Jermal came back fast. In barely a minute, he regrouped with his tribe, who had already begun moving deeper into the forest.
His ability was still active, sparks of deep red and grey trailed around him, radiating an aura of raw power.
Reaching the group, Jermal finally released the energy. The glow faded, and exhaustion hit like a wave. Sweat poured down his face; his body screamed for rest. But he fought the urge to collapse.
"The south is clear," he said, voice steady despite his fatigue. "The fire hasn't spread that far yet, but it's growing fast. If we don't move now, we'll be trapped."
He spoke with utter calm, a stark contrast to the panic rising in everyone else.
"Come on! Get moving! Drop anything we don't need!"
There were about eight children in the group, each carried by a hunter to maximize their speed. The same went for the elders.
At most, a hunter carried one person, plus a share of the tribe's belongings.
All except one.
Jermal.
Even without his mana, even with exhaustion weighing on him, he carried a child and three bundles of supplies. His steps didn't falter. His breath stayed steady.
He didn't flinch.
He led the group, his pace almost too much for his fellow hunters to keep up with.
They reached the river, the Transcontinental, as it was called, named so for its seemingly endless stretch across the lands.
According to Totat, they were near the river's midpoint, right now.
Now, they were heading downstream, south. Towards the unknown.
"Pick up the pace," said Jermal to one of the hunters, Gegina, his voice calm. He had no intention of shouting orders.
Gegina, however, wasn't as level-headed.
"Hurry up, everyone! We'll get overrun at this rate!" she yelled.
A few gasps followed, panic rippling through the group like a sudden gust of wind.
Every Hunter and able-bodied member shifted from a jog to a half-sprint. Their bodies were built to endure that level of strain: muscles dense, lungs efficient. But, that didn't make it easy, not with the weight they carried.
The fire was beginning to creep closer, licking at the edges of the forest behind them just as the river widened ahead, its distant roar growing louder with every step.
Jermal was calm, nonetheless. He had something that could defeat Mother Nature herself. Mana.
In the short time he had to practice, he discovered a number of things.
First and foremost, Jermal's quantity of mana, the absurd power he had been granted, was limited. Once depleted, it took roughly half an hour to recover.
Second, he divided his abilities into three distinct categories.
The first, Small Class Spells, required only minor expenditures of mana. They offered temporary boosts to his physical attributes: speed, strength, endurance.
The second, Medium Class Spells, included direct offensive techniques where Jermal channeled pure mana as a weapon. The beam he had fired earlier belonged to this category.
And finally, there were the Big Class Spells. These were techniques of immense complexity, the kind Jermal knew he could one day master. But for now, they remained beyond reach, his mana reserves were simply too small to sustain them.
With that in mind, Jermal knew he had to rely on his Medium Class spells to survive this. And he had to think fast.
The fire was closing in, the crackling walls of flame almost circling them completely. His mana had only just replenished enough for a single medium spell. One chance. No more.
During his brief training, Jermal had discovered that mana could bend the elements themselves, granting him partial control over their nature. Through trial and error, he'd found affinity with two in particular.
Fire and Darkness.
The rest: Water, Air, Earth, Ice, Light, Nature, Electricity, Space, and Time remained either unresponsive or far too unstable to manipulate. Fire and Darkness, however, bent easily to his will.
And since they were running from a firestorm, Fire was out of the question.
That left only Darkness.
That beam he had launched by accident during training had been made of pure mana: powerful, but devastatingly draining. What he needed now wasn't raw force. It was control. He had to use his Darkness.
Easier said than done. Jermal had barely a few minutes of practice. He didn't even know a fraction of what his powers could do.
The fire was almost upon them. Heat rolled across his skin, the air thick with ash. His tribe's frightened faces turned toward him. Waiting, desperate, helpless.
And then, an idea struck him.
A wall.