Sian and Stiel walked through the endless forest and discovered some things.
“…What’s with all these weird things?”
“Yeah.”
Unlike near the exit of Apental, they met various monsters as they walked further in. Strange frogs spat out a weird liquid that melted insects, which the frogs then licked up to consume their prey. The green and black trees tried to capture Sian with their roots when he walked near them.
The common thing between them was that they all tried to consume each other. It was fierce.
“…and too weak.”
“Right. I thought this world was filled with powerful monsters,” Stiel answered as she remembered Lagaope saying that the land here had countless superhumans. It made Sian and Stiel think that the world was filled with powerful Harijans.
These monsters in the forest were dangerous for normal humans, but they were still weak enough for a Grand Bander to take care of them with ease.
Even now, insects did not dare to approach Stiel who began emanating her energy to turn them away.
“Maybe this tree has a type of poison that can kill a superhuman…”
“I think it’s just some tree.”
“Maybe that wolf-looking monster can hunt superhumans…”
“It’s being dragged by that tree.”
“…”
“Did Lagaope lie to us?” Stiel asked, but Sian shook his head. There was no reason to do such a thing.
“There must be a reason. Lagaope told us that it’s been thousands of years since he left his world. It might have changed a lot. Besides, we’ve only walked for a day. We shouldn’t draw conclusions just yet.”
Stiel nodded. Nothing was was certain right now. They had to find someone living here to understand. Yet, the problem was that they could not find anyone living around here. If there was a human living here, there would be some type of trace, but they couldn’t find any.
“This really isn’t going as planned.”
“Right. We have time, but…”
Sian’s plan wasn’t complicated. He was going to find Lagaope and ask him to build a Ra-Shar-Roa that would connect this place to Ra-Sian. If his group had succeeded, they should have returned to this world and Sian thought it wouldn’t be hard for them to create a Ra-Shar-Roa here.
In this vast world, Sian didn’t think he’d find Lagaoope so easily and thus he decided to take it slow. With no clues, however, he didn’t even know where to start.
After a while, Stiel spoke.
“Should I look around on top of a tree?”
“No, hold on.”
Sian then closed his eyes and began to focus. After a while, his face brightened as he opened his eyes.
“We’re lucky. Let’s go this way.”
“Did you find something?”
“I’m not sure what it is, but we have a lead.”
Sian began running and Stiel followed. After a while, the trees started clearing and they soon reached a small hill. After that hill was a vast plain. Sian and Stiel managed to succeed with the first part of their plan. There were human-looking figures standing in the plains, but there was something that was more eye-catching.
“Is that a carriage?”
“Yeah, but much bigger. And it’s not drawn by horses.”
There were many animals in front. One looked like a rhinoceros, but it was much bigger. Each one was about as big as a house and they had strong armor on their backs. The weirder thing was what was the carriage itself. It was big as a house, and it was created with some unknown, durable-looking material. It seemed like the carriage was too heavy for any horse to pull it.
The carriage was made to protect the passenger, and it seemed to be working well.
“Protect the Muvakal!”
“Bring the women and children inside!”
Human-looking beings were forming a defense around the carriage and some small green beings were attacking them. They were firing green fireballs from their hands and the human-looking beings were desperately dodging the attacks.
The fire did not damage the carriage as they were easily reflected.
The defense became relieved as they discovered that the carriage was safe and fought against the small green ones. It looked like green ones were weak in close combat, so the human-looking ones tried to approach them. However, they were then blocked by a swarm of insects. Sian had never seen such insects before, but the outer carapace made the insects look very powerful. A Master warrior would have a hard time fending one off.
The leader of the defensive line seemed to be at the level of a Grand Bander, but even he was having a hard time.
Sian and Stiel watched them for a while… Then they realized something.
“So, Lagaope did not lie to us after all.”
“Yeah. They are all powerful.”
They could not tell how powerful those human-looking ones were compared to the people back home, but the group had two Grand Bander-level beings while Tian Kingdom itself only had a total of four Grand Banders. All the other younger ones were all Masters.
Sian and Stiel then noticed something interesting. The green ones began mumbling and some of the insects pulled out of the fight before they began charging at the carriage. They were going straight toward the animals that were pulling the carriage.
The leader of the defensive lines realized this and shouted, “Leeron! Dammit! Have all the Ravas crouch!”
Sian and Stiel couldn’t find out who Leeron was, but they managed to find out what the animals were called.
The monsters curled their six legs underneath them and crouched in round form. As these Ravas crouched, the insects jumped up on them and began attacking.
However, the armor of these Ravas was very strong. The insect attacks that even worked against those Grand Banders didn’t seem to have any effect. It left some small cuts, but that was it.
The green ones seemed to realize this and recalled the insects. As they were joined by the insects again, they began to fight more fiercely.
The advantage was shifting toward the green ones. The insects were dying, but more came out from the forest and the defense line was slowly losing.
“Sian, who do you think would know better about Lagaope?”
Stiel asked Sian and he glanced at both sides.
There were the beings that looked like humans, and there were the small green dwarvish people that were trying to eat the human-like beings.
“Unless those green ones are like Lagaope’s relatives and are about three thousand years old… I think the carriage people would know better.”
“Yeah? Then it’s decided. Let’s go.”
“Okay.”
Sian and Stiel jumped out. Sian towards the green ones, and Stiel to the insects.