Book 5 Chapter 8.2 – Face of Darkness
Su’s line of sight then landed on the animal livestock shed outside the walls. His brows frowned slightly, feeling a weak but extremely familiar aura from within. With a flicker, Su’s figure already stood at the center of the livestock shed. The livestock shed was still burning. A few crystals appeared on the surface of Su’s body, and he produced a weak force field, slightly decreasing the heat of the flames as to not burn down the combat suit cloth strips wrapped around his body.
The several hundred livestock already died, their deaths arriving so abruptly that most of them still maintained their positions prior to their deaths. Even the strongest of them didn’t have time to take more than two steps before being burned to death by the raging flames. The livestock corpses were already completely charred, with a few still releasing embers from their bodies. Those were flames that originated from within. The apostle directly ignited every cell within them; it wasn’t the burning livestock shed that killed them, but rather them who burned down the livestock shed.
Su’s eyes swept out, landing on the beast fence that Aire had previously searched through. Then, his eyes moved, stopping at the high up ventilation shutter. Su’s pretty eyebrows raised gently; the familiar aura became a bit stronger. He suddenly jumped up, already passing through the ventilation window, and then he quickly moved towards the forest.
Madeline carried Cirvanas as she made her way around the scene of flames, following Su into the forest, always staying within five hundred meters of Su’s location.
Then, in the forest, Su saw the bull, but right now, the bull’s remaining upper half had already been charred, while the bones of the latter half still maintained their original appearance. The apostle could turn creatures’ flesh and blood into energy sources for combustion, but bones were an exception.
Su squatted down, lightly touching the bull’s skeletal remains. This slight external force made the bull’s skeleton completely break apart. However, under the charred grayness, the glossy cuts could still be seen. When he gently caressed the surface, Su could clearly sense a familiar aura. The feeling was vaguely similar to what Little Luo gave him, but differences still occupied the majority.
Su raised his head, his eyes stopping at the tree branch that the little fella had previously nailed itself to. There were four fine cuts that were difficult to detect even if one was right next to it. However, not even the smallest traces could escape Su’s eyes. These small cuts also reminded Su of Little Luo, reminding him of Little Luo’s extremely sharp limbs.
Su reached out his right hand’s forefinger to try and produce a cutting edge from his fingertip, but his wishes couldn’t be fulfilled. He could freely control his body, yet he couldn’t complete such a simple transformation. From this point, Little Luo’s body was much purer than Su’s. And now, right here, there seemed to be a creature similar to Little Luo?
The feeling this aura left Su with was quite different. Su didn’t feel much instinctive killing intent towards it, but there was definitely no fondness to speak of. This was an instinctive thought. During this period of time, Su discovered that his body’s instincts were becoming more and more powerful, and on the judgment of many matters, clear tendencies began to appear.
Su slowly stood up, his eyes passing through the thick forest and travelling into the distance. He really wished to catch up to it. With his skills in tracking, he would definitely catch up to the little fella who left behind this aura. However, between him and the little fella was an apostle, a colossus that occupied a region of several hundred square kilometers.
Su gave up his own curiosity, gave Madeline who appeared behind him a signal, and then the three of them followed a set distance behind the apostle.
A few dozen kilometers out, the little thing was already running with the greatest speed it had ever displayed in its life.
Its four limbs deeply inserted themselves into the ground, and then the power it erupted with sent its body out like an arrow. The power its limbs exerted was incredibly great as well, to the extent where there was almost nothing that could endure the force of its trample as they offered it speed. Its rhythm of movement was extremely fast, but due to its small body, its speed while running along the earth still wasn’t that fast, at the very least, slower than that of the undercurrent chasing after it. However, when it was about to be caught, it suddenly leapt into midair. All of its jointed limbs tightly curled up around its body, and then its body was pulled perfectly straight, the scales behind it like flower petals as they unfolded, several spots of yellow radiance shining below the scales. Its current self was like a guided missile, quickly increasing speed, its velocity exceeding five hundred kilometers an hour in an instant, roaring through the sky to leave the undercurrent far behind it.
The energy reserves inside of its small body seemed near endless, only landing on the ground after flying for ten minutes. As soon as it descended, it smashed head first into the hard frozen earth, catching a nest of snow rabbits inside the cave beneath the snow layer. In just a minute of time, they were eaten until only a layer of pelt remained. After eating these snow rabbits whose body mass was several times that of its own, it was far from being full, its stomach only swelling up a little bit.
Its body was extremely weak, its energy stockpile already completely gone. The feeling of starvation was like acid, continuously burning it. It lightly cried out a few times as if it was wronged, and then it made its way out from the snow layer. It discovered quite a few life auras in its field of view, but it didn’t have time to eat. Behind it, that mountainous pressure already rolled over. Even though it was still quite far, the undercurrent was just too large, and it didn’t seem to understand the meaning of fatigue.
The little creature released a mournful wail, bounced up from the ground, and then frantically ran again. If it didn’t fly, its speed was a bit slower than the undercurrent, and would thus ultimately be caught after an hour. However, during this fleeing process, its four limbs were slowly lengthening, and its running speed also seemed to have increased somewhat.