Chapter 45: Pursuit

The spirit wolf changed its route. Leon noticed it when the tracks ahead suddenly vanished, prompting him to pull gently on the reins to slow his mount as the others followed behind him.

"Lost it?" Maya asked, scanning the white expanse.

Lyra shook her head. "Not yet."

She dismounted and crouched beside the frozen snow. The wolf's tracks continued for another dozen meters before abruptly turning around; the creature had doubled back. Leon studied the erratic trail they had followed and realized the tactic. The wolf had stepped directly into its own footprints for several dozen meters, then veered away at a sharp angle. From a distance, it would look like a single trail continuing in the opposite direction.

"It knows we're tracking it," Lyra said, standing back up. "More importantly, it's learning how."

Leon glanced toward the distant white horizon. "So we're making it smarter."

"That's why I told you not to rush it."

Leon smiled faintly, remounting his beast. "Noted."

He looked down at the snow beneath his feet, calculating a new logistical obstacle. The snow was getting deeper, which meant their movement metrics were declining. Leon released a fine thread of Qi toward the sole of his boot, but instead of pushing against the ground like a standard strike, he tried a different application: pull.

The Qi clung firmly to the surface. He lifted his foot, and the boot stayed attached to the frozen snow for a brief moment before slipping free. Leon stared at the imprint. He tried again, adjusting the output to spread the Qi evenly across the bottom of his boot instead of concentrating it in a single point. His foot remained attached, and when he shifted his weight, the Qi held.

Leon took another step, then another. Maya stared at his gait. "Are you walking differently?"

"I'm experimenting."

"With walking?"

"Walking is useful."

Adrian looked closely at the snow beneath Leon's feet, his analytical mind catching the trick. "You're making the Qi stick."

"Basically," Leon took another step, then deliberately shifted his foot sideways to test the friction. The pull remained. "If I can balance the output properly, I should be able to use it like a magnetic force. Climbing walls would be easy."

"Easy?" Adrian raised an eyebrow.

"Eventually." Leon looked toward a frozen cliff in the distance. "And if the force can be distributed continuously, I could do much more..."

Maya followed his gaze. "You could walk on water?"

"I guess?"

Lyra glanced back at him, her silver feather bristling slightly. "Please don't test that here."

"I wasn't going to," Leon paused, his amber eyes glinting. "...Probably."

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Lyra let out an exhausted sigh.

---

They continued forward, and the terrain changed drastically within the next hour. The flat, frozen plain gradually gave way to a fractured landscape of black stone and heavy drifts. Jagged cliffs rose from the ground like broken teeth, their surfaces coated with thick layers of frost where some had split cleanly down the middle to leave narrow passages between the stone. The wolf had chosen the worst possible route—or perhaps the best possible route for its own survival.

They eventually reached a frozen river cutting directly through the cliffs, its surface stretching into the distance beneath a layer of opaque blue ice. The spirit wolf had crossed it, but there were no tracks left behind.

Leon looked toward the opposite bank, his Sage Eyes scanning the ice. "How?"

Lyra pointed toward the far side. There, a faint scratch marked one of the exposed rocks near the river's edge. The wolf had avoided the soft snow entirely, crossing over the frozen rocks where its paws would leave almost nothing behind.

"That's annoying," Adrian muttered.

"It's supposed to be," Lyra said.

She reached into her storage pouch, and for once, her expression became entirely serious. She withdrew a small black disk no larger than her palm. Fine silver lines covered its surface, forming intricate concentric patterns that shifted fluidly whenever she tilted it. Leon recognized the craftsmanship immediately.

"This is a divination tool?"

"Tracking divination," she touched the center, and the silver lines began moving in rhythmic loops. "It's called the Pursuer's Eye."

Maya raised an eyebrow. "Sounds expensive."

"It is."

"How expensive?"

Lyra gave her a flat look. "Expensive enough that I'm not telling you."

The disk pulsed with a soft glow, and a faint thread of light appeared across its surface. Lyra smiled. "The more we pursue something, the better it becomes at recognizing its trail."

Leon looked at the device, analyzing the logic. "So the longer we chase it..."

"The easier it becomes to chase."

"That's ridiculous."

"It's also why very few people can afford one," Lyra noted. The disk flickered, and she followed the thread of light toward the river. "The wolf may erase its tracks, cross terrain without leaving footprints, double back, and change its route. But it can't erase the fact that we're actively pursuing it."

Leon looked at the device again. "That's a terrifyingly useful artifact."

"I had to work very hard to get it," Lyra admitted, stepping onto the frozen river. "It also has the downside of being expensive to operate and needing long cooldown periods when used."

They crossed the blue ice carefully, and on the other side, the cliffs became steeper. The path narrowed until the mounts had to move in a single file line. Leon occasionally used his newly developed Qi adhesion to stabilize his balance whenever loose stones shifted beneath his boots. It worked better with every attempt, but he still wasn't entirely satisfied; the technique wasn't simply sticking, as he could feel the Qi actively pulling against the surface in a controlled attraction. If he learned to reverse it... He filed the thought away, focusing back on the target. The wolf mattered more.

---

They climbed through the broken cliffs and eventually emerged onto another frozen plateau. Suddenly, Lyra stopped her mount, and Leon nearly walked straight into her.

"What?"

She raised the Pursuer's Eye, where the silver lines were moving significantly faster now. Then, the patterns all shifted toward the exact same direction. Lyra's expression changed. "The trail is getting stronger."

"Because we're getting closer?"

"Maybe," she looked toward the horizon.

A faint disturbance shimmered beyond the snow, barely visible. It looked almost like a heat haze warping against a frozen world. Leon stared at it, his eyes narrowing as his hyper-intuition ran the data. The wolf wasn't just running away from them; it was actively heading there.

"How far?"

Lyra studied the artifact. "Closer than before."

Leon looked back at the distant distortion. The spirit wolf had spent nearly two days exhausting its own Qi reserves just to reach that specific place. Whatever was waiting there, it mattered enough for the creature to risk everything.

He tightened his grip on the reins. "Then we keep following."

The wolf's tracks disappeared again beyond the plateau, but this time, none of them needed to wonder which direction it had taken. Despite the detours, at the end of the day they were almost at their destination; the final stretch of the journey had officially arrived.