A God in a Xianxia world

Chapter 38 - Red Eyed Wolves (1)

Tom, Rowan and the others all quickly turned their heads to the west, where a series of guttural growls, howls and snarls could be heard.

GRRRRRRRRWL! HOOOOOOWL!

"Well that doesn't sound good" said Lance nervously as the horse underneath him started to whinny and stamp around.

"Alright, we've got company. Pucker up boys" said Pike in his usual loud voice that sounded more like a bellow than anything else. He then tightened the grip he had on his glaive.

"Hah, I suppose those'll be the red eyed wolves that Daniel warned us about" sighed Rowan, who then turned to face Tom.

"Don't worry cousin, I won't let any harm come to you"

"Well it shouldn't be too bad anyway, they're strength is usually only equivalent to 3rd-5th level body strengthening" said Avery, who then also directed his gaze to Tom before adding "You should be able to one on by yourself easily enough".

"Ok then. But what do we do about the horses?" said Tom.

Tom wasn't feeling any pressure from the snarls that were coming closer and closer. He'd already read a bit about the red eyed wolves and didn't feel that there was anything to be concerned about.

As Avery had said, the strength of red eyed wolves was generally only in the range equivalent to 3rd-5th body strengthening level cultivators. Furthermore, they had only little reserves of qi and weren't able to use any qi techniques. This meant that in the Tainted Forest, they really weren't that strong. They were just a type of weak qi beast whose strength lay in the fact that they travelled in packs. There were however several other wolf species that were far more powerful than the red eyed wolves, but they wouldn't be seen this close to the boundary of the forest.

An interesting thing to note about the red eyed wolves was that although they were one of the weakest qi beasts in the forest, they were also incredibly vicious and would attack other creatures regardless of their strength. This was probably because of a combination of their naturally fierce nature and their inability to accurately judge the strength of their opponents. As a cultivator, Tom was able to determine the strength of others, be they other people or animals, by sensing qi and judging the amount, structure and concentration of qi present on them. It seems the red eyed wolves either didn't have this ability or because of their savage nature, they just didn't care about what they saw.

It was because of his knowledge about the red eyed wolves that Tom wasn't concerned about himself but was concerned about the horses. They had been avoiding qi beasts up until now and hadn't been attacked by any in turn. This had meant that the horse hadn't been in any danger. If they had chosen to attack the previous qi beasts they had seen, they would have been in a better position, where they could dismount and pursue them while a few hung back and kept the horses safe. Now however, it was the red eyed wolves that were charging at them and even if they were stronger than the wolves, the horses weren't. Just hearing the sounds in the distance had already gotten the horses agitated and riled up. Out of the eight people present, only Rowan, Avery, Pike and Harrison had kept horses under control. Tom and the other guards that had come with him were having trouble keeping their horses in check.

"We should dismount and form a ring around the horses" said Avery decisively.

"Agreed" said Harrison, who then dismounted and drew the bastard blade he had at his hip.

The rest of the group performed similar actions. Tom got off his horse and drew his arming sword. He had his shield strapped on his left arm for defence. Rowan got down and pulled out her arming sword, though compared to the one Tom was using, which was made from iron, hers was steel and of considerably better quality and Avery unsheathed the two handed longsword he was carrying. The rest of the guards however didn't have to perform such actions. This was because one of them carried a battle-axe and the rest were carrying polearms. They were already just holding them in hand while they were travelling.