Chapter 56—Reached
"This is our last Sealed Artifact. We should pick a good one—better than that captain fool," the fat woman said, taking out a human palm‑sized mirror from the storage ring on her right index finger.
"Ahh, get it out of my sight," the bulky man yelled, pushing the mirror away.
"They’re outright disgusting creatures..." the thin man said with a scowl of pure disgust.
"I also want to puke just by looking at them, but they’re useful when combined with fools like the captain," the fat woman said, forcing down her fear and nausea as she glanced at the mirror.
A grey, creepy insect road inside the glass. It had twelve human hands instead of insect legs and a male human head where its insect head should have been.
She quickly shoved it back into her storage ring, swallowing hard when the insect turned and grinned at her.
"We should plan properly this ti—" she began, but—
Crack!
The ground beneath them split open, and vine‑woven hands shot up, wrapping around their legs and torsos.
"Ahhh!" they all scread, hearts pounding faster as the corrupted human appeared in front of them in a flash.
The stinking rotten flowers foul odour hit them hard, almost making them throw up.
"Leave us! Leave us!" the fat woman shouted, trembling as vines bound her legs, lower body, then crept up toward her arms.
"You’re corrupted... Hahaha..." the bulky man laughed in terror.
They stared at the human whose body had turned eldritch—green vines replacing his limbs, red flowers where his eyes should be, leaves sprouting from his hair as dark energy surrounded him, and he held a human face in his right hand.
"How did y...o...u fi...n...d u...s?" the fat woman forced out with the last of her strength before vines sealed her mouth.
"Your presence‑hiding array is weak. I can sense you even through that," the corrupted human replied, grinning. "Ti to devour." He licked his lips.
Hearing his words, they all felt like their hearts would burst out of their chests.
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Thud!
Boom!
The cattle pulled the slis, rushing at incredible speed, covering more than twenty kiloters.
Elder Sli’s body wobbled as the mount he sat upon beca drenched in his sweat.
"That should be enough..." he muttered, finally blacking out.
The gang’s speed dropped as they lost the aura boost.
Hours later—"Ahh..." Red Sli opened his eyes, a sharp pain throbbing in his core.
"Child, are you fine?" Mama Sli asked with concern, still holding onto him.
"I’m fine, Mama Sli," he replied, breaking free from the chains. She smiled with relief at his words.
He glanced around and saw the cattle running at their usual pace, and the elder sli still fainted on his mount.
Little Sli looked upset, still tied to his cow with rock chains.
’What happened?’ he wondered, looking at the cattle trudging along and the slis bouncing at the back—Wob!
The mana chains had vanished after about half an hour. Only the earth chains remained.
Bull#1, noticing movent on his back, asked, "My lord, are you fine?"
"Yes, I am. How far have we run?" Sli#47 asked, still feeling his core thump because of the corrupted human.
"About twenty kiloters or so... My lord, why are you so afraid? What did you see?" Cow#1 asked doubtfully, turning her head toward him.
Everyone turned to Sli#47, curious about sothing that could frighten him.
"A corrupted human," Red Sli replied plainly.
"Corrupted human?" Little Sli and the others echoed, confused; they had never heard such a term.
"Just know they’re very dangerous—far more harmful than demons," he said, simplifying it for those who hadn’t seen any eldritch creatures.
"Okay..." Everyone nodded, burning the warning into their minds. Cow#1 silently decided she’d run at least a hundred kiloters, if she ever spotted anything like that, or hide near her lord.
It was a pity she didn’t know that if she ever did spot sothing like that, she’d already be dead.
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Soon, days slipped by. On the tenth day after breaking out from Oakfield village, Elder Sli finally woke up. "Ahh, my body hurts..." he groaned.
"Elder, you woke up!" Red Sli said joyfully, noticing him stirring.
Mama Sli dismissed her rock chains on him. She tied him again and again when her chains vanished, so that he wouldn’t fall down.
"How far have we covered?" Elder Sli asked, ready to get back to work, despite only just getting conciseness back.
"We’re very close—almost five to seven kiloters," Young Sli said, pointing at the route on the map.
After he’d woken up, he had taken over navigation. Elder Sli had already marked all important points; he only needed to follow the marked routes.
The roads on the map were drawn in clear detail with illustrations, so even without knowing human script, it was easy to follow.
Elder Sli wobbled his body and—Whoosh!—looked closer at the map with a grin. "Good, you did—" He cut off mid‑praise as a wave of pain shot through him.
He looked at himself and the others.
The cattle were skinny, muscles gone.
All the slis had lost most of their body fluid and turned thin.
Wob! They bounced forward like stiff robots, losing their daily energetic playfulness.
"I see. We haven’t eaten for the past days," he said, then glanced at the perfectly round red sli—he didn’t get skinny at all despite not eating.
"I wanted them to stop, but Mama Sli and Cow#1 rejected and said we’d only move by drinking water," Young Sli said bitterly—the first ti they hadn’t followed his words, ’Because I was weak....I have to get stronger.’
"Well, whatever. We should eat now," Elder Sli said sternly, pointing at himself and the other slis. "We’ll die if we don’t."
Old Sli’s body had been thrown into the water drum every so often; his body had absorbed water on its own to keep him alive.
"Okay... okay, we can," Mama Sli finally agreed.
"Finally... I can eat..." Little Sli said, shivering, having lost almost all his energy.
"Okay... we can eat," Bull#1’s eyes shone as he glared at the skinny Cow#1 with furious eyes, who just turned her head away with a "hmph."
------
"That hit the spot," Bull#1 said after devouring all the leaves from a few trees and returning to his normal size.
But the sa couldn’t be said for the rest of the cattle.
Cow#1 and Bull#1 were demons—they generated traces of mana and aura, which allowed them to boost digestion and recover more quickly. The others didn’t have that advantage; they remained thin.
The slis, however, recovered their round forms thanks to their unique biology that let them devour almost anything.
Elder Sli opened the lid of the wooden drum and Wob!—leapt in.
Young Sli and the others filled drums whenever they passed a water source. They could survive a few days without food, but not without water.
Red Sli had co across many demons and humans along the way; he only fought when necessary.
He’d killed many humans who tried to capture them—and by his bad luck or good luck, the Dancing Lightning Party he encountered was actually the strongest group.
All other humans and demons he’d t were Tier 1 or had just barely stepped into early Tier 2 {Level 51 or level 52}.
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"Finally, we’ve arrived," Elder Sli said, glancing into the distance.
End of the Chapter.
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