the wolves' corpses from the forest. One of Marc’s mercenaries went to take the wolf that Edward had killed.

-“Hey that’s my wolf!! I killed it, it belongs to me.” Edward interjected.

There is no way I’m letting them take that wolf. I need to get stronger, and for that, I need the blood of the wolves. How I’m supposed to become stronger if they take the beasts I kill.

The guard and Edward looked at each other in the eyes, the guard clearly displeased.

Marc threw them a glance.

-“Let him have it if he wants it that bad. I killed enough wolves for the lot of you.”

Edward let out the breath he was holding.

Good, now how do I do this? Am I just supposed to bleed it and bath in its blood? This sounds like something someone in a cult would say. He giggled internally.

At that time Josh brought one corpse to Marc. Marc just concentrated and put one hand on the corpse. Under Edward's incredulous gaze the corpse started to mummify, the blood clearly extracted by just a touch of the hand.

What the heck? Does he have the power to directly extract the blood from the corpses? And we are supposed to bleed them the normal way? That’s cheating!

Suddenly Marc’s injury flashed red and Marc threw up some blood, his face paling.

-“Damn it!! That wolf left a residual aura in the injuries. It’s detecting that I’m trying to absorb the strength of its brethren and it’s preventing me from absorbing this blood. I won’t be able to heal this way, and aura-imbued injuries take longer to heal naturally. The best way for me to heal would be to absorb the blood of another beast beside a dark wolf. I just aggravated my injuries instead of healing them. Umpf if I didn’t have to protect you all nothing like that would have happened.”

Protect us? You were facing only this regal wolf, none of the other wolves help him. You were basically on a one-on-one, and you are the only awaken. If not you who was supposed to face this wolf? We would have been killed in seconds. Moreover, the expedition was your idea, did you organize it without even checking what kind of monsters lived in the area?

Edward was fuming inside.

This guy is always so full of himself. That sounds great for the rest of this expedition, we just arrived in the ruins and our main expert is already injured and we lost a carrier. Well, maybe two…I don’t know where that other guy ended. And the icing on the cake is that powerful monsters are still roaming outside those ruins and we know we are not strong enough to deal with them. Will we even be able to come back at this rate?

After helping the wounded Edward went back to the wolf he had slain. He looked at how the others guards were dealing with the wolves. They removed their clothes, staying in underwear. They then took a big wooden bowl and put it near the head of a wolf. Next, they proceed to cut the jugular of their wolf with a knife, blood quickly flowing out. They placed the bowl carefully under it so that the blood wasn’t spilled. Once in that state, they put their hand in the blood and started applying it to their skin as if they were trying to clean themselves. The blood was being absorbed at a visible rate, the skin glowing faintly once the blood was gone.

We found the perfect natural-based formula to achieve flawless glowing skin. You just need to apply the blood of a fresh slain dark wolf three times a day. Dermatologists hate this simple trick.

Edward shook his head smiling at the thought.

He imitated the guards, went into his underwear, and took his knife to cut the wolf. He parted the fur away before applying the knife to the jugular. He cut it surprisingly easily.

Is it because there is no fur protecting it or is there another reason? I mean those wolves were able to resist a full thrust of a spear without being pierced and yet the resistance I feel what cutting it isn’t particularly strong.

The blood flowed into the wooden bowl.

Now is the moment of truth.

Edward put his hand into the blood and took some to put on his left arm. The blood felt warm, Edward could actually feel the warmth of the blood coming inside him as the blood was absorbed. It felt good. He wondered if he didn’t feel this the first time he had been exposed to wolf's blood because it was the first time he had been exposed to such blood, or if it was simply that he wasn’t paying attention after being exhausted by the fight. He continued to apply the blood to all the parts of his body.

I wonder what happen if you put the blood on one part of your body only. Does only this part get stronger or is the blood distributed in the whole body? Well, for now, I better spread it on the whole body. It’s no use if I only have one strong arm or one strong leg, I wouldn’t be able to move and make use of it properly.

The blood was used up quite quickly. Edward was feeling refreshed after absorbing the blood, it was as if he ate something that his body direly needed without him knowing. He looked at the corpse.

There is probably still blood inside. I need to learn the technique that Marc used as quickly as possible. It’s much more convenient and it will enable me to extract all of the blood instead of wasting some each time I kill a beast. Also, you are vulnerable when you absorb the blood, if you have to remove your armor each time you do it, it means you will only be able to absorb the blood when there is no enemy nearby.

Edward looked at the guards, each one had finished with their wolf too. Twelve wolves had been killed in total. One by Edward and the rest by Marc, the guards hadn’t in fact managed to kill a single wolf by themselves. The wolves were quite resistant, and unless one was going in very close combat to choke them or hit them in a weak point like the eyes, they were quite difficult to kill. Marc had managed to kill them simply because he was vastly stronger than a common black wolf as an awaken. The guards were only able to push them back without killing them. Marc and Edward had both used up one wolf, that way each of the other guards had one wolf each to use. Once everyone was dressed up again Adrien went to Edward.

-“We are lucky, that that beast made the wolves afraid, that could have gone very badly. I thought we were done for a moment. I regret participating in this expedition now, we are used to black wolves as they sometimes try to attack the village, but I have never seen anything like that wolf.” Adrien said.

-“Yes, I thought that with ten guards and an awaken we wouldn’t be in much of a danger, looks like I was wrong.”

-“You impress me though, you managed to kill a black wolf, and you were equipped with just a knife.”

-“I was lucky, my backpack is dead though.”

-“It’s okay, just take the one from Damien.” Adrien told him with a sigh.

As Edward look confused Adrien added. “It’s the carrier who got killed by the wolves. Shit, I didn’t think he would die like that. We all knew some danger was involved when accepting to go in this expedition, but we never thought that it would go this badly.”

Marc interrupted them. “The night is not finished yet. Make a bonfire, we will use it to burn the corpse of the wolves.” He stopped in though. “Change of plans, we will make the bonfire tomorrow, I don’t want to attract the attention of a beast able to make that wolf flee. Just toss the corpses in a corner for now. Josh, Guerard you take the first part of the night watch. Sylvain, Luke you take the second part, David you will take the last part with me. The rest of you get to rest.”

This time Marc didn’t pair one of his guards with one of the villagers for the night shift. He and his team were taking care of the whole night watch by themselves. It seems this encounter with the wolves didn’t improve his trust in the villagers.

Edward was thinking. It seems that Marc is still focused on pursuing the expedition. What is he expecting to find in there? We are ill-prepared, someone already died and we have several wounded, powerful beasts are also roaming nearby. I hope we won’t have to face dangers in those ruins too. The best course of action should be to run back to the path during the day to avoid the beasts and from there to go back to the village or Gobéliard to prepare a second expedition with more powerful experts. He fell asleep on those thoughts.