Outside the Imperial City.
The wasteland.
Ethan threw the fake Colin onto the ground.
The fake Colin rolled twice across the gravelly ground, his grayish-white face getting scraped with bloody streaks. He lay prone on the ground, his vertical pupils reflecting Ethan's downward-staring face.
“If you don't know the way, you die. Understood?”
The fake Colin nodded like a chicken pecking at grain. “I know the way, I know the way! Just go north for about a thousand kilometers.”
Before he could even finish speaking, Ethan grabbed him by the scruff of his neck.
Boom!
The gravelly ground beneath their feet exploded, forming a crater four to five meters in diameter.
Debris shot out in all directions, making muffled thudding sounds as it pelted the surrounding wild grass.
The dirt at the bottom of the crater was kicked up, revealing the grayish-white bedrock underneath.
The fake Colin felt the scenery before his eyes blur into streaks of color.
The wind pressure slammed into his face like a solid wall, distorting the flesh on his face.
Ethan dashed across the wilderness, carrying the fake Colin.
With every step he took, a shockwave exploded beneath his feet.
Dirt, gravel, and withered grass were blown away by the shockwaves, leaving a trail of widely spaced deep craters on the ground.
He was too fast—so fast that before the dust could even begin to settle in the craters behind him, he was already hundreds of meters away.
Suspended by the scruff of his neck, the fake Colin hung horizontally in midair.
His legs trailed behind him in a straight line, his shoes long since flown off to who-knows-where. He wanted to struggle, but the hand gripping his neck was like an iron vise, completely unyielding.
The surrounding landscape receded at a dizzying speed.
Ethan trampled right through a grove of low trees; trunks exploded down the middle, sending wood chips flying everywhere.
Ethan crossed a moderately wide stream in a single stride; before the splashes kicked up by his feet could land, he was already on the opposite bank.
A pack of wolves foraging in the night only felt a gale sweep over their heads; by the time they looked up, not even a shadow remained.
The fake Colin could not open his eyes against the wind.
A thousand kilometers.
This was a distance that would take an ordinary person half a year to walk.
It would take the fastest warhorse a month to run.
It would take those Great Knights, who prided themselves on their speed, more than ten days of sprinting at full power.
Under Ethan's feet, it was a journey of less than three hours.
Without saying a word, Ethan simply carried the fake Colin and bolted north.
The ground beneath them transitioned from wasteland to gravel shores, from gravel shores to dry riverbeds, and from riverbeds to low grasslands.
The moon shifted from the east to the west.
Ethan paused briefly atop a barren rocky mountain.
The stone beneath his feet cracked into several pieces, and loose rocks rolled down from the summit, clattering as they crashed into the scree at the mountain's base.
The fake Colin was casually tossed onto the ground, where he lay sprawled on the rocks, gasping for air.
His face had turned purple from the wind, his lips were chapped, and the light in his vertical pupils flickered unsteadily.
Ethan did not look at him.
He was looking north.
Under the cover of night, the vague outlines of undulating mountains could be seen on the northern horizon.
The silhouettes of those mountains were higher than any of the surrounding peaks. There was no vegetation on their summits—only bare, dark red rock.
As the moonlight shone upon them, the rocks looked as though they had been soaked in blood, emitting a dull red glow.
The Crimson Mountains.
The fake Colin scrambled up from the ground and followed Ethan's gaze. “That's the place. Our lair is inside the third peak, and the entrance is camouflaged. My lord, I've told you everything. Could you perhaps...”
Boom!
The mountain rock beneath his feet exploded.
Ethan leaped from the final low slope and landed at the foot of the third mountain peak.
The dark red gravel beneath his feet shot outward in all directions, clattering against the rock face.
A steep rock wall stood at the base of the mountain. Its surface looked identical to the surrounding terrain—dark red rock with rugged textures, showing no signs of anything unusual.
The fake Colin was casually tossed onto the ground, groaning from the impact. He squirmed on the ground like a worm for a moment before managing to pull himself up onto his knees. “My lord, it's this rock wall. I'll open the door.”
But just as he finished speaking, he realized something was wrong.
A dense mass of vines erupted from the ground. Each vine was as thick as an adult's arm, and their surfaces were covered in dark green thorns.
These vines lunged at the rock wall like living creatures, their thorns sinking deep into the crevices of the stone.
Boom!
The entire rock wall was violently torn away by the vines.
Debris shot in all directions, clattering against the surrounding rock walls.
Behind the rock wall, a deep, dark passage was revealed. Embedded in the stone walls on both sides of the passage were several fist-sized fluorescent stones, emitting a sickly green glow.
Startled cries echoed from deep within the passage.
Several men dressed in leather armor rushed out of stone chambers on either side of the corridor, clutching scimitars and short spears in their hands.
Countless vines burst from the cracks in the stone walls, completely filling the corridor in less than half a second.
Before the guards could even take three steps, they were entangled around their ankles, wrists, and waists by the vines.
The vines tightened.
The crisp sound of shattering bones echoed through the passage.
Before the guards could even scream, their bodies were squeezed into horribly twisted shapes.
Blood seeped through the gaps between the vines and trickled down the stone walls, gleaming a bizarre dark red under the sickly green light of the fluorescent stones.
Ethan walked forward, stepping over crushed bones and bloody mud.
The traps were crushed to pieces by the vines before they could even be triggered.
The crossbow traps mounted on the walls were wrapped by roots growing from the stone cracks, the twang of snapping strings echoing through the corridor.
Pitfalls on the ground were filled by thick roots, and the iron spikes at the bottom were bent flat.
The moment a hidden toxic gas mechanism opened a tiny crack, vines forced their way inside, crushing the entire device along with the guards behind it into fragments.
The guards' screams were cut short halfway.
More people kept rushing out of the stone chambers on both sides.
They brandished scimitars, short spears, and maces, shouting in a local dialect that Ethan could not understand.
Vines surged from every single crack in the stone walls, floor, and ceiling, wrapping around their ankles, wrists, and necks.
The crisp sounds of breaking bones rose and fell. Blood splattered against the stone walls, trickling down the sickly green fluorescent stones.
The center of the lair was a massive cavern hollowed out of the mountain's core.
Several head-sized fluorescent stones hung from the ceiling of the cavern, their sickly green light making the entire space look as though it were submerged underwater.
The stone walls were riddled with honeycomb-like alcoves, each stuffed with various objects.
Shriveled human heads, necklaces made of teeth strung together with animal sinew, and various jars and pots that Ethan did not care to identify.
In the very center stood a stone chair.
Sitting on the stone chair was a creature.
It had a blurry human face, its features resembling a kneaded lump of dough. Its mouth was askew on its left cheek, and its eyes were mismatched in size—the larger one bulging out of its socket, while the smaller one was deeply sunken into its skull.
Beneath its open leather armor, a patch of grayish-white skin was exposed, its surface covered in dense, suction-cup-like protrusions. With every breath it took, those suction cups contracted in unison, making faint, crackling clicking noises.
Starting from the shoulder, its left arm had turned into an octopus tentacle, the suction cups at its tip clinging tightly to the armrest of the stone chair.
Its right arm, on the other hand, looked as though it had been sliced from a ribbonfish—slender, flat, and with its five fingers fused together, ending in a row of fine bone spikes.
Behind it dragged a starfish-like tail, its five arms squirming slowly across the ground, leaving a wet trail of mucus with every movement.
Hanging from its waist were several ornaments made of sea urchin shells, their sharp spines glinting with a dark purple, cold light under the glow of the fluorescent stones.
Rate on N.U.
