Chapter 323: 323 Perception of Being Attacked
E’Rantel, the North.
Here lay an expanse of forest that was quite vast.
The forest wasn’t far from E’Rantel; one only needed to travel approximately three hours straight from the northern gate of E’Rantel to reach this forest.
After flying for a while using the spell "Flight," Reiger finally arrived above the forest.
"Has she run into the forest?"
Looking down at the seemingly boundless forest below, Reiger furrowed his brow.
Based on the life reactions returned by "Life Detection," he realized that Clementine had entered the forest. Therefore, he had pursued her all the way here.
However, Reiger had to admit that he had underestimated Clementine a bit.
"I thought I would catch up quickly, but I ended up being led astray."
One was flying in the sky, the other was running on the ground. Which would be faster should have been unquestionable in theory.
Hence, Reiger hadn’t thought that he would still not have caught up to her by now. He assumed that with the help of magic, he’d be able to quickly catch up with Clementine and deal with her.
Who would have thought that Clementine had set up numerous deceits to confound her pursuer during the chase, causing Reiger to chase in the wrong direction a few times and almost allowed her to escape.
"Seeing how adept she is at this, she must’ve been chased quite often before, hasn’t she?"
The other party had fully considered the possibility that the person chasing behind might use magic to search for her, and therefore, she implemented several countermeasures to throw off her tracker. Her counter-surveillance capacity was quite remarkable.
Her decision to flee into the forest, too, was deliberately chosen to shake off Reiger’s pursuit.
In the forest, there were many animals, many life reactions. As long as Clementine didn’t flee using speeds or methods far beyond ordinary creatures, Reiger would find it difficult to distinguish her from the numerous life reactions.
"It seems that relying solely on ’Life Detection’ is quite ineffective in finding that madwoman."
Reiger relaxed his furrowed brow.
"If I could use higher-ranked information magic, I would be able to track her in different ways, but unfortunately, I don’t know any."
Out of the ninety-nine spells Reiger learned from Ainz, only a meager few were information-based, and among those, "Life Detection" was the most applicable to the current situation.
If Reiger could use higher-ranked information magic, then, not to mention the ninth-tier "God’s Eyes," even the eighth-tier "Remote Viewing" would have helped him locate his target more swiftly in this situation.
"Next time, I must seize the opportunity to learn as much system magic as possible from Demiurge."
So muttered Reiger as he continued to fly over the forest, launching "World Predation" in an attempt to search for Clementine’s traces.
...
Within the forest, in a thick growth of underbrush.
When Reiger flew over this area, and after a few minutes, a figure suddenly stirred lightly like a panther lurking in the darkness.
The owner of the figure was, naturally, Clementine.
"Dammit!"
Clementine, hiding in the bush, twisted her face and spat out a highly unflattering curse toward an unseen place after Reiger flew away.
The curse was like spitting, uncouth and gave off a dirty impression.
In this manner, Clementine vented her inner anger and... fear.
"What the hell is that monster? How could a human possess such power?"
"This is no longer the realm of heroes, not even a human beyond, but a transcendent being above all else!"
"Why would such a monster appear in this nation? Where did it come from?"
"Dammit... Damn it all... Bloody bastards...!"
As Clementine cursed, she struggled to suppress her own actions, desperately trying to conceal her presence.
At this moment, she had lost all her earlier crazed vigor and trembled in her corner like one who had come to know what fear was for the first time.
No, if she were truly ignorant, it might even be considered a bliss.
But because she was not ignorant, she knew just how terrifying beings like Reiger, who transcended human understanding, could be.
In the past, the Slane Theocracy she belonged to had such monsters.
They were beings who carried the bloodline of the six gods who had descended 600 years earlier.
Among the human descendants who inherited the gods’ bloodline, individuals would sometimes be born who, like them, naturally awakened extremely powerful special abilities or strength.
They were known as godkin, monsters who naturally came to possess power far surpassing heroes and humans after their awakening.
In the Slane Theocracy that Clementine was once part of, there were two such godkin.
One of them was the leader of the Black Scripture, the captain, and the other was ranked extra seat, revered as the ultimate Guardian of humanity whose strength surpassed even the captain of the Black Scripture.
Clementine felt the same terror from Reiger that she had from those two individuals.
Therefore, she chose to flee without any hesitation because she knew all too well that she could never win against such a monster.
Clementine was puzzled, why would a human who could rival the divine suddenly appear in E-Rantel?
Was the other party also a descendant of the six great Divine Bloodlines?
No, now was not the time to think about these things.
"I need to think of a way to escape first..."
Clementine immediately switched her train of thought to focus solely on this matter.
It didn’t matter who Reiger was or if it was important; what mattered was that she had to escape from him.
"If only I could use magic like ’Life Concealment’."
Clementine bit her nails until they bled.
"When evading Fufa’s pursuit, I used eleven different methods of concealment in total. These methods were only effective the first time they were used against an espionage expert like the Fufa Holy Scripture."
"Although that monster is much stronger than the trash of Fufa, he obviously isn’t adept at espionage. The fact that my techniques worked on him is proof."
"Considering this, the methods I’ve prepared should still work on him three times... no, probably around twice."
Clementine racked her brains and finally came up with a non-method method.
"If I use all these methods, I should be able to avoid that monster for an entire night."
"By dawn, nocturnal creatures will rest, and diurnal ones will become active, inevitably causing some interference to his ’Life Perception’."
"I’ll seize that chance to sneak out and return to E-Rantel."
Deciding to return to E-Rantel did not mean Clementine had gone mad.
It was often said that the most dangerous place was the safest. If he couldn’t find her, he would surely deploy various methods to search outside. Frankly speaking, Clementine had no confidence that she could continue to elude him once her methods were exhausted.
Under such circumstances, it was better to return to E-Rantel.
The odds were high that he wouldn’t expect her to double back, which would significantly increase the chance of him overlooking E-Rantel during his search.
At that time, she could certainly find an opportunity to leisurely leave after the man returned to E-Rantel and gave up the pursuit.
"It’s the only thing I can do."
Determined, Clementine took out several vials of potion from her bosom. She consumed some on the spot and applied others to her skin.
Some potions could eliminate scents, others could reduce signs of life activity. For someone like Clementine, on the run, they were extremely useful.
Clementine had prepared many such items and had already used some to evade Reiger’s pursuit. Now she was simply continuing their use to maintain their effects.
"I can’t stay in the same place, or I might attract the attention of that monster."
If he noticed a life response hiding motionless in the shrubs, wouldn’t he come over to investigate?
At this moment, concealment was no longer important. Instead, she needed to mimic the movement patterns of forest animals, so she wouldn’t stand out among the many life responses.
Clementine, who thought this through calmly, slowly started to move, like a snake hunting in the night, crawling forward.
Unbeknownst to her, Reiger had encountered an unexpected event during her cautious movements.
...
"Hmm?"
Reiger, who was flying midair, suddenly stopped and made a sound of surprise.
The reason was simple.
"What kind of reaction is this?"
His ’Life Perception’ had suddenly sent back a message, informing Reiger that a large group of people was entering the forest.
These people were not entering the forest from the same direction but were divided into two factions.
The bigger group rushed into the forest and then rapidly dwindled in number, visible even to the naked eye, as if they were encountering something terrible, with life responses constantly disappearing, going out one after another.
The smaller group, of about a dozen or so, seemed cautious after entering the forest, moving slowly as if conducting some exploration.
Reiger directed the magic power of his ’Life Perception’ toward the side with more people.
Then, the unexpected happened.
"Bang!"
As if repelled by something, the magic power Reiger had radiated was disturbed, and then a force followed the path of his magic power and approached him. When it reached Reiger, it exploded abruptly.
Reiger was hit by an invisible shockwave, causing him to recoil.
Feeling a slight pain coursing through his body, Reiger lifted his eyelids.
"I see, things are getting interesting."
Reiger’s eyes sparkled as he turned and flew toward the source of the rebounding force.