Chapter 93 - 87

'Here we go…'

Along with the erratic howls and war cries, the monster parade charged forward creating a thunderous sound as they marched, and like a tidal wave, the monster parade surged in and devoured everything in its path. In the next instant, cries of death and pain were mixed in with those erratic howls and war cries, and as that ominous melody played in the background, more and more presences disappeared after being swallowed by the tide.

'Found them!'

A little over beyond the tide of monsters, I noticed three distinct groups cutting across the monster parade. According to my Sixth Sense, the respective leaders of those three groups seemed to be leading their subordinates straight towards this place.

'Yeah… This will be messy.'

In our original plan, the three packs were supposed to rush in here before the monster parade arrives. This way, we would be able to organize our escape and minimize the possibility of any internal conflict down the line. After all, there was a lot of bad blood between these three packs, and that would inevitably lead to a conflict that we couldn’t afford to have.

'Looks like something went wrong.' Unfortunately, things didn’t seem to have gone well on their end. And to make matters worse, the situation left the ape and me with no other choice but to wait and stand our ground, because if we didn’t, we had no hope of ever regrouping with the wolves due to all the chaos that was about to come. 'Okay, let’s do this.'

At first, what appeared was a small number of ants—or at least, that was what they looked like. 'What the heck?' In just one glance, I realized that the ants were completely different from the ones that I had fought before. To be more specific, it was the presence and the feeling that they gave off. Because as unbelievable as it was, even though they gave off the vibes of a hungry and insatiable beast, these guys at least showed some semblance of order and intelligence beneath their violent front. But now, from what I could tell, all of that was gone as if the monsters had completely sunk into the darkest depths of insanity. If I had to compare it to something, I’d say that it was the same as what I saw from the Underclaw. Although considering that appearance-wise nothing much had changed, maybe it was closer to the changes that the Hackclaw had to undergo before its supposed evolution.

What came after the ants were a bunch of Hellhounds and an assortment of different monsters that had an equally crazed look on their eyes. To be honest, there were so many varieties of monsters to the point that I couldn’t even recognize most of them. I didn’t know how or why all these monsters have gathered like this, but I would bet that they could rival or even surpass the threat level of the ant army.

Whilst I grit my teeth and prepared myself for the clash, the ape, on the other hand, approached a nearby tree and placed his hand on its trunk. When I saw that, I felt both intrigued and confused at the same time. After all, I was still curious about the staff-like weapon that he had somehow conjured during the fight against that Beast and Underclaw. But before my doubt could even take form, I noticed some movements on the trunk of the tree. It was, if I wasn’t mistaken, moving as if it was in liquid form.

'Huh?' For a moment, I thought that there was something wrong with my eyes, but as if to prove that all of it was real, the ape then plunged his arm inside and it just sunk in as if the trunk had always been a liquid all along. Then, in response to that, the surface of the trunk rippled violently whilst the entirety of the three trembled as if it was in pain. After a few seconds, the ape pulled out his arm and along with it was a familiar staff-like weapon on his hand.

To my surprise, the tree began to wither and die the moment that staff was pulled out. It was as if that staff itself was what keeping that tree alive. The bizarre thing was, that tree dried up and died in just a split second. And though the tree didn’t turn into dust much like the effect of my Shadow Collection, I still couldn’t deny the fact that there were some similarities between the two.

'I see… So, that’s it, huh?' At this point, the monster parade was almost before us, so I decided to focus my attention upfront. But before a lone monster could even reach us, the ground trembled as a multitude of vines jutted out from its resulting cracks. The next thing I knew, a wall of thorny and rampaging vines had appeared in between the monster parade and me.

'What the heck?!' Surprised, I turned to the side only to see that the ape was already beside me, his staff stabbed on the earth near his feet, and for some reason, there were some glowing streaks of light on both of his arms and it all flowed through the staff all the way down. Furthermore, I also noticed some vines coming out from the bottom section of his staff—specifically, on the part that was impaled on the ground.

From what I could tell, it seemed like the ape had created an arc-shaped wall that stretched from one side of the plain, all the way to the other. When I turned back and looked to the other side of the wall, I saw the monster parade trying to brute-force their way inside. But try as they might, they still weren’t able to get past the wall of rampaging thorns and vines.

As if they were conscious and alive, the vines either smacked the monsters away or even pierced multiple of them like some kind of barbeque. And even if some vines were chopped or separated from its roots, another one or even two would immediately take its place to continue its job. From the monster’s perspective, it probably felt incredibly annoying because it seemed as if there was an infinite supply of vines.

Obviously, all of us would have a harder time without this wall of vines. So, of course, I wanted the wolves to somehow get here and gather together before the ape reaches his limit, and the wall came crumbling down. Ideally, it would be even better if the wall fell apart, only after we had finished organizing our ranks.

With greeted teeth, I couldn’t help but exclaim inside. 'Damn it! Move faster, you bastards!' And as if the heavens had granted that wish, I noticed that all the three groups of wolves had started to pick up the pace. Although in retrospect, it was most likely the decision of the three alphas after they had seen this strange wall of vines.

After a long minute of waiting, the first group had finally arrived so the ape opened a part of the wall. Using that entrance, the Lightning Wolf’s pack passed through all the while disposing of every enemy that would try to slip during all the chaos. Though of course, it was inevitable that some would somehow succeed so I had no other choice but to personally dispose of them.

Surprisingly enough, the stray monsters were all easy to kill mostly because they all seemed to be only following their instinct. It was as if they were possessed by something and that drove them mad to the point that the only thing they knew was to charge forward and attack. As a result, it was easy to read their movements and bait them into a trap. And while it was true that they had the raw power to back it up, all of it was just being offset because of their reckless behavior and crazed mind.

'This is completely different from that Chaos Beast and Underclaw…' I observed as I activate Shadow Collection and turned all the dead bodies around me into dust. Then after I gave the Lightning Wolf a cursory glance, I checked how many stacks I’ve got. Six, huh?' In that instant, two new openings appeared on the wall so the Lightning Wolf and I decided to take care of each one.

I took the one on the left, while the Lightning wolf took the one on the right. But in a rather strange twist of fate, the pack who entered on the left opening was the pack of my secret enemy, the Tempest Wolf. What’s more, I even somehow came to recognize some members of his pack. Specifically, they were the ones who were with the Tempest Wolf when he attacked and destroyed my father’s—the Frost Wolf’s pack.

'You’ve got to be freaking kidding me. Like, really, what are the chances of this?' But as if that wasn’t nearly enough, the Tempest Wolf chose that timing to look my way and flashed a friendly smile.

'Good work.' The Tempest Wolf greeted with a tone that only seemed to be sarcastic despite his sincere smile.