The spikes shot towards Logan from all directions, leaving him with no way out.
’This level of coordination?’ Logan thought, alarmed as he activated the basic version of his Flaming Body technique.
His skin immediately turned red. Feeling his strength increase immensely, Logan spun around, just barely managing to dodge and block the spikes.
’I need to get out of here,’ he thought, pouring more mana into his glaive.
He charged at the cage wall, jumping over several small roots bursting through the ground.
Reaching the wall, Logan swung his glaive down with all his strength.
Flames erupted from the blade as it tore through the vine cage, blowing open a wide gap for him to jump through.
’The roots from these wolves are way more durable than the other two,’ he thought, dashing away from the cage towards the first wolf.
Seeing Logan break free from the cage, the blue wolf in front of Logan immediately turned around and ran.
Logan cursed and sprinted after it, but a quick glance around made him freeze.
Alarm bells went off in his head as he saw the remaining wolves on Livia and Derek’s side retreat as well.
’They are trying to bait us,’ he thought, coming to a halt immediately, fearing the worst.
He poured large amounts of mana into his Mana Sight, expanding its range and allowing him to see up to 700 feet ahead.
Logan’s hair stood on end as he saw two large mana signatures in the distance, surrounded by a pack of around twenty more smaller mana dots.
"Shit," Logan cursed, spinning around to his group. "C-ranks."
He watched as Derek charged after the wolves that were running away from him.
"Wait!" Logan shouted, attracting both Livia and Derek’s attention.
Derek came to a halt, looking irritated at Logan, while Livia frowned and turned her gaze toward the distance.
"What do you want?" he asked loudly, staring at Logan. "You can’t really tell me you need me to stay behind to protect you?"
Logan frowned, getting irritated by Derek’s behavior.
"If you have a brain, I’d suggest you start using it," Logan said, pointing in the distance.
"These wolves are just bait. There are two C-rank wolves waiting with another pack of twenty D-ranks up ahead."
Derek’s face turned pale, looking over in the distance before slowly backing away.
Ignoring his teammates, Logan walked over to the two wolves he’d slain and ripped out their mana cores.
Livia gave a quick nod in Logan’s direction before also digging out the cores from her kills, her pretty white combat suit and veil completely stained by red blood.
Logan looked back to where the wolves had been, just barely catching a glimpse of them retreating.
He let out a sigh of relief but didn’t say anything to the rest of his team, just wanting to get out of there as soon as possible.
It didn’t take more than a few tens of seconds before all of them retreated with their spoils, running through the forest in the opposite direction of the C-rank wolves.
They ran for two miles before finally coming to a halt.
"Good catch," Livia said, turning to Logan.
Giving a small nod, Logan started burning the blood off his glaive.
Livia turned to Derek, glaring at him in irritation.
"You brought us in danger with your reckless behavior once again," she said coldly. "If Logan hadn’t stopped you in time, you would’ve been dead and we would likely follow soon after."
Derek remained silent, avoiding Livia’s gaze and instead glaring at Logan with an unreadable expression.
Livia turned around, taking a seat on some rocks.
"We’ll rest here for a few minutes," she said sternly. "Make sure both of you get rid of any blood on your clothes."
At the same time, Livia’s bloodied suit started shining a soft white light all around her.
The blood on her suit slowly disappeared, making it look as if she’d just entered the dungeon with her pristine white suit.
’Interesting,’ Logan thought, burning the blood off his clothes. ’I’ve never seen that before.’
Turning to look at Derek, he saw him pull something out of his pocket that looked like some kind of spray.
He sprayed his armor, and the blood slid off, dripping onto the ground.
After cleaning off the blood, they walked another mile to leave the scent behind before settling near some rocks for a proper half-hour break.
"We have to set out soon again," Livia said, sitting down. "Once we pass the underground river, we’ll be in a safe area without C-ranks around."
Logan sat down beside Livia, closing his eyes as he replayed the fighting scene in his mind.
’I’ve improved significantly,’ he thought. ’Even my Flaming Body technique in its basic form boosts me up to the strength of a Silver Core.’
It didn’t seem like Livia or Derek had seen him using the technique either, both probably occupied by their own fights at the time.
’Still, it’ll only get more difficult from here on.’
Glancing between Derek and Livia, Logan felt a thick tension in the air.
His eyes narrowed slightly as he observed Derek closely without him noticing.
’He does not look like he’s super happy with either of us,’ Logan thought, making a mental note. ’I have to be very careful while fighting the C-ranks later.’
Logan saw something in Derek’s eyes he couldn’t quite put a finger on. His instincts screamed at him to leave Derek behind right there in the forest.
But just like Livia, he wanted to rank first in the dungeon challenge in order to get accepted by the SSS-rank and gain access to the locked grounds.
’To do that, we’ll need both solid teamwork and the best raw mana cores.’
The good teamwork grade was the only reason why Logan saved Derek from rushing into the C-rank wolves.
"Time to continue," Livia said, standing up while opening her small map of the dungeon.
"We’ll only take one short break after crossing the river," she continued. "To win, we have to maintain our pace after that."