Shing! Shing! Shing!
With three bloody flashes, three of the monsters were slashed open, causing a blood mist to spurt everywhere.
Dahm wiped off the blood on his face and dashed swiftly to his team. Only the elites of the team were left fending against the monsters; the rest had either been swept into the water or were heavily injured.
Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam!
With a chain of continuous explosions, the monsters were destroyed one by one, leaving behind only bloody mist.
As Dahm was attempting to save the guide and one of his team members who had just been dragged into the water, the sound of machine gunshots filled the air.
They finally managed to see what the huge beast lurking in the water looked like.
The black monster looked like a hippopotamus with two horns on their heads, resembling those of a buffalo. At a size of almost 3 meters in height, it seemed to be a species of the giant hippopotamus.
Additionally, on its back was a huge tail that resembled that of a crocodile’s, muscled and scaly. It was a terrifying sight.
However, under Dahm’s flurry of attacks, these monsters were like sitting ducks. With every strike, another one would be killed. In just a short moment, he killed more than 20 of them.
Roar!!!
Suddenly, the ground behind him split open as a 5 meter tall humongous black beast dug out furiously from the ground and lunged towards Dahm’s back. It was speeding in like a black wave, flinging black mud, wilted leaves, and branches into the airs, rousing a thick rotting smell.
Dahm immediately turned around, facing the lunging beast. His vision was completely filled with the monster’s size.
His pupils started to contract. He saw that there was a strange mask embedded in the monster’s abdomen. That mask seemed so familiar!!
******
Whoosh!!
With a gust of wind, Garen appeared at the top of the guest hall’s throne. He slowly sat down.
In the bottom right seat, an androgynous-looking Caucasian with a white veil was seated. There was a cinnabar gem embedded in the center of his brow, giving off an Indian vibe.
On the left seats were 2 of the underlings sent by AG. They were both young witches wearing tight skirts.
The mask Garen was wearing all this time had, for some unknown reason, turned completely silver. The eyes all over the head also started to seem much more active.
Through the eyeholes of the mask, he peered down at his guests.
“How is AG’s progress? It looks like it’s quite successful, right?” Garen asked softly.
“Lord Holy Fist, Lord AG’s progress have been successfully progressing. The motive for our visit was for us Dark Color witches to seek aid from the Holy Fist Palace,” the leading witch spoke earnestly.
“Regarding the aid, taking my friendship with AG into consideration, I will accept the proposition. I’ll leave the negotiation between you and Hochman. In exchange, we also require your help regarding some issues,” Garen nodded. He wasn’t actually on good terms with the Dark Colors leader Nasira, so naturally, he wouldn’t help her without any compensation.
“We are at a standstill against the Blood Breeds, and if we break the stalemate it may lead to unpredictable results,” Garen’s vision moved to the other party, the Caucasian representative from the witches’ main force.
“So, the self-proclaimed representative from the Witches Association, what is your motive for coming here?”
The veiled Caucasian smiled as he stood up, calmly bowing down before Garen, his hands in a praying hands pose.
“I bring forth a declaration of friendship from Lion Mother. Maybe Lord Holy Fist would want help from my master?”
“Oh?” Garen’s curiosity was piqued. “Tell me, what exactly would I need help in?”
The Caucasian did not reply, but he just lightly touched his own right eye.
Garen glared down.
“You have a way to recover my eyes?”
“I do not, but my master might be able to,” the Caucasian politely answered.
Garen paused for a moment as if he was thinking about some things.
“Is there any way for you to prove this?” he asked after pondering for a short moment.
If even Black Sethe was helpless, to the Lion Mother who was from this world, this kind of injury should be incomprehensible to her.
A wound from the Nine-Headed Dragon Queen Nadia was not so easily cured.
However, most importantly, for them to voluntarily offer to help repair his eyes, they must have done a lot of preparation. Thus, as compensation, they definitely desired something great.
In this world, Garen’s one and only fear was the First Apostle Ashen, and everyone else was merely ants in his eyes. Only Ashen stood as a threat to him. However, this was only on the Blood Breed forces side, and he had not pried into the witches side of things. He lacked an understanding of the types of tricks they used.
Listening to Garen’s doubt, the Caucasian smiled. He pulled out a pure white lily and tossed it into the air. It then naturally flew towards Garen.
Catching the incoming lily, Garen took a deep breath, he felt overwhelmed by the strong aroma, slightly mesmerized by it. More importantly, his right eye started to ache slightly, causing him to shiver.
“My lord wishes that if we manage to heal your wound, the Holy Fist Palace and the Blood Breeds will be able to coexist peacefully. This way, there would no longer be any bloodshed in this world…”
The Caucasian had a solemn look on his face, Garen could see that this was not an act, but rather a true desire to achieve peace.
“Ceasefire? I am not against it, but I fear the Blood Breed side would be against it,” Garen calmly said.
His overall strength was far weaker than the Blood Breeds and a ceasefire would definitely benefit him, so he definitely wouldn’t reject such a proposal.
“For the Blood Breed side, naturally, my master will try to change their minds,” the Caucasian nodded. “However, we have one more request before we can heal your eye.”
“Oh? What request is that? Tell me,” Garen remained calm. The Lion Mother was the only one from the witches side who had an existence at a Death Apostle level. For her to be able to influence and suppress the Blood Breed, she was definitely no random person. What’s more, her abilities could have some effect against a wound from Nadia, which largely exceeded his expectations.
“My master wishes that you would stop collecting the Sleepless Faces.” The Caucasian said with his head lowered.
The atmosphere suddenly sunk, as Garen’s body emitted a suppressing aura. This aura was so strong that the people below would feel as if their hearts were sealed behind a lock, and that they were suffocating.
The Caucasian continued on impassively with his head down, “The Sleepless Faces are the cause of all these troubles and will bring disaster to the world. My master hopes that Lord Holy Fist can give up on collecting them.”
With the atmosphere in the room getting more and more serious, Garen was still seated motionlessly on top of his throne, calmly glaring at this Caucasian. Despite clearly suppressing the aura at his heart, making it difficult for him to even breathe, the Caucasian was still standing motionlessly in the room, almost as if dismissing the effects of the suppression.
This seemed to be supported by the willpower of his belief.
“We’ll talk about this once you actually manage to repair my eye,” Garen finally answered. The strong suppressing pressure started to fade away as he started speaking.
“I will send your message to my master,” the Caucasian politely bowed.
After the representative from the Witches Association and Lion Mother left, the Holy Fist Palace guest hall was once again in silence.
Hochman and Quentin appeared from the corner.
“Master, the witch organization that the Lion Mother represents are the self-proclaimed protectors of world peace, and it’s filled with sad people. They have also come to warn me before. What an annoying bunch. This time I think it’s not just something as simple as trying to ask for a ceasefire,” Quentin frowned. She was in charge of recon and information collection, and she definitely had a certain amount of understanding of the strength of Lion Mother’s group.
“These people are using world peace as a pretense, but we don’t know what their true motives are. We shouldn’t trust them so easily,” Hochman chimed in.
Garen lightly tapped on the armrests of his throne, signaling that he was thinking.
“I know.”
The collection of the Sleepless Faces was not something that could be stopped. These masks were one of his main sources of potential points, and they could also block Nadia’s movement. No matter how you look at it, it was a precious treasure that he needed to have.
However, the Lion Mother’s mysterious abilities which could even affect the wound on his eye, this made Garen wary. He twirled the lily in his hands; the hint of aura it had had already dispersed, and this was now just a normal water lily.
The slight feeling in his right eye had also disappeared.
“Lion Mother…” Garen sniffed the lily once again, showing an amused expression on his face.
******
Outside the Holy Fist Palace
The Caucasian was slowly moving down the mountain path. Passing through the main gate of the Holy Fist Palace, he smiled at the two guards stationed over there. With light footsteps, he sped up his pace as he continued down.
After walking a short distance, he turned back, looking at the Holy Fist Palace.
The white palace was sitting on top of the peak of the snowy mountain, looking like a place from a legend. Outside the Palace, groups of cloaked figures kept entering the gate, showing their identification tags. These people were selected from all over the world to come over to the Holy Fist Palace for training. They were either chosen by the Combat Club or the Nighthawks, and all of them had stable blood and qi and light footsteps despite the freezing weather.
What the Caucasian found to be weirder was that on the way back from the Holy Fist Palace, he’d met with groups of Blood Breed and Vampires who had come to this place. The aurae they were emitting seemed to have been altered, appearing stronger than before but also slightly weird.
“Master was right, Holy Fist Palace… It’s the source of all this…” the Caucasian raised his head, looking at the grey sky. That unimaginable feeling of pressure and the roaring thunder, all of this managed to accentuate the strong force that this place was!
No matter if it was humans or the Blood Breed, the Holy Fist Palace’s arms were slowly spreading to every corner of the world. Furthermore, this force was expanding at a rapid pace.
The Caucasian started to feel a fear arise in his heart.
He thought back to the people he met on his way down here. Whether human or Blood Breed, all of these people had a sort of a passion as if they held absolute admiration and loyalty towards the Holy Fist Palace.