Chapter 401: Encounter 1
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
As he sat on the white rhino, Garen intermittently recalled memories from Iron Tank City, and there was an inexplicable emotion within his heart.
He’d thought that Goth would keep blaming him, angry at him. That the two of them would possibly remain at this state of misunderstanding. Who would’ve known….
From the announcement, he can see that Goth still held grudges towards him, but carried a similarly complicated emotion.
"Team Leader. There’s something that awaits your decision." Old Man slowed down at the front, and as Garen closed the distance between them, he held out a map, a soil-colored yellow scroll.
Garen took it from him and listened.
"We picked two routes on the map which were safer, but we couldn’t decide on which route to take. Both routes has its pros and cons." Old Man explained. "Please have a look."
Garen nodded, then opened up and scanned the map.
On the map, there was a winding mountain range from the middle leading to the top of the map, as though a black centipede had laid down upon the paper. The route they were currently taking was the way along the mountain range.
Two red lines clearly illustrated the two possible routes.
The destination of both routes was Kovitan Kingdom, but the one on the left was winding, it was significantly longer with a detour. Plus, there were many markings of sightings of strong creatures.
The route on the right was more straightforward, but they would have to go through three troublesome locations.
Garen frowned slightly.
"How long would the shorter route take?"
"Assuming that we do not stop, it will take about 7 days." Old man continued. "The troublesome sections have been marked out. Of course, there will be hordes of weaker creatures, but as there’s no markings, it is safe to ignore.
Garen nodded.
"The longer route will require us to brave through 4 clusters of at least form 3 monsters’ territories, and we may not necessarily be able to avoid confrontations. Some of them are more troublesome, the terrains are also more complex, and the swamps are not ideal for the white rhinos’ movement. We should choose the shorter route."
"But the shorter route passes by Blood Queen’s territory…" Kitten interrupted, and the remaining members shuddered. Except Red Umbrella, who was asleep on his white rhino’s back.
"Blood Queen Earnest? What’s the issue?" Garen raised his brows in confusion.
"One of the members of Secret Service caused a huge amount of losses in her territory Avision City, and now both sides are in a tense situation. Queen Earnest herself has Daniela’s support, and there are also strong subordinates under her wings. There was an announcement about a month ago which states that members of the Secret Services are all unwelcome in the city.
Garen was slightly shocked.
"Does the Secret Service have such a strong member? To be able to wreck havoc at Avision City?" Garen was interested
"Who would've known, that person from the Green team, who really wasn’t eye-catching by any means, actually could cause such a huge loss." Old Man forced a smile.
"What kind of losses?" Garen got more curious.
Old Man shook his head. "He absorbed the Blood Queen’s blood essence. It was an accident that nobody anticipated."
"Blood essence?" Garen was stunned. As one of the Three Heroes, even though she was not abnormally strong; probably on Goth’s level,she was not a character that one should offend. Blood essence was a form of essence gem that was extracted from her flesh and blood. This was the core of her largest tactics within Avision City, there were only four of them present in the entire city, and they powered all the tactical arrays.
An ordinary totem user would melt instantaneously as soon as they approached the blood essence, let alone absorb it. Who would have known that it would have been absorbed by some outsider totem user.
Old Man shook his head slightly.
"Now the Secret Service is in an awkward situation with Avision City. At times like this, It is best that a totem user of your calibre maintain your distance from Avision City to avoid any further conflicts."
"What about that person? That fella from Green Team?" Garen was more interested in that man than the tense situation. To be able to do what others could not, he must be special.
"Still hiding in Avision City. With the entire Avision City out for his blood, trying to capture him. It’s also hard for us in the Secret Service to step forward. After all, we were at fault for absorbing their important resource."
"Then let’s take the short route, just so I can see what this Blood Queen is like." Garen laughed. "Spread this news through the communication device. If that person is smart, he’ll take this opportunity to leave Avision City."
"Um...alright." Old Man grimaced.
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Two days later…..
The sky was ashen and heavy with mist.
Yellow weeds waved gently in the breeze upon the pale yellow plantation soil. Surrounding the area was a ring of shrubs.
Those murky yellow shrubs grew in uneven patches, but among them was a green passage..
Broken fences littered the area about the passage, the surface of the passage was covered in dense layers of leaves and moss.
Upon the passage were five greyish-white rhinos slowly marching forward. These rhinos were about three metres high, their bodies were round and huge, and every step they took was very stable. They could barely move along the passage, and sometimes they would bump into the fences on the side.
On the thick skins of the rhinos were concealed scars, giving them a rugged appearance.
There were even a bunch of oddly-dressed people riding on their backs. As they were donning black armors and hoods, their faces were hard to see. The exception was the golden iris embedded on their necklines.
Evidently, they were members of the Royal Alliance.
Deep within the plantation field, several pairs of white eyes were observing the passing rhinos, while carefully gauging the auras of the humans on the rhinos’ backs.
Woooo.....
A deep howl like a dog’s howl was heard from both sides of the plantation.
The rhinos started feeling alarmed and refused to move forward.
Suddenly, white shadows lunged from both sides of the passage; there were no sounds, just the light rustling of the weeds as they were brushed aside.
Most of them were rushing towards the white rhinos, while some of them targeted the people on top of the rhinos’ backs.
"Let me do it!" A girl’s voice was heard from the top of the rhino’s back. "I was looking for some potential points to upgrade my equipment!" he voice was clear, and a red ray flashed as she swung her hand.
Bam!
A giant red tiger was formed midair, with a long, whip-like tail fiercely sweeping.
Bang bang bang!!...
After a series of impact noises, large amounts of white shadows were battered back into the plantations. They tumbled upon the ground several times and no longer moved.
The group then saw the true identity of those white shadows; they were all white stray dogs, except they had two tails instead of one, which was odd.
"That’s the Dual-tailed White Dog, just a Form 1 monster pack." a man on top of the Rhino’s back said calmly, it was Old Man’s voice. "But they usually inhabit areas near the Red Unihorn Lizards. Everybody be more aware."
"Check me out!" Kitten commanded the giant red tiger to start killing recklessly around the plantation, with each swipe and lunge killing off two or three white dogs.
After a while, endless whines were heard as the scent of blood spread across. The pack that originally rushed towards the rhinos were now scrambling away.
"This dual-tailed white dogs have excellent breeding capabilities and are able to give birth to more than ten pups in a month. It’s also the reason why they are almost always in state of starvation and are constantly on the hunt for food." Old Man explained. "Coincidentally, they make great prey for higher leveled, evolved creatures too."
Before he’d finished speaking, the sky was suddenly abuzz with a horde of red unihorn lizards flying over them.
They had a black unihorn and red bat wings; much like a winged version of a lizard. These lizards were making some odd sounds as they flapped their wings towards the group. Behind them was a large white bat.
"Is that a white bat?" a man looked up from the back of a rhino in the middle of the formation. A sliver of golden hair was visible from the hood, the man had three scarlet markings between his brows, which look like a birthmark.
This person was actually Garen, who was rushing towards Kovitan Kingdom.
Watching the white bat swinging its chains as it rushed at him, Garen couldn’t help but recall the early days of Iron Tank City, where he first met a white bat. At that time he’d been extremely weak and had to resort to fight tactics just to go up against a white bat. But now…
Roar!!
The Giant red tiger roared in fury as it leaped upwards powerfully and pounced onto the bat. Its limbs had ignited in crimson flames, and as its mouth opened wide, a fireball was fired.
Bam!
The sky turned into a sea of fiery explosions, and the bat disappeared into a giant fireball, dyeing its surroundings red.
"Yay!!" Kitten happily withdrew Red TIger, and surveyed at the messy battlefield. " Successfully cleared!" She puffed out her chest and sneakily glanced at Red Umbrella, but noticing that he was fast asleep, so she pouted.
"Let’s go." Garen said coldly.
Kitten then obediently shut up and continued the journey.
After that time where she was frightened by Garen, she didn’t dare cause a ruckus in front of him anymore. She could clearly feel that Garen at that point of time had seriously been planning to kill her. It was unlike any other enemy that she’d faced before, where they would have second thoughts due to her attractive appearance and body figure, which would allow her more time to drag it out. But with Garen, she felt that he was looking at her like a corpse, and with just a single misstep, nobody would be able to stop him from killing her. The others may not have realized it, but she’d felt it. Even Red Umbrella, who was most sensitive to killing intent, thought of it as a joke. Kitten had almost wetted herself at that time.
She truly didn’t misunderstand that feeling. Garen at that time was really thinking about killing her, and had she been unaware of the affairs, Garen would have better control on the team after removing the "volatile" parts of the team. She did not expect this man to be so capricious.
The six rhinos continued walking past the plantation after a moment of settling and calming them.
After an unknown period of time, the fields in front slowly changed to golden-yellow, as though the harvest season of autumn was coming; golden wheat fields surrounded the passage.
"So pretty…" Kid beside him couldn’t help but comment. He gazed at the sky on his left, as though there was something even more mesmerizing there.
The group looked towards the direction in which he gazed but there was only a layer of grey clouds in the sky, nothing else.
"And so it’s happened again…." Kitten pouted as she lowered her head, continued playing with her toy which looked like a rubik's cube.
Fox also lowered his head to continue reading
Old man shook his head, and went back to sleep like Red Umbrella.
Only Garen, curiously studying Kid, realized that he was incomparably innocent.
He looked up to the sky, there was indeed nothing there.
He then shuddered suddenly.
An odd situation happened.
Garen actually noticed a little hint of gold in Kid’s eyes.
His heart shivered. The sky was still covered in dense layers of clouds and there were no sun to be seen,where did he see the golden thing?
A sudden thought flashed through his mind.
He recalled that he’d received an augmentation tactic previously, which was the war shackle he received when he joined the war guild: Eye of Isaiah.
The Eye of Isaiah was activated through his thoughts.
As he gazed towards the sky again, a blurry gold image faintly appeared from within the clouds.
Garen’s heart skipped a beat, and he looked closer after suppressing his surprise. With his current improved vision, he couldn’t see any clearly, but he could roughly make out a golden, human silhouette.