Chapter 18 - Nether Devouring Flower (6)
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The trees that are supposed to be exuberant and ebullient, were now exanimated. The supposedly greeneries that the birds flew over were now colored gray and ash.
Bai Fuah was also looking at the scene ahead. His mouth is agape for some time now.
He had already suspected since earlier after some skillful deductions, that there must be something going on in this forest, and it seems he must have been right, somehow.
As he was thinking things, Arthur had already walked a few steps over this death-scented forest.
'I'm going to personally beat the fuck out of this little brother.'
After contemplating for quite a while, he decided to let Arthur be. The reason why the mayor sent Arthur here was to train. Stopping him now is wrangling. As long as no danger that he couldn't handle appear, he would continue to protect Arthur. He is, after all, a genius the city had never seen.
Surprisingly, there hadn't been any particular sensation crept over Arthur after stepping on this gray colored trees part of the forest. Which he was rather feeling subtle about, earlier, he faintly surmised that something ominous might happen if he walked a step on this part of the forest.
However, it seems that he might be overthinking things. He quickly scoured through the memories in his sea of consciousness, there might be something that is related to this strange occurrence that will be useful to him. Yet, his efforts were useless in the end. The Item Spirit has indeed only granted him specific cultivation techniques and the grandmaster's proficiency in some of the auxiliary jobs. He was not surprised, they only met by chance in the first place, the Item Spirit paying Arthur back more than what he has lost is already a gargantuan favor, although he is greedy, he is not greedy to that extent. (Author's Note: If you somehow forgot, auxiliary jobs are alchemy, inscriptions, and arrays... etc.)
Speaking of favor, Arthur was supposed to pay the Item Spirit back by getting strong enough to kill his... or rather, the owner of the Item Spirit's mortal enemy, Great Empyrean Abyss. The scenes that he saw in his "dream" after the Item Spirit vanished and after officially entering the first stage of the Body Strengthening Realm reappeared in Arthur's mind...
A figure hiding behind a tree was still watching Arthur closely, he still remained on the same spot when Arthur was still in the lush part of the forest. Suddenly, he saw Arthur halt his movements and seemed to be in deep thought while maintaining his standing position. But upon a closer look, Bai Fuah was astonished to see that his eyes were even closed.
'Seriously, this little brother...'
Bai Fuah was now starting to have doubts about Arthur, the place they are currently in can be considered a danger zone, an extremely dangerous zone with little to no information on it. And this thirteen-year-old younger brother of him is dozing off in the middle of it.
After a few minutes, Arthur finally started to have some movements and walked forward.
The trees and flowers that he passed by all have the same characteristics, dead and gray. Not a single living thing could be seen as he trudged slightly due to irritation.
Not long after he walked a few steps, he faintly sensed something baleful up ahead. The grayness of the trees around him can also be visibly seen to have been darker in contrast. The wood even had a few small cracks on it.
He immediately slowed down his pace and increased his vigilance. Originally, he was to survey the area around the farm land and gather information about those Green-scaled lizard beasts, so he did not bring his borrowed sword with him. Only a small low-grade Mortal-rank dagger is in his possession, it was given to him by his father, Jiu Vermillion, as a gift when he was little, which is currently on his back with his right hand strongly gripping the hilt.
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At this moment, the scent of blood quickly entered his nose. It was strong enough to the point where a mortal would just faint on the spot if they ever encounter such a strong scent of blood.
His speed has even become noticeably slower by this. He slowly unsheathed his dagger. It was rather bigger than the common dagger, and it wasn't something to marvel at. The only thing that makes it stand out from the rest is the marking above the hilt, which is a crimson flame that resembles a Vermillion Bird.
Not much time had passed, but the scent of blood grew even stronger in comparison to before. And the source of this scent made Arthur a bit unsteady...
Countless corpses of dead beasts lay scattered all around this area. Some even had their limbs separated from them, while some had parts of their bodies devoured. The dark gray color of the dirt and trees accented the scene of this massacre with blood spurted all over. It was something that a famous grandmaster sadist painter would make, beautiful yet disgusting.
As for Arthur who was seeing this up close, he only felt a bit uncomfortable by the strong scent of death. He carefully walked past the corpses of these beasts, slowly becoming closer to the baleful aura that he faintly sensed.
However, at this moment, one of these "corpse" hand suddenly grabbed Arthur by his left foot. He quickly reacted and sent that beast a powerful kick. He then moved his right hand holding the dagger above him to gather momentum and furiously slashed at the beast's wrist.
"Pa!"
Its hand came plopping on the ground. Arthur steadily scanned his surroundings, after confirming that there were no more beasts that were alive, he carefully plodded once again.
It was a relief that the beast who clung on to his feet was already on his last breath. If his guess wasn't wrong, then that beast's former strength is equal to an Altering Bones Stage cultivator! That is a whole two stage above him. If it wasn't for it having been half-step onto the grave, Arthur wouldn't even have the chance to say his last words. At the same time, numerous questions popped into his head. The corpses of the beasts here must have died not too long before he arrived here, it could be proven by the fact that one of them still had the strength to move its hand. Also, since he was very close to the corpses, he could see that their wounds were not caused by humans at all, it looked more like they were caused by their fellow beasts themselves.
However, this almost never happens since beasts are somewhat similar to humans. Since they can cultivate, they also have a tiny intelligence even if its only minuscule. They would not unnecessarily attack their own for no reason unless someone provoked them or they are running out of food and must cannibalize. Arthur felt that the former wasn't really the case, the latter seems highly probable, but if that were the reason, then he would have wasted a trip here. However, Arthur's inference is telling him that something greater is happening here than some mere cannibalism.
The baleful aura that Arthur has been sensing became even stronger with every step he took. He was not sure why he was feeling this aura, but he did so now, he is still currently following it.
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