Chapter 707: Spirit (1/2)
”Well then…that's my answer I guess.” Vendrick muttered as he entered his secret hideout.
He just came back from his trip - a risky but totally worthwhile one as he ended up witnessing the whole debacle between the Eldest Sister and uncovered the real identity of the Forest Witch.
The scene he witnessed answered some of the things he was curious about. As it turns out, the Forest Witch's relationship with the Hag isn't so good and it was kept a secret from the other hags. It isn't so hard to realize what was up since the actions of the Hag were pretty obvious.
It's clear that the Forest Witch has something that belongs to the Hag and she's using it to control her. Now, from what he had seen, it's probably that girl that's embedded on the tree. He doesn't know who she is but he could tell that she's important to the Hag, so much so that the Hag has no qualms about blowing this whole forest up and threatening to use the alleged 'Dear Brother' of the Witch against her.
This gave him a lot of options. Thankfully, he made some recent breakthroughs that allowed him to infiltrate their territory without being detected or else he'd missed out on this completely. Still though, it would be hard for him to actually do something right now.
He knows that the Hag won't exit the swamp so easily. If he clashed with her in there, the Forest Witch will definitely sense it and would probably do something about it. Whether she helps that Hag or just curiously watch, it'll be bad for Vendrick.
Right now, what he needed is time. Since he could infiltrate the core of the wilderness without them detecting his presence, it bought him time. He'd use that to deepen his accumulations and make himself stronger before dealing with them.
Sighing to himself, Vendrick wanted to get some rest before cultivating but before he could do so, his senses detected something.
He swiftly turned his head towards the direction where he felt it. He squinted his eyes to see if he could make out something but he couldn't, even so he knew that his senses weren't wrong so he immediately activated his ocular technique. Lo and behold, he saw something, a spirit passed through the formation as was silently approaching him.
”So you CAN see me! That's great!” The spirit exclaimed, its face brightening up like the sun. It looked around his base with awe and wonder, saying: ”Nice base you have right here. Is this why they can't sense your presence?”
”Identify yourself, Spirit.” Vendrick coldly stated, he wasn't really thrilled about his privacy being compromised. A bit hypocritical of him really.
”Geez, calm down. No need to be all rude or something.”
”I won't repeat this for the third time. Identify yourself or - ”
”Or what?” The Spirit interrupted him. ”You're going to kill me? Heh. Go on then, I dare - ”
*Bzzt!* *Boom!!*
”...you.” The Spirit shivered as it dumbfounded stared at the large gash that appeared close. It then looked back at Vendrick and saw that he was already holding a spear made out of pure lightning, he's seconds away from hurling it.
”Hey! Hey! Hey! Wait! I'm sorry, okay! I'm sorry! It's my bad. I-I'll introduce myself.” The Spirit panicked and thought to itself:
'Shit! I encountered a Madman!'
”My name is Maria! I'm - ”
*Bzzt!* *Boom!*
”Eek!” Maria shrieked in fear as another bolt of lightning landed not too far from her. ”What the fuck is wrong with you!?”
”I didn't ask for your name, I don't care about that. I asked you to identify yourself.” Vendrick coldly stated.
”Isn't my name part of my identity? What the hell!? Shit! Okay fine!” Her outburst were stopped when she saw another lightning spear appearing on Vendrick's hand. ”U-uh, ah! I'm the spirit of the girl embedded on the tree! You should've seen me since you were sneaking about the swamp without being detected!”
*Bzzt!* *Boom!*
”What the hell!!!?” Maria shrieked at him. ”Have I not told you my identity yet? I'm not lying.”
”No, you already did. I know you're not lying.” He replied.