Unsealing Emptiness

Chapter 113: The actual mission starts from here.

The night passed while nothing unusual happened. As per routine, some beasts had stumbled upon the area, and the mercenaries quickly killed them.

Ozul opened his eyes the next morning when he felt the light enter in his tent. He was a little excited since, according to the map, they are close to the other forest.

He anticipated what dangers lay inside that old forest to make it so dangerous. And if it was really so unexplored that they couldn’t even mark any critical points of it on the map, what secrets could it be hiding?

In the previous years, he had done many things, but exploring wasn’t one of them. The thought of learning new things and exploring unknown places was somewhat exciting to Ozul.

Only because he knew many things from birth; every piece of new information would delight him because learning it by himself had a unique feel to it.

As he went out of the tent, he rotated three small black balls in front of him. He floated them in mid-air while continually changing their shapes and direction.

They were relatively bigger than the ones he practiced with last night. Only because he was not fully concentrating on them, but just doing it to get the hang of it.

.....

The other mercenaries were mostly done with their stuff, and the duo had also readied the cart. He just hoped on the roof and sat there with his legs crossed.

This time Blaze sat in the carriage instead of walking alongside it while Raven was back on the driver’s seat.

“Everyone is ready! Let’s move!” The shout of Clive sounded out as the carriages began to move.

The convoy started moving at the same pace, but everyone was apprehensive about what was to come next. Most of the mercenaries could figure out that it wouldn’t be long for them to reach the other forest.

As they were moving closer to the other forest, stronger monsters began to show up. When there would hardly be any rank 5 before, now beasts at that level were showing up like cabbages.

Though none of them could do any harm because of the number of mercenaries that were surrounding the convoy.

Except for the tense atmosphere, all was the same as the days before. One thing the convoy noticed, though, was that the forest became quieter.

The more in that direction they traveled, the quieter the forest turned around them.

“Hm. Weird.” Ozul muttered after trying to sense any life around him. It turned out that as far as he could discern, there were no beasts around them. Magical creatures aside, he couldn’t even sense the ordinary animals around!

‘It seems that normal beasts and animals don’t even dare to go near this area.’ Ozul concluded that this must be due to the dangers ahead of them. The beasts and the animals live here, so they are probably aware of which places to avoid for survival.

However, that thought did not bring any dread in him, and instead, he anticipated what awaited him there that caused people to be so apprehensive about it.

The convoy continued for another hour before it stopped all of a sudden. Since Ozul was sitting on the roof, he had a clear view of why the people in front had stopped.

Even he had to stare for a couple of seconds since it looked almost unreal.

The forest they were in at the moment was enormous, but the trees were tall and not mushed together. They could see their surroundings quite clearly since the trees did not block the sunlight.

However, the scene in front of them was totally different. When they had seen that this forest was connected with the other on the map, everyone had thought that there wouldn’t be much of a difference.

Only now did they understand why the other side was considered as a different forest. The sight looked quite artistic from the convoy’s distance.

A horizontal line of trees stretched from each side to the far ends. It looked as if the real forest started from here and their earlier journey was not at all in a jungle.

All of a sudden, from the tall trees, it turned into those thick bushy woods with wines entangling the branches. From outside, they couldn’t see anything in there.

It was like a wall was built in front of them, and they would have to cross over to find out what awaited them.

“Everyone! From this point on, we will have to travel on foot. So get off the carriages and prepare what you want.” Clive shouted again, and his voice reached the whole group.

Most of the mercenaries were already on their feet. The ones on the carriages also got off as they stored them. However, anything alive could not be stored in the Spatial Rings. So they just set the horses free.

After being set free, the horses ran back in the direction where they came from. It seemed that even when they were never really here, their instincts warned them of the dangers ahead.

Raven also set the horses free and stored the carriage. Ozul had come down from the roof at that point.

There was no other choice; the forest in front of them did not seem like it would allow the big carriages to move through it.

Clara and Venessa also got out of the carriage before Hanry came by their side.

When Clive saw that everyone was prepared, he shouted, “Gather around! I will again repeat the basics before we venture inside.”

The mercenary leaders quickly gathered around Clive when they heard his shout. Raven and Blaze, on the other hand, looked to Ozul for confirmation.

Ozul nodded his head as the trio also made their way towards Clive.

Clive swept his eyes through the crowd around him. Most of the mercenaries were already panicking over their journey ahead.

“As you can see ahead, there is a whole different world on that other side. It will be dangerous, but there is nothing to worry about that as long as you follow my orders. Your duty is to protect lady Clara from any dangers, don’t forget that.” Clive said.

“And keep in mind that no one lags behind. If you can’t even keep up, then how will you even protect lady Clara?”

The mercenaries who were sweating from anxiety, turned red to their ears after hearing Clive’s words. They were supposed to protect someone else, and they were worried about their own lives.

“Hey, Uhm... so do we really have to go through this route? I mean, look at it! It speaks nothing less than danger! It will only get more difficult to protect her there.” One of the mercenaries who was still afraid to venture in spoke up.

“We will be going through this route. If you want to leave, you are free to go anytime.” Clive turned to look at the man and replied with a cold tone.

He had already explained why they would be taking this route, and repeatedly asking the same question was an insult to him and only a waste of time.

When Clive saw that everyone understood his words, he looked towards the thick woods in front of him and said in a loud voice, “The actual mission starts from here-from these Old Whispering Woods.”