R-a - Volume 3 - Chapter 30

R-a - Chapter 188 (Live in editing-v2)

‘Whelp, this isn’t good.’ Two and a half hours later and Micheal’s optimism had waned considerably.

Their Guide had led them well thus far, avoiding too many encounters with Magic Beasts. They’d only spotted two Magic Beasts throughout their journey through the depths of the Dragon Mountains.

The first one was a Mid-Tier Magic Beast, a White-Stone Raptor. They had been sneaking through the middle of a deep valley when the lean, only 2-meter tall monster appeared in front of them.

The raptor looked much like a velociraptor from Micheal’s home planet of Earth, though one without any feathers. It was covered in small white scales, with a large, hooked claw on each foot. Unlike normal raptors, this one was incredibly muscular, giving off a sense of raw, untethered strength.

And, at this time, the creature had paused, frozen as it stared at Micheal and his motley crew. Tension rose in the moment as the two parties looked at each other, sizing the other up.

The raptor was a Mid-Tier Magic Beast, not a Low-Tier one, though only barely. That meant that it had the raw strength, at the bare minimum, of an average Second Rate Warrior.

On its own, it wasn’t an extremely dangerous Magic Beast to Micheal. Micheal was confident he could take it on using his glove and metal threads, if nothing else, even if it was stronger and faster than him. In fact, even if their entire group worked together without him, they would stand a chance at defeating it, though they’d likely suffer several casualties.

It was a Mid-Tier beast, but its main strength lay in its speed and versatility. The Byrens here were all experienced warriors that would gang up on it as one, forcing it to suffer multiple attackers.

However, combat would make noise, and noise would draw attention. They had, thus far, managed to avoid attracting any attention in their journey. A battle now would throw in many uncontrollable variables.

As soon as the creature crossed their path, Micheal had begun to prepare for the worst. His entire body had tensed up as he zeroed in on the Mid-Tier Magic Beast, ready to jump into action at the drop of a hat.

Thankfully, though, the reason he had hired a Guide proved its worth instead.

“Scatter! Flee! Off with you!” A voice broke the tension of the moment, full of powerful intent. While the speaker wasn’t yelling, they were speaking with conviction, just loud enough for everyone within 30 or so meters to hear clearly.

The Guide was standing confidently, his arms outstretched and his chest puffed. As he spoke, the plain mask he wore began to glow with white light, shining softly in the afternoon air.

The White-Stone Raptor looked at the guide curiously for a few seconds, its body crouching as it prepared to launch itself. It was a very keen beast and could sense that no one here was stronger than it, purely in terms of physical power. In the animal world, physical strength and mass were two of the biggest factors in most fights.

However… as soon as the mask began to shine, the raptor froze.

Its entire body began to shake as it stared at the Guide’s mask. Slowly, it began to creep backwards, its eyes never leaving the plain visage on the warrior’s face. It kept its head down, its shoulders slouched, doing everything it could to project that it wasn’t a threat.

Only when it was completely out of sight did Micheal hear its frantic scampering as the Magic Beast fled in terror.

The Guide took this in stride as he turned back and made sure everyone was still alright. He called for a brief break to let everyone calm down before they moved on, his manner quick and practiced.

Micheal nodded in appreciation.

Guyren Masks. That was the name of the unique Artifact every Guide was assigned to wear. These Artifacts were strange ones, unique tools that were bonded to the Soul of each Guide. In order to deepen that bond, Guides wore them at almost all times, doing their best to increase their control over the mask.

Guyren Masks were named after an infamous ‘Demon’ named Guyren Shalgo. Guyren wasn’t actually a Demon, an actual species of creatures, but instead a fallen Toren that had left behind remnants of several experiments.

A majority of those experiments had to do with the psychological aspect of the concept of fear. How to inflict it upon others, how to resist it, and so on. These Guyren Masks were able to emanate a feeling of raw terror that would spread to any sufficiently powerful Magic Beast.

When confronted with such feelings, ones that seemed to arise naturally, any Magic Beast’s first instinct would be to flee. In the wild, there was no such thing as honor, only survival. Unless a Magic Beast understood the intricacies of each Guyren Mask, they would never be able to resist it.

When traveling through the Tansol Pass, you would be considered lucky if you only encountered half a dozen Mid-Tier Magic Beasts over the full, 6-hour-trip. If you didn’t have a Guide armed with a Guyren Mask, you would have to fight for your life against each Magic Beast, drawing attention and potentially even more enemies to yourself with each battle.

The White-Stone Raptor was well and truly gone, leaving them free to travel without issue.

It was only after that incident that Micheal’s worries began to grow.

For, as they were in the middle of traversing through a sparse forest on the side of a grand mountain…

His necklace had begun to hum.

This humming noise was audible only to him, carried on energy-filled wavelengths that connected to his Soul. The noise was noticeable, but only barely, and wasn’t something that would annoy him.

What that noise represented, however, made his heart go cold.

When people used an Ability, or any type of Spell, Magic, Ritual, or some other mystical way to search for him, they would automatically run into the Aura Nullification Necklace he wore.

This Artifact essentially scrambled his location, energy signature, and Soul resonance, making it flatly impossible to track him down. Given the plethora of ways that people could track other people that Micheal knew of, he wore this necklace with him at all times, under almost all circumstances.

Normally, he wouldn’t be able to sense much, if any, of their inference. His Artifact did a splendid job at what it did, a one-trick pony that reigned near the top.

However… when a being that was significantly more powerful than he was, or someone using a legendary Artifact of unparalleled strength, tried to look for him, his necklace would undergo a certain level of stress.

This transformed into a level of pressure that was transmitted to him, straining his Soul and warning him with a ‘humming’ noise.

Micheal’s Soul, at the moment, was his strongest Aspect. As a result, he could easily handle the increased strain without breaking a sweat. The Aura Nullification Necklace was something formed from the Shop and was extremely well made. There was no chance it would shatter or stop functioning.

Even with all of that said, though, it still meant that, common things being more common, an extremely powerful being was looking for him here on the Second Layer.

‘Who could it be? Did I anger the Divine Might Sect, somehow?’ Micheal’s first thoughts jumped to the territory he had just left. He immediately discarded this, however, unable to come up with any plausible scenario that made sense.

Even if one of the higher-ups in the Sect became aware that he was a human… so what? Why would they care about him? He hadn’t exactly done anything, publicly, that would make him stand out.

The only thing he could think of had to be Yvvtal’s Inheritance. He narrowed the subject down to that, the only truly significant thing he had done here. He didn’t believe this would be a random coincidence, it most likely had to do with something he had done recently.

Unfortunately, that was all he could determine. Without more information, he was left unable to figure out anything else.

Micheal had kept moving with the group, but kept his attention zeroed in on maximum alert. His Artifact necklace hummed off and on with only small breaks, meaning whatever being was looking for him was searching continuously.

And that was what led to the second Magic Beast they encountered.

An enormous undead Dragon.

“SHOW YOURSELF, WRETCHED TOREN!” A staggeringly loud shriek crashed through the air, forcing Micheal and everyone down to the ground by the sheer dint of power within those words.

They had been in the middle of sneaking through another forest on the side of a random mountain, following a well-worn path, when this monstrosity of a beast showed up, far in the sky above.

Its presence was immediately noticeable. As soon as it came within sight of everyone here, a wash of emotions had slammed into everyone.

Fear, horror, terror, inexplicably devastating and yet present nonetheless.

This was one of the infamous inherent Abilities those of Draconic heritage possessed:

Dragonfear.

It was, rather ironically, quite similar to the way the Guide’s Guyren Mask worked. The huge creature up above was emanating energy waves that sank into the subconsciousness of every being present, actively forcing emotions upon them.

That terror kept almost everyone in Micheal’s group frozen, unable to even move an inch as they struggled to withstand the emotional onslaught. Even the experienced Guide stood stock still, his breathing ragged as he weathered the unearthly pressure.

‘I guess that answers my question.’ Micheal was the sole outlier of the group that wasn’t drastically affected by the Dragonfear. His Aura Nullification Necklace was tailored to resist things like this, and while it couldn’t fully resist the entire brunt of the Dragonfear attack, it was able to dull it enough that Micheal could mentally shove aside the residual effects.

However, to blend in, he stood frozen like the rest of the group, not allowing himself to move.

“COME OUT, YOU COWARD!” The undead Drake continued to fly about in the air, roaring ineffectually as it terrorized everyone within range. Its yells displayed its rage, though it didn’t seem to be targeted anywhere specific.

‘So this is the Dragon Mountains’ infamous Draconic Lich, huh?’Micheal was able to surmise a great deal from this, his heart pounding as he hid his presence as best as possible.

This Draconic Lich was notoriously powerful, known to have fought against one of the Six Lords and survived, a feat of epic proportions. No one knew its name or history, beyond that it had a raving hatred for the Six Lords.

The undead leviathan was rarely seen and typically left most creatures alone. For it to come out now was a truly rare occurrence.

'What the- why in the 56 HELLS are you HERE of all places?!' A voice Micheal hadn't heard in a bit popped up in Micheal's head as Yvvtal broke his silence to speak up, full of outrage.

The typical cool demeanor the Fallen Deity showed was nowhere to be seen as he griped, sounding genuinely concerned. Whatever meditation he had been in the midst of seemed to have been shattered by the overwhelming presence of the fierce Drake.

Micheal paused for a second and didn't reply, instead flicking his eyes to the left and right as he scanned the members of his group. On their faces, he could see horror, terror, and multiple layers of confusion. He stood still for several moments as he observed them and the undead Dragon.

'Can it sense me here?' Micheal asked, his heart pounding as even he sent up a few prayers.

Yvvtal silently groaned and didn't reply, as if unsure and doing his best to lower his presence, not boosting any of Micheal's confidence.

The undead Drake raged in the sky for several more moments, holding everyone in horrifying suspense. Finally, however, Micheal’s prayers were answered as it flew northward, exiting their line of sight as it continued to search for the presence of a Toren.

In his head, Micheal sensed a nearly audible feeling of relief from the unwilling passenger that was temporarily sharing his body. He could sense, for a few seconds, Yvvtal examine the Aura Nullification Necklace Micheal wore.

Right after that, his presence vanished again as the ancient Toren's spirit went dormant. Micheal noted all of his reactions, tucking them away to review later.

After it left, the effects of its Dragonfear gradually faded away. Soon, wheezing gasps and cries overtook Micheal’s party as half of them collapsed to the ground, arms and legs trembling.

If you weren’t mentally prepared, experiencing Dragonfear for the first time was enough to break the mind of some people. Even for hardened experts that had gone through tough times, it was something unforgettable, in the most unpleasant way possible.

“Wh-what the hell was that?!” One of the stronger Third Rate Warriors, a black-haired Byren with a scarred face, stuttered as he spoke, his shaking voice cut with fear.

Micheal didn’t know his name, or anyone except the Guide’s name, but that wasn’t exactly unusual. Most people kept to themselves and held their affairs private, unless they were specifically seeking renown or honor. That hobby was typically left to famous disciples or the wealthy, though.

“…one of the legends of these mountains.” The Guide’s voice was surprisingly calm, causing Micheal’s opinion of him to go up a notch. The Byren continued,

“A deathly Dragon, risen from the grave. It's an extremely rare sight, however, and typically never seen. I’ve never had to face it in the 18 years I have served as a Guide.” As he spoke, he maintained a sense of calmness and control, giving off a feeling of complete confidence.

The Guide’s explanation, and more importantly, how he gave it, served to calm everyone down. Those that had fallen to the ground stood up and the mood lightened slightly.

“What did it want? Is it going to come back?” Another martial artist spoke up, a blonde-haired female Byren, her tone hushed.

“I don’t know.” The Guide shook his head. As he spoke, his voice came off slightly hoarse, an indication that he wasn’t taking this as easily as he was pretending to.

Given that no one seemed to understand what the undead Drake had yelled, Micheal took that to mean it had been talking in an ancient or foreign language, one normal Byrens would not speak. The only reason Micheal could understand it was because of the auto-translation perk Humanity’s Shop Attribute came with.

“So what do we do now? Do we turn back?” Micheal cut in, his question catching everyone’s attention.

The one thing he wanted to avoid was wasting time by returning back to Tansol City. However, the existence of this Draconic Lich presented a very real risk that Micheal could not discount.

If he went around the Dragon Mountains, he would almost certainly be too late to save Myla from being killed by the minions of the Vile King. At this point, the options he had left were very few and very dangerous.

The Guide looked forward down their path, and then looked back. His expression was hidden behind his mask, but Micheal could see the tenseness in the man’s stance.

After a few seconds, the Guide seemed to make an internal decision.

“…We’ll press on. The Drake has moved past us and it will take longer to go back than it will to continue all the way.” Almost everyone nodded when they heard his decision, but no one seemed comfortable with it. It was hard to be comfortable with any decision at all given what they had just experienced.

Yvvtal offered nothing more to Micheal, the Fallen Deity’s consciousness stably returning to hiding away, as if trying to make Micheal forget he was even there.

Micheal grimaced slightly as he took everything in with a sigh. Things were never easy it seemed.

A few short moments later and they began to move out, no one in a mood to rest. Their travel now took on a bit of a frantic, but still furtive, rush as they resumed journeying through the Tansol Pass.

Two and a half hours remained.

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