Chapter 6 Chapter 5 Just Right Faith

Danica gazed into the flames of the campfire, watched the orange and white dance, and used it to hypnotize herself, allowing her mind to wander far.Her thoughts fell on Cadderly and the many problems.She knew that he was serious about fighting against Headmaster Thobicus, and that he wanted to dismantle all the rituals and class system of the Denier sect that had been built over the years.The resistance he encountered would be vicious and tenacious, and while Danica didn't think Cadderly was in danger of his life as he had been at Trinity Wall, if he lost, the pain of defeat would be permanent.

These thoughts inevitably made Danica think of Dorigen, who was sitting wrapped in a blanket across from the campfire.She wondered what the magician should do.What if Thobex, anticipating Cadderly's reaction, disrespected Dorigen's rights as a hostage and ordered Danica to execute her? Danica shook her head, pushing the uncomfortable thought out of her head, scolding herself for letting her imagination run wild.After all, Dean Thobicus is not an evil man, and his weakness has always been a lack of decisive action.Dorigen is unlikely to be in danger. "This area is fine, too," Xuelin said, taking Danica out of her thoughts.She looked up to see the elven maiden enter the camp, bow in hand.Xuelin smiled and nodded at Dorigen, who seemed to be sleeping soundly.

"The mountains haven't woken from their winter slumber," Danica replied. Xuelin nodded, but her mischievous, very fairy smile let Danica know that she thought the time for the Spring Dance was getting closer. "You rest now," Xuelin said. "I'll do my trance pose later." Danica looked at Xuelin for a while, and then agreed with the so-called "trance" of the elf with interest as usual.Elves don't sleep, not by the human definition of the word.Their trance was a meditative state, apparently as restive as true sleep.Danica had asked Xuelin about it several times, and she often saw this kind of behavior when she lived with the elves in Simista Forest, but although the elves did not hide this custom, the monk It's still pretty weird.Danica's practice also involves hours of deep meditation, and while that's certainly very restful, it doesn't come close to elven trance.Danica decided that one day, she would unlock that secret and be able to rest like an elf.

"Do you need someone to stand guard?" she asked. Xuelin looked around at the dark trees around her.They returned to the Snowflake Mountains for their first night after a long and arduous trek south across the open country north of Cala Raton. "Perhaps not," replied the elf.Sitting by the fire, she pulled a blanket from her pack. "But don't sleep too deeply, and keep your weapons by your side." "My weapons are my hands," Danica reminded with a grin. Across the campfire, Dorigen watched from under half-closed eyelids, trying to hide her smile.Perhaps for the first time in his long life, the magician felt as if he was among his friends.She had already sneaked out just now, setting up magical defenses around the camp.However, there was no need to tell Danica and Sharin about the existence of these spells, because Dorigen had adjusted the spell so that the trap would not be activated by them.

Dorigen drifted off to sleep with these comforting thoughts. ※※※ Shortly before dawn, Xuelin was out of trance, and the surrounding forest was still quite dark.The elf sensed something was wrong, so he got up from the bunk, shook off the blanket, and picked up the longbow.Xuelin's keen eyes quickly adapted to the night.The towering mountains enveloped her like a black silhouette, and everything looked very quiet and nothing unusual. However, the fine hairs on the back of Xuelin's neck were still trembling.One of her keen senses hinted at danger, and it was not far away. The elf tried to look into the shadows, tilting her head slightly from different angles, trying to pick out a voice that shouldn't be there.Then she sniffed the air, and wrinkled her nose in disgust.

It's a troll.Xuelin recognized the stench. In the kingdom, almost every adventurer would encounter an annoying troll at least once during their journey. "Danica," she called softly, not wanting the enemy to know that she knew they were around. The alert monk woke up immediately, but did not make any rash moves. "It's a troll," Xuelin whispered. "nearby." Danica looked at the fire, which was now nothing but a red glowing embers, the logs all gone.Trolls hate fire and are afraid of it - if anything they are afraid of it. Danica called out to Dorigen under her breath, but the magician didn't move.She glanced at Xuelin, and then the elf girl slid past the campfire lightly, getting close enough to poke Dorigen lightly with her longbow.

Dorigen moaned and started to wake up, then her eyes snapped open as Danica yelled.A burst of explosions burst from the side, and one of Dorigen's defensive spells sent forth intense blue flames that knocked down a monster.But three more trolls rushed past their flaming companion, caring not the slightest for its terrible fate, and burst into the clearing, their eyes glowing red fiercely, and their stench almost unbearable to the three women.Tall, lean figures of the monsters towered over the group of companions—one must have been almost eleven feet tall—and their rubbery skins took on a rotting gray-green as they came into the light.

Xuelin's bow was raised and fired in the blink of an eye, and three arrows shot into the closest troll.The monster twitched violently with each blow, but doggedly continued to approach, its thin arms swinging awkwardly in wide arcs from the palms of its hands. Xuelin didn't take it lightly because of this clumsy way of moving. The three fingers on those palms ended with long and sharp claws, which could easily tear off the flesh from a bear.A fourth arrow hit the monster in the chest, and Xuelin jumped away, thinking it would be best to hit the monster from a distance. Two flashes, one gold and one silver, passed the elf, and it was Danica who shot the short sword.The monk jumps up, head first, and rolls over the top of the campfire, following both attacks at full speed (they both hit the next troll hard).She jumped up after rolling around on the ground, then turned around, and flew up with a trailing foot, hitting the troll's upper abdomen hard.

Danica frowned at the sick, crushing sound of the blow, but she dared not hesitate.She spun around again for a second flying kick, then jumped straight up, hitting the shambling troll in the jaw twice in a row. "Dorigen!" she screamed, seeing a third troll press down on the mage sitting on the ground.As far as Danica knew, Dorigen had no weapons, and had very little - if any - material to cast a spell on, not even any decent spell book she might be reading.The monk was locked in a fight with the monster, and Xuelin was still fighting the first troll, so when the troll pounced on the woman wrapped in a blanket, the monk thought her new companion was going to die undoubtedly.

A flash of light appeared, and the troll fell back, clutching nothing but the blanket.The blanket suddenly emitted a strong light with flames, scorching the monster's arms and making it cry out in pain. Danica had no idea where Dorigen had cast the spell, but she had no time to think about it now. The troll kept punching her, and she twisted and danced beautifully, completely avoiding its deadly arms.She leaned closer, came inside the monster's attack range, and tried to twist and get out behind it, hitting it a few times before the lumbering monster turned around, but the troll turned out to be faster and smarter than she thought, It opened its hideous maw, and she was startled.The long, sharp teeth were within an inch of Danica's face—she could smell the thing's sickly breath—and could have hit her, but the incredibly agile monk quickly slid a The leg kicked straight in front of her face, kicking it up right in front of her face, even though there were only inches between her and the troll.

Her kick hit the troll's long nose, which snapped up and folded back with a loud crack.Danica instantly ducked into a crouch, dodging the battering arms, then slipped out from under the troll's armpit and around the back, unleashing a burst of rage and a burst of heavy punches. Xuelin continued to fall backwards, shooting arrow after arrow into the approaching troll.However, she knew it wasn't working, as the troll's initial wounds were already healing.Trolls are regenerative, their rubbery skin sustaining life in its own way, and take an incredible number of hits before collapsing and dying. No, not dying, Xuelin realized with horror, because even if a troll has fallen, even if it has been chopped into small pieces, it can come back to life and regain its shape, unless its wounds are completely burned by fire. coke.The thought brought the elf's eyes to the fire, but the embers didn't seem helpful.It would take a while for that flame to become a decent flame, and neither Xuelin nor her companions had that kind of time at all.The elf looked to the side of the camp, but found that the troll just now had been burned by the explosion (Xuelin didn't know what happened), fell into the snow, and the fire that destroyed the monster had almost disappeared.Xuelin spat out an elf curse. Another arrow struck the troll hard, hitting the monster in the face.The stubborn monster continued to move forward, and Xuelin looked down at the half-empty quiver suspiciously.So she thought about running into the woods and luring the monster away, but glancing at Danica she knew she couldn't do that, that her friend couldn't keep up. The troll, having failed in its pursuit of Dorigen, now turned to the monk, and it and its creepy companion made a quick circle, looking for an exposed opening.Danica struggled to watch for attacks from all angles, as the troll's long arms bypassed all direct defenses. "Where's she?" Danica called to Xuelin, clearly referring to the missing magician. Xuelin sighed helplessly, and shot another arrow at the chasing troll.Where did Dorigen go?She wondered, and she guessed the magician decided it was a good time to escape. Danica's mighty fist slammed into the side of the head of a bent troll, making a disgusting splash.When she pulled her hand back, she found a patch of monster skin stuck to her knuckles, along with a few hairs from the thing.Danica groaned nauseously as she noticed the filth, as the troll's hair was still wriggling on its own. She turned the nausea into anger, and when the troll punched her again, she stepped closer, pounding it repeatedly.Then she smartly dropped to her knees and quickly rolled to the side, avoiding a second troll that was pounced on her back.When she stood up, both monsters towered over her, and she kicked one foot up quickly, kicking away a lunging hand. "They heal as fast as I hurt them!" the weary monk exclaimed in frustration. Danica wasn't quite right, because Xuelin found that her next arrow—her sixteenth—had knocked the troll to the ground.She looked at her quiver, there were only four arrows left in it, and sighed again. Danica moved to the left, was forced back to the right, and then frantically backed away as the two trolls suddenly charged forward together.Behind her there was a sloping log, a dead tree had fallen against another, and she could not go any further. "Damn it!" she spat, and she jumped high, kicking out with both feet, hitting one of the trolls twice, kicking it back several steps.However, she saw that the other was going to hit her, so she twisted to protect her vitals as she fell. Just as the troll was about to attack, an arrow sank heavily into the side of its head.The shock knocked the monster out of momentum, and while the swung arm did hit Danica, the blow had little power. Danica spun a full circle quickly to gain balance, and then rushed out to attack, her flying feet pounding the monster several times in a row. "Wait until I get rid of you," she called defiantly, though of course the monsters couldn't understand what she was saying. "I will go after a cowardly magician and teach her what loyalty is!" At that moment, as if on cue, Danica noticed a small fireball appear over the head of the closest troll.Before she could ask what was going on, the hovering fireball exploded, sending a cloud of hungry flames covering the troll's body. The monster screamed in pain and flapped its arms frantically, but the flames continued to burn mercilessly.Danica stayed away from the disturbing flames.The second monster skirted its flaming companion (giving the flaming troll room to fall), and she focused wisely on it before delivering another flying double kick to the monster. Danica devises a ruse to drive the troll back to its flaming companions, but the cunning monster isn't fooled.It staggered back from the kick and stepped forward again, putting Danica between itself and the burning troll. An arrow sank into its side, and it turned its ugly head to look at Xuelin. Before it could turn back, Danica jumped on it again, and the monster stumbled and fell.Danica got up quickly and wanted to jump on top of the monster, but she stopped urgently and saw another fireball emanating from the sky above the lying troll. A moment later, the troll also screamed in pain, engulfed in a burst of magical fire. Xuelin noticed something moving nearby, so she pulled the stringed arrow, then quickly turned around and fired - into the troll she had just brought down.The monster collapsed into a heap again, but still stubbornly twisted and squirmed, trying to stand up. Immediately Danica jumped on top of it, hitting wildly.Xuelin also joined in, slashing hard with a long sword in her hand, chopping off the troll's legs. Immediately the severed limbs writhed, trying to reconnect with the torso, but Danica kicked them smartly toward the glimmering embers of the campfire. One of the broken legs burst into flames when it touched the embers, and Danica grabbed the other end and picked it up, using it as a creepy torch.She ran across the small clearing and poked the flaming broken leg into the face of the unburned troll, which was still writhing in amazement under Xuelin's slashing and cutting.Soon the troll was on fire, too, and the battle was over. At this point Dorigen walked back to camp to examine what she had done on the two burning trolls.By that time, they had become almost two crumpled black balls, and the regeneration process was actually stopped by the magician's flame. Danica could hardly look at Dorigen, feeling rather guilty about her previous suspicions. "I thought you had escaped," she admitted. Dorigen smiled at her. "I swear to..." Danica began. "Follow me up and teach me what loyalty is." Duo Ruizhen finished speaking for her, her tone light and without the slightest accusation. "But, dear Danica, don't you see that you and your friends have taught me what loyalty is?" Danica looked deeply at the wizard, thinking that the courage Dorigen had shown here, and the fact that she was willing to stay and help them fight, would do her a favor when they returned to the library.As Danica thought about it, she realized that Dorigen's heroics hadn't surprised her.The magician has been subdued, heart and soul, and, although Danica agrees, Dorigen should be severely punished for assisting Wall Trinity in waging war on Xuelin's people. The monk still hopes that the punishment will be positive, allowing Dorigen to use her powerful magical powers to do good for the region. "You literally saved our lives," Xuelin said, getting Danica's attention. "I'm very grateful." These words seemed to please Dorigen very much. "Compared to what I owe you and your people, this is just a drop in the bucket." The magician replied. Xuelin nodded in agreement. "I trust you to fully pay those debts," she replied gravely, but clearly confidently. Danica was glad to hear her say that.Sherin wasn't cruel to Dorigen in any way, but the elf wasn't friendly either.Danica could understand the elf girl's struggle.Xuelin is an elf with wisdom and keen observation ability, and she will make judgments based on the actual behavior of the individual.She was the first of all her people to accept Ivan and Pikel as true friends and allies, not letting the typical elves' prejudice against dwarves cloud her judgment about them.And now, among the elves of Simista, she is the only elf who has seen a new side of Dorigen.While she may not be able to forget, she may have progressed to the point where she is able to try to forgive. Her support, as well as that of King Albereth (Danica is confident that the Elf King will accept Shereen's judgment), may play a pivotal role in Cade's immediate showdown with Headmaster Thobex. Role. "It's almost dawn," Dorigen said. "There's still the stench of trolls in the air, and I don't even have the appetite for breakfast." Danica and Xuelin wholeheartedly agreed, so they packed up the camp and set off early.In just three days, they will arrive at the Mengzhi Library.