Chapter 377 - Fierce

"Master, after you cross that river there will be a small village where we have people station. Today we can just get some rest here." A druid pointed at a winding and quiet Blackwater River. "Tomorrow morning, we can cross the Blackwater River and walk another 40 miles. Then we will be at the necromancers’ secret base."

"I notice that the further north we go, the fewer death spirits there are. Is the necromancers’ secret base ahead of us? Why didn’t they send more death spirits over to protect their base?" a mercenary in Ye’s team asked in surprise. Only Ye knew the real intention of the druids, otherwise the mercenary would not have asked so bluntly.

"Well…it could be necromancers are afraid of being noticed by top powers," a druid said.

"Where is Suzanna?" Anfey asked quietly. Is this where they try to set him up? Anfey thought to himself. Using his full telepathy, he tried to see as far as he could. Soon, pictures of the areas around river and even that small village started to show clearly in Anfey’s head. Once Anfey started the Heart of Nature, wherever there were plants, or where the distance between himself and plants was not far, Anfey could see everything around it.

"She is in the village," the druid answered.

There were only about seven people on the outskirts of the village. Four of them were around bonfires, while the other three slept in simple tents. Anfey could not imagine they would try to kill him with just seven people. Anfey did not think they would act just on instinct. After a close search, he still could only see seven people. Suzanna definitely was not in the village.

"Let’s go. We need to get to sleep early so we can leave early tomorrow," Anfey said casually.

"Sure," the druid said.

There were four people next to the fire only a few miles across the river. They found people walking towards them and stood up one after another. The three people sleeping were woken up. Even though the druids with Anfey had sent out signals, they still kept alert. When there were only about 20 meters apart, they still coldly watched Anfey and his group. A druid walked over and whispered to their companion. That guy looked Anfey over for a while before he smiled. "Are you Master Anfey? How are you doing?"

As the guy was checking Anfey out, Anfey was watching him as well. He did not pay attention to the guy in the front, but others behind him. There was a beautiful and tall elf carrying her green bow diagonally on her back next to the guy. She also wore a short scepter on her belt. Obviously, she was a paladin just as Anfey. Two human swordsmen stood next to the elf. All the druids crawled out from the tent. It looked like this was not their first time working together. They stood in formation. If something happened, they could immediately form a defensive line.

"Are you…" Anfey pretended he did not know him. He actually knew not only his name, but also detailed information about him, including his age, childhood, personality, family background and other information.

"My name is Luther." Luther held his hand out to indicate a seat for Anfey. He smiled. "You guys must be tired from travelling so much. Come, sit next to the fire and rest a bit. We can sit and talk."

"Where is Suzanna?" Anfey pretended he did not know the answer again. He also looked worried.

"Unfortunately, she went to watch the necromancers around the river. You do not have to worry. You can see her tomorrow," Luther said.

Anfey had a bitter smile and shook his head. "Ok, everybody, take a seat and rest."

Everybody took a seat around the fire. Luther casually tossed a few logs on the fire. He hoped the fire would make them feel warmer. Anfey scanned the rising smoke. The person who planned this setup was cunning. He knew what he was doing, but the people carrying out this plan seemed too naïve. If the so-called necromancers’ secret base was only about 40 miles away, who would dare to light up a bonfire? Didn’t they worry about being found by the rising smoke? This village definitely had been attacked by death spirits before: the leftover smell made them uncomfortable. If he took such an important job, he should not have stayed outside the village. He should have stayed in the darkest room in the village and quietly hid there in case he was found by any chance.

Luther looked at the druids and asked in surprise, "Where is Captain Babylon?"

"Master Babylon was attacked by Spirit Separation, and…" the expression on the druids turned mournful.

"It is so unfortunate." Luther heaved a long sigh. "But if I remember correctly, it seems that you are missing one person."

"We had a fight with death spirits," one of the druids answered.

Luther paused and tried to comfort them, "Don’t be sad for losing your companion. In fact, you should feel lucky that Master Anfey was with you guys, otherwise none of you probably would have come back safe." Luther turned to look at Anfey with gratitude.

The druids looked at each other but did not know how to respond to Luther. When they were travelling on the road, one of their peers "accidentally" woke up a group of zombies. It would make sense that Anfey should have led them join the battle to kill the zombies, since he was the group leader. However, Anfey ran away from the zombies faster than any of them. Ye also led his mercenaries after Anfey and offered them the opportunity to be heroes. After that, they did not dare make any mistakes "by accident". They tried to avoid any conflict with zombies. When they heard Luther giving Anfey compliments for keeping them safe, it made them feel uncomfortable.

Luther waited for a while, but no one agreed with him. He had a weird look on his face. If Anfey was powerful, those druids should have given him a lot of compliments and described the fighting scene to give him some clues about Anfey’s fight ability. If Anfey’s fighting ability was not so great, they should have given some compliments out of courtesy. Now they all lost their tongues. What had happened?

"The fight must have been fierce, is it?" Luther had to remind them.

"Yes, master," a druid said with his head down. He understood Luther’s hint, but could not turn the topic to Anfey. He simply could not tell Luther that Anfey had fled from the fight.

Luther secretively gave that druid a dirty look and tossed a few more logs in the fire. He went into thought. He was thinking how to turn the topic toward Anfey without having Anfey suspect him.

That elf was interested in Anfey from the beginning and had been watching Anfey, while Anfey aggressively looked back at her. He kept his eyes on her face and chest. The elf, like any proud female, felt offended, so she turned to look away from Anfey. She sort of looked down on Anfey. In fact she misunderstood Anfey. Anfey only looked at her neck because he was thinking of all kinds of ways to break her neck. He did not have any other intention.

Not only barbarians could go crazy. Sometime people could go crazy as well. At that moment, Anfey was a proof. If they had conflict for their own interests, Anfey would not use extreme ways to deal with them, at least not during the Death War threatening them. They should keep their alliance to maintain their fighting ability. Anfey felt they not only had conflicts, they wanted to kill each other.

Suzanna was not wrong. Anfey was indeed very aggressive, especially when others cross him. Anfey would turn into a cruel person who could use any indecent ways to kill his opponents. His only objective was to wipe out all his opponents in order to leave no possibility that the opponents would rise up. He had checked this person in his mind. Beside this one, he also checked on Manstuly.

Anfey had forgiven them twice. The first time, Anfey ignored Philip on purpose after giving consideration to all aspects, based on the fighting ability he had back then. The second time, he listened to someone’s hint and allowed Marquis Djoser to act crazily in front of him, but this time, he would not let Manstuly get his way. Anfey was still not as good as Manstuly, but he did not have to challenge him in the same way. Anfey had been an assassin for the past ten years. He had killed a boxing champion who had not listened to the underground boxing trainer and a sharpshooter who could shoot a target a few miles way. The boxer’s fighting ability had been as good as his, while the shooter’s accuracy was far better than Anfey’s. Anfey still completed his missions because he knew how to attack his opponents’ weakness with his strength.

"Please allow me to make introductions," Luther said with a bright smile on his face. "She is from elf tribe…"

"Luther, how long have you been here? Did any death spirits attack you?" Anfey interrupted Luther. Anfey was not a machine. Sometimes he could feel annoyed as others since he had been dealing with anger the past few days. These people in front were all dead people to Anfey. He was not interested in knowing a dead person’s name.

"Hrr…" Luther was shocked for a second and shook his head. "No, it has been very quiet here."

That elf could not help snorting at Anfey to show she was unhappy with Anfey’s rudeness.

"Oh, right, did you see anything here? Does it have anything to do with Shadow Empire?"

"Shadow Empire?" Luther asked in surprise. This name sounded so gloomy. It was easy to guess it must have something to do with necromancers.

"Don’t you know about it?" Anfey looked shocked as well.

"This is the first I’ve heard of it." Luther shook his head. "Master Anfey, what does Shadow Empire represent?"

Anfey looked around. Luther got what Anfey meant and signaled the people to leave. However, the elf still sat there without any intention to leave. Luther looked back at Anfey, "Master Anfey, can you tell me now?" Luther looked a little nervous. Necromancers were the enemy of the whole Pan Continent, and his enemy as well. No matter what happened here, he would have to fight necromancers sooner or later, so he was really interested in Shadow Empire.