Nightmare's Call

513 Obtained: Part 1

The Divine Pillar in the Nightmare Plain.

Inside the cylindrical cavern, Lin Sheng looked up at the darkness above, from where Cypross, the fly monster, came to attack him last time. Black stuff still billowed from the honeycomb walls. It seemed that the blast of his holy power here last time had affected this place. But he could not have cared less about it now; his attention was on the biggest threat.

“Do you think you’re confident enough?” The golden red humanoid asked.

“Never try, never know.”

Lin Sheng leaped up without the aid of the holy power. All that had been burned away earlier. He did not know how to fly. Even back then, he was relying on the jet of the holy power to create back thrust to propel himself in the air. With the holy power gone now, he was merely climbing and leaping with the use of his limbs.

It did not mean that this method was slow. If not for the noise the power of the Dark Wheel would produce, he would have to summon his Ward skills to launch him up the cylindrical well. He wanted to do it more quietly because he had something else in mind.

Lin Sheng kept climbing until he could no longer see the bottom. It now looked like a pitch-black abyss to him. After a thousand meters or so, he finally saw something different above him.

There were fewer honeycomb structures up right here, and the color of the wall had changed into a striking fuchsia, with something that looked like cotton wool sticking to the wall and a red cocoon right above him. Lin Sheng could see through the cocoon the fly monster inside.

“That is the nest of Cypross.” The golden red humanoid reminded him. “Because of the Black Tide, half of Cypross’s body has been corroded. So he is mad half of the time. But his consciousness had this madness under control. If you can wait for half a day, it would be its bedtime—to go into hibernation.”

“That means it is not dead entirely?”

This was the first monster with such a strong will he had ever seen around here. To be honest, he was a little in awe.

“No. Its soul has disappeared long ago. What remains of it was just its body reflexes and instinct. After fighting the corrosion all its life, it has become a sort of instinct. So long as there is still vitality in its body, it will carry out the same action, which is dictated by its consciousness.”

“Understood.” This was akin to the theory of soul angels in Blackfeather City.

He had wanted to survey the surroundings carefully, but the noises coming from the wall were drawing his attention. He heard the tearing sound of cloth and then came the cotton stuff on the wall being ripped apart as maggots wriggled out from the inside. Each maggot was as long as half the height of a human, its mouth hideous like the saw with a pair of semi-transparent wings on its back. There were hundreds of this creature, flapping their wings in a loud buzz as they flew toward Lin Sheng, who was hanging on the other side of the well. Knowing that he was already exposed, there was no need to conceal himself anymore.

“I suggest that you wait. These maggots are attacking on instinct. You have not woken up Cypross yet—it is still sleeping. But once you use force, Cypross will burst out of its cocoon and go on a rampage,” the golden red humanoid suddenly said.

Lin Sheng’s heart missed a beat, and he held back the urge to summon a Ward. He scanned around. Analyzing with his eyes and mind, he found a route that he could avoid the maggots. After striking away two maggots that blocked his way, he suddenly saw an opening, a hole with no maggots. He lunged toward it, and had only collided into three maggots despite being surrounded by hundreds of them, finally weaving past a small opening in a sea of maggots.

It was the advantage of intelligence. He suddenly got a lightbulb moment, finding the most simple solution in a complicated situation. Before this, he never had this quick calculation ability and good judgement. He had relied on his powerful ability of concentration. This time, it was more like a natural ability as a result of the accumulation of soul power, not an effect of intelligence increase.

Lin Sheng rolled and took a soft landing into the hole. Inside, silk web that looked like pink cotton wool were everywhere. There were even a few human skeletons, rusty weapons and tattered clothes lying around at the entrance. He waved his hand toward the entrance and a powerful pure soul power instantly sealed off the opening, separating the inside from the outside.

As soul power was none physical, when used on its own, it would appear like a mist and not produce any gravitational or kinetic phenomenon. But when used together with a living body, soul power could become even more powerful. But right here, Lin Sheng was using it as a barrier to conceal the scent of his soul.

“Nice place.” He concealed his scent, scanning the hole. There were no maggots pursuing him. It looked like the barrier and the concealment of his scent had worked.

“What are you going to do?” The golden red humanoid was perplexed.

“Do what I want to do.”

He started by carefully drawing several complex magic circles on the ground and on the walls. He was a dab hand at this, taking less than ten minutes to finish drawing one. After he finished, magic circles had filled the entire hole.

He then checked the situation outside. Those maggots had returned to their lairs, and it was quiet outside. Standing near the entrance, he looked up at Cypross, quietly waiting.

Time ticked away. After several hours, the giant cocoon shook suddenly, its surface bulging. Something sharp was cutting the cocoon from the inside. Cypross, the fly monster, burst out of the opening, circled in the air once and flew straight down.

Just then, Lin Sheng took down the barrier of soul power. Cypross suddenly changed its direction and flew toward him. His maneuver was quick and smooth without the slight hesitation, as if it knew where Lin Sheng was hiding from the very beginning.

The speed of the fly monster’s reaction surprised Lin Sheng despite he had engaged the thing once. Before Lin Sheng could react, Cypross had come in front of him, opening its hideous mouth about to bite at his forehead.

The thing could maneuver at high speed. Without the help of Rock Dragon blood, Lin Sheng’s physical strength and reflexes had weakened. It would be no good to fight a close-range combat. That was why he had prepared everything in advance.

“Explode!”

A massive soul power explosion went off inside the hole all of a sudden. The pure and highly concentrated soul power rushed out of the hole at speed in the form of a navy-blue air current, hitting on Cypross’s body. Cypross shivered as its corroded soul was stunned. The effect was almost the same as setting off a stun grenade in the hole. The impact had disengaged the soul from the body momentarily.