Chapter 184: Teleportation Gates (2/2)
“Understood.” Julia acknowledged the order with a respectful bow. Before leaving, I passed her some Soul Flames to help her recuperate as well.
While she went about her work organizing the dogmen, I slowly swept my eyes over those around me. Most of them weren’t doing too well; they were either injured or too tired to move. Perhaps it was the tiredness at work here, but those three harpies sisters weren’t clamoring around me as well.
‘That battle just now exhausted a great deal of our energy, if another enemy were to attack us now, it might just be game over for us…:’
“For you.”
A slightly dishevelled Habona stepped out of the crowd and handed me Shadowfang. Reaching out to receive it, I meekly gazed into her bloodshot eyes: “I’m really sorry, about Harlow…”
“That had nothing to do with you.” She immediately interrupted my self-admonishment. “A warrior’s fate is to die on the battlefield. The moment the battle started, Harlow decided his own fate. Following you into battle was a choice we made ourselves. Thus, we were only following our own will. Even without you, Harlow and I would’ve walked this path but with less people and a much grimmer outcome.”
The Habona standing before me right now was unusually chatty but amidst all that, I could tell that she held no resentment for me. ‘Perhaps she truly felt that Harlow’s death had nothing to do with me…but if I hadn’t encouraged them, the outcome definitely wouldn’t be like this…perhaps it might’ve been a lot worse or perhaps it might not have…”
Even though Habona didn’t blame me in the least bit, my heart refused to calm down. Yet just as I was wallowing in the guilt, a furry, meaty paw slapped me on the shoulders. Habona’s voice, completely devoid of anger, echoed over my head: “Without you, Harlow would’ve died in the harpy’s nest already.”
‘Is that so…I saved Harlow but he also ended up dying in Majosha’s embrace because of me. In that case, was my involvement in his life a good or a bad thing? Perhaps it was really like what she said, without me, Harlow might have really died in that harpy’s nest.”
Not giving me anymore time to wallow, Julia came over bearing an exciting piece of news for us all.
“Your Highness, those motes of light should be teleportation gates…”
Because the dogmen who entered the lights each had their own encounters and these encounters were clearly visible from the outside.
Within the greenish light, a wasteland completely devoid of life was revealed. From time to time, one could see a skeleton or two wandering about. Having spotted a certain dogman running for its life, the skeletons immediately locked onto this piece of meat. Like that, with one side chasing and the other fleeing, the scene became one of a dogman sprinting away on all fours while a growing crowd of skeletons pursued it.
Within the crimson light, an entirely different scene played out. It depicted a river of molten lava with intermittent rock platforms thrown in an almost deliberate fashion. Glimpsing through the light, I managed to spot a dogman panting heavily at the banks of the molten river; it probably couldn’t stand the heat. In fact, it was sweating buckets as it laid there like a cooked dog. I saw it try to get up at times but failed due to the sweltering heat that made it lightheaded…finally, it fell into the molten river in a moment of carelessness, disappearing in an instant without so much as a bubble.
The last mote of light was a rather special one. Within, I actually saw countless vegetation and a dogman busily harvesting a variety of fruits; was that a three meter tall fruit tree I spied?
“Master, that’s Abaddon! That’s where we used to live.” Seeing the dogman harvest fruits, Baccarel excitedly ran up to the light and after confirming once more, said that.
“Those fruits are edible and while I don’t know what are their names, I’ve eaten them before…”
‘So the black light really can teleport us to Abaddon?’
‘The crimson light teleports us to Purgatory. That’s why it’s filled with lava rivers?’
‘As for the green light, that’s Gehenna. Why? Because there are skeletons!’
‘Seems…seems like this is the end, huh…no, rather I should say that it’s our victory! We broken through the limits set by this prison! we survived…’
The moment the news came out that the black light led to Abaddon, everyone went into a frenzy. Some cried, some cheered…no matter what kind of reaction they had however, this represented a successful prison break. In an instant, a multitude of emotions came crashing down on everyone.
With this lifeline laid out before us, the dead no longer mattered that much. Bringing the injured with them, the troops began shuffling into the teleportation gate, watched over closely by the lizardmen.
Including me, everyone’s goal here was to reach Abaddon. The demonic werewolves, the demonic half-orcs, the dogmen, the lizardmen and etc. were all creatures of Abaddon. As for my reason for seeking Abaddon…that was to find Yi Yi. Ferti’nier once said that in order to recover my male body, I had to split off from her soul. For that, we needed to find Yi Yi. That was non-negotiable. Thus, no matter what my reason was for doing so, seeing Yi Yi had become my main questline.