Chapter 672 Calm Before The Storm

Outside the cave, the experts of the four great families were sitting down to catch their breath.

Around them were the ten Child Soul Realm beasts that had guided them to the cave in the first place, but these were also the same beasts that had saved them from that cloaked figure just now.

After catching their breath, the four Child Soul Realm Experts carefully came over to the one Child Soul Realm beast that had signaled for them to follow it earlier.

They were still wary of the Child Soul Realm beasts, but they also couldn't feel any hostility coming from them at this moment.

So one of the four Child Soul Realm Experts said, "Thank you for saving us." But then after a pause, his voice filled with doubt as he asked, "But why did you save us? What are your intentions?"

There was still that fact that it was these ten Child Soul Realm beasts that had driven them to this cave in the first place. If it wasn't for them, they wouldn't have been caught up in this mess at all.

The one Child Soul Realm beast lifted a paw and dropped a piece of paper in front of this Child Soul Realm Expert.

,m Then without even looking back at them, all the Child Soul Realm beasts suddenly disappeared into the trees. Even when they tried searching for them with their spiritual senses, they couldn't find a single thing.

It was just like what had happened when these beasts had ambushed them.

Seeing that they couldn't follow them, after coming back to their senses, the Child Soul Realm Expert went over to the piece of paper that the beasts had left.

He picked it up and when he saw what was written, his face was filled with even more shock.

He turned and let the other Child Soul Realm Experts see what was written and they all revealed the same look of shock.

After a long moment of silence, one of them finally asked, "If what's written is true, what should we do about this?"

There was a bitter laugh from another one of them before they said, "Is there really anything to consider here?"

The other three looked at this one that laughed and then the one that laughed said in a serious voice, "We've already offended one side, is there really anything left to consider?"

These words hung heavy over them, but still not a single one of them said a thing because they knew that he was right.

It was just…

The cloaked figure was just too strong.

It was clear that the cloaked figure hadn't even come close to using his full power and yet he was able to dominate all of them. He was even able to face all the Child Soul Realm beasts by himself…

While they didn't know anything about the master of the Child Soul Realm beasts yet, they knew that he wouldn't be normal since he was able to control all those Child Soul Realm beasts.

Their only concern was if the master of these beasts could defeat the cloaked figure.

If they were to back the wrong side…

The most important thing was that this would determine whether they would be able to leave these Ancient Era Ruins or not.

So this wasn't a decision that they could make lightly.

After all, with the power that these two sides had, it was clear that they wouldn't just let them leave that easily.

On the piece of paper that they were holding, there was only a single sentence written.

"The Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect are working with the Assassins Association."

…

Back where Lin Fan was, he was focused on Brainy who was giving him reports.

After he had commanded the ten Child Soul Realm beasts to escape with the experts of the four great families, he had been focused on watching the movements of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.

Of course, that naturally included the cloaked figure from the Assassins Association.

However, when the scouts that Brainy had left in the cave tried to follow the cloaked figure as he made his way deeper into the cave, they found that there was a barrier that kept them out.

Brainy had many different kinds of scouts, so she had tried sending them through various different methods to penetrate the barrier. Of course that was penetrating the barrier through ways that couldn't be detected.

However, none of those different scouts could find a way to make it through the barrier that had been placed. Even when trying to dig under it or above it, they found that the barrier was actually placed inside of the walls of the cave as well.

No matter how they tried digging around it, they weren't able to do so. It was as if the barrier formed a perfect sphere around the area where the cloaked figure was.

Seeing that was the case, Brainy had no choice but to give up in the end.

After a bit of thought, Lin Fan said, "Forget it, there's no point in trying to force our way in. It'll be bad if he discovers what we're doing."

Brainy looked like she didn't want to give up, but seeing that Lin Fan had already spoken, she had no choice but to pull her scouts away from the barrier in the cave. The only scouts that she left in the end were the ones that were watching the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect group.

Lin Fan didn't say anything else at first, but then he asked, "Do you know where the groups of the other factions are?"

Brainy nodded and drew up a simple map of the surrounding area that marked where each group was currently camping out.

Of course, these groups were small for the amount of people that came in because not everyone had come out of their trials yet. Once more and more people came out, it was certain that the distribution would change as groups with more members would seize more and more territory.

After all, it wasn't just the trials alone that gave them benefits. There were plenty of herbs and beast materials that could be collected in the surrounding area as well.

If they became too injured from the trials, they wouldn't take the trials anymore and would focus on collecting the materials from the surrounding areas instead.

Once that happened, it was certain that there would be a clash between factions over these materials.

That also wasn't counting the final clash that would happen between the other factions and the cloaked figure, which was clearly the cloaked figure's plan. The cloaked figure hadn't hidden how domineering he had been the entire time, so it wasn't hard to figure out.

Before that, Lin Fan had to prepare since he wasn't certain if he could beat him with pure power alone.

In fact, Lin Fan wasn't even certain what the upper limit of the cloaked figure's power was because he had never seen him fighting at full strength. Whenever he had faced him, he had always felt that he was holding back for some reason.

If there was ever a time where he stopped holding back…

That would be a disaster for them.

So after some thought, Lin Fan pointed at several points on the map and said to Brainy, "I need you to set up a few things at these locations. Just…"

…

Five more days passed after the clash in the cave without much happening.

During this time, there were more and more people that came out of the trials and there were even people that went into a second trial.

As Lin Fan had expected, the people of the Hunters Organization had been able to clear the trial with just two of them being lost, but they were two that Lin Fan didn't recognize.

Still, that was an acceptable loss since that was how these Ancient Era Ruins were designed. Of course, their own greed was also one of the reasons why they had lost their lives and they couldn't blame anyone but themselves.

After they all came out of the trials, Lin Fan immediately gathered them in a group and filled them in on the situation.

All of them immediately believed Lin Fan. He had been able to find them immediately right after they came out of the trials, which proved his surveillance abilities. As well, they all knew that the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association were planning something.

So they all started following Lin Fan's instructions as they made preparations for the final clash.

Lin Fan also contacted the Myriad Sword Hall, the Ice Goddess Palace, and the Tamers Guild and filled them in on the situation.

The Myriad Sword Hall and Ice Goddess Palace were more inclined to listen to them, but the Tamers Guild weren't as cooperative as they continued heading into the trials.

Still, that didn't matter to Lin Fan since he knew that the Tamers Guild wasn't something that he could trust in the first place.

In the end, they wouldn't be able to run from the plans of the Assassins Association, so he just let them do what they wanted.

As for the Alchemy King Hall, he chose to ignore them for the most part.

While they were part of his mission, it wasn't imperative that he saved everyone for the mission and he chose to focus on saving the ones that he could. It would be very hard for him to work with the Alchemy King Hall since they didn't have any previous connections, so he chose to let them fend for themselves.

Of course, he sent a secret letter to them with the ten Child Soul Realm beasts that gave them the same information as the four great families.

He believed that they wouldn't be foolish enough to ignore this.

With all these plans in place, Lin Fan waited for the move of the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and Assassins Association group, but they didn't do a thing during these five days.

It was only on the sixth day that there was movement in the cave.