Reaper of the Martial World

Book 8: Chapter 189: Mellow (3)

“It’s been over a week already… Is this safe?” Ri couldn’t get Dyon off of her mind. He seemed calm and serene, and had even made it to the next tier, but this sort of constant battling couldn’t be healthy for anyone to take over such a long period of time.

The limit for most, even dao experts, was about a few hours to a day. Only those with special abilities like Lyla who was used to constantly hearing the thoughts of others could last this long. But Dyon’s case was something they had never seen before.

He should be performing the worst amongst them, having only just entered the second tier after so long, but his endurance… It was unlike anything ever recorded. Who cared if you went slowly if you were able to last so long?

“I don’t know…” Damaris bit her pink lips. “… We can only trust Sect Master. Calming Lake shouldn’t be a dangerous place, there are countless safeguards…”

What Damaris didn’t say so as not to worry Ri further was that these safeguards were only effective if the person in question accepted their help. Many dragons of her Clan had died arrogantly believing that they didn’t need any help… And she had a feeling that Dyon’s arrogance was greater than even theirs.

Amphorae, having awoken from her meditation on Calming Lake remained silent as she observed Dyon. In the end, she turned to leave. Like Damaris said, she could only put her trust in Dyon.

**

The Mellow Tribe. A Failed Clan from the late Chaos Era period.

In truth, they had given up on ever forging their path toward the Mortal Plane once more. Mellow wasn’t even their original Clan name either, it was a tribal name they were forced to take up because they lost the right to their true name.

These so-called Tribal Names were rampant on the outer edges of the Ancient Battlefield. It was a symbolic way of expressing a Clan’s lost hope and also a way to establish hierarchy. Clans were stripped of their rights and demoted to Tribes in order to herd the masses like sheep. By making these tribes lose their sense of identity, they became easier to control.

Usually, Clans were stripped of their names and given a number. Only after they perform meritorious feats under the name of their ruling Tribes were they given a name.

The Mellow Tribe was one such tribe. A former disdained number tribe elevated to the status of a named tribe. The disgusting part was that they were actually proud of it. This was the hidden poison the infected the outer edges of the Ancient Battlefield.

This Clan didn’t even have the Legacies that once made them mighty. Much like how the Golden Crow Clan’s [Nine Suns of Armageddon] fell from the Mystical Grade to the Divine Grade because their Faith withered, the Legacies of this Clan, or Tribe, rather, lost all of their power in a similar fashion.

Still, this ‘proud’ Clan fell in a single day. No, it was more accurate to say that they fell in just a few hours. The attack was swift, and despite their enemies being outnumbered 5 to 1, it felt like it was actually them sitting at a numbers’ disadvantage.

It was early one morning, before the suns even came up, that the attacks began. They received no word from their scouts, it was as though they never existed.

The beasts they faced were a combination of ferocious and quick. They couldn’t even land a single attack, let alone fight against them in earnest.

When had the stupid creatures of their forests suddenly become so cunning? What was going on?

Also, beasts never attacked their homes too, so why were they doing so today?

There was a reason for this. Humans only had one advantage on beasts in this world: their minds.

What did beasts in this world fear the most? Energy Surges. historical

Just like Dyon hypothesized, the rigid ground beneath their feet needed relief. Over time, ridiculous amounts of energy stores built up. Eventually, the pressure would become too much, leading to an eruption that tore through the earth. These eruptions were incredibly dangerous and only became more fatal as one traveled toward the center of the Ancient Battlefield.

Beasts had the ability to predict these surges and avoid them on instinct. Using this to their advantage, humans raided underground caves formed from these Energy Surges and mined what they called Type Stones – essentially the very same stones Dyon had also been mining all of this time.

They were then able to arrange these stones in a formation to simulate the energy signature of a coming Energy Surge, thus keeping beasts away. This was what kept them safe.

However, today, for some odd reason, these beasts completely ignored a safeguard that had worked for them for countless years. Even when they attempted to use their underground escape routes, they found the passageway blocked.

Maybe the most humiliating part was that these beasts didn’t kill them. Rather, they toyed with them. From start to finish, other than some broken and bruised bones, they suffered no casualties.

It was then that a boy they had never seen before strolled into their tribal lands. His appearance made them shiver because only a man or woman from the central lands could look like he did…

Like this, the ‘prideful’ Mellow Tribe, with a population of 53, fell into Dyon’s hands.

This event would cause an avalanche of occurrences. If the Mellow Tribe could be stripped of their original name to become a number tribe, then promoted to a named tribe, it was obvious that someone had to be doing the gifting and punishing.

Dyon’s actions had declared war on this individual.