Chapter 70: Passage Way
Reinhard then felt countless images flashing through his mind of the Colin Forest before he felt a rush of energy. He let out a sigh as he straightened up, as Mimir flapped its wing and sat on his shoulder.
Reinhard’s glance to see the others had also devoured the souls of Cheronos. And from what he could recall, all of them were on their way to the Colin Forest, which took 3 hours.
Each of them absorbed fifteen souls in total, leading Marie to be pushed over a hundred. But in total, Marie had 109 Souls, Joseph had 99 souls, and Reinhard had 87 souls.
Then, after devouring the souls of Cheronos.
Marie should be at 121 souls from devouring twelve souls, and Joseph should be at 105 souls too after devouring six of them as well.
While I’m at ninety-three souls now. But with all the stored souls in Mimir, all of us reaching over a hundred is a matter of time, and even two hundred is a high possibility. Reinhard thought that since Marie and Joseph were already over the hundred gaps.
He recalled Phineas was a Tier D Inquisitor, meaning there was still a big gap between them.
They needed to quickly close the gap and not rely on Phineas desire to follow his own plot to help them win. Fortunately, they had lots of souls stockpiled, and their devouring will double every hundred.
Joseph nodded toward the path ahead. "We should keep moving before something smells all this blood."
Without further discussion, they continued forward, leaving the field of Cheronos corpses behind them as they entered Area 2.
Marie moved first, stepping into the passage while Reinhard and Joseph followed with their boots, finding stability on the uneven ground.
The air felt cooler and a bit colder with the moss growing thick on the rock faces, and an odd smell spreading.
As they kept walking, Joseph’s expression shifted and his head snapped left before then the right with his eyes narrowing.
Joseph slightly frowned as he moved his hand down to where Arondight would appear and said. "There is something around us."
Reinhard tensed up as his eyes narrowed, and Marie’s began quickly glancing all around. Then two seconds passed with nothing coming out of the grass and trees near them.
Then the area shaked as three massive hands erupted from the forest on both sides. They were made entirely of thick roots that were twisted together to form fingers and palms. They rushed toward the trio and closed into fists as they blasted through the air.
Reinhard instantly sidestepped, letting the massive fist of twisted wood whistle past his shoulder. The air pushed against his cheek before Zenuken appeared in his hand, and he hacked down with it. The sword connected with the wrist of the root-hand, and the wood split with a crack before the blade cut cleanly through. The severed hand dropped to the ground while the stump retreated back into the forest.
Reinhard glanced to his left and saw Marie leaning back as the root-fist passed inches from her face. Then Longinus materialized with a flash of crimson-gold before she swept the spear upward in a smooth arc. The blade sliced through the root-arm, and the hand hit the ground hard before Reinhard glanced away.
He saw Joseph thrust Arondight forward, and it was diving through the center of the oncoming fist. The roots exploded outward in a spray of splinters while the ruined arm jerked backward into the forest.
The crow perched on Reinhard’s shoulder shifted its weight. "There are Greenmen around. E-tier rank Phantasm Beasts."
Reinhard scanned the walls as he only saw grass, mass, and patches of shadows. Nothing else was moving, and he wasn’t feeling any eyes on them.
"I thought this was a Green Zone." Reinhard said.
Joseph shrugged as his eyes continued sweeping the passage. "I thought so too."
"Ah!" Marie’s voice rang out before she spun to face them with her eyes bright. "Right, I just remembered. It’s the smell of blood on our Beast Spirits, the Greenmen will attack anything with it."
Reinhard blinked. "Okay, but why?"
Mimir ruffled his feathers. "Greenmen see the stench of blood as a sign of predators. They hate all predators in the forest and believe predators disturb the peace and beauty of their domain."
Marie nodded while bouncing on her toes. "Exactly what Mimir says. The only thing we can do is rush through this passage. Then we disperse our Beast Spirits so they don’t see us as predators anymore."
A smile tugged at Reinhard’s mouth. "I’m guessing dispersing them now won’t help?"
Marie’s grin turned sheepish. "Unfortunately, no. They already marked us. They’ll keep attacking." She shifted her weight from foot to foot, energy radiating from her frame. "So let’s run! It would take forever to wait for them to come out and hunt them all down."
Reinhard and Joseph exchanged a glance before they both nodded.
And then everyone rushed forward.
Their boots hammered against the ground while the corridor of bushes became blurs on either side.
It then a root-hand erupted from the left side of the forest.
Reinhard’s sword rushed out and pierced through the root-hand at its wrist before it fell away in two pieces.
All of them kept moving, even as another hand burst from the right, then two more from above, and then three from the left side.
Reinhard hacked through the first as his blade carved a downward diagonal that split the root cleanly. He then brought the sword back up to chop through the second hand reaching for his throat. The third hand tried to grab his legs, but he jumped, clearing the grasping fingers by inches, and landed in a roll.
Reinhard rolled on the ground before pushing up and came up running without missing a step. But then a hand burst from the ground with its fingers spread wide, but closed on empty air as he already jumped before his boot came down on top of the wrist. He then used it as a stepping stone and launched himself forward to catch up to the others as the hand withdrew.
Marie flowed through the attacks as her body bent and twisted out of the twisted root hands. As three hands converged on her position from different angles, she dropped into a slide with her legs extending forward while her torso leaned back. All three hands collided above her and crashed into each other.
After sliding past the mass of roots, she sprang upright in one fluid motion. Then Longinus swept in a wide horizontal arc and blasted through two hands reaching from the right side. Both severed limbs crashed to the ground before a root-fist the size of a barrel thrust at her face.
Marie pivoted on her heel as she twisted her body while swinging her spear, and it cut through the root-hand wrist. The hand tumbled past her, and she was already moving forward again.
Joseph Arondight punched through a hand reaching from the left before. He yanked the weapon free, pivoted, and drove it through another hand coming from above. Then two hands grabbed at him from opposite sides, leading him to dismiss his lance, and he dropped into a roll, his body fitting through the narrow gap beneath the grasping fingers.
The hands closed on empty air above him.
Joseph then came up and was already summoning Arondight. The lance materialized in his hands, and without looking, he stabbed backward. The point drove through a hand that had been reaching for his spine, and the roots exploded into splinters.
The attacks came faster towards them, with more hands erupting from the walls.
A massive root-fist formed directly ahead, blocking the entire width of the passage. It was easily six feet across with the knuckles formed from twisted branches as thick as tree trunks.
Reinhard didn’t slow down as he hurled Zenuken like a spear. The blade spun end over end before blasting through the center of the giant fist, and wood exploded outward. The fist shattered into chunks while Zenuken dispersed into particles.
Reinhard extended his hand as Zenuken reappeared, and then he leaped through the gap where the fist had been. Before he swept out with it to cut through two smaller hands reaching from the sides.
Marie and Joseph also leapt through the gap before quickly catching up with Reinhard. Then Marie threw Longinus at a cluster of three hands gathering from above. The spear pierced through the air and straight through all three, pinning them together. Before then, the spears disperse and then reappear in Marie’s hands as she immediately hurls them again at a root-arm sweeping low to trip her.
It was then they saw the passage widened with light filtered in from ahead, which meant the exit was close. And it’s something Greenmen knew as they made one final desperate assault as hands erupted in a wave. Six came from the left, seven from the right, and four dropped from above.
But Reinhard, Marie, and Joseph moved in perfect synchronization.
Reinhard’s sword became a blur as he hacked left, slashed right, and upwards. While Marie’s spear pierced through one, slashed another, ducked under one hand, spun past the next, and drove her spear into the third as she kept moving. Joseph’s lance thrust forward in rapid succession, blasting the various hands apart.
Then, as they reached the end, they all burst out of the passageway and into Area 2 of Colin Forest.