Chapter 67: Run!!

Chapter 67: Run!! A few hours later, Kieran was back on his feet, staring at his body.

The major wounds on his torso and the large cut on his forehead had stopped bleeding while most of the smaller ones ahd closed up completely, leaving small marks that would fade away later on.

’It’s still gonna tear up’

Kieran thought about the upcoming battle.

"I still don’t get. I’ve only ever seen one person with such a freakish body, Jake and he’s pretty much anything but normal"

Ruby muttered outlook in shock despite being the one who applied first aid on him, and it was to be noted that the drugs she applied weren’t the cheap type.

Kieran couldn’t blame her though, he pretty much felt the same about his insane recovery speed. He already noticed this trait ever since the first signs of changes appeared in him, but ever since the events of the exploration mission in the woods, that aspect of him had grown substantially.

He still didn’t understand how he had gone from a random student that bled from the weak punches of a few guys to tanking sharp claws and gritting his teeth through the pain like it was nothing.

"You still want to go?!"

Ruby asked, looking towards the piece of land which still had the corpses of the beasts Kieran had killed earlier on it.

Strangely, not even one breast from the third group had popped up. Not even any other creature had revealed their presence. Like they weren’t attracted ro the blood, or.....like there was something that could make them ignore the immense temptation that was on the peice of land.

All this strange behavior only served to solidfy the romurs that there was a very strong creature in this part of the swap.

Meanwhile Kieran’s had was slowly stroking the body of his scythe, as he stared into space contemplating deeply on what to do.

He was staring to reconsider challenging this ’mystery’ beasts. Ever since they got into this region there seemed to be something which made the beasts here so cautious that they would ignore what was practically a free for all buffet. This made him remember the beast, no....monster, that he had seen the other night.

If their ’mystery’ monster was stronger than that, then he wasn’t sure if he could handle that alone. Even with the help of Ruby, the chances of winning to him were still low.

Kieran thought about this for a long while, his self preservation instincts kicking in strongly.

’What do I get if I don’t risk it?’

Kieran thought, making up his mind. He was going to face this mystery beast if it appeared and he was going to kill it. He had every reason to fear, but it would be disappointing if fear was the thing that stopped him from progessing on this path he had chosen for himself.

"Let’s go"

He said to Ruby jumping into the distance, it would be best if he could kill the last group and clear the first part of the mission before it got dark, when the beasts got active.

Ruby carassed the two kusarigamas which hung from her waist for a while before packing the bloodied wools and emptied bottles of drugs she had used on Kieran into a surprisingly small bag, catching up to him in no time.

’Spatial bags were the best thing to happen to humanity!" She muttered to herself on the way.

.....

"Are you sure there’s a third group?"

Kieran asked the moment she landed on the place.

He was basically standing above the bunch of holes, in the territory of those beasts and yet, nothing had happened. It was completely odd.

Even if they didn’t intervene in his fight with the monkey’s, no beast or group of beasts was lenient enough to let a stranger step foot upon the place they considered as territory.

Well, except the high beasts of the planet, but those were very rare to see individually, talkless of in groups.

"That’s what the mission says"

Ruby answered uncertainly as she checked the description of the mission once again.

"Try sensing if you’ll get something!" Kietan suggested with a strange expression, what she should have done from the start.

He had also tried doing the same, but he couldn’t sense anything, it was better to hear from Ruby who was of a higher level than him before jumping into conclusions.

Walking forward, Ruby bent and put her hand on the ground and shut her eyes.

Opening them after a few minutes,.she turned to kieran with an equally strange expression.

"You don’t feel anything right?"

Kieran asked upon seeing the gloom on her face.

Unlike what was stated in the mission, there was no third group of beasts. And it seemed like this had been the case for quite a while, because there was no left over corpses of a different type of beast apart from the other two he had cleared.

They must have been cleared by the others, but then, not even their bones were spared, that wasn’t something he could think of an explanation for.

What was more strange was the fact that none of the other two group of beast had stepped foot into the free territory. That was another thing he had no thoughts on.

"What’s going on?" Ruby muttered.

"Doesn’t matter, mark the mission as complete, there is no mystery beast here. Let’s go!"

Kieran said with a deep frown, a deep sense of urgency could be sensed from his tone.

’There’s something off about this situation’

He could feel that itch in his bones again, the same he felt when he faced that huge monster. There was something eerily wrong with the situation they were in, something he had yet to notice, he could feel it, it was clawing at him.

’Wait?!’

Kieran looked around with narrowed eyes.

"Do you hear that?"

Kieran asked Ruby who he could see from the corner of his eyes, his grip of the scythe tightened.

"Hear what?"

Ruby be asked, before tensing in realization.

"Exactly! Nothing. Since when did it get this quiet?"

Kieran mentioned, his eyes shooting around frantically trying to locate whatever was behind this.

"Let’s go, we are done here!"

Kieran said, trashing any of intensions to hunt this ’mystery’ beast which was the prime suspect behind their current situation.

How the fuck was he going to hunt a beast he couldn’t even find. And that beasts was there, playing games with him. That just made it clear how much the difference between the was, and Kieran got the message pretty clearly.

If he had taken on the mission a few years ago when it first appeared, then he might have stood a chance against this beast, but not now, years upon years of sending recruits as food to it had made it grow and accumulate its power. Whatever this beats was, Kieran doubted it was something a level five recruit could handle, he had a pretty deep feeling it was above what a normal level 6 could handle, seeing evtermy cautious expression on Ruby’s face.

Having gotten the message, Kieran and Ruby started their retreat, but fate wasn’t really a kind person. Ruby and Kieran had willingly stepped into the domain of this beast, and just Luke they both knew, thw beats if thos planet were very territorial.

This one wasn’t going to be one of the strange cases they had encountered until now, where they could just walk away. They had even killed its livestock. They’re was no way the beast was going to let them walk away scot free.

"Run!"

Kieran said to Ruby when he couldn’t withstand it anymore and their tensed bodies broke into a mad sprint. Their lives depended on how far away the could run at this point.

......

Despite how much they ran, the feeling of being doomed didn’t fade one bit.

If anything, it only got worse, making it seem like they were running to an infinitely far distance. This only made the both of them want go get out of there more, making them summon some sort of inner potential and run faster. It was surprising that he could even do that, suprassing their limits, but at that point, neither of them cared.

After several hours of running, which they barely noticed, just when the sky of the swap was about to be devoured in its usual darkness, Kieran’s eye lit up as he spotted the unmistakable boundary between the two regions, he never felt this much joy to see a bunch of beasts.

It didn’t matter what their number was, he would rather fight through the horde of creatures than face the single abomination that made him feel that way.

"Haaa! That was fun!"

A low voice resounded from all directions, sending a wave of shock down his spine, his face wet with beads of cold sweat.

He almost tripped the moment he heard ghat voice, it was like something was trying to drill itself into his soul, making him unable to take a step further.

The fear he felt was several times more than that when he saw a whole small nation of beasts during the exploration mission.

"You really are good at running, it was rather entertaining to watch!"

A cold, inhumane voice was heard, this time with direction.

Fighting the effects of the voice on him, Kieran manged to break free and turned to the voice, finally setting his eyes on the creature behind their despair.

Unfortunately the darkness did no justice to his purpose, he could see nothing!

"You can move?"

The creature’s voice had some excitement? When it saw Kieran break the trance and turn towards him.

"She’s useless then, but she seems useful?"

The voice suddenly appeared from beside him, next to Ruby who still couldn’t move, and he snapped his head to her, but she was no longer beside him.

"Come meet over me there!"

The beast said, it’s voice fading into the distance along with Ruby.

The intense pressure on him surely coming off him at once making him fall to his feet.