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Back in the pocket space, after Vaan’s body was cleansed, he wore his black outfit before he glanced at the four wolf-men corpses.
‘Assembly of Silent Night and goblins…’ Vaan thought about the relationship between the two.
Although the small group of wolf-men he had encountered didn’t show any sign of working with the goblins, they wouldn’t have anywhere to go if they didn’t at least have a non-hostile relationship.
‘Considering the goblins were trained and enhanced, these wolf-men were unlikely to be the cause of it,’ Vaan contemplated.
Of course, the fact that the wolf-men decided to retreat to the Red Goblin Mountains could also suggest that the Assembly of Silent Night had a base in the mountains and had been experimenting on the goblins for many years.
However, the odds were unlikely, considering goblins are only known to follow the commands of higher-rank goblins or an even higher-ranking demon.
‘A mutual understanding between the wolf-men and a higher-ranking being that commands the goblin?’ Vaan speculated.
‘Well, the wolf-men are no longer of interest to me. Now that I used the Rank 5 Demon Wolf Blood that they possessed to stimulate the awakening of my Immortal Lycan Bloodline, it’s no longer effective if I want to achieve a greater awakening.’
He didn’t come to the Red Goblin Mountains to deal with the wolf-men. To begin with, their misfortunate had stemmed from him.
As such, he wouldn’t go out of his way to uproot their dark organization.
The hints and clues he gathered did suggest that the Assembly of Silent Night had a much greater influence outside the seven witch kingdoms.
Perhaps, he would have a use for the Assembly of Silent Night when he ventures outside the seven witch kingdoms one day.
‘I should make use of these corpses,’ Vaan thought back to the four wolf-men bodies in front of him.
Shortly after, he searched the four corpses for anything useful or even remotely valuable on their bodies. He took their weapons, tools, equipment, and even their clothes.
After he stripped their bodies bare and tossed everything into the Heaven-Swallowing Space, he chopped the four corpses into pieces.
Afterward, he threw them all into the silver tub along with the scattered blood fragments before he fired up the heat with Kinetic Energy Manipulation, cooking everything.
‘Kyuu…’
Topaz stared at the sizzling half-human meat in the silver tub with a disgusted look, wondering if Vaan was going to eat them.
Nevertheless, Vaan packed everything away after he finished cooking the chopped-up corpses.
A few moments later, he took out his gunblade ammunition and filled the empty cartridge cases with rock powder before fixing the bullets in place, making the cartridges whole.
Afterward, he packed them into their magazines and stored them away before he turned his attention to contracted earth spirit.
“Time to go back inside, Topaz.”
‘Kyuu…’
Topaz flapped her wings as she flew back inside Vaan’s body, albeit with some reluctance.
Earth Manipulation!
After he collected everything he needed from the pocket space and wore his human mask, Vaan drilled his way down towards the enormous open region he sensed deeper below the earth.
The earth quickly split apart as he descended over three hundred feet.
His body immediately plummeted when he broke through the last layer of the earth and reached the enormous open space.
In that instance, he quickly broke off a large piece of rock from the ceiling with Earth Manipulation and threw it under his feet to break his fall, achieving geo-kinetic flight.
At the same time, he was greeted by soft purple-glowing light from glowworms and purple moss that could be found throughout the enormous open space.
Whether it was on the ceiling, the ground, or the numerous towering pillars supporting the top from collapsing, the glowworms and purple moss could be seen everywhere.
Even the edge of the enormous open space could not be seen; it felt boundless.
Coupled with the heavy air and surreal environment, he felt like he had left the human world and entered someplace in Gehenna.
“A world like this was hidden right underneath the Red Goblin Mountains?” Vaan quietly muttered as his eyes widened, showing a rare human emotion of surprise.
Even when he suspected the underground space beneath the Red Goblin Mountains to be big, the scope had far exceeded his imagination.
It was more than just an enormous cave; it was a pocket realm.
‘Was this pocket realm formed by a large Realm Fragment?’ Vaan speculated.
Nevertheless, he quickly descended roughly seven hundred feet before he reached the ground level within the pocket realm.
Staying in the air left him in the open.
The pocket realm was a place he knew little about. It was hard to say what kind of creatures, monsters, or possibly even demons lurked in it.
Ding!
Seeing the system notification, Vaan understood the antimagic spores had also spread throughout the pocket realm.
At the same time, there was a chance that the Plant-type Abomination could be somewhere inside the pocket realm.
The problem was finding the right direction to it.
Nevertheless, Vaan used Magic Vision to determine where mana was the most concentrated to determine his direction.
‘It’s leading me in the opposite direction of the mountain peak,’ Vaan narrowed his eyes.
The punitive expedition had entered the Red Goblin Mountains from the northern side and headed south to climb the mountains.
However, the most concentrated mana pointed north.
‘If the entrance to this pocket realm is somewhere up the mountains, then heading south would bring me back to the surface, while heading north leads deeper inside the pocket realm,’ Vaan mused.
Suddenly, his eyes flickered as he picked up several pairs of footsteps moving within his detection range.
He quickly hid behind a large boulder and lay in wait as the sound of footsteps drew closer.
‘A group of goblin patrols?’ Vaan furrowed his brows after determining the source of the footsteps, which belonged to a group of six goblins.
But unlike the other Rank 1 Green Goblins, the ones before him were well-equipped and moved together with trained discipline.
‘Of course, given the sheer size of this pocket realm, there should be many goblins than what was seen on the surface,’ Vaan silently thought.