3 Steps To Survive (1/2)

As the dull red light fades Yu opens his eyes and looks at the wolf before him, which is more than just different, the previous brown fur had taken a slightly red shade, with the red spots on its body intensifying and spreading to becoming noticeable red lines, the wolfs build seems to have taken a better turn after the lack of food provided.

”Grrr”

”Well i didn't except you to forgive and forget just because you became my Soul Guardian anyway”

As it is to be expected the wolf, though accepting the bond, still harbors much hate for Yu, since to it, it is still the same person that had trapped and tortured it, in fact it can be said that accepting the bond was solely because the Sacrifice gave the wolf the feeling that it would bring unprecedented power to itself, off course Yu is still clueless about this fact.

As Yu stands up he takes in his surroundings once again. The mansion which seems to have been left untended for a long time, so much so that no one would like to live in this place more than a shack with all the rotten wood and creeping moss.

Turning his eyes to the book, Yu opens it and flips the first two pages but before he change to the next page he notices the wolfs portraitand description had already occupied the place where the Python and Spider were.

”Since the Soul Guardians hold much importance i guess this makes more sense”

Moving his eyes to the description Yu reads it with hardly any anticipation.

Soul Guardian : Wailing Wolf Variant

A Wailing Wolf originally with slight Vermillion Wolf blood had its fire attribute intensifiedthrough Sacrifice.

”So the red spots were indeed not a color variation but a blood one, hmm thats good but the slight variation wont open manychances anyway”

Looking at the frame of the picture which is bronze with 3 stars at its top Yu sighs thinking that expecting a rank up was wrong of him to do with the bad state the wolf was in to begin with.

As the frame of the portrait refers to the rank of the creature, Bronze is the lowest rank there is, followed by Silver then Gold then Platinum and lastly Diamond.

The stars at the top refer to the stage at which the creature is at, every rank has five stages with the fifth being the lowest stage and the first being the closest to rank up.

The Grimoires are ranked similarly.

In other words the wolf is at the lowest rank in the exact middle stage.

”Hmm? Wait, what about my Grimoires rank, did it reset after the owner change or did it remain unaffected like the Soul Beasts?”

Closing the Grimoire Yu looks at the cover wonderingly as there is no way to tell a Grimoires rank just by looking and he doesn't know of a way to ascertain it. It would have been easy to check otherwise if he wasn't in this Dimensional Battle Field.

Yes the mansion Yu is in is part of a Dimensional Battle Field, the one he is in is fortesting the younger generation of the Southern Paradise every five years, this Dimension is one that cant have forced entry and upon entering your rank shall be lowered to bronze rank and all the summons above bronze shall be sealed. Yu's Grimoire just like the rest was sealed to bronze and he cant tell its rank until he gets out of this Dimension.

”Well that will have to wait since i don't even know if i will survive this week”

Off course testing the younger generation doesn't mean putting them in a life and death situation but sadly that doesn't apply to Yu as when he was thrown in the dimension he was informed that the castle core he was protecting didn't had a life lock negation, implying that if anyone who has a life lock on him got fatally hit in the area of the construct core then the life lock will be termed useless and the person would end up actually dying. Off course all Yu had to do was leave the cores area of affect but then his own life lock would be the cause of his death since his family forbade him from leaving the core without fighting and to make sure he doesn't, they put a rune on his life lock that activates if 24 hours passed from the rune being in the vicinity of the core's aura, the 24 hours off course do not reset upon entering the vicinity of the core it just freezes.

Putting it in simple terms, Yu cant get away from the vicinity of the core for more than a total of 24 hours while staying can cuase him to get killed.

”This is a tricky situation, but first before I think about it I need to get something to eat, and so do you”

Turning his head to the side Yu looks at the wolf who is also hungry and more so than Yu.

”There are a few wild Soul Beasts in the wild woods behind the mansion but as i cant leave here you mist hunt on your own, remember, when you fight go for something weaker or slightly close to your strength but don't attack anything as strong as you or stronger as we have enemies coming at us later”

The wolf looks at Yu for a little more than goes off to the exit of the mansion, as to wether it understood or not, that is all a mystery since even if it can understand through the connection between it and Yu it can understand only so much and the rest will have to depend on its instincts.

After the wolf leaves, Yu turns to the inner mansion staring a the old wooden door that looks to be in a little better state than the rest of the house, then starts walking to the door and opining it, what greats him is a shining blue crystal the size of fist floating on a small pillar in the middle of an empty room.

”Castle Core”