Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Zhang Lisheng accompanied the three girls and finished his breakfast in laughter. The four of them proceeded to leave the cement house and walked towards the wall gate of the gathering place under the sunlight.
Eight o’clock was the most crowded time for human flow. Blending themselves amidst the crowds, it took quite some time for them to slowly walk out of the city gate. However, they did not realize that they had been targeted by two middle-aged men, one tall and one small, wearing old black suits, who seemed to be strolling on the foggy old London street, as they walked on the foreign world’s island.
“I can smell the stench of sweat in that hair without any chemical scent. That girl’s hair is not dyed, but is naturally red!” The slightly taller middle-aged man, with pale skin and a pair of artist-like melancholic eyes, was staring at Trish, who was walking into the jungle with utmost concentration, without blinking. “An Aryan Special! She’s an Aryan Special! We actually encountered a prey that is worth collecting in this land that is not bound by the ‘secret agreement’! This is a blessing!”
“Drizzt, we have more important things to do! Compared to your favorite ‘artwork’, His Excellency’s command is…” Upon seeing the tall man’s enchanted look, his brown-skinned companion, whose height only reached his shoulder and who had a big nose that was unique to the Indians, shook his head and said.
“Hawk! Just how long would it take for us to collect an ‘art’ in the jungle!” Drizzt revealed his white teeth as he licked his lips. “Don’t worry, I won’t delay Lord’s order.”
“It better be so.” Hawk had already known that it was impossible for him to dissuade his headstrong companion so he said helplessly.
The two of them whispered at each other as they followed Zhang Lisheng and the other three into the jungle from a distance. After they entered the jungle, they were astonished to find that their prey had already disappeared.
Drizzt’s expression changed at once. Closing his eyes, he sniffed and relaxed his expression. “There’s no scent of any spell being cast. Looks like the three girls have found a good guide that is familiar with the terrain. Let us spare that Asian kid’s life later, he may be useful to us. Hawk, now that my personal affairs have become official business, please use your ‘doll’ to help then!”
“You always have so many excuses. If you really want to catch her, isn’t it easier to find them with your nose?” The Indian rubbed his nose and complained. However, he still took out an old doll sewn from assorted-colored rags with a tilted mouth and eyes from his pocket. Then, crouching down, he dug a hole and buried the doll.
“I’m not a hound! And on top of that, the earlier your doll is planted, the earlier you’d feel safe anyway. I’m doing this for your sake! Mutter your incantation now, I’ll help go look for two pieces of fertilizer.” Seeing that his companion had already taken out the doll as he wished, Drizzt chuckled and opened his arms wide to flap them gently. Suddenly, together with his clothes, he transformed into an owl with bloodshot eyes and flapped his wings. His huge body began to fly in midair agilely like a hummingbird before he charged into the jungle.
Hawk, on the other hand, remained on his original spot tiptoed and began to dance a peculiar dance in a circle around the doll buried in the pit.
As the Indian’s dance and movement gradually intensified, the seven orifices on his face — mouth, ears, nose and eyes — began to ooze droplets of black blood, forming a few lines of bloody tears on his face. Such a strange scene seemed to make the jungle’s hot air gradually become chilling.
After a while, the bloody tears on Hawk’s face gathered to become thicker but they never dripped down at all. Right at this moment, a sudden whoosh sound resonated from the depths of the jungle, which was followed by the appearance of a big bird with a black cat head that was holding onto the skulls of two sturdy and tall men, who were kicking and struggling faintly, with its sharp claws as it flew up to Hawk.
The owl landed and transformed into the graceful bearing of Drizzt again.
“Look, two sturdy middle-aged men that are still alive. I believe their warm blood will make your dolls grow stronger!” Drizzt grabbed the two sturdy men on the verge of their deaths with one hand each and handed them to his companion, who was still continuing to encircle the doll, as he said with a smile.
Hawk looked at the two ‘fertilizers’, whose tongues had been pulled out and had a twisted horrifying expression on, without saying a word. Smiling silently, he grabbed one of the sturdy men and tore open his neck with his hands despite the fact that the man was still alive.
In an instant, with the last fierce struggle of the strong man, a tremendous amount of blood spurted into the ground like a fountain and infiltrated into the pit where the doll was buried. After a while, the soil covering the pit was gently moved and broken open by a head as big as a basketball that seemed to be sewn from red clothes.
After that, the ugly puppet’s head protruded out of the soil, the blood that was splattered onto the ground, the surrounding trees, and even on Hawk and Drizzt’s bodies began to tremble and gather into its mouth.
Seeing that the doll had already formed, the Indian threw the sturdy man, whose blood had completely flowed out aside, and grabbed another ‘fertilizer’ from his companion’s hand and did the same thing. Finally, he scraped the bloody tears from his face using his fingers and drop by drop, jerked them towards the red puppet doll that had already grown to more than two meters high, before helping it to pull its legs out of the soil.
Lastly, he commanded the dried doll to crouch on the ground and split its mouth wide. Like eating noodles, it sucked the two bodies into its stomach as Hawk nodded in satisfaction. “Drizzt, you’ve found good ‘fertilizers’ this time.”
“Thank you for the praise, man! But we’ve delayed quite a bit of time already. Let us go now! I can’t wait!” As Drizzt was speaking, he grinned and his body turned short as he transformed into a huge leopard.
Seeing that his companion had used the Transfiguration Spell, Hawk did not say any nonsense and began to chant his incantation. His short body suddenly turned into black smoke that wrapped around the red puppet doll that already had a height of nearly three meters.
The doll that was originally sluggish, started to stand on the ground, swaying around as though it had soft legs that were gradually straightening its body up. Its face that had facial features seemingly drawn by a kid also suddenly turned vivid and lifelike.
“Follow me, Drizzt!” The doll shook its head and its eyes outlined with charcoal actually swiveled around. Suddenly, like a rag being torn apart, it roared and strode out towards the right. Its speed was so fast that it was absolutely incredible.
Even though the voodoo doll was moving rapidly in the jungle, the piebald leopard running behind did not lag as well. These two monsters were able to keep their pace with each other in the jungle.
The strange thing was that, despite having a fast speed, both of their efforts still came to naught after tracking for more than 20 minutes in the jungle.
“Drizzt, this doesn’t seem right!” Hawk commanded the doll to stop the leopard as he began to feel uneasy. Halting his steps, he said, “An ordinary person would never have such a fast speed while walking inside a jungle. Looks like that group of three women and one guy is not a group of easy people…”
“You only realized it now, Hawk? The leopard also showed the same thoughtful expression as a human. “They don’t have any mark and there’s no scent of spells being cast. They can be tracked by your doll but we can’t catch up to them at all. Looks like this island has been locked on by other free ‘Darkwalkers’.”
“What should we do then? There are four of them but we only have two! And now, they’re in the dark but we’re in the light…” the doll’s eyes turned wide as it whispered.
“The loudest name in the dark world of New York is Sir ‘Lord’. The Shrimp B1 Island is close to New York so by right, it should be His Excellency’s territory! We have ‘Lord’s mark on us so I think these people would not easily make their moves on us. Otherwise, they would have long ambushed us already.”
“Drizzt, you mean…”
The leopard lifted its front paw and made a ‘quiet’ sign that could send chills down a person’s spine. Sniffing hard with its nose, it said, “They’re not here! Hmph! I think these people are testing our strength. If we can’t catch up to them, then there’s nothing worth paying attention to. If we catch up to them, we wouldn’t know what would happen. Perhaps they’d be willing to cooperate with us on a temporary basis. After all, the four ‘Darkwalkers’ are dispatched at the same time so it means that they must have a big plan going on! However, there’s a bigger possibility that they’d kill us immediately. The fact that they didn’t make their moves so simply doesn’t mean that they’d never do it. Now, we have a problem. Despite knowing all these, we still have to do our best to find and meet them!”
As it was speaking, a bitter human-like expression crept upon its face.
“Oh yeah, I almost forgot! Lord has given out a new order for us to figure out their purpose if we happen to find Darkwalkers on Shrimp B1 Island!” The doll’s expression froze as he blurted.
“Because of this, no matter what, we must continue to pursue them. Make way, Hawk!”
“Even if we come across any danger, you can just turn into an eagle and fly away just like that. After you report to Lord, you may even get a reward as well. Me, on the other hand, could only stay there and die if my doll is destroyed by the enemy!” Hawk muttered under his breath and made way for him.
A lifelike scorn appeared at the corner of the leopard’s lip. “So what then? Don’t tell me that you dare to dismiss Lord’s order and just leave like that? Or perhaps, you think that you can deceive Lord’s eyes that can see through everything?”
Then, it began to run frantically.
“It’s all your fault! If it wasn’t for you who wanted to collect those damn ‘artworks’, we wouldn’t have given chase to those four Darkwalkers, let alone finding their traces! Everything would have been fine!” The doll followed its companion and roared angrily.
“Then, has it occurred to you that they might have the same purpose as ours?” The leopard ran and sniffed its nose at the same time, “Wouldn’t it be worse if we had only come across them by that time?
“Drizzt! Did you think that I’m an idiot? There are so many indigenous tribes on the island. Even if our purpose is the same, the chances of us coming across each other would be…”
“Shut up, Hawk! The scent of the girl’s hair is not far away!” The leopard suddenly interrupted and whispered to the puppet.
This was a matter of life and death so Hawk no longer complained about anything. His tone finally calmed down. “Inform me when we’re within 100 meters from them.”
As he was speaking, he saw his companion rush out of the jungle and suddenly stop in front of a lofty river. At the other end of the river, there was a pair of twinkling eyes staring at them coldly.
