66 66 - Disappointing

They had spent a lot of time from when they had entered the Fortress until the time they killed the Boss because Jasper needed to rest after each group of monsters they killed. Not that Noah was in a hurry to keep moving quickly and ending up as tired as Jasper in order to speed up the process. He didn't want to run out of energy over time.

So it took them 7 hours from when they entered the Fortress until the moment they killed the Boss. Everyone had brought extra food, so time itself wasn't a problem in that regard, just that when they killed the Boss, everyone was mentally exhausted from spending so much time on alert.

The group was made up only of elite Blessed Rank E, so Noah did not have to show the teleportation ability he possessed. No one died and no fatal injuries were caused, just a few cuts that could be resolved with a healing Blessing without much difficulty.

The group was unsure as to why Noah burned the corpses of all the monsters they killed, but Jasper said he supposed it was a quirk, something like a tic, that he always had to cremate the monsters' corpses. This explanation, the group just thought was a little stupid and a waste of energy, but as Noah never ran out of energy during the Fortress raid, people just forgot about his peculiarity and believed he did it just because he could, since no matter how much energy he wasted, he had so much backup energy that it didn't matter. Just as people with flying Blessings flew whenever they wanted exactly because they could, they believed that this was the same case with Noah.

Once Noah joined the group again after going on to complete his own mission, everyone was more polite than before with him, since they had suffered so much without him and just his returning had already helped the group so much that the Blessed Ones were grateful. All the bad feelings they felt for him, thinking he was weak and useless, were washed away by the image he built of being a very powerful mage. Unfortunately, no one in the group knew of his true strength using both skills.

'Participating in this Fortress with a powerful group was really a good choice, since even if it takes me a little longer to get exp, I will be sure that I will survive to gain more exp in the future. There is no point in me risking myself unnecessarily to get a lot of exp in a short time if I end up dying and don't have the opportunity to spend it,' Noah thought with satisfaction as he looked at his backpack on his lap as he sat on the floor and waited for the portal to open for them to leave the Fortress.

The other Blessed were like Noah, sitting on the floor while resting, taking care of each other's wounds and talking to each other, waiting for the portal to appear.

After killing the Boss, the Blessed didn't even remember the monster's roar. Now that they had already killed the Boss, this roar, when it came again, caught everyone off guard.

It was common knowledge that the strongest monster in a Fortress was always the Boss. So after they killed the Boss, they felt safe and just stood there waiting carefree, even laughing with each other.

But now, even though they had just killed the Boss, which was clearly several times more powerful than the common monsters, another roar appeared - a roar much more aggressive and frightening than that of the Boss itself. The terror they felt when they heard it the first time came back again; the fear of death came up again.

All the Blessed Ones were afraid of the assumption they had made mentally about why the portal had not yet appeared. After all, this roaring monster was clearly more powerful than the Boss they killed. But strangely, they had never heard of this monster, otherwise this Fortress would have been considered at least Rank D.

The only person who knew what was really going on there was Noah, but he had not entered the Fortress knowing this information, but rather, he discovered it while completing the mission he had received from the system a few hours ago.

- Begin Flashback -

Teleporting into the big nest, Noah was horrified by what he saw inside. The totem was something he was already hoping to find, but around the totem were hundreds of other things.

Eggs, countless eggs, the size of an open adult hand, were scattered throughout the nest. Noah was shocked by this. Because of the monster store, he already knew that it was possible to find monster eggs inside the Fortresses. If the Blessed could get those eggs and take them to some monster store, the store would surely pay well for that product, especially if it were an exotic monster, since the bright-eyed mice were starting to saturate the market.

But what really surprised Noah was not that there were eggs there, but that some of the eggs had apparently hatched some time ago. And these little monsters, just a few days old, had already grown to a size larger than a normal Angry Bird, or that is, these eggs were not from normal Angry Birds at all.

Observing the size of the monsters to be a few days old, Noah made an assumption that scared him: these eggs were actually eggs from another type of Angry Bird; they were eggs from Boss Angry Birds.

One, two, or even three eggs would be acceptable, but Noah was seeing dozens, if not more than a hundred Boss Angry Bird eggs. These infant monsters alone could eliminate a team of Blessed Rank D.

'Is this Fortress undergoing an evolution?' Noah started trying to find an answer to what he was seeing. 'Perhaps, is that the reason for this?' He thought as he stared at the totem that had begun to be absorbed by the system since he climbed into the nest, as now only a small piece of the god's leg remained.

Noah did not have time to pay attention to which god was depicted on this totem pole, as he was very concerned by the eggs. His mission was just to let the system absorb the totem's divinity and leave, but looking at the large amount of eggs that weren't even that big yet, Noah had an idea that might end up being very profitable for him. He had no knowledge of or prepared conditions to raise these eggs until they became adult monsters, but that did not mean that there was no one who could do this, and whoever they were was probably willing to pay a good price for each egg.

Without taking a second moment to think about what he was doing, Noah grabbed the eggs closest to him and carefully placed them in his backpack after removing the most useless and least valuable things from there, and then he closed it.

Looking around the nest, Noah realized that there was no tree in the forest taller than this one, so he could see for a long distance. And from a distance, probably hundreds of kilometers away, was a small flying black speck.

Since Noah could see this black speck even at this distance, Noah guessed that this black speck was actually the monster that was driven away by Lilith. Seeing it from so far, Noah was amazed at how big this monster probably was. He stared for a moment at Lilith sleeping around his wrist and tried to figure out why this tiny snake managed to chase away that big monster.

When the totem finished being absorbed, Noah realized that the monster was starting to fly back to its nest. It was so far away that Noah thought it would take several hours to get there, but without wanting to take any unnecessary risks, he teleported to the ground and ran away.

'I'm not going to stay here even if they pay me. That monster has a partner somewhere most likely, unless it is one of those rare animals that lay eggs without a male.' Noah thought as he accelerated his own running speed, but still being careful not to break any eggs on his back.

- End Flashback -

Hearing the monster's furious cry, Noah didn't know if it was here because of the stolen eggs or if it was because of the destruction of the totem. Whatever the answer, Noah was to blame, and he didn't want to stay to find out if the second Boss would identify that it was he who caused its problems.

Worried, Noah looked at the place where the first Boss had died and waited anxiously.

The furious roars were becoming louder and louder, indicating that the Boss was getting closer and closer to the group. The Blessed were already preparing for a battle to the death.

Noah didn't know if he hoped for a miracle or accepted that he would have to fight this freakish creature that he had no confidence winning against, especially now that Lilith wasn't showing any signs of waking up from her sleep.

After a few seconds, the roars were becoming deafening, indicating the Boss was very close to them.

All the Blessed were prepared for a life and death battle against these monsters, but when Noah rose from the floor having resigned himself to his fate, luckily a familiar dark purple portal with a bright purple plasma appeared nearby.

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