Myriad Devils-Chapter 87: Escaping me is rather difficult

"Catharina... Catharina... Catharina...?" the brightness, the radiant light that once shone in his golden amber eyes, had vanished. As he trotted through the forest, even though numerous wounds covered his body, his state of mind, and his clarity of thought, it did not appear as horrible as it did with Catharina.

As they said, the eyes were the windows to the soul. Though his eyes were dim, there was no visible weakness like before. Though blood still oozed from his wounds, his body did not tremble as he maneuvered through the jungle. In the air, there was a faint scent of blood that wasn’t his, yet his heart remained steadfast and untroubled.

"Have I forgotten her family’s name?" Anon mused to himself: "I forget not. What was it? Oh, yes, Allmond." He suddenly smiled. And though there was a grin plastered on his face, his eyes did not reciprocate with the lower part of his face, creating a peculiar scene.

"The child of an Otherworldly Knight, now deceased." Anon unconsciously sighed: "Oh, how pitiful. How powerful are they, Otherworldly Knights, transcendent over worlds, and yet, to the death of their children, they remain none-the-wiser. Father, dear father, truly, how unimaginably frightening are you? Indeed, unimaginably frightening you are!"

Speaking aloud.

Anon felt as if, there was no need to hide his thoughts.

The fact that he could kill the child of an Otherworldly Knight made Anon shudder internally.

Unknowingly, the necklace around Catharina’s neck might have just been an excuse. His true desire, maybe it wasn’t to kill her for the necklace, but to see if the Knight standing behind her would intervene.

’Right,’ Anon sighed: ’Who am I fooling.’

A subtle smirk appeared on his face.

’Dead mother said that, confronting my father may send me to a point of despair. Still, I am far from reaching that point. When I become an Otherworldly Knight, and I will, everything will change!’

...

Within Blood-Drip Jungle... The moment one began trotting into the true depths of this landmass, it is in this moment, does one enter a wholly different realm.

There were frightening creatures that resided all the way in the outer reaches of the jungle, but in the depths of this jungle, even if one was yet to truly reach the core of the forest, what lived were monstrosities that mortals found truly difficult to grasp.

One such monstrosity...

Though Anon’s golden staff had cracks running across its body, its strength had yet to diminish as it released waves of resplendent golden light wherever it passed.

Anon stabbed into the empty air.

Because of the silence that permeated his surroundings, it almost appeared as if he was practicing his staff techniques in the darkness of the night, but this was certainly not the case.

Spectral Stalkers.

This was a type of monster within the Blood-Drip Jungle. It usually moved by itself, but one wouldn’t come across more than two at any one point in time.

Wherever they went, they inhaled sound and exhaled silence.

It was an unnatural, a disconcerting silence that would suddenly and unexpectedly envelop the area.

But simply sensing this sudden shift might be difficult in the first place. After all, who in their right mind would always be conscious of the noise of their surroundings?

It was only when Anon felt a twig crush under his feet, cracking without sound, did he catch himself.

Swiftly thereafter, his spirit manipulated stellar cosmic energy to draw out the power of his principle, seeing to it that a golden aura expanded into his surroundings.

’Spectral Stalkers. Its threat is relatively low, but it latches onto humans, following them around. The longer and more noise one makes, the more stellar cosmic energy it utilizes to silence one’s surroundings. Eventually, it’ll draw in other creatures sensitive to stellar cosmic energy.’

Though Spectral Stalkers couldn’t be seen by one’s eyes, there was a way to defeat them.

Anon’s staff stabbed into the empty air once, then twice, thrice, the force and speed of his attack rapidly increased.

The leaves on the branches of nearby trees began to flutter as the winds picked up, growing increasingly chaotic. Although there was no sound, creating an unsettling atmosphere, a smile spread across Anon’s face as he suddenly leaped into the air before descending, driving his staff into the ground.

An explosion!

With the force of Anon’s staff, the earth trembled violently in silence. As cracks began to form and the ground started to cave in, an unusual noise suddenly assaulted Anon’s ears.

It was a scream!

Such a high-pitched scream that Anon, for a moment, felt his mind go blank. Though he stumbled back, momentarily losing balance, he stabbed his staff into the earth, propping himself up.

Sigh!

Hearing his own breath of relief, the smile on his face subtly grew.

...

The time he spent traversing the jungle was enough for him to heal from his wounds and confront a variety of creatures. Besides the Spectral Stalkers, he confronted multiple Gore Pigs. They were a branch of the pig evolution tree that grew to a size almost three times larger than humans.

Their every step caused the earth to tremble and quake, with the earth itself being inclined to assist it whenever they confronted adversaries. Verily, the principle engrained in them was earth related. So, sending foes off balance, knocking foes back, trapping and holding their foes in place, all sorts of annoying trickery saw Anon’s patience tested.

Then, there appeared a Vermilion Panther. This type of panther had jet-black fur, allowing it to blend seamlessly into the darkness of night for a brief time. It was one of the more formidable foes, leaving Anon’s body riddled with wounds and gashes after he finally defeated it.

Finally, he confronted a group of Crimson Howlers. Completely opposite from the Spectral Stalkers, whenever they located humans, they released noises that echoed into the far reaches of the forest collapsing the towering trees that densely packed the jungle, and more importantly, unsettling and attracting all types of beasts and plant beasts.

After slaughtering that group of Crimson Howlers, Anon drew out as much power from his principle as possible to escape that area as quickly as possible. In this escape, he faced a whole new set of challenges that could only be considered his own luck being rather bad.

Goreflies.

These oddly small fly-sized beasts moved in swarms. They moved through the air relatively quickly, and in their wake, they left behind a foggy trail. Anon didn’t know when, nor how he had found himself being chased by them, but they did indeed spend almost thirty minutes chasing him through the forest.

More importantly, the trail that they released held another name, "Fog of Forgetting!" It contained the properties of a strange principle, or principles, that affected one’s ability to think and even jumbled one’s memories. If one wasn’t careful, they might just end up no different than a vegetable.

In the midst of this chase and escape, Anon’s bad luck struck once more when he crashed into a beehive. However, this was no ordinary hive; it contained blood bees. He became engulfed in the potent waves of pheromones they released, plunging him into a strange state.

...

Anon was leaning on a thick tree trunk. Sitting on a tree branch several meters above the ground, he stared at the dark skies above the Blood-Drip Jungle. His amber pupils were coated by a blood red hue. In fact, his world was painted in a dark red color that saw him hallucinate a great many things.

Who knew if this was the catalyst, but towards these hallucinations, Anon had seen much worse in his nightmares. Having high resistance towards the pheromones of the blood bees, Anon fell asleep like this.

Since entering the Blood-Drip Jungle, he had slept through several nights. In fact, since maneuvering through the jungle by himself, a couple of nights had passed already.

If one were to count the days, fewer than ten remained. So far, the academy’s bracelet had not alerted him that he had reached the required depth of the jungle, but he found it inconsequential. It was quite possible that it had indeed given him a notification, but in the chaos of his circumstances, he simply hadn’t noticed it.

He found it hard to believe that the academy desired its students to venture even deeper into the forest than he had already reached. Even someone like him had a relatively hard time.

Like this, time passed.

This was the third night since the separation from the others.

The night fluttered past. Although he had slept for hours, to him, it felt as if he had closed his eyes and reopened a moment thereafter, it almost felt like blinking.

The first thing that took up his vision was the rising sun.

Anon was standing atop one of the highest branches on the tree, staring above the forest, towards the morning star that slowly rose high into the sky.

For a moment, he was caught up by the scene, unmoving.

His golden amber eyes shone with a bright glint as it reflected the sun’s burning light.

The sun star.

Like an eternal golden flame, it released waves of heat that gave warmth to the world.

As his golden amber eyes reflected this beautiful sun star, these same amber orbs seem to come to life, shining this splendorous radiant golden shine brightly.

Right then, it clicked...

"A-Ah-?!"

His vision slowly turned blurry as a hot steam rose from his eyes.

His golden eyes...

"..."

No, two sun stars resided in his eyes’ sockets.

Two eternal flames.

"...n"

A smoldering heat.

His eyeballs liquified, oozing from his eye sockets.

"A..."

There was a pot atop a blazing fire, and inside this pot was scalding water.

The two sun stars were this blazing fire, and Anon’s skull was this pot.

Naturally, his brain was this scalding water.

"A...n"

Pain?

Well, of course!

But he couldn’t do anything.

It had reached a point where he couldn’t do anything.

"An..."

So much pain that even though he was awake, even though he knew that the nightmare had ended, this pain seemed to transcend the bounds of a mere nightmare, bulldozing its way through the fabrics of reality.

"Anon?!" Seth’s voice violently reverberated in his mind, causing his eyes to abruptly widen whilst he shot up from the branch in shock.

In reacting like this, evidently, he fell off the branch.

Observing Anon’s reactions, Seth chuckled, seemingly amused.

Standing atop the branch, he looked beneath him, towards Anon, asking in a genuinely confused tone, "Hehe, did you think that you could escape me?"

"Let me tell you oh ignorant soul, escaping me is rather difficult."