Chapter 457: The Second Guardian Site

Titus quickly made his way over to the snake and pulled it by the tail as the vines covering his body branched out and started covering the snake. He was making sure that it would not be able to break free as he dragged the other half of its body out of the hole. Tank shuffled over as well as Titus was slowly dragging the snake out, he was waiting at the hole until it reached the point where he could rip the snake's head off. If Tank simply bit off any part of the snake's large body then it would be possible for it to get away and regenerate, but if he tore its head off and crushed it then there was no way any beast could survive such a thing.

Soon the red blinking light from Natalie's tracker arrow came within view showing that the snake had been pulled out all the way to its neck. Tank immediately chomped down on the glowing red light pulling the rest of the snake out. The clamping force pressed on the snake's neck by Titus caused its camouflage to disappear as its head became visible. It was flailing the rest of its body in an attempt to break free as its mouth was open wide and hissing. It tried to turn its head to bite at Tank, but Tank had its neck clamped down while Titus kept the large beast from breaking free from all of his vines.

With what Joshua could only assume was a smirk from Tank at their struggling opponent, Joshua suddenly heard a large snap as the snake's thrashing came to a stop. Tank bit down aggressively before using one of his feet to hold the snake down as he pulled as hard as he could. Soon another cracking sound occurred before the head of the snake was ripped off as parts of its spine was torn out of the rest of its body. The long body thrashed around without the head for a minute before it lost all signs of life and everyone in the group could feel a sudden surge of experience.

Joshua grinned as he felt himself level up once more in what was likely the last time for a while since the expedition was coming to an end. He was level eighty four now and he could feel a difference between his strength after gaining so many levels in such a short amount of time. Joshua hadn't felt such a rush in a while and he knew it would take a while to get his body accustomed to all of the new stats if he wanted to be at his best with a tournament coming up. Judging by all of the excitement from the other members in the group it was clear that several people in the group had gained a level from the large scale battle. It wasn't all that dangerous of a fight because of the way that they had set themselves up beforehand, but it was still a ton of enemies that they had to take down.

It took a minute for everyone to go around and gather up all of the dead bodies of the coyotes and the vultures. There was a lot of damage to the bodies since they were bombarded by so many spells, but they would still be worth keeping for materials or to use as meat for Lilly's beast companions. At the end of the expedition Joshua, Laura, and Madalyn were going to have to figure out how of the materials they had gained from the expedition should be given to Vince's group but that was something they would have to worry about in a couple of days.

After the short clean up and the slightly longer time they took to clean off all of their gear at a nearby hill so that other beast wouldn't be able to track them by the scent of blood they were ready to get on the move. It was a lesson that none of them would forget after the first time a pack of beast chased after them even with Vince's illusions up, simply because of the smell of blood. When that was all done Lilly summoned Momo once more and they got on the move again. The tension that Joshua and the rest of the group had been under for the past couple of days was gone since the snake was no longer stalking them and it seemed that they had killed most of the beast in the area after the last fight since they didn't see any other beast around once Momo got on the move.

The sudden empty prairie area was a good sign that their initial assumption of them taking out most of the beast in the area was true. Although after thirty minutes of racing through the prairie without coming across any beast or other signs of life at all Joshua was starting to have a feeling that they were getting close to another guardian site. The last time they had come across a guardian site there wasn't a single beast around the area and that seemed to be the case here too.

It didn't take long for that fact to become even more obvious as the terrain that they were traveling through was starting to gradually change. Instead of tall grass and open fields with hills as far as the eye could see, they started seeing a far more flat area that for the first time since they had entered the prairie looked more dried out and barren than the usual luscious plains. Even though it was a gradual change it wasn't very hard to notice. The new terrain was similar to the dried out dessert area they had visited a while back with all of the scorpion like enemies, but it didn't seem to be as nearly as big an area.

The sudden change in the environment clearly pointed to the area being another guardian site, but unlike with the last guardian site there weren't any giant indicators around to let them know that they were nearing one. The only reason they were able to tell they were approaching a guardian site was the fact that there were no beast in the area and that the terrain seemed out of place in a prairie. They had seen places in the prairie with lots of dirt exposed do to prairie chickens or ground hogs, but not to this extent.

The moment Momo noticed the change in terrain she slowed her pace down a bit so that she could react to anything that could happen. The wide open area made it extremely difficult for any creatures to try to take the group by surprise, but that didn't mean they couldn't come across some sort of trap. They had no idea what could possibly be set up around a guardian site seeing as how the two ones they had come across were extremely different from one another. They couldn't role out other types of dangers outside of beast even if it wasn't a dungeon. The prairie territory seemed to enjoy throwing new things at them constantly so they had to be prepared for anything.

As they got further into the new area they didn't come across any changes for a while, but eventually they did come across a similar large slab set up on the ground in the same fashion that the one at the last guardian site had been placed. The slab seemed out of place compared to the barren area around it, but the fact that a slab was here meant that the barrier holding the guardian of the area was likely right behind it. This time around there weren't any giant pillars that could make the barrier more obvious, but Joshua could feel a bit of a distortion in front of him with his aura sense. The barrier kept him from sensing what was inside of it which made it seem as if the area in front of him was warped in some way when Joshua used his aura sense.

After examining the slab a bit from a distance the group all approached it to see what it said this time around. The first thing everyone noticed about this slab was that it had a different beast depicted on it than the last guardian site. Instead of a bobcat being shown there was a large coyote with several smaller ones crowding behind it. This told them what the guardian of the area was, but it didn't give anyone a clear depiction of its strength or the number of followers it would have.

Below the image of the coyote there was a similar description as the last site that they had checked out so Joshua just skimmed passed that to read the last portion that was about the guardian of this specific area.

[A pack of coyote rules over this guardian site with a terrain that has been made specifically for them. These coyotes are not like any other that you have faced up to this point so be prepared for a harsh struggle. The pack leader of this group is the true guardian and if you can take it down then you shall have your victory.]

Joshua got the jest of what the description was getting at. It was clear that things had been set up in favor of the coyotes the moment they entered the barrier and the amount of them inside would be numerous, but as long as they killed the pack leader then they will have won. Joshua didn't know if that meant that the rest of the coyotes would die as well or if the barrier would be released and all of the remaining coyotes would be let free to roam the prairie, but taking down the pack leader was going to be their priority when challenging this guardian site later on.

When he finished reading the description Joshua decided to walk forward and touch the slab so that they could all get a look at the inside of the barrier. Just like with the last guardian site a small hole was formed in the barrier that allowed them all to look through it and see what was on the other side. Last time they were able to get a clear view of what was within the barrier but this time there was a large dust cloud that seemed to be hindering view of what was inside the barrier. The moment the hole appeared Joshua could feel the power of the different beast inside of it and his eyes immediately locked onto a large hidden figure in the dirt cloud that was staring directly at the hole in the barrier. It had glowing red eyes that gave off an eerie feeling, but the power coming off the creature was even more troubling as it felt as powerful as the last guardian they had tried to peek in on.

Soon several more pairs of glowing red eyes started popping up as the hole began to close once Joshua took his hand off of the slab. That's when Adrian whistled getting everyone's attention. "Fighting that beast and a dust storm sounds like a good time to me." Joshua could only shake his head at his friends antics.