The same forest Amber visited on her last training but in the Inner Zone.
“I’ll swear I’ll kill him!!!” Aileen screamed in rage while piercing the disgusting origin beast that was attacking her. The monster looked like a giant frog.
Aileen would have liked to take one second to rest, but unfortunately she wasn’t given the opportunity because one second later, she was forced to tilt her head aside.
*Swish!*
Watching an origin beast’s sharp claw flying an air breath from her face while cutting a strand of her hair, Aileen turned pale and looked at the origin beast. Because of carelessness, she almost lost her head. The beast that almost got her from the sneak attack was a Mad Lion, a Tier 2 (Level 5) origin beast.
”Fuck, even this beast is trying to mess with me.”
Aileen was furious; dark green origin surrounded her body, increasing her speed to the point where she appeared to have disappeared.
The Mad Lion felt that something wasn’t right and roared; the beast immediately launched an attack, but it was already too late. Aileen had disappeared, and her rapier cut through the air blasting a huge hole through the monster’s body.
Swoosh!
Boom!
Thud!
At her level, it was not hard to instakill a Tier 2 beast; the problem was what followed. More Mad Lions appeared from the forest and surrounded her.
”Seriously, I thought that Mad Lions are lone wolves; since when did you know how to work in a group?” Aileen couldn’t help but wonder as she looked at the seven Mad Lions surrounding her.
”I will help you, sister.” Stella appeared beside Aileen offering her help.
”Thank you, Stella. Let’s survive to go kick his ass.” Aileen said, trying to drag Stella into her vendetta; however, the cat demi-human didn’t fall for her sister’s trick; she didn’t say anything.
Noticing her sister not supporting her, Aileen blamed this on Orpheus. She vowed to one day teach the hateful man a lesson.
With Stella’s help, Aileen could quickly deal with the Mad lions; it was almost like the two sisters were playing.
”Stella, you must help me teach that man a lesson.” Aileen had not dropped the idea of making Stella help her, but the latter had no intention of helping her sister in this suicide mission.
”I refuse.” Stella flatly refused.
”Why? It’s because you’re afraid of him? Come on; together, we can face him after getting stronger.” Aileen tried to persuade Stella after killing the last Mad lion.
”I refuse.” Stella still refused; she moved to another area to fight an origin beast that looked like a human. High orc.
Aileen chased after her sister, still trying to convince her.
Looking at her sister’s fight, Katherina heaved a tired sigh hearing her sisters bicker. She could not understand how those two had the mood to play around in a place like this.
Katherina then looked at her surroundings and heaved another sigh.
‘What kind of monster is he?’ She wondered. She already knew he was strong and had powerful subordinates, but that was one thing, and this was another thing, immobilizing two hundred and fifty men and forcibly teleporting them to another location.
“Is that something a human can do? I wonder what his level is? 3? 2?” Katherina whispered to herself before shaking her head. It was better not to think about that.
She looked at the men around her and raised her voice. “Hold strong! We need to endure just another three hours!”
“Hah!!!” The men around her grunted in acknowledgment, but anyone could see that they were tired.
When they passed through the portal, their restraints were gone, and they appeared here. This place was nothing short of odd. Giant trees were everywhere; beasts’ howls constantly rang out while being attacked by hordes of monsters. It was literally a nightmare; they were forcedto fight without any rest constantly.
The first origin beasts that attacked the group were weak. The strongest was just in Tier 3. Most of her men could defeat them with a bit of work.
Of course, she did not know that it was Orpheus who made sure that no monster stronger than the Tier 3 could attack them.
But when half an hour passed by without the monsters reducing, Katherina truly understood Orpheus’s goal.
The sadist bastard was planning to make them fight the monsters continuously for six hours without rest. He wanted to use the overwhelming pressure to force them to become stronger.
It was very effective. In this place’s environment, even Katherina herself felt she was growing stronger. But at the same time, it was brutal. If something went wrong, then many of the men here would die. It was a ruthless tactic, but as a leader, she could understand what goal he was trying to achieve, not that she could do the same thing.
Although Katherina was not that knowledgeable, she still knew about dangerous forests and forbidden zones; however, she had never heard of this forest.
The only thing that made her happy was the abundance of origin filling the air.
Orpheus had arrived for a while and watched Katherina and her gang fight. He wondered if he should increase the difficulty seeing Aileen badmouth him, but it would feel like bullying. Amber and Lilith watched others fight.
Back on the battlefield.
Katherina gritted her teeth; the pressure her men were filling increased as time passed. One thing was sure She would not allow it. She would bring her men back alive!
“Akilah! Take care of the left side! Five fourth-layer monsters are attacking!”
“Yes, sister!”
“Aileen and Stella, hurry up, killing the big ones!”
“… On it.” The two responded before moving simultaneously toward stronger beasts.
“Damn! Where in the hell are we!?” Cursing in a low voice, Katherina, who had just ordered her sisters to attack, took off her a red sword (a new sword, a high-grade sword) and swung it forward.
Tens of weaker monsters died instantly, reducing the pressure on her men. She then continued wielding her new sword around, killing any monster that was near to breaking through her men’s formation.
She was going to protect them! She wouldn’t fail. She had vowed to do so. They had come from far away to fail midway. No matter how hard it would be, they would survive. She would make sure of this.
Katherina, Aileen, Stella, and Lucien came from the same place. They were caught when they were children and raised in an illegal slave-training base. Lucien was her blood-related brother, but she was not blood-related to Aileen or Stella; she later adopted them as her sisters.
The people that caught them raised them as high-class enslaved people. Since the four had talent, they were taught cultivation together with another group of enslaved people.
But one day, fifteen years ago, the base was attacked.
Katherina and the others took advantage of that opportunity to escape, but even so, most of the group died in the attempt. Of fifteen escapees, only five survived.
And of them, Katherina was the oldest and the strongest.
From then, the siblings wandered around the empire, trying to survive. More than once, they were attacked, and a few times, they almost died. It wasn’t easy to escape; they did everything they could to survive.
But meanwhile, they grew stronger.
Finally, two years ago, they entered the capital.
For them to survive in the underworld, Katherina formed the Black Snake Gang. Using her blood and tears, she created a place that her siblings could call home. For her, the gang was her family.
So she would not allow them to die here!
“Ah!” Raising a cry of determination, she cut tens of origin beasts into two.
Her body was dyed in blood, and her clothes had pieces of beast’s organs on them. But she continued fighting until a mountain of bodies had formed around her.
And finally, six hours passed.
Katherina and the others panted. They were tired, and their bodies hurt due to their wounds.
Even Stella, the assassin-type origin master that avoided fighting the monsters head-on, had been injured a pair of times when fighting the beasts. One of the men was so gravely injured that he had fallen unconscious. One of them died, they thought.
But when they were about to celebrate that all the beast had been killed, a powerful presence surged from the depths of the forest, striking fear in them.
It was a lizard-like beast, a firedrake, a peak Tier 3 beast comparable to a low-rank level 3 origin master.
”Roarrrrr!” With a cry of rage and hunger, the firedrake roared.
Katherina’s expression fell. As the most experienced fighter in the group and the strongest, she was the first one to feel its power.
”This thing is comparable to low-rank level 3 origin master. How can we survive this?”
Never had she expected such a monster to appear just as they were about to leave. Even for a final boss, it was too much.