341 Change
BANG
BANG
BANGGGGG
In a vast and seemingly endless dry plain, boulders shook one after another as if they were not made out of solid rock but were leaves exposed to the chilly winds of the winter.
The boulders trembled under the influence of a great force, some that were unable to withstand the force instantly exploded and shattered around, while some lost their original shape. Moving closer to the source of the great pressure on the landscape, the number of shattered boulders increased by a lot, to the point that there was almost no intact piece of land close to that great force.
And right where the force was being emanated from, even the ground had shattered to pieces, pebbles had turned to dust and dust had risen to the air.
Standing at the center of the shattered land, a man wearing all black shorts and pants, as well as a long black cloak, was holding a bloody spear in his hand while his left foot was pressing on something on the ground.
Red liquid wet the ground the more he put pressure on the left foot as the corpse under the black blood-stained boots got bent and twisted more and more. The sound of breaking bones was heard from time to time, but the man didn’t retreat his foot. Instead, he raised the bloody spear in his hand before moving it down with all his might, thirsting it in the body of the already dead woman. He raised his spear and thirsted down it once again.
SHAP
.....
SHAP
SHAP
Again and again and again, he stabbed the corpse’s face, chest, limbs, and all parts of its body until there was nothing left from it but some smashed meat with countless holes in it.
“Hah!”
The man raised his free hand and whipped the blood that has splashed on his face with the sleeve of his black shirt as he smirked at the corpse. Finally feeling somewhat satisfied, he straightened his posture and moved back a little bit. He glanced at the ‘thing’ that couldn’t be described as a ‘corpse’ anymore, and a smirk formed on his face.
“Heh! Pfff hehhehe!”
His smirk turned into a chuckled and his chuckle developed into a burst of laughter, a burst of loud continuous laughter.
“Hehehe hehe hahaha!”
His laughter echoed in the silent plain, making them feel more like shrieks than the sound of laughter.
Zzzz
Zzzz
The man’s gaze then fell down on a shining stone attached to his cloak. The white piece of jewelry was emanating light and electric currents from it as if it was a lit-up lamp. The scene made the man stop his laughter and instead, grab his cloak and pull it away, resulting in the cloak being thrown to the ground. The man turned his body towards the cloak, raised his leg, and kicked the piece of cloth. The cloak got thrown into the air before falling down to the ground meters away from him.
“Tsk!”
“Hey, lad! Don’t treat this thing so rashly!”
At that moment, he heard the voice of a man from afar. A few seconds later, he could see the figure of a golden-haired man appear. The golden-haired man stopped beside the cloak and picked it up before dusting it and tidying it up. He resumed walking forward until he reached the man and the ‘thing’ on the ground.
“Tsk! Is that supposed to be that woman’s corpse?”
He received a cold glare from the man as his answer.
“Alright alright! Return to the others. They’ve already killed the last one. With this, the Ranks of Philomns were all either killed or arrested. Phew! Finally!”
Alan tossed the cloak in his hand at Aaron and turned around.
“By the way, do something about that nosebleed of yours before returning to the team. It’ll give that little girl the freak!”
“....”
After seeing Alan go back the way he came and disappear from his sight, Aaron gradually raised one hand and whipped the area under his nose. Dark red liquid wet the back of his claused hand and his sleeves. After staring at the blood for a few seconds, Aaron took out a handkerchief from a pocket and cleaned his face with it.
After he was done, he bent down to pick up his spear and then started to walk to where Alan was headed to. After a few minutes of walking in the dry land, he finally saw a group of people standing beside a corpse. The corpse they were looking at was a man’s body whose face was smashed, unrecognizable, however, his body was intact except for a few wounds. It looked not even close to the ‘thing’ left behind after Aaron’s battle.
As soon as he joined the ground, all of the members turned to look at him. Watching his usually cold face and blood-drenched dark clothing, the others turned silent for a few seconds before looking away from him.
“Well done!”
It was only the leader of the team who spoke and smiled at him, before also looking away. It was as if they were all scared of the man in front of them and did their best not to annoy him.
That was right. None of them wanted to think about the fate of those Philomns members who had fallen to this man’s hands. Most of them refused to go after him in their battles and thus sent Alan to find him most of the time, as they didn’t want to see the smashed corpses of humans on the ground or their cut-down organs splashed around the room. Even if they were used to violence and death, this was still too much for them. Some of them still had nightmares about the first few times they all saw the fate of the man’s victims.
As a result, they started to avoid them little by little. Some treated him as if he didn’t exist, and some only talked to him when necessary. Aaron didn’t seem to care about them at all as he treated most of them as if they didn’t exist at all.
It was completely different from the person he was just 10 months ago. He was a whole different man than the one who trained with them and helped them get stronger.
Nonetheless, there were a few people who still tried to get close to him or maintain their relationship or some that the man didn’t mind interacting. One of them was Alan, who was actually annoying but somehow no one among the team hated him. The other one was the young girl Claire, who was actually still leaving with Aaron and treated him like a father figure. The other two were Aaron’s dead brother’s friends, who kept visiting him from time to time while also being scared of him at the same time.
“Let’s go back to the headquarters.”
With that order from the team leader, the team picked up the corpse of the last ‘Rank’ from the members of Philomns and headed started to teleport back.