Chapter 2: The Furnace Bellows, Volume One, Part Four

As they advanced while thinking it over, Zhou Yan and Oboro came at last to a sunken valley, where the colossal footprints came to an end. The moon above had been hidden by clouds without their noticing.

The valley was choked with thick mist, threaded with sounds like distant thunder.

Even before they drew near, they could already sense a faintly ominous aura ahead.

“Lord Yan, there is demonic power coming from within. It is rather frightening.” The girl slowly drew her blade.

“There is indeed some oppressive force. Let us go in and look.”

The burning plague-flame of Zhou Yan’s spectral sword flared to life in his hand. Smiling, he took the lead and stepped into the fog. The instant his figure was swallowed by the dense whiteness, his presence vanished from Oboro’s perception.

“Lord Yan!”

The girl was instantly struck pale with alarm. Raising her sword, she hurried after him into the mist.

Whoosh.

Once Oboro plunged into the fog, the heavy whiteness seemed to disperse by surprise. She looked around, but there was not a trace of Zhou Yan anywhere, and panic surged through her.

“Lord Yan! Where are you!?” she shouted, desperate for his reply.

What answered her was only a thunderous roar.

Booming rumble.

Oboro raised her head toward the source of the sound, and her eyes widened; her whole body trembled despite herself.

“My heavens!”

Above the valley, layer upon layer of black cloud pressed low.

And within the center of that cloud mass, a terrifying mud-yellow face with a single eye stared down at the tiny girl, a greedy smile spreading across its features.

The next moment, a gigantic foot thrust forth from the clouds and crashed down from the heavens toward Oboro.

Fear flashed across the girl’s face. Blue light burst from the blade in her hand as she drove power madly into her feet and ran, barely slipping aside at the very instant the foot descended.

BOOM!

The mud-yellow foot slammed into the ground with a tremendous concussion. The terrifying force gouged a deep pit into the earth, hurling up a storm of dirt and grit.

Faced with such an enemy, one that could not possibly be resisted by strength alone, Oboro fled in utter panic, not toward the valley’s exit, but deeper inward.

As she ran, she cried out at the top of her lungs, “Lord Yan——where are you!?”

She called for Zhou Yan again and again, her heart burning with anxiety.

How could this monstrous being of a battle-hunter be so terrifying? It was practically divine. Such a dreadful monster—why had the demon-extermination hall not come to destroy it first?

Could it be that even the other regions’ monsters were stronger than this one?

Absurd. Utterly absurd.

Tears began to spill from Oboro’s eyes. She was overwhelmed with regret that she had not insisted more firmly on stopping Zhou Yan from climbing the mountain.

At that moment, while still running, her heart lurched, and she hurriedly drove her demonic power into another explosive burst of speed.

BOOM!

She cast a frantic glance over her shoulder. The enormous foot had smashed the ground she had just crossed. Had she been half a second slower, she would already have been flattened into paste.

Grinding her teeth, the girl pressed onward. She dodged several more massive stomps in succession before finally reaching the innermost part of the valley.

And yet Zhou Yan was still nowhere to be seen.

She fell completely into despair.

Just then, the giant foot came down once more.

After barely evading it, Oboro’s face twisted into a ferocious mask of rage. She clamped both hands around the sword hilt, then, with a forceful spring backward, shot forward like a loosed arrow.

“Damn monster, how dare you touch Lord Yan——”

“I’ll take your life!!!”

She flashed to the foot’s front and, with a sharp cry, unleashed blow after blow into it. The keen demon blade bit deep into the massive flesh.

A muffled howl rang out from the clouds overhead.

The foot withdrew at once, trying to retreat skyward.

“Don’t think you can run!” Oboro seemed to have entered some frenzy of wrathful abandon. With a nimble leap, she sprang onto the back of the giant foot and stood there, hacking it madly into a bloody ruin as she was carried swiftly upward into the layered clouds.

Within those clouds, she finally saw the body behind the foot at close range—a towering one-eyed giant.

The instant they met, the giant raised both hands and slammed them down toward the girl.

The two palms, joined together, were wider than a man’s height, and they came down with terrifying speed, ready to crush Oboro into pulp.

Oboro showed no fear whatsoever—or rather, she welcomed death.

So she thrust up the tip of her blade and drove it madly toward the center of the hands.

The immense giant hands and the slight girl were about to make contact.

Then, in the next instant, a dreadful great blade wrapped in violent black flame appeared out of nowhere across the sky.

Slash!!!

That godlike giant was cleaved apart in an instant by a colossal blade of black fire!

A scream that seemed to shake the heavens tore through Oboro’s ears.

At once, the clouds, the mist, the wind and thunder, and the great demon all shattered and vanished.

Her vision cleared. She found herself still deep within the valley.

Before her stood a massive beast’s head, bristling with terrifying tusks.

It looked like a boar, but even the largest wild boar Oboro had ever heard of would not have reached even one third of its size.

Now, black fire raged across that boar head, which stood nearly as tall as Oboro herself. Its eyes, ears, mouth, and nose trembled faintly within the flames, but its death could no longer be averted.

“Huh?”

The girl, stunned by the scene before her, let out a confused sound.

Countless blue points of light appeared in the air and streamed into Oboro’s right hand, where she absorbed them all.

“Oboro, you were deceived by this monster’s tricks.”

That longed-for voice sounded, and a figure slowly emerged from behind the gigantic boar beast.

The flames upon the black-blazing greatsword slowly died out, restoring it to the form of an odd-shaped sword.

It was Zhou Yan.

*

[Slain the battle-hunter and gained 603 spirit]

[You obtained: Rune Factor — Physique]

[You obtained: Rune Factor — Agility]

[You obtained: Rune Factor — Mind]

[You obtained: Rune Factor — Destruction]

[You obtained: Rune Circuit Core — Steadfast (1)]

“Lord Yan!”

Before he could even finish reading the flurry of prompts, Zhou Yan was already embraced by the girl who came running toward him.

Buried in his arms, Oboro sobbed without end. “Lord Yan, I thought this monster had killed you!”

Zhou Yan gently patted her shoulder, wearing a warm smile. “That was my oversight. After entering the valley, I saw that boar demon resting in the depths and thought to launch a surprise attack. I never expected that the moment you followed me in, you would seem to be deceived as well—shouting and running about, which woke the monster straight away.”

As for why Zhou Yan himself had not been deceived by the boar demon’s sorcery, the reason was simple: his mental strength was too high, higher even than the monster’s.

So when he entered the mist, he only felt a slight stabbing pain in his head before quickly returning to normal.

Still, this encounter had shown him something.

The girl who had declared she would follow him had indeed already regarded him as a master worthy of her life, to the point that she was willing to die with an enemy in order to avenge him.

He did not know how the minds of these ancient people worked, to so completely offer up their loyalty after only one or two days of contact.

Yet in return, it also brought Zhou Yan a trace of sorrow.

A girl who had entrusted herself entirely to him would, in a little more than twenty days, have to face the ending of Zhou Yan’s departure.

Merely thinking of it left him uncertain how to deal with it.

Well, one step at a time. There was no need to think too much yet.

Holding Oboro lightly in his arms, Zhou Yan extended his left hand to touch the boar demon’s corpse and inspect its information.

[Battle-Hunter]

[Type: Monster]

[Description: A boar that became a spirit through the corruption of calamity. It deliberately leaves a chain of enormous footprints along mountain roads to lure people into seeking it out. In truth, by the time they are following the trail, they have already been gradually guided and hypnotized by its strange sorcery. When they finally meet it, they believe this monster to be an unimaginably huge mountain god, and are then toyed with and slain by it.]

[Rank: 3-star, Tier 0]

[Attributes: Physique 36, Agility 13, Mind 31]

[Note: Wild boar meat is pungent, but boar demon meat from one that has truly cultivated well? Delicious.]

[Detected a chaotic object meeting the requirements. Would you like to record it as material for the talent: Super Fusion?]

From the description, it was exactly as Zhou Yan had suspected. Though a wild boar beast by nature, it was in truth a cultivated monster capable of laying illusions.

It did have some appeal as fusion material.

After fusing with his fate-armament, could it turn the form of that weapon into armor bearing boar-like traits?

A masked rider boar knight?

No, no, that would destroy his dignity.

Thinking of this, Zhou Yan quietly gave up the idea of taking the Battle-Hunter as material.

On the other hand, Oboro, who was hiding in his arms, seemed to remember something. She slipped out of his embrace, then hastily produced a leather pouch before turning and heading toward the Battle-Hunter’s corpse.

“Oboro, what are you doing?” Zhou Yan asked, puzzled.

“Taking blood!” Oboro’s expression was fierce. “If this battle-hunter was strong enough to be this formidable, then using its heart’s essence blood to draw your shadow seal ought to work very well, my lord.”

“Hmm?” Zhou Yan tilted his head. “After drawing the shadow seal with this boar demon’s blood, if we encounter a stronger monster later, can the shadow seal still be strengthened?”

As he said this, he glanced at his quest. The completion count for “Slay three renowned great demons” had not changed, which meant this Battle-Hunter was not recognized by his cheat as a “renowned” great demon.

If the shadow seal could not be improved, then he would have to consider whether to let Oboro inscribe him with the boar demon’s blood right now.

“Yes. As long as the shadow seal likewise draws upon their heart’s blood, it can be done.” By then, Oboro had already reached the front of the battle-hunter’s headless corpse. With the blade in her hand, she precisely split open the exposed bone, then reached inside and yanked out a massive organ larger than a basketball.

The tiny girl lifting the giant boar’s heart made the scene at once eerie and uncanny.

And Oboro’s technique was perhaps a little too practiced.

Zhou Yan watched her deft hands and began to wonder just how many similar monsters she had personally slain before losing her memory.

Seeing that she was seriously cutting open the heart and collecting the blood into the prepared leather pouch, Zhou Yan turned away to examine the valley, and immediately noticed something different.

Because the boar demon was dead, the illusion it maintained had collapsed. A large section of the stone wall at the deepest part of the valley had vanished, revealing a cave large enough for a person to pass through.

A treasure vault guarded by a monster?

Zhou Yan’s interest was piqued. Turning back to the girl, who had finished packing the boar demon’s blood and risen to her feet, he said, “Come, Oboro. Let’s go in and take a look.”

***