Shivering, Aya collapsed to her knees and began to dig into the frozen soil with her bare hands as she searched. Dirt and grit stained her hands a dirty brown, and despite her shivering, her forehead was still covered in beads of sweat. Her eyes still stung where a few stray drops leaked into them earlier. Pausing to wipe her forehead with the back of her hand, the battlemage ignored the muddy smear she left behind and continued to dig until she carefully unearthed the tree's root, and the treasure it held.

Aya stared at the fleshy white mass still covered in bits of dirt. Pulling her belt knife, Aya carefully harvested the Winter Truffle.Holding the fungus in her hand, it radiated ice mana now that it was severed from the tree. Nodding to herself, Aya added it to her storage bag with the others before burying the tree root and moving on.

Following her mana senses, Aya slowly picked her way through the section of forest, carefully searching for the rare fungi. Winter Truffles only grew on some of the trees in the Forest of Kresh, and could only be found with mana senses when mature. Marking locations didn't help as the Forest regularly shifted and changed. Finding the same exact tree on two separate trips would be impossible. Making it harder was that the plants only leaked out a whisper of mana while attached to their host tree. A whisper that could easily be drowned out by the atmospheric mana of winter. But waiting until Spring to harvest them wasn't an option. By then the plants would change into Spring Truffles. Still just as hard to find, and not what the bounty demanded.

Unlike the rest of her teammates, Shiori handed her her bounty scroll ahead of actually doing the task. It didn't make the task easier.

"Silver Bounty: Winter Truffle Harvest

Harvest a minimum of 10 pounds of Winter Truffles in the Forest of Kresh.

Recommended Party: n/a. Strong mana senses required.

Reward: 5 gold per Winter Truffle.

Reward deduction for poorly harvested and damaged Winter Truffles.

Bonus Reward: 15 gold for Awakened Winter Truffles."

Finding 10 pounds of the stuff was proving to be a gargantuan undertaking. While each of her teammates had been doing their own bounties, Aya had been searching the entire time and only found a little over 3 pounds of the valuable plant across more than 20 harvests. Even a truffle the size of both her fists combined had only weighed a few ounces.

As Aya pushed herself up, the first wolf howled, sending a shiver down her spine that, for once, had nothing to do with the cold. Time froze as memories long buried unearthed themselves. A young girl ran along a shaded path as something pursued her, until she tripped and fell on stones stained with blood. Unseeing eyes stared and torn out throats smiled as they split blood. A howl, then another, and another. All around her. It was the first time in that young girl's life that she'd ever felt powerless. Alone. Afraid.

Until a large hand wrapped around her waist and scooped her up and threw her across a man's broad shoulder. The man's armor dug into her stomach and his run jostled her about as he carried her to safety while weapons clashed, monsters howled, and men and women screamed as they died. A woman took her from the man, her mother's delicate hand squeezing her own as she led a young Aya to safety. Until she couldn't. More screaming. A thud as Aya fell, only for fetid breath smelling of blood and rotting meat to wash over her.

Searing heat. Bestial screaming. The stink of burning hair and flesh as cleansing flames incinerated her mother's murderer. She grabbed onto that heat, letting it fill her chest and lungs and mind until it melted her terror away leaving only a singular emotion. Searing, burning rage. Grabbing onto that emotion, Aya cast her terror into those flames, clearing her mind as time resumed.

"Against the tree," she barked, pointing at a large tree near her teammates who'd been following her around, keeping an eye on her as she collected Winter Truffles. "Cian up front, Jun block off the sides, Keira and Michael be ready to support!" As Aya barked her orders, she harnessed the burning core of rage in her heart, letting it focus her. Survive and grow stronger. She would not fall here.

Bright lights banished the gloom as Jun's snares and barriers winked into being, surrounding them in a thicket of defensive magic.

The only warning they had was a small flicker of fire mana before a torrent of flames nearly as hot as her own blasted into the barriers on the left. Jun's barriers started to turn pink as they absorbed the fire mana and her teammate and estranged friend turned to focus on it, her brow furrowing slightly in concentration. But the attack was only a distraction.

Aya felt it with her mana sense just a moment too late. A flicker of mana that whispered of heat and energy as something rushed out of the gloom in front of them, headed straight for Cian!

Their armored companion grunted as a massive wolf slammed into his shield, barking and snarling as it grabbed his spear by the haft and ripped it out of the warrior's hand. Unfazed, Cian ducked behind his shield and rushed back, his mana singing of strength and frozen fury as the wolf was knocked back. The wolf was a large thing, nearly as tall at the shoulders as Aya was, and broad, a mound of lean muscle hidden beneath a wiry black winter coat. The creature stared at them curiously, as if confused that its attack failed. Cian used the brief pause to draw his sword and hold it threateningly, but he didn't advance.

It was good he didn't. Keira drew and fired, her arrow flickering in Jun's spell light for just a moment before a high pitched yelp erupted from the darkness, only for more blasts of flame to come at them from all around. Jun's barriers absorbed the fire from two sides as Aya moved her mana and cast her own, creating a blazing circle of flames that intercepted a blast headed for Cian.

Flames filled the forest air, briefly banishing the ever present chill before the attack winked out, leaving only Aya's shield of flames hovering in the air. Aya winced as she felt her mana drain significantly. The spell was nearly as powerful as her own, and from how only a single wolf had shown itself so far, such an attack was being used as a distraction. She couldn't get caught up in a defensive battle. She lacked the stamina for that, unlike Jun who she'd only seen get stronger as a battle wore on. No. She wasn't Jun. She wasn't a defensive specialist like her friend who never talked about her past, secretive yet awkward and naive, making it clear that she was hiding things, if poorly, like her obvious crush on Sara. No, Aya had her own secrets, her own past, and her own way of doing things. She'd leave the defense to Jun, because the rage that drove her demanded that she attack and advance. So she did.

Abandoning the shield of flames, Aya threw her mana into a spell, channeling it into her fire affinity as she put the spell together. Targeting the wolf that attacked Cian, Aya unleashed a flurry of [Fire Darts] at it.

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The wolf looked at her spell for just a moment before the flames converged, incinerating the beast in a brilliant display of fire and flame!

Or so Aya thought. A strange distortion appeared around her flames, and suddenly she felt her mana drain away as if she touched another of Jun's snares. Decisively cutting her link to her spell, Aya watched as her flames seemed to get sucked in, revealing the black-furred wolf as it huffed at her with disappointment. The wolf barked once before flames converged on them from all sides, shattering Jun's snares and searing her barriers.

Keira blurred as she drew and fired, launching arrow after arrow at what could only be the Alpha of the pack, the only wolf to have shown itself so far. Before her first arrow landed, two more were in the air right behind it, whistling for the wolf's chest. With casual ease, the wolf stepped to the side. Its mana fluctuating strangely before a distortion appeared around it and the arrows scattered in all directions before being lost to the gloom. As if on a casual afternoon stroll, the beast padded forward as Keira shot arrow after arrow at it, each of the projectiles going wide around the creature..

Aya summoned spikes of earth to impale it, only to watch in disbelief as her spells crumbled away, the earth spikes failing to materialize. Somehow the wolf had burned her mana.

She had a strong Earth affinity, but it was nothing like her affinity for Fire. Aya watched as the wolf slowly padded forward, its fur shifting slightly in the wind blowing through their section of the Forest from the torrent of flames that attacked them from either side. It gave her an idea. The wolf might be able to control flames and heat, but how would it take a combined spell? One that wasn't just heat and flame, but something more?

Summoning her mana, Aya pushed it through multiple affinities. The strange teachings Shiori taught them had been useful, but awkward and slow for Aya to use. She couldn't grasp the finer details, nor did she have time to dedicate solely towards mastering it. She couldn't understand whatever this "affinity shifting" Shiori taught them was, only knowing that it was apparently whatever Jun used to get around a lack of affinities. But the practice made her better at combining her affinities into compound spells, an advanced skill not taught until the third year.

Pushing her mana into her favored affinities, she created a core of compressed wind with her [Gust] spell. A ball of wind started to form as the spell coalesced, but Aya didn't stop there, instead pulling a thread of mana through the spellform and wrapping it around the rope of her fire mana before feeding the combined aspects into her [Fire Blast] spell. A sea of red and orange flames appeared before her and converged on a point just outside their defensive line, condensing down onto the forming ball of wind. The flame's colors began to shift from red and orange to yellow, then nearly white as the ambient temperature raised. Fresh sweat burst across her forehead as she fed her mana into the pyre of her spell, but she still wasn't done. Pulling a thread out from the double spell was already immensely difficult with the amount of mana she channeled, nothing like the first amateur compound spell she'd cast months earlier. Before, it'd been like wrestling with a seasoned warrior, but now it was like trying to tame an angry sea serpent. Aya felt a sharp pain behind her eyes as she pushed herself further, barely feeling the warm wash of healing magic flood through her as she added a third tendril to her braid. Earth mana, sturdy and resistant, flooded out of her second strongest affinity before she sent the combined mass into a third spell, one meant to be defensive. [Earth Shell] was weak, a newly learned Novice ranked spell unlike her Apprentice ranked [Gust] and Initiate ranked [Fire Blast]. It created a simple shell of stone around something, but the shell was thin and brittle unless a truly ridiculous amount of mana was fed into it. It was weak enough that a mere low Bronze child could break through it without much effort, but Aya didn't use it for defense. The thin shell was terrible for that purpose, but it was perfect for offense. Once the spell was powered, Aya took the combined thread out and connected it to the final glyph in her first spellform, completing the circle.

The ball of wind and flame compressed down even more as Aya's [Earth Shell] manifested around it, her mana scraping near empty as the double compound spell took form. Nausea and lightheadedness washed over her, untouched by the pulsing healing spell Michael sent through her. The spell seemed to shudder with anticipation as it fully manifested.

"Jun, max strength dome now!" she shouted, unleashing her spell on the Alpha that stared her down. The shaking stone ball moved slowly at first, but like a boulder rolling down a hill it quickly gained speed as it closed the distance between the students and the wolf. Thick walls of barrier magic popped up around them, forming into a dome that visibly thickened as Jun fed her mana into the spell.

The wolf stood rooted to the spot, seemingly transfixed by the approaching spell before it collided with the wolf's nose. The sound of thin stone shattering was lost in the resulting explosion as the earth shook, knocking Aya and all but the twins to the ground. The sound of ice shattering filled the air as the ice capped canopy broke and fell down all around them in a small avalanche of ice and branches. Chunks of ice and frozen branches crashed against Jun's shield, the defensive magic buckling in places under the pressure of tons of material falling on it!

Aya winced and unconsciously took a step back, moving closer to the trunk of the tree as the canopy catastrophically collapsed around them, but Jun and the rest of their party stood firm, their faith in the defensive specialist's barriers clear. Aya couldn't see it that way. Even though Jun's barriers were powerful, she'd seen how thick the ice canopy was when Jun fought the Mage Hunter. She knew how strong an Iron ranker was supposed to be and saw barriers made by stronger and more experienced mages fail under such pressure. It made sense to step back. But Jun's magic held.

Minutes passed as the ice and branches tumbled down, filling the Forest beyond Jun's magic with dust and mist that obscured the air. Weak sunlight filtered through from above, reflecting prettily off the small particles but making it even harder to see through. Worse still was the weak ice and wood mana of the Forest that filled the air. The wolves' mana had already been hard to sense without the noise, now it'd be near impossible, if they survived.

Everyone's eyes snapped towards the center of the cloud of mist and dust as a huge surge of fire mana filled the air and Aya wasn't the only one that stepped back this time. They instinctively knew that that amount of mana wasn't anything they could handle. The mist and dust cleared, and all the students could do was stare at what was left for them in stunned silence.

A wolf stared back at them, an unmoving statue of ice and stone that radiated fire mana that seemed alive. Out of the corner of her eye, Aya saw a flash of light as a wolf's tail vanished into the gloom and barking laughter filled the air.

Aya glanced between where she saw the wolf vanish and the statue, confusion written on her face. All it used was fire! How did it manage this?!

Minutes passed as Aya and the rest of the team watched the surrounding area for another attack, but none came. Keira went out for a brief scout of the area, but she couldn't find any trace of the wolves that'd attacked them. Wherever they were, it wasn't here.

Casting one last search around the small section of the forest, Aya shook her head. She couldn't feel any more traces. While it was likely her mana senses just weren't sensitive enough to detect more of the hidden mushrooms, she'd learned the hard way that it was best to just move on and try her luck as they moved to the next location. Besides, the strange battle with the wolves ensured that even if any of the mushrooms survived in the area, they'd be well hidden by the ice mana in the air.

Turning around, Aya looked back at the battlefield, wincing internally at the upturned earth, destroyed trees, and chunks of ice marring a new clearing in the Forest. She hadn't been able to hold back, not that it mattered. The wolf used fire mana in ways she hadn't thought possible and couldn't even begin to replicate. She didn't have the right spells.

As Aya thought to herself, she didn't notice Shiori appear behind them. "We're done here, let's get moving," Shiori said. "Aya, you'll have to keep looking in another location.

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