And there was nothing outside but a ravaged hallway. Glen sighed in relief and embarrassment. There was a trail of blood on the floor leading outside. It looked like he left a cut on the monster when he slammed the door on it. He stepped out into the hallway carefully and quietly, despite how futile his caution would be were the beast still nearby, considering how loudly he opened the door.

He looked around. He could see some light streaming in through the door to the foyer. The angle of the light indicated it was most likely morning. There was something almost magical about the way the sunbeams reflected off of the dust in the air, creating a hazy atmosphere around him.

The aged floorboards creaked softly under his feet as he moved toward the door. He peeked his head through the exit and glanced around. There was no green monster in sight. Glen sighed and spoke softly under his breath.

“I suppose I’d better check out the pantry in this house since I missed the chance in the last one.” Glen grumbled as he searched around for the house’s food stores.

Eventually, after a couple of minutes, he found a back room that smelled of flour and jam. Entering the room, he met with the welcome sight of a stack of preserved meats, among the many other things one may expect to find in a pantry. He reached over his shoulder to remove his shoddy backpack, pausing momentarily to consider why he hadn’t thrown his things to the ground as he was being chased.

He spent a few minutes gathering various ‘necessities’ from the pantry, as well as an assortment of other helpful items like a belt that could hold the sheathed blade he ‘borrowed’, among other things. Eventually, the master thief returned to the foyer carrying a full backpack

Glen still hadn’t heard anything outside, but he was nonetheless worried. He gripped the handle of the sword at his hip anxiously. He poked his head out of the still busted-open front door before promptly bringing it back inside.

“Aargh, I forgot my eyes haven’t adjusted to the light!” He complained loudly, before squeaking and covering his mouth in realization.

Fortunately, the green monster didn’t appear at the exclamation. He squinted his eyes and snuck out through the exit, making way more noise than he intended as his bag bumped into the door and the rusty hinges squeaked.

Judging from the sun which he could now locate clearly, it was indeed the morning of the following day.

He looked around frantically. Still no horrifying green creature in sight. Though he did notice the peculiar fact that the three corpses that were originally nearby the front of this house were missing and there were numerous trails of blood where the bodies once lay. And that all of them were leading in the same direction.

Glen was pretty certain that bodies didn’t naturally decay like that.

Burdened by his complete lack of reassurance, he nonetheless pressed on. Glen quietly moved in the opposite direction that the blood trails moved, because he wasn’t remotely interested in uncovering the extremely predictable prize at the end of that path.

The silence was dreadful. Every step he took echoed around the area at an uncomfortable volume. It probably wasn’t as loud as it felt to his ears, but knowing what might be listening made each one progressively more anxiety-inducing.

Glen had a highly stressful and equally uneventful next couple of hours as he continued scavenging for supplies; this was, in fact, the reason he had begun exploring the village in the first place. He was able to acquire enough food to refill his rations stock, taking a few pots and other useful items he could carry with him.

As he explored further, he paranoidly avoided crossing over to the portion of the town where he imagined the creature that attacked him had most likely taken up residence. Every time he bumped into a shelf or a cabinet creaked, his heart skipped a beat. He was sure that he would look ridiculous from an outside perspective, but anything was worth avoiding another encounter.

The sun was a little over half-way to the top of its arch by the time Glen decided he was done. He may have been a terror to all houses who knew his name, but he would certainly be able to survive a few more weeks in case the border fortress turned out to be a bust.

It was finally time to put the harrowing experience behind him and move on towards his destination.

Despite this, Glen continued standing anxiously in place.

It occurred to him that if he wanted to cross through the town, he would have to walk through the portion where the green creature was probably lying in wait. Alternatively, he could go to the sides of the villages and end up wandering through the surrounding forests which are probably even more dangerous than risking the way through the-

“Wait a second.” Glen interrupted his train of thought.

“Why am I even thinking about this? It’s obviously less dangerous to walk through the forest at the edge of town for a little bit. I could even just stay within the village limits and just follow the forest to make sure I won’t run into that thing! Wow, I’m stupid.”

He dropped the train of thought immediately and turned towards the edge of the village, scolding himself mentally… before suddenly realizing he had been so lonely that he said all of that out loud.

“Shit.” He mumbled under his breath, hearing a distant grunt and shuffling of soil.

Glen ducked behind a nearby fence and tried to avoid making any noise.

“Well, I guess Plan B will have to do.” He whispered, watching and listening intently to see where the creature was coming from.

After about thirty seconds, the strange green creature showed up where he was previously standing.

It took a fair bit of effort to control his breathing, but he focused on staying quiet while he tried his hardest to figure out a way to take it down. There was something bizarre though; he felt strangely confident as he gripped the sword at his waist.

It was something he’d never felt before. It almost felt like… he could just stand up… and approach it.

Before he could even process what he was doing, Glen found himself staring down the creature before him, wielding the enormous claymore in an excellent fighting stance. He hardly even blinked as he slowly but consistently moved.

The sounds of the screeching creature didn’t register in his mind. In a single downstroke of his blade, he cut into the shoulder of the beast. It reeled in agony, falling to the ground; within only a moment, Glen pierced its heart.

Watching the crowd part like a sea as he stepped forth was immensely amusing to him.

“So I can do whatever I want to them?”

The young Blademaster bore the kind of cocky smile that could only be worn by the foolishly arrogant or incomprehensibly powerful.

The proctor sighed exaggeratedly.

“Do as you please. As long as you sufficiently demonstrate your capabilities, it is of no matter to us what becomes of the trial beasts. They would be scheduled for euthanization in a few days regardless.”

“Then let me show you what I can do.”

The Blademaster sneered.

Within an instant, he dashed forward, fast enough to appear nothing but a blur. He could vividly feel the sensation of his blade cutting through their flesh. The monsters, which would ordinarily have put up at least some resistance, fled in sheer terror.

But there was nowhere for them to run, and the young master struck each of them down, one by one. Within only a few seconds, all thirty of the creatures gathered in the room for testing lay dead on the floor.

The proctor's eyes were open wide.

“They really didn’t exaggerate. He’s a prodigy.”

He blinked several times, his eyes adjusting to the light as if he’d only just woken up.

“What…”

He stared down at the rapidly fading life beneath him, bewildered.

“What just happened?”

He held his hands in front of his eyes, obstructing his view of what he’d just done.

“Did I…?”

The last glimmer of life faded from the eyes of the green monster that had once attacked him.

Somehow, it had been slain. Glen struggled to comprehend that it had been by his hands. The blade he held was stained with a bit of blood and viscera drawn out of the monster’s body. He shuddered as he suddenly realized what he was looking at.

“W-what the fuck…?”

Glen couldn’t understand what had just happened and chose simply to ignore it for the time being. He mentally accepted that it was practically unexplainable for the time being and figured it would be better that he just thank lady luck for saving his life before getting on his merry way.

After a few minutes stuck in his head, Glen Hiscovol simply picked up his things and walked away.

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