Straw@hat publication; Chapter - 14 ; The devil's layer ::

Time passed by in no time it has already been above 4 months from the day Huo ling entered the forest.

"My battle sense and utilisation of my resources has grown by a large margin during the stay in the wild." He was thinking while Chasing a group of his targets.

He remembered how naive he was to get ambushed by these cunning devils from first day till around 2 and a half months.

Now then he became very vigilant and also gained a scouting celestial worm. From then onwards he never got ambushed.

" It makes me wonder if I got ambushed and almost died so many times to these devils, what if I have to face some intelligent organisation" These devils only had some intelligence when compared to humans but he was already in such a state.

" When I go back to the academy i will surely inspect my mistakes" his thinking was interrupted when he noticed the devils enter a cave.

Thr entrence was not that big and was therefore easy to miss in the forest.

" Oh , this seems to their home or something" he sneaked into the cave with his silent shadow activated.

The cave was dark so it was a little easier for him here. The silent shadow worm also could keep a person well hidden in darkness too, just the concealment was weaker than it provided in shadows.

" The concealment seems to weaken by a noticeable margin, but it should be enough as the environment is dark and little concealment can also work if i donot make a fuss" he beagan to inspect the cave.

It was a huge cave in from the inside by using his soul sense Celestial he scanned maximum of the outer area.

" It seems like a small fortress, there are cunning devils roaming like they are on patrol. Seems like there should be around 200 of them in the cave" he shuddered it was a large number and the strength of these bests seemed to multiply when they were in numbers due to their good co-ordination.

But soon his face turned into a smile " let me show you the disadvantages of not keeping candles in your home"

He approached a group and unleashed his sword. Very cleanly he activated his Swift gale celestial and his sword like butter cut through the necks of the five or so Devils in the group.

" I can be considered a master in these type of sneak attacks it seams" he laughed in his heart.

In the same manner he cleared his way to the inner part of the cave. He activated his soul sense Celestial and entered.

Huo lings eyes narrowed as he looked towards the centre of the area. It was little raised and a blur image of a devil was in his eyes.

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It was dark and he could not see it clearly , so he tried to get close to there passing through them very silently and carefully he came in the 10 feet of the centre.

Through his soul sense he had a very clear picture of the thing there. It was a cunning devil eating a lightning boar with a carefree attitude.

" This one seems different from the rest of them " Huo Ling frowned.

He had continuously followed these beasts and studied them with caution to make his hunt easier, so he could in the first sight tell that this one was different.

It was a little bigger than the rest of them and it's eyes looked very calm like some wise person. There was also a very erie aura it was giving.

But soon Huo lings jaw dropped to the ground and he very carefully went to his prior position.

The devil seemed to have sensed some change in the surrounding and was scaning the area with curious gaze.

" It actually sensed the soul fluctuations the soul sense grid produced. " his look was dark.

" It means only one thing that it's soul power is higher then mine and by a considerable margin at that" he was having a very complicated storm of emotions right now in his head and heart.

Why? Because if it's soul power was higher than a human it only meant one thing, that this devil had the clear clear worm on it, thinking so Huo ling was feeling very happy and excited.

But the problem was very difficult then he had imagined it to be. By experiencing it first hand Huo ling knew it was not easy to get this worm. This cave could very well be his grave.

" No ,i have worked so hard for this moment, and i was also on deaths door so many times to get this Celestial." But soon his thinking was abruptly stopped.

The Leader of the pack had locked his eyes in Huo ling's direction and an evil smile could be seen on its face.

Soon Huo ling with his soul sense noticed 5 devils sneaking on him from behind.

His stealth was busted, Huo ling laughed loudly and deactivated his Silent shadow then he turned backwards and dodged a little to his left and with his sword dealt with the attacking devil.

"Damn it , in such a scenario I will be surrounded and dead in no time" he frowned and looked around.

Soon he sensed other devils were closing on him. So he gave up fighting and activated his Swift Gale celestial to escape from the dangerous situation .

He then ran towards the entrence of the cave and stoped.

" The entrance will not allow many of them to pass at a time and i wll not be surrounded by them too " he looked at the chasers and brandished his sword soon a very tiresome battle broke out.

"It is atleast two times more difficult to deal with these beasts this time, the book was right if a worm holding devil is leading these beasts it becomes too troubling to deal with them" he was breathing heavily his celestial essence was leaving his body very rapidly.

A devil jumped off from the back of another and while Huo ling was busy dealing with two devils in front of him, it managed to injure his left arm.

Huo ling gritted his teeth swallowing the pain , " this is for the 10th time now " he pushed back the other two devils and swinged towards the attacker but it dodged and ran into the group.

Huo ling was covered in heavy injuries and running out of all his strength, but in the process he also had manged to kill a lot of the beasts, if his guess was correct there were only 50 or so left now.

" If not for this advantage due to the cave entrence I would have died a thousand times till now" he now understood why people didn't want to get this Celestial worm despite its massive advantage.

It was too difficult to find, it took nearly four and half a month of deadly battles and massacre to find one and now that he had found one, he could not guarantee that he would be left alive to collect it.

"Finally got rid of these trash " he had a sigh of relief as the devils were not comming out now. " Seems like they got the point that it is worthless to attack as I have a huge advantage, here at the entrance.

He sat to recover his essence and wounds. He opened a little bottle from his little hanging pouch.

" Thank heavens, I collected some of the liquid essence for emergency times before absorbing it all." He was so happy that he took that decision.

It was not much but it could get him near his peak condition in terms of essence.

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