Before Abium could understand the secret behind those threads, drowsiness assaulted his mind. At that moment, the Shadow Fiend's red eyes were glowing and hypnotizing him.
'No!..Resist!' He gripped his hand tighter and soon found himself sitting near a broken bed in a small house. On that bed was a blonde-haired lady with azure eyes who appeared pale as white. She was in an ill state and appeared to be on the verge of dying.
At that moment, she lay on the broken bed and stared at the ceiling with a vacant expression. Teardrops were constantly flowing from both her eyes, and she didn't seem to have any strength even to wipe those tears.
"Come closer." She said while shifting her eyes towards Abium. But there was a difference in Abium's outer look. He had black hair instead of blonde and looked more like a human.
He sat near her with a soulless expression, grabbed her smooth hand, and moved his face close to the blonde-haired woman's face.
"Abi, I don't want to die without knowing the answer." She paused, looked deeply into Abium's black eyes, and asked,
"Do I have a place in your heart?"
As he heard her question, tears began flowing out from Abium's eyes, and he quickly nodded.
"Hahaha- 'Cough,' don't lie to me. Even after 10 years, you still didn't forget about her, right?" She glanced at him with a weak smile and muttered after a short pause.
"Kiss me before my breath stops."
Abium's body went stiff for a moment, and he forcefully pressed his lips against the blonde-haired lady's lips. They kissed for a minute, and slowly Abium separated his lips with a slight blush on his face.
"'Cough' you look more handsome now." The blonde-haired lady said with a blooming smile and soon sighed deeply. There was a deep sorrow that appeared in that sigh.
Both of them fell into deep silence, and soon her breath grew rougher. Abium could feel her heartbeat slowing down, and her body began to tremble.
"A-Abi, don't forget me when I embrace Mother Nature." A weak voice full of sorrow came out from that lady's voice, and soon she closed her azure eyes.
Meanwhile, Abium closed his eyes and noticed something was off about the situation.
'Why didn't I feel sorry for her death? It's as if I have another chance to correct everything...' He felt strange about the situation and soon felt pain in his head.
At that moment, he sensed some invisible barrier was blocking him from recalling his memory!
He stood there motionlessly for a few seconds and soon noticed hundreds of runic characters began to hover around his body.
The next instant, all those rune characters entered his body and broke the invisible force blocking his memories.
A second later, his appearance changed from a black-haired human to a blonde-haired elf! Abium also regained all his memories and spoke with a smile.
"Break!"
The next moment, the surroundings began to break like broken glasses and were replaced with a different scenario.
Slowly, Abium opened his eyes and smiled.
Meanwhile, the Shadow Fiend stood puzzled and noticed something was off about this elf.
Before it could even understand, a surging killing intent came out of the weak elf, and felt trembled.
Abium stared icily at the shadow creature and unsheathed his sword.
'You should've never touched my precious memories!'
As he was about to attack that creature, it raised one of its hands and shouted in abyssal language.
"Wait! I didn't do that on purpose."
"What the?!" Abium blurted out in surprise and stared at that creature full of wariness.
He never thought magical beasts could speak like normal humanoids and was surprised.
"Hey! Hey! I'm not a beast. I'm the second son of Elder Shadow and an honorable guard of Shadow Sea." It stood while waving its arms and said.
From its earlier words, anyone could tell that the Shadow creature was very proud of its origin.
Meanwhile, Abium raised his eyebrows a little and ordered while pointing his finger at multiple shadows,
"Unbind those shadow threads."
Upon hearing Abium's words, Shadow Fiend relaxed and instantly retracted those threads. The next instant, everyone woke up from the nightmares and soon turned their heads vigilantly towards the Shadow Fiend.
'This creature can manipulate our thoughts pretty easily.'
After a short deliberation, Abium looked curiously at the Shadow Fiend and asked,
"What are you?"
A chuckle escaped from that creature's dark void-like mouth as it heard Abium's words.
"I'm also one of the servants of Dark God Ringer like Zack you killed a few days ago. Well, everyone here is somehow connected to 'Him,' so we know about your every movement from the beginning."
Everyone got shocked when hearing that creature's answer and became more cautious.
After a sudden pause, everyone, including Abium, turned their head toward Cedric and looked at him in confusion and wariness.
"Not him. He is just a seed, and our lord has other plans for him." Shadow Fiend said mysteriously and soon stopped talking as if that creature had received an order from above.
"Sorry, forget what I said just now. Although I was supposed to kill or defeat everyone who entered the fifth layer, I wouldn't like taking risks. If you are eager to look for battle or treasure, you can find other servants roaming in this layer. You can go to the sixth and seven layers if you can kill a third-tier beast." The creature gave a small piece of advice, turned into a shadow as it finished its words, and disappeared from there, leaving others dumbfounded.
"What the hell was that creature?" Fennelis gained some courage once she saw that creature disappear from her sight and asked with a frown.
"I have no idea. It appears this creature came to warn us about something but stopped due to someone's interference." Abium said casually and turned his gaze sharply towards Cedric.
"Cedric, ask Ringer about the exact location of the Death Cane." He said coldly.
Cedric went silent for a few seconds and spoke while pointing his finger toward the dense forest,
"He said that artifact is located fifteen kilometers away from here."
'I hope that god is not playing any tricks.'
Abium nodded his head and signaled others to follow after him. Although they met a few first-tier magical beasts along the way, they didn't pose any threat to them. After two hours of roaming the dense forest, they finally saw an enormous temple surrounded by five-meter-tall walls.
This temple was five times larger than the Temple of Dark god on the second layer and looked more magnificent. Unlike the other temple, this temple was completely covered by beautiful trees and vines.
"What should we do now?" Edith glanced at the conical-shaped temple's peak and asked in confusion.
"A third-tier being is guarding this temple, so it's not safe for us to enter now. If we want to get our hands on the Death Cane, I need to act as a Holy Knight for a while," Abium said with a mysterious smile and added,
"Until I come along with those Light Church members, you all should hide somewhere near this temple and wait for my message." As he said those words, he tossed one communication ring to Fennelis and disappeared from there.
Although others were confused by his action, Fennelis completely trusted Abium and knew he was planning to infiltrate the Light Church group!
"Let's go. We must also prepare some backup plan if Abium somehow gets caught." Fennelis said solemnly and began to search for any cavern nearby.
Meanwhile, Abium arrived a few hundred meters from their location and took out a black gems-embedded amulet. Using that amulet, he began to sense the location of Count Henricus through the 'Dark Touch' spell.
After a few seconds, Abium managed to find the exact location of Count Henricus and curled his lips upward.
...
Bare Keep Town, Peral Kingdom.
It was around 4 A.M.
More than ten leather-armored soldiers stood on the eastern fortified stone wall with vigilant eyes and seemed to guard the town like guardians.
"Guys, did you hear that sound?" A blonde-haired soldier named Jack, who looked around 40 years old, asked while perking up his ears.
"What? No, I didn't hear anything." A tall, muscular man with blue eyes answered. At the same time, another soldier voiced out.
"Hey, I hear rustling noises from the Eastern woods."
"Me too." Another black-haired soldier also replied while nodding his head.
Frowning, Jack quickly picked up the fire torch and stuffed a mid-tier magic stone into the fire. Then, he took a deep breath and threw it toward the Eastern woods at full force. It would have become an embarrassing moment if Jack were an ordinary mortal. But he was not an average human. He was already a peak fourth-tier warrior, multiple times stronger than the average human.
The fire torch flew up in the sky with a whooshing sound and soon landed five hundred meters from the eastern fortified wall.
As the fire torch touched the land, a bang sound echoed! The fire began to expand like a raging storm and illuminated the surroundings.
The fire began to shrink quickly a second later and soon disappeared, leaving darkness behind.
But that short moment was enough for everyone to see what was hidden inside the Eastern woods.
In that split second, everyone saw thousands of red eyes in those woods and got frightened.
"Sound the alarm!" Jack spoke anxiously and signaled others to prepare for battle.
Within a few seconds, warning bells began to ring in every direction. At the same time, hundreds of soldiers woke up from their sleep and hastily climbed up the fortified wall through the stairs. Archers and spearmen moved toward the edge of the walls and got ready to attack at any time.
The peaceful moment lasted only fifteen minutes, and then a loud horn echoed from the Eastern woods. No, the soldiers heard multiple horn sounds from different directions and went deadly pale!
A second later, hundreds of goblins, kobolds, orcs, and other humanoid monsters ran toward the entrance gate while roaring.
"Aim," Jack shouted. The next moment, hundreds of Archers took metal arrows from their quivers and placed them on their bows. Then, they pulled strings back and locked onto their targets.
"Fire!" Jack raised his hand and ordered as the monsters arrived at the marked areas.
Hundreds of metal arrows flew up in the sky and directly rained on the monster horde!
"Again!" Jack shouted.
Once again, the archers took out the arrows and followed the same procedure.
Archers released more than two thousand arrows within a few seconds and killed 500 monsters.
BANG!
A banging sound came from the western direction, causing everyone's faces to turn white. They knew the other soldiers were facing some dangerous monster on the other side and shuddered inside.
Simultaneously, an iron bolt flew from the monsters' side and stuck on the fort wall. But that was not the surprising thing. A veteran soldier noticed that a rope was attached to the iron bolt's end and got panicked.
"C-Captain, these monsters are using ropes to climb up the wall." He shouted in anxiety.
"Cut the ropes. Spearman, protect the Archers." Jack didn't lose his calm and sent out the orders one by one.
As he ordered, he saw a small yellow spark from the Eastern woods and frowned.
At that moment, another human walked out of the woods while holding a fire torch in its left hand and a broadsword in its right hand.
Within a few seconds, that human arrived behind the monsters and started attacking them mercilessly.
'An ally? Who is it?'
Jack blinked his eyes in surprise and soon saw his outer appearance.
He was a black-haired youth who looked around 20 years old and familiar. He wore a black leather coat and shoes and appeared like a professional warrior.
'Why does he look so familiar?' He rubbed his eyes and soon stuttered,
"Y-Young Master!" He became shocked.
Upon hearing his stuttering, other soldiers followed his gaze and soon widened their eyes in shock.
"F*ck, we need to rescue him," Jack spoke tremblingly.
"But he looks fine, captain." A blonde-haired soldier said while pointing his finger at black-haired Nicolaus.