Chapter 157: Towards the Valley of Life&Death (a)

Elliot and his slave traveled towards the entrance of the Eternal Snow Zone, which was extremely far away.

The nightmare zone was a place that harbored many spirit beasts in the warrior and elite stage. One would come across many no matter how much they try to evade them.

Elliot had no intention of picking a fight with any of them. Nonetheless, he encountered many ignorant fools who didn't know any better and attacked him fearlessly! Sometimes he was attacked by a lone but strong spirit warrior. However, a few times, a flock of beasts attacked him.

The horrifying nightmare watched their end with eyes widened like saucers.

A flock of squirrels with bat-like wings and mouths larger than a watermelon attacked them.

A typical person would have died against them without being able to put up a fight at all, ripped apart by the hundreds of tiny but sharp teeth in their mouth.

However, its master simply raised his right hand and released blasts of spiritual energy.

The explosive balls crashed on them, and their bodies popped like balloons as blood and pieces of flesh rained down everywhere around them.

A truly gory and horrifying sight to see.

Its master effectively dealt with them in a couple of minutes and moved ahead, the massacre causing not even a single change of expression on his calm and collected face.

Some hours later, they met a few loose evil spirits who launched a sneak on its master, angering its master to the point of subduing them personally, then summoning a group of undead and ordering them to eat them alive.

"Gah!"

Roars of horror & Moans of pain filled the northern part of the nightmare zone as the spirits lost one limb after another to their predators.

Seeing fellow evil spirits being eaten alive in front of it caused it to fear its master more than ever, and its root-like body shivered unconsciously.

'The wickedness in my master's bone is considerably larger than the one in myself!' The horrifying mandrake thought, standing on his shoulders in complete silence.

The moonlight in the clouds dimmed after a while, and Elliot's surroundings darkened.

His eyebrows raised in bewilderment. Why is it suddenly darkening? Is something unpleasant going to happen?

"What is happening?" Elliot asked the horrifying mandrake.

"Nighttime is approaching the nightmare zone." The monster replied in a voice filled with uneasiness. It hurriedly climbed down to his chest and settled inside of his shirt.

Its words caused him to remember the nighttime of the mystic spirit forest!

His hair stood on edge by just remembering about it.

He hurriedly turned towards the one who had lived through the nighttime of this zone, then asked, "Care to explain? Are we going to face a hazard? Or is it something else?"

"Nothing of that sort." The horrifying nightmare popped its head out of his shirt and said, "It's just that the monsters with corrupt souls are the most active when it's night since their predatory senses are the most effective at this time. It's safe to say that when the moonlight disappears from above our heads, we won't be able to evade monsters anymore. After all, the monsters will gain the ability to smell out living beings from thousands of meters away."

"Thus, we'll be encountering a lot of monsters soon."

Although it said we, it had no intention of fighting the beasts or getting on their radars. Thus, the horrifying mandrake slipped back under his shirt, physically hiding its body as well as letting his scent suppress its scent.

"Are they stronger or weaker than you?" After a while, Elliot said in a tone that an investigator would use to demand an answer from a suspect or a king from his subject.

"Weaker." The horrifying mandrake replied. "Those stronger than me reside in the Eternal Snow Zone."

"Though, are you going to just hide in there?" Elliot's eyebrows raised.

It was hiding under his shirt because it didn't want to be targeted by the nightmare beasts.

"I am too weak because you destroyed my secondary body, and in my current conditions, even killing a spirit warrior is as hard as a human toddler lifting a boulder. It will take me a few weeks of nourishing myself in spiritual energy to recover a part of my strength." Its voice that sounded a bit angry came from under his shirt.

Because Elliot destroyed its avatar and also ripped apart its legs, its strength had drastically fallen.

At most, it could release a soul attack by using the spiritual energy present in its body to activate the soul magic matrix on its corrupt soul. That would harm anyone as long as they have a soul, but not kill them. Killing them would require additional efforts, but it didn't even have legs to walk and limbs to strangle another, so how could it dare to fight?

What a useless slave! Elliot shook his head in disappointment.

"Anyway, use your spiritual senses to sense the situation in our surroundings." Elliot held no intention of letting his slave enjoy the ride and just rest! Especially not while he was doing all the hard work. Thus, he ordered it to do some work and prove itself useful.

Although the horrifying mandrake didn't have much spiritual energy left in its body, it was still enough for it to outstretch its senses by a thousand meters.

"As you say, master!" It released its spiritual senses and immediately sensed dozens of monsters crawling towards one another in the vicinity of its skill.

After a while, they passed through the third hunting ground of the nightmare trees. Then, they headed to the Valley of Life & Death, the only place that connected the nightmare zone with the eternal snow zone.

By that time, night has fallen. Elliot and his slave could hear the distant roars and cries of spirit monsters rising and falling in the distance.

The hunt has begun, and the strong have started to prey on the weak!