The start of the journey was simple as it was just a straight path leading to the mountains. However, once they entered the boundary of the sacred mountain, the environment became tense. Aile and his team immediately took a V formation. One was leading, followed by Aile and Two at the end was Three and Four. Aile looked to the side at about 2 km away and saw Hazel.
Likewise, Hazel divided her people into 7 units. Each unit consisted of 3 close combat people at the lead and 2 long-range behind. They too created a V formation. However, theirs was at a much larger scale, and each position consisted of units and spaced apart. Hazel was at the lead.
She had made her most trusted people the lead of each unit. She told them to delay and fight slowly with the excuse that she did not want them to be weakened in front of the enemy later on. They all agreed as Hazel was the leader and no one wanted to get in her wrong side.
Aile's goal, on the contrary to others, was to find a beast early on. These beasts would be weak, and as a team, they can make harmless mistakes delaying the process of killing it. He had his eyes close, and his senses expanded to 5 km around him to find a beast.
Soon, Aile opened his eyes made a slight adjustment to the mount towards it. Everyone else did the same. After 2 minutes, in front of them was a giant lizard. It had dark blue scales and red eyes. The surrounding around it had a green bubbly substance that had burned the vegetation. It was clearly poisonous.
The eyes of the lizard met Aile's and his team, giving them a warning not to come close. But Aile, of course, ignored it, as it was a tricky beast perfect for this occasion. This is because anyone that was not used to it did not know its weakness, as it was the soft skin under his stomach. With short leg, it made the ground protect its belly, and unlikely for anyone to hit it there due to his body type.
The experts could take about half an hour to kill it once they knew of its weakness. However, if you do not know it's weakness, it can take a very long time.
It was a bit rare, so not everyone has experienced fighting them, giving them a perfect excuse to delay here.
Aile, who was left-handed, took his blade on his right hand started to swing. He had practised with his right hand, but he needed more experience. Therefore, Aile used this opportunity to train.
Ching
Klang
His sword kept on hitting the tough skin of the lizard, and Aile used barely enough strength to hurt it. Aile was also trying to infuse light element into his attacks just to see how he can effectively practice it.
One, Two, Three and Four would join in to interrupt the lizard's attacks, making it so that it could not spray poison at them.
Aile had been practising with the ancient scroll about the Fundamentals of Blade, and he could even do the First Moon Slash of the second old scroll.
He had not asked Emily where she got this from as it was a great technique and could not even easily be improved by the Heavenly Book of Myriad Stars.
The fight continued on, and the group of 5 clumsily fought with the lizard. Not far away, Aile noticed that one of Hazel's units was also fighting another beast. He smiled, seeing that everything was going as planned. He continued to waste time-fighting the lizard.
After about 13 groups passed Aile, the group that consisted of Arnold White, the assassin, the other person that Aile could not gauge his strength, reached Aile's location. They were together with Hunter, Marcus, Ellie and Violet's group. To Aile's surprise, they actually came to him.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
The powerful old person next to Arnold White moved quickly and arrived in front of the lizard with a quick movement of his hand he made the lizard flip.
The lizard was weak by now, and so it flipped without any resistance, and with a slash, it died. Aile realized the person appeared to be at least a 5th stage cultivator. From the minimum action in his attacks, Aile could assume he was most likely a 6th stage cultivator.
The lizard died, One was angry for their interference before he could say anything Aile said, "Thank you for the help, young master of White Clan, and the great expert."
The older person nodded.
Arnold was rejoicing and looked at Ellie and Violet to see their expression. Only to be disappointed as they were talking with each other completely ignoring him. Seeing this, Aile knew that Arnold was a praise seeker and he could use this as an opportunity.
Aile realized how easy it was to handle this leader of White Clan's forces, so he said, "Young master thank you, we were tired from fighting it and you helped us just when we needed it. I will let our boss know of the young master's generosity."
"Oh, no problem, I enjoy helping our allies."
"That is very admirable."
Arnold was happy to hear the praise and prompted Aile to keep on praising as he hoped to get appreciation from Ellie and Violet. Aile continued to praise as everyone almost rolled their eyes multiple times.
How could Arnold lose the opportunity to keep someone that praised him in front of Ellie and Violet? He immediately invited Aile along with his team to join them.
Aile agreed, and he had reached his goal. Aile was worried about Ellie and how she would fare, Marcus was not reliable enough to protect her. He also wanted to get information out of Arnold about Duke White, if possible. The problem was the strong cultivator with him would possibly stop him from revealing too much. Therefore it would be ideal to talk if they are ever separated.
Like this, the group continued, and Aile would dish out a few compliments inflating Arnold's ego from time to time. On the way, as they saw group after group that were fighting beasts, no one asked for help either as Aile's group was following Arnold. Thus, Aile also benefited from this.
The only issue was they were moving slowly due to Arnold. Ellie and Violet were also having some difficulty keeping up as they had lower cultivation at the 3rd level.
Aile and his team had no problem, as they were trained in many conditions and they had undergone harsh training by Aile. Hence their physical fitness level was very high. Slowly like a breeze, they went ahead, and on the way, Aile saw many strong beasts that would have made them waste a lot of energy if he and his group fought them. Now he did not need to, as others were keeping them busy, of course, presently they still would be one of the first people to reach the mountain. Soon they overtook everyone.
They reached a valley both sides of the valley were coloured beautiful blood red. The mountains were not red in colours, but due to small red flowers that grew everywhere, they gave the illusion of a giant bloody wave. Up ahead, Aile noticed 2 beasts concealing themselves as he had kept his sense on high alert.
One was 1 km away, and the other which seemed stronger was about 3 km away.
By now, their group had entered the forefront of everyone. The mountain that the needed to reach was just after the red valley. Thus everyone had let down their defence in anticipation of the riches up front. Aile distanced himself close to Ellie as she was the priority, he could not face Diana again if she was hurt, and he slowly gestured One to be on guard.
Aile wanted to use this opportunity to test the old man next to Arnold.
To Aile if Marcus, Hunter or that person interfered it would be great as he will know more about their fighting method making him more prepared to face Duke White in the future.
Step by step they were closer to the beast, the person closest to it was the assassin that followed Arnold, for some reason he had been quiet throughout the journey. Then it was Arnold and the old person followed by Aile and his group. Behind them was Ellie and Violet and at the very end was Hunter and Marcus.
Aile started talking with Four and randomly moved in a location close to Ellie. These beast do not always attack the front. Especially if a strong cultivator is there. As he was concerned about Ellie, he moved back, and he was close enough to protect her.
Aile was talking about their journey so far with Four. He was also counting down the steps to the beast in his mind.
"30"
"29"
"..."
"3"
"2"
"1"
A few more seconds passed then there was a roar.
rewwwweew