Unsealing Emptiness

He was more curious about what the Mana was used for. He had already figured out that those monster plants absorbed the Mana from the victims while the vines brought them here. However, what about the compressed Mana?

To find the answer, he had to walk even more. At this time, Ozul was honestly getting quite bored of this. So he sped his pace to get over with it and return to the group quickly.

Without wasting any more time, he cut away all the vines that approached him and ran forward. It didn’t take him long to arrive at a dead end.

He stood before a wall made up of trees and bushes, and it did not seem natural because of how straight it was. The giant roots also passed through it.

But the most significant change was of the vines. They did not attack Ozul anymore! All of a sudden, they just retracted and stopped attacking him, seemingly losing interest in him.

He could finally give rest to his divided attention to keep the blades spinning around him. He stood still and tried to sense everything on the other side before rashly rushing in.

.....

Although there were many strange things on the other side, he sensed something very familiar. The mercenary group, including Raven and Blaze, were all on the other side!

And the situation did not look any favorable either since it seemed that Magical Beasts surrounded them on the other side.

*Sigh*

“How long has it even been?! And here we are again...” Ozul sighed. Although he was not sure how much time had passed because before he started forcing his way here, he had been sleeping.

Unknown to him, it had already been two days before he had separated from the group. Just that most of this time was spent while he slept. If it weren’t for the teeth of the plant monster trying to stab him, he wouldn’t have noticed anything!

As mentioned before, Ozul did not really sleep when he closed his eyes. He was just too lost in the nothingness that he did not bother to wake up until something different happened around him.

He did not notice anything that could potentially harm him if he cut straight through the wall. And there weren’t any specific areas where he could go from either, so Ozul advanced by butchering his way through.

The wall made out of vines turned out to be a meter thick! However, Ozul had no difficulty in creating his path to the other side.

*whish*

Some twigs and branches fell down from the wall as the metallic hand pushed them away.

On the other side, the group of mercenaries and the Silver Knights looked at this scene with wonder and surprise. The past few hours had been a rollercoaster for them. They didn’t understand what was going to happen now.

As Ozul appeared from behind the bushes, everyone looked gaping at the scene. They had yet to make a complete understanding of their own situation, and things kept piling up.

——

A few hours earlier, they were on their daily routine, advancing without anything to worry about other than the fog.

Some of the mercenaries were also not as tense as before because it had been a while since anything dangerous happened to them. But most of all, Ozul had suddenly left the group, which also made some of them sigh in relief.

All of them weren’t exactly comfortable traveling with him after they had seen his strangeness.

While this was the thoughts of the majority in the group, some of them had different opinions.

Those who had other opinions included Clive and Clara. In contrast, Raven and Blaze need to be mentioned. Both of them already looked like some wooden dolls that only had a little life in them. Their interaction almost looked robotic by the others.

However, it was just that they did not have anything to talk with anybody. Their only purpose was to keep doing what they were, so it couldn’t be helped that they seemed like some robotic golems who were assigned a specific task.

After Raven had killed Brud, their relation with the other mercenaries had only worsened. Barry tried his best to avoid the duo. Although he had said those things to Brud, he was still like a brother to him, so he was raging inside. Barry tried to keep this to himself since he knew it was not the right place or time to get revenge.

He was afraid that he would lose control if he had any confrontation with the duo. It wasn’t that Raven and Blaze hadn’t noticed this. They just ignored it since this was the attitude they had learned from Ozul.

Anyway, they were going about their usual routine together with the other mercenaries in the fog. It was then when suddenly a man shouted, “Everyone stop!”

Since the fog was everywhere, the mercenaries didn’t see who shouted, but they all still stopped in their tracks like Clive had told them to do so.

Everyone gathered in a close circle since it was difficult to talk in the formation that they had. A man with a missing tooth in the front looked worried as he raised his hand.

“My friend Tibby is not here!” He said while looking around. He was still trying to find his friend in the group.

Clive waited for a little while to see if the person named Tibby was really missing or not since he would reply if he were here.

After a few seconds, no one seemed to be confirming. The mercenaries only looked at each other. Just as Clive was about to say something, another voice sounded out, “My friend is not here either!”

It was a woman this time. She searched everywhere with her eyes, but she couldn’t find her friend either.

“Calm down!” Clive shouted when he noticed that the unrest was rising among the group. He was vice-leader for a reason. He knew his way around to manage a group.

“Everyone checks if your partners are with you or not! Don’t cause any commotion. Just look around and see if you can find everyone in your circle. If you can’t find someone, don’t panic and tell me one by one!” Clive understood that if two people were missing, there could very well be others too.

Although he had given clear instructions, when people couldn’t find some, they all started shouting out that their friend was among the lost too.

“Stop panicking! We can do this all day, and we wouldn’t get anywhere with it!” Clive shouted while releasing a bit of his pressure on everyone. It seemed to work wonders as everyone immediately quietened down.

“Now, raise your hands if you think your friend is missing!”

One by one, many raised their hands. Clive ordered one of his men who began to write down the names as he asked the people on whoever they thought was missing.

Naturally, many names were repeated. However, Clive still shouted each name in the group to see if the person who was missing was actually there or not.

“Tibby!... Yanari!... Adam!... Aqil!... Ayat!...” One by one, he shouted each name. Only two people were still present in the group while the other fifteen had gone missing!

Fifteen people had suddenly disappeared from their group, and no one had realized anything until now!

It naturally caused many of the mercenaries to tense up. Clive was still thinking about what to do with this situation when a man standing right next to him suddenly fell down on the ground!

When they checked the person who had suddenly fallen unconscious on the ground, they noticed that the only thing that seemed to be the reason was the sting on his leg.

Following that, the group noticed that there was a strange plant near the guy who had fallen unconscious earlier.

“What type of plant is this?” Clive turned towards one of his men who everyone thought was some expert in this field. However, the person in question could only shrug, saying that he had never seen anything like this before.

Clive had no choice but to bend down and check the plant himself. He thought that it was only one of a poisonous plant when a mercenary found a plant that looked the same as that.

When they couldn’t find anything else, a guy plucked the whole plant with his hand in anger. However, he did avoid grasping the poisonous thorns on the leaves.

That seemed to be a big mistake because just as he plucked the whole plant out of the dirt, random vines started to attack the group!

Following some vines, many followed right after, and in the end, they were forced to run all the way to that strange place while continually struggling with the vines.

The vines were too strong for most of the mages in the group. At the same time, the stronger ones couldn’t use their spells since they were all crowded in one place. They could only run to a safer place, hoping that the vines would stop after some time.

Only when they had arrived at that place did the vines leave their tail. However, it wasn’t the end of their trouble.

When all of the Mages were sighing in relief, they were surrounded by those random beasts in the forest!

It wouldn’t have been much of a problem if those beasts weren’t at least Rank-6!