"Thanks for letting us stay in your house."It was the next morning, and both Dad and I bowed gratefully to the elderly lady who had so graciously hosted us in her house.
"No, it"s nothing. It"s actually beneficial for me to have a couple of young men help me out around my house." The elderly lady, s.h.i.+nra, chuckled. "There"s no inn in this village, and I will feel bad if we force you both to camp outside even though we have perfectly inhabitable houses in this area. I had spare rooms anyway, and it"s been a while since things were so lively."
Her husband, Guo Hao, nodded as he hobbled off the porch with a smile. "We"re going to miss the help you two gave us."
"Nah, you let us stay for free and even treated us to dinner. It"s the least we could do." Dad waved their grat.i.tude away. He had tried to pay them, but being nice people, the elderly couple had refused. "I still feel bad imposing on you."
"Don"t worry about it. You didn"t impose on us at all. It just gets so lonely because no one comes to this village anymore. It"s been so long since we have visitors…we really enjoyed it." s.h.i.+nra beamed brilliantly. "Make sure to drop by again when you return."
"Sure!"
After the farewell, we proceeded toward the mountains, as s.h.i.+nra informed us yesterday. Before we did, Dad stopped by Thaksin"s ruined field to conduct several investigations. I didn"t know what to look for, so I just stood around and summoned Corvus to scout ahead a hundred meters (more, if you include the fact that each Corvus could see anything within a range of about a kilometer or two clearly). The mountains were too far and secluded to spot anything, and honestly, s.h.i.+nra"s information was a big help. The area was so vast that we didn"t know where to start searching.
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The mountain was a good start.
"Seems like a few AV-100s and at least three six-tonners." Dad straightened up after observing the wheel tracks. "Meaning they probably have to take a solid road, or abandon their vehicles partway."
"Mrs. s.h.i.+nra said something about them taking the northern road."
There were several roads leading to the mountains, and so many mountains, that having a specific road to follow was a great help. s.h.i.+nra had pointed out the specific road that the vehicle convoy had taken, and that narrowed which mountain the enemy had headed toward.
"Combined with the traces of monster experiments conducted within the forest…" Dad mused.
The reason why we trekked through the forest instead of simply flying straight to the village on my Constellation spirit was because we were trying to find clues as to what the Dark Church was doing in the forest. Their experiments on monsters and how far they had progressed regarding their goals (to control monsters or manipulate Emergence events) were worrying. The reason why we had dropped down there was to check out reports of an Emergence event being artificially triggered in the forest.
We found nothing so far, no traces of any artificial Emergence event. Weirdly enough, it seemed that the Dark Church was moving away from that. Dad told me that the protective enchantments that formed a barrier around the city interfered with the technology, making it impossible to trigger an Emergence event within a barrier. If they wanted to use it, they had to trigger the Emergence event outside the city, away from the barrier.
Just like how Lin Zhan Long and his cronies foolishly did.
"Did you know?" Dad had told me the other day. "Even though you nuked three thousand monsters at first, the reason why the Dark Church was still able to set so many thousands of monsters on Jing Tian City a week later, was because they fell back on their second plan – to trigger an Emergence event outside the city, and then direct the outpouring monsters into an underground network of caves and tunnels?"
"But doesn"t the machine only work for a few seconds? A minute at most? I don"t see how they could have gotten thousands of monsters to emerge…"
"Idiot. They didn"t need to summon thousands of monsters from the Emergence event. They only needed to summon one, and it will call the rest."
Realization dawned on me when I understood what Dad meant.
"The Silver Wing Wolf King…"
"Correct. Once they summoned that b.a.s.t.a.r.d with an Emergence event, all they needed to do was run to one side while that rank A monster howled and called forth countless wolf-type monsters to its territory. As you probably already know, the lower-ranked wolf-type monsters will recognize the Silver Wing Wolf King as their Alpha…their King. And…you can guess the rest."
Once he had a.s.sembled his pack by calling them from all over the Middle Continent, the Silver Wing Wolf King launched his attack on the city. Most likely the Dark Church had been able to mentally influence and subtly direct its hostile attention toward the city, though we didn"t know what kind of technology they used.
Most probably it had something to do with the technology the Dark Church used to draw the h.e.l.lfire Drake to the mountains just outside Jing Tian City.
"I wouldn"t be surprised if they are triggering Emergence events in the mountains," Dad suddenly spoke up, drawing me back to the present. I blinked, tearing my eyes away from something one of my Corvus was keenly observing, and turning back to him.
"That would be bad. Another rank A monster?"
"Or rank B. but since it"s out here in the wilderness, I think we"ll be fine. I"ll just as you to nuke all of them into oblivion."
"I could just nuke the entire mountain range with Draco"s Thuban," I pointed out as I gestured vaguely toward the mountains. Dad grimaced.
"Please don"t do that. If you destroy everything, we won"t be able to find out what they are up to, how far they have advanced, or get some clues as to what their plans are or how far they have progressed with their research. Besides, there are mountain communities out here, with some people living in the mountains. Let"s try to avoid accidentally killing innocent people unless we really have no choice."
Avoid. Meaning that if there was an army of monsters running down the mountains, Dad would just consign them as collateral damage. Sacrifice the extremely few innocent people living in the mountains in order to save the thousands, if not millions of people living in the nearby city. And the village here as well.
"Let"s go." By now, Dad had finished collating whatever traces or clues he was searching for, and he turned toward the road.
"Yes, Dad."
I summoned a couple of Pegasus, and we hopped onto the winged horses and began riding along the road. It would be too slow and inefficient to proceed across a clear, open road on foot, and we would draw too much attention by flying over on Cygnus or Aquila. Besides, Dad wanted to keep his eyes close to the ground, to ensure that we didn"t accidentally miss out on any clues or trails. If the convoy suddenly veered off at a fork, or took an alternative route (a dirt path along the spa.r.s.e gra.s.s rather than continue along the main road), he wanted to know.
As such, I didn"t disturb Dad while he was keeping his eyes on the road. Once we were out of the village and beyond the protection of its barrier, a bunch of monsters lurked and stalked us, barely able to keep pace with my Pegasus. I largely ignored them, because if I slaughtered them, a new pack of monsters would just show up, and it just wouldn"t end. I would be wasting too much mana on needless battle.
On the other hand, if we let them tag along for now, the current pack of monsters would keep other monsters off our backs. Once they were exhausted after trying to keep up with Pegasus, they would be easier to finish off anyway.
Dad would look up occasionally to tell me which direction to take, especially when the road diverged into a fork, or when the vehicle convoy moved into a different terrain, as expected. I obeyed without question, my mental connection with Pegasus allowing us to veer toward the new route before I needed to vocalize anything.
"Wow, these Constellation spirits of yours are really convenient," Dad remarked with a grin. "If I was alone, I would have to rent a rover. And sometimes, villages like the one we just left don"t have many vehicles to rent out, so I would have to make the journey on foot. We save money this way, as well as have a backup plan in case we can"t get the resources we need for a mission."
Now that I thought about it, Dad didn"t actually have any other spirits or soul beasts except Angelica. She was his only summoned spirit. I wondered about that.
"Dad, don"t you have any other summoned spirits?"
"No. Angelica is my only one, and will be my only one."
There was something in Dad"s voice that stopped me from pursuing the topic, and I fell silent. as if to ease the mood, Dad perked up.
"We"re almost there. I think it"s that mountain."
The vehicle tracks went up to a certain mountain, which had a road carved along its surface. The convoy then disappeared into what seemed to be a cave at the base of the mountain.
"Time to get off and move on foot." Dad glanced at the Pegasus he was riding, a look of pity on his face. "Sorry, Richie, but your horses are a bit too conspicuous. You might want to dismiss them. We"re going to hide in the shadows for now."
"I understand."
Hopping off, I dismissed both Pegasus, and then joined Dad in disappearing into the shadows. Melting into the darkness of the environment, we stepped into the mountain.
For the first few minutes, we saw nothing. Not because it was dark – evidently someone had hollowed out and repurposed the interior of the mountain. Concrete and metal replaced rock, and dim lightings hung from the ceiling, providing illumination for whatever vehicle convoys drove through here. Dad kept a lookout for security cameras and cast a fire-type illusionary spell to ensure we were invisible.
"The place is huge," I murmured in awe. Well, duh. It was a mountain. Even so, it reminded me of some secret base.
"There"s no mistaking it. This is one of their facilities."
Dad"s voice was grim. Having already razed two of the enemy"s facilities, he was familiar with the layout and patterns. He strode forward with a purpose, as if he knew where to go, and I hurried to keep up. Glancing around cautiously, I wondered about the lack of people, but this was just the transport tunnel. Of course all the people would be inside the base proper.
And not a moment too soon. Dad held up a hand and gestured for me to stop, right when a huge, metallic door loomed out in front of us.
"We"re here."
My jaw dropped as I studied the ma.s.sive double doors, which seemed mechanized and made of reinforced t.i.tanium. Whatever this place was, the owners certainly did whatever they could to fortify their positions against attacks. I doubted if even my Sagittarius"s Alnasl arrow could pierce through those heavily armored doors.
No…they might have designed the doors that way to keep something inside, to prevent something from escaping from within their facility.
I shuddered, feeling a sudden chill run down my spine. Gulping, I turned to Dad.
"So…how do we sneak in?"
"Who says we"re going to sneak in?" Dad replied, grinning as he began casting a fire spell. His hand lit up as a gigantic fireball began expanding exponentially above his palm. "We"re going to blast our way in through the front door."