Chapter 149: Traversing the dark forest.

Chapter 149: Traversing the dark forest.

The dark forest turned out to be surprisingly dark. Who would have guessed it, right? What was interesting about that was that it wasnt dark everywhere. Small patches of sunlight were sparingly littered throughout the forest and they functioned as resting spots for humans, animals and monsters simultaneously.

The map that Everic had provided us had a lot of these lit-up areas marked on it in the form of inky blotches, which allowed Emeri and I to plan out our route in advance.

As we traversed the hot, damp jungle, it became increasingly apparent why that precaution had been the right move, because even with the resting spots marked on our map the forest managed to get us lost numerous times in between each spot.

We had been traveling for about half a day, yet we were only at the outer edge of the forest still. The trees were getting taller, to be sure, but it was more the other vegetation that stood out. Roa and its neighboring countries mostly had spruce, oak and mixed forests, all of which I had grown up with.

The moment you left Roas southern border, however, you would find yourself here, in a forest so strange, dense, and full of life that I had never seen before. The increased temperature would have been crushing for any ordinary citizen, but thankfully it didnt have much effect on me because of my stats. Constitution went a long way in dealing with extreme temperatures.

It even helped protect us from the swarm of bugs that lived here, which I nice, since I didnt recognize even a single one. Even the leaves and branches seemed to have legs here, which made it all the more odd.

Unfortunately, an increase in plant- and animal life usually also meant an increase in monsters of all kinds, and this place was no different.

We hadnt taken two steps into the dense treeline before a rainbow-colored frog and a blue wasp had attacked us simultaneously. Fighting them off had been a disgusting, albeit easy, affair, since most monsters on the outskirts were tier 1.

In the beginning, my companion and I hadnt conversed much, scared to miss the sound of an impending monster attack, but eventually, we became comfortable enough in this alien environment to not care anymore. It turned out that Emeri knew more about this place than I did, so I decided that she would be the one to satisfy my growing curiosity.

As I wiped the green blood off of my sword and cut a thin-looking vine in half, I turned to her.

So since you did your due diligence and studied about this place, do you have any idea why this area is so different from anywhere else on the continent? All the monsters weve encountered so far cant be found anywhere else on the mainland.

Emeri nodded.

See this here? Weve gone a little too far to the left. We should be at this one. Emeri pointed out, sliding her finger over to a vaguely owl-shaped resting spot.

Were not that far off I replied, somewhat defensively. I had led the way through the mob of fighting monsters, so this was kind of my fault.

Emeri seemed to notice my guilt, because she quickly apologized.

Oh, sorry. I didnt mean to blame you, I was just saying

No, no, its fine. Lets head a little more right next time. This cloud-shaped spot should be a decent way back to our previous plan. I explained, not having been offended in the first place.

Emeri took my response in stride, though she couldnt help teasing me slightly.

Sure, that works. Let me go in front, though. She said with a smile, taking pleasure at my hesitant nod.

After eight more hours of sleep to recover from the nights battling we were off again.

Turns out Emeri was better at following directions than me, because we reached the cloud-shaped spot in record time. To be fair, I had been navigating us through a small monster war, while she had only had to lead us through a calm, albeit confusing forest. How she would fair at night was still up in the air.

In preparation for another rough night, we rested for an extra hour at this spot, before heading out again, trying to make it as far as possible before the last bit of light disappeared from the forest.

Sure enough, that night we faced another monster outbreak. Tiring as it was, not a single monster managed to even scratch us when we worked together, so we still made it back to our intended path before the sun rose. That situation couldnt last, however.

After a few more days of traveling, we entered the inner part of the forest, where we stood face-to-face with dozens of tier 3 monsters. All. At. The. Same. Time.