Chapter 138: Changes of the Necklace
This day passed swiftly and everyone managed to safely live through it, as night fell the group found a resting area, it was late into the night when fearsome roars were suddenly heard.
The people who were deep in their sleep were swiftly awakened, fear could be seen on their faces, the sound was akin to that of Ning Yan after she had completed her demonic transformation.
No one spoke in the darkness, they merely exchanged glances as they heard the sounds of an ancient demonic beast roaring in the night, Su Yu could not help but stand up, he felt an impulse to go take a look, wanting to check up on Ning Yan but was swiftly held down by Zhang Zhongmou.
Zhang Zhongmou could guess at what he was thinking.
Su Yu was merely being impulsive but swiftly regained control of himself.
“Pass me a stick.” Su Yu whispered.
“Alright.” Zhang Zhongmou handed a cigarette over to him before assisting him in lighting it.
Su Yu took a deep puff, swallowing it into his lungs as he slowly sat back down against a tree before slowly blowing forth, looking at the smoke as he silently contemplated.
The roars made by Ning Yan continued through the night, it was mixed with another kind of roar, as though she were fighting with another fearsome monster.
The roars continued through a good half of the night before finally coming to a halt.
Jade’s face was filled with worry as she softly spoke: “I wonder how is Ning Yan faring, is she alright?” Back in school, her relationship with Ning Yan had been quite good, it was only when Ning Yan’s character took an abrupt change did they slowly drift apart, knowing the real reason for her change in character, Jade began to feel worried for Ning Yan.
Qin Jiagui said in a heavy voice: “Everyone forget about her, although……. Although it’s rather cruel, we are simply unable to help her. The best we can do is force ourselves to forget about her, also, from Xue Tong and Mo Tian’s reactions, Ning Yan is definitely very special, it’s possible…… that she will be able to live well within this forest. If we become sufficiently strong in the future, we may then be able to help her……” Having spoken to this point, Qin Jiagui suddenly stopped speaking, even he was unconvinced by his own words.
“That’s right, everyone stop thinking about it.” Su Yu suddenly spoke up.
The group were stunned as they looked over at him, Qin Jiagui and the others knew that Su Yu liked NIng Yan, amongst the group he was the one who was most likely to defend her.
Su Yu stubbed the cigarette he had in his hand against the ground, firmly pressing down as he slowly continued: “None of us are able to help her at the moment, stop thinking about it. We should think about how we are going to continue living well, how are we going to get stronger……. Only when we are sufficiently strong will we be able to help her…… we are currently just too weak……”
His last words were spoken very softly, as though they were spoken to himself. His entire body was shivering as he held the stubbed cigarette within, he hated himself for being so weak, when Ning Yan exploded forth with that frightening strength, he was unable to find the courage to face it, this was simply because he was too weak…… just too weak…….
Strength! I need to become stronger, only when I am sufficiently strong will I be able to protect whoever I want to protect, believe in whatever notion I wish to believe in!
There was never a moment in his life where Su Yu thirsted so much for power, within his right hand, that drop of Golden Blood began to roil, ‘it’ could feel the intentions of its master, slowly releasing streaks of gold as it swam throughout his body, suddenly flowing towards the origin force necklace that was on his neck.
The necklace seemed to have been aggravated by something as it suddenly began to wildly suck Su Yu’s strange energy, streaks of source energy that belonged to the necklace gradually began to have traces of awakening.
Su Yu felt his heart lurch as he grabbed the origin force necklace, he could see a faint blue light shining from it, however, when carefully scrutinising it, there was simply nothing special.
“Weird, could that earlier feeling have been an illusion…… that feeling…….. It was as though something was in a deep sleep within the necklace, it seemed like it had almost awakened……”
Su Yu silently contemplated.
This night, no one was able to sleep soundly, it was only when the sky began to brighten did they finally fall asleep, however, they were swiftly awakened by an assault from a group of goblins.
Three Greater Goblins led a group of fifteen Lesser Goblins as they charged forward.
The group swiftly leapt to their feet, Qin Jiagui’s right shoulder was raised as a metallic cylinder suddenly appeared, ‘Chi!’ the Steel Missile was sent flying forwards.
“Kaboom!”
The missile exploded within the pack of Lesser Goblins, immediately blowing four Lesser Goblins apart.
Xu Ruyun did not speak, his body was stooped low as his right hand waved, immediately slicing the throat of a Lesser Goblin.
The wooden club of this Lesser Goblin was thrown away as it clutched its throat while fleeing, it was not long before it fell to the ground, twitching before it finally died.
Huo Shan held his precious case within his left hand while his right hand stretched forth, strange energy began to gather within his palm, a charcoal briquette slowly appeared before he tossed it out.
The charcoal briquette smashed into the ground with a ‘Bang!” immediately killing a Lesser Goblin while heavily injuring another.
Jade began to continually draw runes in the air with Su Yu protecting her, if any monster approached he would easily deflect it. Finally, Jade was done drawing her rune as a streak of white rushed forward.
“Boom!”
The Greater Goblin which she had locked onto gave a ferocious howl as crisp cracking noises sounded out from its chest, the bones within had thoroughly disintegrated as its back exploded, bones mixed with innards flew out from its back before it fell to the ground, dead.
The Three Greater Goblins had been swiftly taken care of and the few remaining Lesser Goblins noticed that the situation was grim as they swiftly turned to flee, Wang Xiang, Mao Mingzhu and the other newcomers wanted to chase but Qin Jiagui said in a heavy voice: “Don’t chase, the forest is filled with many unknown dangers.”
The new people immediately halted as they heard these words, they quickly calmed down as they swiftly retreated back.
Since the day before, they had merely met with low tier monsters, besides Huo Shan who had advanced to tier one, the others maintained their status quo.
Zhao Shichang said with delight: “Doesn’t this mean that we’ve reached the outer fringes of the forest? Usually, the deeper we are in the forest the more dangerous the monsters, the outer fringes should be much safer. I think……. It may be possible that we could be exiting this forest soon, we’ve only met with goblins since yesterday.”
Hearing these words, several people began to nod their head, his words did make sense and they began to fill with anticipation.
Having eaten some food, the group continued forward. Qin Jiagui had gotten their bearings as they continued in a new direction, Zhao Shichang had carved a clear marking of a ‘10’ on the trunk of a tree.
After they walked a certain distance, he would always leave a marking on a trunk in case they needed to retrace their steps.
Su Yu once again offered to assist Jade with carrying Lei Rui but was rejected once again, Jade wanted to personally carry Lei Rui.
Su Yu came to a silent realisation, Jade’s determination was really outstanding, once a woman set her mind to something, it could even be greater than that of a guy’s determination.
Zhao Shichang could have made the right conjecture, along the way they met up with only low tier monsters, there were some Lesser Goblins, Gnomes and even the strongest of the monsters was merely a Greater Goblin.
Initially there were still packs of goblins with Greater Goblins that attacked them, however as the road wore on, they encountered groups with merely ten odd Lesser Goblins that fled at the sight of them.
Initially the group really believed in Zhao Shichang’s deduction, they felt that they were at the outer fringes of the forest and would be out of it in no time, however, after half a day of walking, there was still endless amounts of forest before them, the excitement and anticipation within their hearts gradually died down.
As Zhao Shichang used his boneblade to clear some branches blocking the path, he signalled for them to stop with a ‘shhh’.
Qin Jiagui who was following behind him acknowledged as he swiftly came to a halt.
This was already the twelfth day since they entered the forest, besides the school, supermarket and police station, this was the fourth building that they had come into contact with.
At the back, Su Yu, Ma Ziye and Zhang Zhongmou swiftly moved forward. Zhao Shichang continued to open a path with his bone knife, clearing the branches and vines that were in the way allowing for the entire group to see what was in front of them.
The vegetation in this area was extremely dense, countless numbers of vines were hanging from tall trees, there were even several plants and flowers that could not be identified. Amongst the lush greenery, there were even a number of strange yellow flowers that seems like stars amongst the green.
Within this lushly vegetated area stood a huge building, at this moment, there were several vines snaking along the walls, as though the building had existed here for a long period of time.
The door of this building was very impressive, above the marble doors were nine large golden characters: The First People’s republic hospital of S.Z. city.
At this moment, looking from a distance at this building that was surrounded by thick vegetation, one could feel desolation, as though that place no longer had any life within it.
“Hospital? It seems like it’s been in this forest for a long period of time.” Qin Jiagui measured from a distance.
Zhao Shichang stopped his hacking of the vines as he looked back: “What’s the plan, does everyone wish to go forward to check it out? Or should we just avoid it?”