In the thick forest, leaves rustled and twigs cracked as a group of six people ran through the underbush, desperately trying to reach their destination as quickly as possible.
“Whoo, whoo!” Apollo panted heavily while dodging the loose branches and then asked. “J-Jake, can you see the stars?”
Jake squinted his eyes and strained to look up at the night sky. “Yeah, I can see them!”
“Are we going in the right direction?” Leon asked, not panting as much as Apollo but still feeling the fatigue of the hour of running.
“Yeah, we are almost there!” Jake shouted, and he didn’t look very fatigued because of his Starborn physique, which also put his level of stamina at superhuman levels.
“Damian, you go ahead and see if Mars and Zero have arrived yet!” Apollo shouted an order.
“Roger!” Damian shouted and suddenly turned into a cluster of crimson lights. He then shot off into the air and flew like a shooting star through the night sky.
“Ahh, shit!” Henri and Loki struggled to follow others as they didn’t have as much stamina as others.
Henri might be the fastest person in Black Heart Pirates, but that was only at small distances and during fights; when it came to long distances, he was one of the worst.
Loki was also a spellcaster and had focused his whole life on learning different magical spells. He never trained his body to be strong or agile.
Ambrose managed to follow after others with somewhat ease—his morning jogs and increase in strength and stamina stats had significantly improved his physical abilities.
However, he was also feeling the strain as his breathing had gotten heavier.
After a while of running through burning lungs, they saw Damian crouched behind a bush, keeping an eye on the vicinity of the stairs that circled around the giant’s hand as it went all the way to the palm.
“Damian!” Apollo finally came to a stop, and while panting heavily, he asked. “Any sign of him?”
“No.” Damian replied, peering through the leaves of the bush. “But we should hurry; we would be rather visible when we enter the stairs, and if we don’t reach the top soon, he might discover us!”
Apollo nodded and looked at other exhausted-looking men and said, “Final push, let’s go.”
Others nodded and gritted their teeth as they ran through the bush and arrived at the stairs.
The stairs were steep and seemingly endless, made of rough-hewn stone that looked ancient and worn. Each step was also ten meters wide, and there seemed to be an endless number of steps.
After stepping on the first step, they continued running up the stairs, and soon, they were already hundreds of meters up in the air, and some of them began feeling dizzy.
This was already high enough to die if they fell.
‘This has to work…’ Ambrose glanced over his shoulder at the forest that was getting further away and hoped. ‘Zero, delay him somehow!’
…
In the thick forest, walking past the trees, Mars and Zero could hear the faint sound of rushing water.
“…” Mars silently looked around and didn’t seem to be in much of a hurry.
‘Hmm, no sight of death minions so far.’ He thought.
‘I wonder if they have already reached the giant’s hand.’ Zero wondered and looked past the swaying branches, seeing the giant hand’s getting closer with each step.
‘We should be arriving there soon. I need to somehow delay Mars; otherwise, he might discover others, and no matter what excuses they cook up, Mars will kill them.’
Zero came to a stop, looked at a random part of the forest, and put his best acting face on.
“Captain, I saw something!”
“Huh?” Mars stopped walking and saw Zero looking at a part of the forest that was shrouded in fog, but the sound of the rushing river seemed to come from that direction.
“What did you see?” He asked in a hurry.
“I don’t know; there was definitely someone watching us!” Zero shouted.
‘Is it the death minions?’ Mars wondered with a frown and flexed his fist before throwing a straight punch. “Saturn Punch!”
Boom—as his fist struck the air, a powerful shockwave burst through the trees, sending unrooted trees and debris flying in all directions.
With that single strike, the force of the Saturn Punch was unleashed, leaving a trail of destruction in its wake. A portion of the whole forest was decimated in an instant, making the fog vanish, and the flowing river was now flowing with a violent current, tearing through the remnants of the once serene landscape.
“If something was there, it’s long gone.” Mars said coldly and continued walking. “Follow, we still have some distance to go!”
Zero nodded, but inwardly he was cursing. ‘Damn it.’
…
At the stairs, the group of six heard the sound of destruction and saw a dust cloud rising in the distance.
“Mars is already that close!” Damian felt cold sweat forming on his forehead.
“We have to hurry!” Apollo shouted and began leaping across many steps at a time.
Others quickly followed after him, their hearts pounding with exhaustion, but they knew they couldn’t stop now.
“H-how can we leave the giant’s hand?” Henri asked with fatigue while following closely behind. “We can’t use the stairs, or Mars will definitely discover us!”
“We’ll have to find another way out,” Apollo replied.
If they had known about the layout of Necro Island beforehand, they could’ve planned this even further, but they weren’t aware of the giant’s hand; otherwise, there would’ve been many escape routes if the Nymn Tree was simply down in the ground.
“Let’s focus on just getting the heart!” Ambrose shouted and ran past Henri and Loki as he picked up his pace.
As the night continued to become darker and more sinister, the group of six found themselves on the last step of the enormous stairs.
As soon as they took that last step, they all collapsed on the giant’s palm with nothing but exhaustion.
They didn’t even feel relieved, as they could barely breathe.
“Ni Nu Lemen Kalahama Death Entourage?” They heard a young voice.
They raised their gazes and saw a curious child looking at them with a flower bouquet in hand.
“W-who the hell?” Damian frowned and barely stood up. “W-who are you?”
“Viraka, ar ominak or Lilana.” The child said with a curious smile and extended the flower bouquet to them. “Ossor or ihk Death Entourage.”
They couldn’t understand a single thing spoken by the young child. After all, she was speaking death language, which was mostly unknown to others.
“Loki, mind bestowing us with the language spell?” Apollo turned to Loki and asked.
Loki nodded and chanted the incantation. It was one of the spells that even Mars had no idea of. It wasn’t part of Magic Book of Ancient Wizards.
Instead, it was Loki’s very own unique magic that he created!
Damian awkwardly accepted the flower bouquet and looked at Lilana with a mix of confusion and curiosity.
“Who did you say you were?” Damian asked.
“My name is Lilana!” The child said with a smile, and after hearing them speak the familiar death language, she got more sure that they were correct people. “You are Death Entourage, correct?
“Death Entourage are subordinates of the Death King.” Apollo whispered to others.
“We, are. Young Miss, may you show us the way to Nymn Tree?” Ambrose politely asked.
“What about the rest of the ceremony?” Lilana questioned with an innocent tilt of her head. “The Nymn Tree only appears after the ceremony.”
Ambrose glanced at others and nodded.
“All right, let’s do the ceremony, shall we?” Ambrose said and looked at the little girl before smiling. “Mind showing us the way?”
Lilana smiled sweetly and began walking back to the village, followed by Ambrose and the rest of the group.
“Loki, do your spell to make us look more like servants of death.” Apollo whispered in Loki’s ear.
“Sure, but the spell will make us sick for the rest of the week.” Loki whispered back, and behind his back, he made a few hand signals while whispering an ancient spell.
As the incantation left Loki’s lips, a dark aura enveloped the whole group, making their skin paler and more sickly, with a stench of death lingering around them.