Logan sat at the desk in his reserved room and thought about his immediate future. He also had a lot of emotions to sort out and was only able to go through a handful. His usual strategy of compartmentalizing things until he had time to deal with them was rearing its head. His nerves and worries strengthened while his pride was shaken. He sat back and took long breaths through his nose, held it, and released it just as slowly out his mouth. One of the first things he was taught after being collected was the importance of mental stability

  As his worries and emotions calmed his beast growled and snapped at him. Logan wasn’t surprised at the beast’s state. The repeated suppression over the last few days wasn’t helping its default temperamental mood. He made a mental note to go hunting that night and appease the thing.

  He couldn’t help but to go back to his thoughts on who the traitor might be. He would keep an eye out as Master Sigurd instructed him to but had little hope in finding anything. He had never been good at counter-espionage. Amara had described him “ as blunt as a brick to the face.” Sure, he could be underhanded in a fight, anything social beyond that was on the difficult side. He was raised too honest and even after over two hundred years he was never able to shake the habit. He was relieved he wasn’t the only one his master was sending out.

  Instead of focusing on finding the spy themselves he decided to try and help whoever else is chosen by narrowing down the suspects. Currently, the only lead he had was the leaking of the India mission’s date. In general, missions such as that one started with the Scryers. He felt a chill as he thought of them. Scryers was the unofficial designation for Scout-Class beings that had immensely powerful visual or sensory abilities. They were used to scan the world for magical abnormalities and/or emergencies. This includes the awakening of artifacts, mana spikes, and illegal use of large-scale spells.

  No matter the origin or ability, scryers had an otherworldly presence, which was saying something in his line of work. They always seemed to know things they shouldn’t while being ignorant of their immediate surroundings. It wasn’t uncommon for a Guardian to have to track a scryer that casually wandered off and got lost. After the scryers found something, they relayed it to the Scouts assigned to them. The Scouts then do their job and gather further information. With this information they contact the local powers to see if they can handle it. If not, they either complete the mission themselves or send it to another class.

  The major points of vulnerability he could think of were the scryer’s handlers, the Scouts collecting data, and the local powers contacted. In these points the leak could come from leaders, managers, assistants, interns, secretaries, regular employees, or whoever else touched the data.

  Logan sighed at the job in front of him. At headquarters he should be able to find the identities of the groups for each step. Who scryed the anomaly, who researched the information, and the local power contacted. The big question was how he would do it without being suspected or caught. He wasn’t nearly technologically savvy enough to do any hacking, so he would need to find information the old-fashioned way. But before all that he had a job.

  It didn’t take long for him to start going in circles. After almost an hour of sitting, thinking, and breathing his beast had enough and started snapping at him. The best way to literally appease the beast was to go on a hunt. Luckily, he had a weird forest populated with prey for that very purpose.

  Leaving his equipment and shoes behind, he exited The Temple and started toward the nearby forest. After walking about a hundred meters, Logan reached for his wolf and shifted. He felt his limbs extend and his muscles bulge. His face became a muzzle and filled with sharpened teeth, ready to tear warm flesh apart. He let his wolf decide on the hunting ground. His beast was apparently feeling nostalgic as it chose the European forest.

  The quartered foliage were multiple square kilometers each and were unique. The north was like the evergreen forests of North America, the east the towering pillars forest like in China, the south a thick jungle like the amazon, and the west was a coniferous forest like that of Europe.The size and scale of the magic circles required to keep up such an environment was a massive undertaking in its implementation and maintenance.

  With leaping strides, he approached his hunt. His beast was thirsting for a larger hunt, something challenging. Pork chops came to mind. When he reached the forest’s edge he lowered to the ground and scented for any traces of boar. He moved further in to find any traces. It had been years since he last stepped foot in the magical landscape. He could feel the mana altering the atmosphere and soil to make the forest grow and feel natural.

  It wasn’t too long before he found a faint scent. He followed it and soon found deep footprints in the dirt. The combination of information told him it was a large healthy male boar and was easily a half times larger than the regular uncultivated boars found in nature. He was already salivating as his beast jumped in excitement. Not only would it be a good meal, it would also be a good fight. The pigs never went down easy. This made them a historically dangerous prey making humans use specialized spears or high-caliber firearms to take them down.

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  He eventually found the animal rooting through the underbrush. It was as large as he hoped it would be. His heart started to race as he prepared for the fight. He lowered himself to all fours as he circled the boar until he was upwind. Every step got him closer to satiating his beast and giving him a break from the ornery animal.

  He made sure to avoid leaf piles or branches as he approached. The closer he got the more excited he became. By the time he was able to get within 10 meters he had to force his twitching body from leaping early. Thankfully, it didn’t take much longer before it somehow sensed him and turned Logan’s way. He began his sprint when their eyes met. The beast released a loud squeal as it prepared for a fight. While it was still turning Logan landed sharpened nails first. The beast’s thick hide and coarse hair protected it from more than a few scratches. As Logan used his claws to get a grip the boar thrashed trying to throw him off. He didn’t let the struggle affect him as he brought his teeth down onto its spine.

  Warm blood gushed into his mouth sating both his and his beast’s thirst. He knew that only chewing on its reinforced spine wouldn’t end the boar, so he ripped some flesh and disengaged. He jumped back as a sharp tusk barely missed him. He moved back a few more feet as it staggered slightly before regaining its balance. It stared down Logan with eyes filled with pure wrath. With another squeal it charged tusks down, ready to introduce Logan to his own entrails.

  He faced it head on. When it reached him, he grabbed onto the tusks and pushed back. The sheer amount of kinetic energy the beast possessed pushed Logan back and left long furrows in the ground from his dragging feet. He pushed internal energy into his muscles to strengthen them. With his increased strength, he was able to stop the charge and turn it into a pushing match. The two animals continued to compete. As Logan was beginning to lose, he quickly twisted and pulled on its head. The sudden movement forced it to follow its head and fall onto its side.

  With the boar down, Logan leapt toward its now vulnerable throat. He used his claws to hold on while aiming for its jugular and biting down. It struggled harder as the fear of death set in. Without the internal energy infusion there was no way he would have been able to bite hard enough to latch on properly. He shook his head to rip and tear the boar’s throat. He could feel the life draining from his prey. Just as he thought it was over he became overconfident and softened his grip on the beast’s head. In one final surge of energy, it twisted its head and sent its tusk deep into Logan’s shoulder.

  Logan yelled in pain and jumped back pain as the final struggle ended and its head fell limp. If he didn’t know better he would have sworn the thing was smirking. He didn’t take a chance on it, striking again by biting down on the already gushing neck once again and not stopping until he tore a chunk. It was only a few seconds before the pulsing blood slowed and stopped. Logan dropped the meat in his mouth to growl. He put his hand to his open wound and shifted his energy from his muscles to his regeneration. The bleeding stopped almost instantly while the internal damage would take longer. It was a relief to feel his regeneration being back to normal instead of the snail’s pace the anti-being bullets put him in.

  As he was recovering, he felt an energy from the corpse. The oldest blood started to turn translucent and disappear. Logan groaned as he watched it very slowly disappear. He had killed a mana construct. A creature made completely out of mana using a technique way out of his league. Most of the animals found in the forests were such constructs. He was told this was done such that the cursed and other beings with a need for hunting or killing could act out their impulses without upsetting the druids or destroying ecosystems.

  He would have sworn that his target was real. The last time he went hunting the constructs weren’t nearly so lifelike. They both smelled and moved artificially. Because of that he was able to fight accordingly. Also known as not drinking a metric shit load of blood and meat. When the solids and liquids turned into atmospheric mana gave him some major mana burps. To make a comparison, they were like soda burps and beer burps had a kid and taught him enough Kung Fu to kick the ass of anyone who dared go against it. Since he hardened heathen more than a few small pieces during the struggle along with the blood they weren’t as bad as they could’ve been.

  “Ah, Shit,” he said as he checked in on his beast. It was feeling better while still being mad. If the damn thing was real he would have been done already.

  Since eating anything from his prey was a very bad idea he had to start over. Leaving the dissolving body behind, he stalked further into the forest. The next scent he found was that of a deer. He couldn’t tell it was real or face so with hope he followed the trail. Although not as much of a challenge as a boar, it would be enough to satiate his beast for at least a few days.

  As expected, the deer was simple. The chase itself was fun but there was no real danger. He was actually discovered because the conjured blood in his stomach had dissolved and made him let out a loud burp. The second kill was real flesh and blood so he was able to calm his beast down and get a good dinner. As long as he didn’t piss off his wolf they should tide him over for a few days. On the way back he had time to think with a clearer mind. Accepting that it wouldn’t be a short assignment he mentally prepared for the morning. The first day as an assistant.