The second armed man standing more on the left edge of the tall observation tower jumped in fright at the sudden loud shout of his colleague. However, he didn't even have time to get angry because when he turned his gaze to the right, just to the north, he saw something that made his heart almost burst out of his mouth.
In the middle of the dark night, practically devoid of any natural light and barely illuminated by the light of the base's spotlights, a huge silhouette dozens of meters long was approaching at speeds comparable to those of an all-terrain vehicle.
Even more terrifying, that strange creature whose body appeared to be similar to that of a flood dragon jumped over ten meters before slowly falling to the ground and then jumped back once more, closing the distance between them quickly.
"Sh- Shit!" The second gunman finally lowered his binoculars and shouted at the top of his lungs.
"Q- Quickly! Report to base!" The first gunman shouted in alarm as he pointed behind him.
The second gunman was so scared that he almost peed his pants as he ran hurriedly to the corner where the handheld radio rested on top of a small wooden box.
"Wait!"
Just as the second militant was about to initiate communication and call for urgent reinforcements from the soul evolvers, the first man shouted again so he unconsciously stopped..
"And now what happened?!" shouted the second militant with fear and anger in his voice.
"That... Isn't that the leader...?" The first man pointed forward with his eyes open in the shape of two huge round pans.
The second armed man raised his binoculars again and now that the distance between the giant monster that looked like a huge dragon soaring through the skies had shortened to less than three kilometers, he could finally make out something that was previously not possible.
Just below the huge body of the large seemingly mystical beast could be seen a comparatively tiny body that had both hands outstretched pointing skyward while holding the giant monster's back.
Seeing the black hair and that black armor with spiky protrusions protruding from various parts, the first and second armed man immediately realized who was the person that was carrying the monster in his hands as if he was the king of the barbarians returning to his village with his trophy of victory in hand.
"Holy shit! He really is the leader!" The second gunman exclaimed in shock and unconsciously took a step back.
The first gunman gulped audibly and lowered his binoculars to rub his eyes. Except that he didn't have to use them again since due to the great distance closed by Bai Zemin's powerful jumps, when he opened his eyes again the distance of three kilometers had already been practically closed.
Bai Zemin arrived in front of the first guard tower that was closest to the side he was on and stopped before reaching the ten-meter distance to avoid affecting the tower and the guards on it with his skill Gravity Manipulation in reverse.
As he casually threw the body of the First Order snake to the side, he looked at the armed men who were staring at him dumbfounded and ordered in a deep voice, "Call in several trucks and tractor-trailers. Have one of them take this snake back to the military base and have the rest wait here."
He didn't wait for a reply and deactivated Gravity Manipulation before dashing off into the woods and disappearing in a matter of seconds from the sight of the two men guarding the area.
"This... A snake? That giant creature is a snake? Not a flood dragon from the legends?" The second militant gasped.
Although he had seen several large monsters over the past month, this was by far the most enormous in terms of length. Now that he was seeing it from such a close distance, he could feel the unconscious pressure his heart felt as every fiber of his body seemed to be begging him to flee.
One could imagine how powerful that beast was when it was still alive.
"The leader is still human?" The first man sighed and shook his head, "Forget it, there is no way for normal people like us to comprehend his level of power. The leader is the leader for a reason after all."
The second militant also sighed and a complicated look flashed in his eyes. For a moment, the desire to become stronger was born and grew in his heart. Unfortunately, before that spark became powerful enough to generate fire, he saw the massive body of the blue-scaled snake filled with blood; this was like a snowstorm, totally fatal to that little spark with no resistance whatsoever.
"Let's call the base... We have orders to follow given by the leader himself." The second man finally shook his head and stopped thinking useless thoughts.
After picking up the radio and saying several words to the other side, the two militants went back to carefully surveying the surroundings. However, this time they were infinitely more tense and attentive as they knew that the leader was in the vicinity fighting giant and powerful monsters.
Approximately twenty minutes later, the roar of several engines could be heard from the west gate of the base and then the two men managed to spot a caravan of approximately fifteen cargo vehicles including three cranes approaching in their direction.
Of course, Bai Zemin had no idea that his little act had frightened and discouraged a potential fighter. However, even if he did know, it was unlikely that he would care too much.
If such a minor matter was enough to scare a person to such a degree, then there was no point in them becoming soul evolvers to begin with.
Soul evolvers might not be impressive for now since most of them could not yet challenge the modern weaponry created by mankind in the past, and a single shot was enough to end their lives. However, the more time passed the more evident it became that the soul evolvers were really the future and the only hope the human race had if they wanted to overcome the hell they were involuntarily dragged into.
As the hope of mankind, the soul evolvers were destined to face existences thousands of times more terrifying than that First Order snake that Bai Zemin had killed several minutes before. Therefore, there was no point in being scared to the point of cowering; if such a thing happened, then there was no future for that person.
* * *
Inside the dark forest.
Bai Zemin's body was like a shadow in the midst of the darkness, flashing through the trees at speeds exceeding 150 km/h while moving as if he were an agile gecko camouflaging himself with the surroundings.
Although he occasionally met some beasts prowling the outer perimeter, these were all ignored by him. Since his main objective tonight was not to casually hunt monsters and his real goal was to train his Gravity Manipulation skill in combat, what Bai Zemin needed was to find at least a First Order beast or else all his effort would be meaningless.
Unfortunately or fortunately, even after two hours of unstoppable searching, Bai Zemin failed to locate a second First Order beast.
This discouraged him, as much time had passed without him getting anything in return.
However, it also made him feel secretly relieved since this meant that, while First Order beasts were not a super rarity within the woods, at least they were not in astronomically high numbers either.
One had to know that even now the number of existences among humanity that could take on First Order enemies were definitely few and far between; even Bai Zemin's faction, which was working hard every day to raise the level of its troops, only had a handful of such people.
During the two-hour period, Bai Zemin also tried to test his Shadow Blink skill. Unfortunately, he was unable to do so.
"One of the requirements to activate Shadow Blink is precisely that there must be a shadow you can move into, isn't it?" Lilith asked after thinking about it for a while.
"Yeah... I need a shadow equal or larger in size to my own shadow." Bai Zemin nodded as he walked deeper into the huge forest.
"In that case, it makes sense that you can't activate your skill." Lilith suddenly seemed to realize something as her eyes glinted with understanding as she slowly said, "While this forest is dark, that doesn't mean it has shadows."
"Oh?" Bai Zemin looked at her with interest.
"Darkness and shadows are two things that seem similar but are actually completely different at the same time." Lilith calmly pointed out, "For example, this forest is dark due to the lack of a light source. However, for a shadow to exist, it needs light either natural or artificial. Do you understand what I mean?"
"I see!" Bai Zemin patted his thigh before smiling bitterly, "Damn... And here I thought I could casually teleport myself inside this wolf-mouth dark forest."
"Hehehe, well too bad..." Lilith giggled softly.
"Uh?" Bai Zemin paused and looked to his right for a moment before a smile appeared on his face, "I finally found another one!"
Without waiting for an answer from anyone, he rushed like a whirlwind into the distance and disappeared into the darkness of the deep forest at the next instant.
Lilith pouted prettily and stomped the ground beneath her feet as if she were a little girl trying to express her grievances with the world after being abandoned. Then, she too rushed forward and chased after the cruel man who didn't seem to care about her.
After catching up with him in an instant, she said with hidden bitterness: "Little brother Zemin, aren't you afraid that something bad might happen to this big sister? How can you be so cruel as to neglect me just like that?"
Bai Zemin rolled his eyes and really didn't know whether to laugh or cry, "Lilith, there is nothing on the current Earth that can threaten even a hair on your body. Am I supposed to need to worry about your safety?"
"Tsk tsk tsk..." Lilith clicked her tongue several times and sighed wearily as she said, "Little brother Zemin, we, ladies, fear the dark by nature. You should be more understanding of us... No, especially with me!"
"Yeah sure, whatever." Bai Zemin wisely decided not to argue the matter and continued charging forward.
"Hey! Don't give me the crazy reason!"
,,,
"Holy mother..."
Standing in the middle of a tree that ascended over 400 meters high, right on a branch the thickness of a truck and hidden by hundreds of smaller sized branches with countless leaves, Bai Zemin looked at the beast 500 meters away and sighed softly.
The beast currently had its eyes closed and seemed to be sleeping. Its entire body was covered by a thick layer of scaly skin with ten pointed protrusions sticking out from its upper back with approximately 2 to 3 meters high each.
Its body had a length of approximately 20 meters, but due to its long tail, the total length of the beast could definitely be compared to the blue-scaled snake that Bai Zemin had killed a few hours ago. Its tail was also as thick as a tree trunk and had what appeared to be a large rock-like protrusion at the end tip.
The most terrifying thing was that even lying on the ground sleeping, this monster was ten feet tall! Furthermore, its snoring was so powerful that the surrounding trees trembled while the grass around the monster seemed to have burned due to the heat exuded from its nostrils.
"What the hell is this? It was definitely a lizard in the past but no matter how you look at it, this thing definitely looks like a dragon!" Bai Zemin was speechless.
* * * * * * *
1/3 chaps today
Thanks a lot to all those who use their Golden Tickets to vote for BW <3