Chapter 96: You Found A Challenge

Elias would think that the time he had spent inside the Fragment might have desensitized him a bit to scenes of great carnage, but it was different when you were looking at a monster and when you were looking at the bodies of people.

It was easy for Elias to recognize the final emotions in the eyes of these people, and he could see the pain and horror inside of them. From the whimpers and the small cries he was hearing in this field of slaughter, there were still survivors here, and they were not alive because of chance, but due to the fact that these cannibals seemed to enjoy the suffering of their prey.

Elias enjoyed the act of battle and killing, but he did not luxuriate or crave the suffering of his prey. It was inefficient and was just a waste of time and effort to torture his prey.

It may appear that he may have toyed with some of those cannibals before, but he was simply trying to learn from them, because knowing how they reacted to pain and the death of their fellows were useful data in combat, other than this, his kills had been clean and precise, and none of his prey had suffered for more than a few seconds.

From the smell and the weak cries of the people in the piles of bodies, they had been here for hours, and if they were not dead, the captors were keeping them this way.

It was almost as if they were storing them for someone else, while taking out small bites here and there.

He had a pitiful cry and turned to see a bleeding child pull himself from the pile of bodies, looking closer he saw that this child had gentle curves that could not be hidden despite wearing rags that were soaked with blood, and Elias realized that he was looking at a woman, but one that was rather short.

She looked around with fear and horror, a blank look in her eyes that Elias was beginning to understand as the onset of madness. Whatever these folks had survived, they had not seen anything like this tribe of cannibals.

Yes, Elias was calling them a tribe as he had seen several distinct characteristics that they all shared. Outside the walls of the city, it seemed that the laws of the jungle were not being played in the shadows but out in the open.

Elias had stood here for a few seconds, but he was already recognizing the distinct pattern of a language by these cannibals, but he did not have the time for him to learn all they were saying.

However, this was a good time for him to observe and gain information about this oasis and the attackers. From killing barely a dozen cannibals before he reached this place to seeing fifty to maybe seventy cannibals in front of him, would he see thousands if he went beyond this clearing?

His eyes began to roam across the bodies of the cannibals, disregarding the woman who was still looking around in shock and near madness. Her appearance was drawing laughter from the cannibals around her, and from the crude gestures they were making, it was very possible that this woman was about to suffer not just the pain of being eaten, but she could most likely be defiled as well.

Elias’s eyes, which seemed to have awakened to the Lumina was checking the bodies of the cannibals, and all he could see were peak-level Fury Forge, and he was wondering if perhaps the difficulty of reaching the Mist Phantom level was too great for most of these cannibals.

After killing a dozen of them, Elias had noted the amount of Lumina he had harvested, and he could confirm that everyone he had killed had only a single pool of Lumina.

The sheer gap that existed between him and them was extremely frightening, and it reminded Elias that it was possible that there would be geniuses out there with all the resources that a powerful Ascendant faction can pour into them, and that their attributes may be so powerful that beside them, he might be equated to these cannibals who only had a single pool of Lumina.

It was no wonder he had not seen any of them with a Talent, as he figured out that if the Pools of Lumina was a Siphon’s foundation, then having a single pool would not be able to carry a Siphon beyond the stage of Fury Forge, and it might be possible that these cannibals had only been able to reach this stage because they fed on the flesh of others, and so had access to more Lumina than the average Siphon.

Elias disappointment was rising as he was not seeing anyone stronger, even after checking more than forty cannibals. He knew there were advantages in number, especially if he was swarmed, but he was not intending to be swarmed and was only looking for a challenge that would fit the growth of his body, something that was not too excessive and yet powerful enough to take him to the limit.

Still, Elias did not know why he would expect powerful resistance when in a major city like Stormfall, it was hard to even see Fury Forge, and it was amazing that he was seeing so many powerful warriors, and he had just grown strong too quickly, and he was finding greater challenges to push him forward.

An average Siphon would have taken years to reach the point he had just surpassed, and Elias needed to begin curbing his expectations. The cries of the woman distracted him from his investigation as he saw three of the cannibals begin to toy with her.

They swiped at her with their claws in a playful manner, but every move they made drew blood, and the despair and madness grew in her eyes as a weird sound began emerging from her mouth. It was as if the fear she was feeling was now so profound that she had forgotten how to speak, and her mind was on the edge of breaking.

Whether it was by coincidence or luck, the woman glanced in his direction, and she froze. Elias could guess what she saw, and he smiled helplessly inside. There goes his chance to hunt like an assassin; now he had to be a brute once more.

After he landed, he had dissolved his robes and simply created wrappings around his arms, knees, and elbows, while wearing knee-length breeches. The flapping of the robes would alert his prey to his location, and in the jungle, they could be caught in bushes.

What she would have seen was a man who seemed to have emerged from a painting, with long red hair and bewitching eyes that looked at everything with an air of curiosity, almost as if he was not part of this world, but merely passing by.

Her shock was so profound that she stopped responding to the slight cut from the cannibals and began staggering towards him. Her actions were noticed by those around her, and they looked at her with surprise before looking forward at where her eyes were fixed, and they saw him.

His appearance sent ripples across their ranks, and Elias began to ready himself for a fight that should bring some surprises to him. He did not move from his position, even as more cannibals were alerted to his presence, and finally, he saw a worthy prey, a massive cannibal who had been crouched at the edge of the body pile, that slowly stood up with the thick leg of a man in his mouth.

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