Chapter 236 (1/2)

Chapter 236: The Alternate Black Forest

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio  Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

In the alternate Black Forest of the Soul Realm, the light was dim, yet the trees were glowing faintly. When one stared into the distance, everything merged into a muddled haze, and there was no way to discern anything clearly at all.

After hearing what Felina had to say, everyone stopped in their tracks and looked around suspiciously.

Just as the crowd was on alert, the strangest noise emerged out of nowhere.

“Caw caw…Caw caw caw…Hahahaha…”

It sounded like someone was laughing…and it sounded as if the monster that was laughing was standing right behind them.

Everyone was shocked. Link was no exception.

Swoosh! Clang!

Everyone pulled out their weapons and held them tightly in their hands. They stood in a circle with their backs against each other and their eyes facing the source of this bizarre laughing noise.

Link cast an Illumination spell, although its effect was very weak in the Soul Realm. The brightness of the spell was less than one-tenth of its original and wasn’t much brighter than a firefly.

Link tried to improve things by focusing all his attention onto the spell.

Get brighter! Get brighter! Get brighter! he chanted in his mind.

Then, a strange thing happened. The light seemed to hear Link’s thoughts and quickly got brighter. Soon, the magic light was bright enough to illuminate an area with the radius of about 20 feet. Further in the distance, it looked as if a thick fog blanketed over everything, turning the surroundings into a single blurry picture.

“Do you see anything?” asked Link. He was looking left and right trying to catch anything out of the ordinary. Still, he couldn’t find anything.

“No.”

“I don’t either.”

“That’s strange,” said Felina. “I clearly saw it just now. It was about seven feet tall, it had a large head, and it moved at lightning speed.”

“Are you sure you didn’t just imagine it?” asked Annie.

“Are you doubting a Dragon Warrior’s eyes?” retorted Felina coldly, displeased with Annie’s question.

Link believed that Felina saw what she thought she saw.

“Which direction did you see it?” he asked. If it had been other people who saw the dark shadow, Link would probably suspect that they’d made a mistake. But Felina was a Level-7 Warrior; there was no way that she would make such a silly mistake.

Felina pointed to a bush nearby that was more than three feet high.

“Over there,” she said. “I saw it stand by the edge of the bush watching me in the corner of my eye. But the moment I turned to face it, it ran away.”

Link directed the ball of light towards the bush that Felina had just pointed to. The area around the bush then became illuminated, and everyone’s eyes turned to its direction to observe its surroundings.

“I don’t see any signs of anyone passing through here,” said Annie a few minutes later. “What about you guys?”

“Me neither,” answered the scouts, all shaking their heads.

Things seemed to get stranger now. Based on Felina’s descriptions, the shadowy monster had a large head and moved at a fast speed. It was impossible for someone like that to leave absolutely no trace behind.”

“But that’s impossible,” said Felina, flummoxed. “I did see it very clearly. How could this be?”

Link sensed that something was not quite right.

He couldn’t find any explanations for what was happening. He’d entered the alternate realm before in the game to complete some missions, but each time the journey was brief and uneventful. Simply said, he’d never experienced anything quite so odd as the situation they were currently in before.

He just didn’t know what to expect here anymore. What creatures dwelled in this realm? What would happen to them? He just didn’t know. He had a vague feeling that they were being watched by some creature, but he had no idea how to deal with it.

If they continued this way, Link feared that something bad would happen.

Link looked up at the sky again through the gaps between the branches and leaves. It was dark and gray, and he could feel a certain pressure which indicated that the Dark Serpent still followed them; it was not that far behind.

This completely crushed their decision to use this path to return to the physical realm from here.

“Let’s move closer together,” he said after considering it for a while. “Make sure none of us get separated. Felina, you walk in front, I’ll walk in the back, and Annie, you and the rest walk in the middle.”

The Soul Realm might contain some kind of power that affects the mind. Among them, he and Felina possessed the strongest souls, so they would be the most resistant to that kind of influence. It was wisest to let the scouts walk in the middle.

Everyone nodded silently and adjusted their formation, then continued their journey.

As they went deeper into the Black Forest, the trees got denser, and the forest got darker and darker. If it wasn’t for the faint glow that the trees emitted, the wouldn’t be able to see their own fingers stretched out in front of them.

Hahaha…Hahahahaha…

Just when they least expected it, the laughter was heard again, and it almost gave them a heart attack.

Soon after, in the middle of the party, a scout called Eric suddenly turned around and stared into the dense forest then smiled.

“Oh, Ally, my dear daughter…” he murmured. “You’re still alive! Ally…”

He was about to walk away from the rest of the group and into the depths of the forest.

The other scouts hurried forward and pulled him back while shouting his name.

“Eric! Wake up!” they yelled. “Eric! Eric! Get it together!”

They slapped his face as they shouted his name, but the scout didn’t respond to them at all. The eerie smile remained on his face; it was as if he was in a state of bliss.

After a while, his body no longer moved, then a faint shadow slipped out of his body which then flew quickly into the forest, vanishing from their view. When they looked at Eric again, they found that he’d stopped breathing.