A few minutes later, after Liam covered about half of the distance, one of his chicken minions dashed toward him at full speed.
BAK BAK BAKA!
Unlike his pets, these soul undeads did not have the ability to communicate with him directly.
They had the ability to understand his commands but it did not work the other way around.
So the chicken furiously made a pecking noise and pointed its head towards the eastern side.
“You found something there?” The chicken nodded.
Liam ignored the bird’s comical wing flapping and head butting and shifted his gaze to look at the village in the distance.
He then dismissed all of his soul undeads and hurried in the direction. Not long after he entered the small and desolate town.
Here as well, the streets and the surroundings were empty just like the other areas and the houses and the various establishments were broken down.
Liam quickly peeked into a few places when he suddenly caught the distinct stench of blood and death in the air.
It was the smell of rotting corpses.
He knitted his brows together and hurriedly dashed over to the run-down building from which the smell was coming.
However, after reaching the door, he stopped abruptly. The sight in front of him was a bit too… gory.
There were several bodies piled on the ground and there were flesh, blood and guts sprayed everywhere inside the small room.
Just the stench was unbearable.
Cough. Cough. Liam covered his nose, not able to stand the horrendous smell of the rotting bodies.
“These are NPCs?” He kicked around one to see if there was anything underneath, but there was only something squishy and unrecognizable.
“Tch.” He rubbed his boots on the ground again to get rid of the things stuck on his shoe and then backed out of the room.
There was no point in looking around there any longer. The room was completely and utterly destroyed.
And considering that everything was still smeared around without disappearing into light particles, these corpses probably belonged to NPCs.
Liam stepped out of the small building.
He was about to summon his soul pets again to continue the search once more when suddenly his eyes fell on a bloodstain outside the building.
When he looked closer, surprisingly, he also saw a light footprint or rather marks as if someone had dragged a bunch of bodies across the ground.
Liam looked around in the nearby areas and found the weird set of muddled marks leading away from the broken-down house.
“Did the dark elf perhaps drag his multiple captives from this hideout to another hideout?” He did not know what to think of it.
He continued following this trail and a few seconds later unexpectedly the vague scuffle marks on the ground started to become clear footprints.
Some of them still looked as if they were dragging their feet but at least some of the footprints were clearer.
“Hmmm…” Liam stopped and squatted on the ground.
He extended his hand to touch the black spots and red sploshes that were dotted around these footprints.
“Whoever went this way was probably heavily injured. Maybe Alex escaped on her own?”
He doubted it but that was still a possibility. He dusted his hands, stood up, and continued following the trail.
Everything was progressing quite well so far as he had even managed to find a good clue possibly about the whereabouts of Alex, but something seemed off.
It was unusual that the dark elf casually let his captives escape easily like this, that too after holding them for so long.
“Well, I guess I will go and find out.” Liam maintained his [Stealth] mode just in case and continued following the trail.
For a while, he did not see anything or come across any further clues but a couple of minutes later…
The footprints became even clearer and the blood drops on the ground started pooling more and bigger splotches were seen on the ground.
“I am getting closer.” Liam frowned and quickened his pace.
A few feet later, he again stopped and this time, he paused slightly and narrowed his eyes to look at the trail closely.
At first glance, this seemed just like the other spots but there was something off about this particular area.
Or rather one particular blood drop. There was a small imprint of a different set of feet on this dried drop of blood.
It looked like this was made after some time, thereby allowing the blood to dry up.
Liam gazed at this and suddenly had a thought. Was perhaps someone else also following the same trail?
It could even be the dark elf assassin himself!
He did not have to wonder for long as after he moved a few more feet, he heard a small disturbance ahead of him.
“I cannot walk anymore.” Someone said.
“No, we cannot take a break here. We need to keep moving.” This was unmistakably Alex’s voice.
“Only a few more steps! We have to press on.” She was urging someone else but her own voice sounded very weak and feeble.
Liam hurried over and arrived at the site in a jiffy.
And just like he expected, he also saw Alex standing there. She was leaning on the remains of a dry dead tree trunk.
“There you are. Bingo. Found you.” Liam stopped. He did not immediately approach her and decided to observe the situation first.
There were about eight other people around her. Players? NPCs?
It did not look like this mattered because all of them seemed to be very gravely injured.
They did not have any armor or weapon or any other belongings for that matter. Their clothes were in tatters.
There were covered in injuries from top to bottom. Not just ordinary cuts or bruises but these injuries seemed a little strange.
They were deep and still bleeding and the flesh and the scar had turned blackish purple as if they had been poisoned?
Liam waited for a couple more minutes and observed the group and the surroundings carefully to see if there was someone else hiding in the vicinity just like him.
But nothing seemed out of place.
The group wheezed and panted and all of them were on the verge of collapsing and buckling down on the ground.
“Wouldn’t just dying be simpler? Why struggle so much? Hmmm.”
Liam did not understand their behavior. Nevertheless, nothing seemed to be happening. So he decided to take action.
He was just about to rush forward and grab the damned woman who had caused him so much headache when suddenly…
SLASH.
THUD.