The dried meat that had been stored for months after being dried tasted like dry wood, salty and astringent. But for Yaruta, it was also a rare delicacy in the forest. The further north one went in the Anserra Forest, the colder the climate became. In the woods near the northern end of the forest, the older hunters called the Misty Weaver Forest, there would occasionally be snowfall at night. Even during the day, the frost could weave a thin mist in the forest.
Here, the animals in the forest also became very rare. Except for the occasional thick-furred rodent, even the veteran hunters found it difficult to replenish their food in the forest.
Yaruta cut a small piece of the dried meat and put it in the boiling pot. The soup in the dark iron pot was full of wild vegetables, and the heat rose as if to melt the snow on the branches.
Such food was naturally not eaten by the nobles, but it was a common occurrence for hunters.
"There's not much food left …" The young man turned over the fur in his heart, and there were only some blackened bread crumbs left below. He sighed slightly in his heart, but he had expected this. Before entering the mountains this time, the family was almost starving.
His sister said that after entering the mountains this time, he could save enough money to go to Karsuk and seek refuge with his relatives there. He greedily sniffed the fragrance from the pot, and his stomach growled.
He looked up at the neat and beautiful tents on the other side of the woodland, and the sound of dispute continued to come from the camp. He knew that the hunters from the town had a disagreement with the nobles, and the disagreement mainly came from the hunters' reluctance to cross the river in the north and continue forward.
Thinking of the river in the north, Yaruta could not help but shudder.
After passing through the Misty Weaver Forest, with the Nugan River as the boundary, one would enter the Falling Needle Hills north. This river connected Lake Vallenden with Lake Green in Lantonilan downstream, and ice floated on the river all year round. But there were some more terrifying legends. After night fell, there were often 'things' wandering in the Stained Frost Forest in the north, and no one who had seen them had ever returned from the forest.
Such legends were passed down from generation to generation, so the north of the Nugan River gradually became synonymous with the forbidden area.
Even Yaruta often heard those terrible stories, such as the 'man in the tree', the 'lost Knight', and the like. He couldn't help but shiver when he recalled the legends that the older generation of hunters told him by the bonfires.
He turned back to look in the direction of the hills. For the past few nights, he had seen ghostly blue things in the forest. He only told his sister about it, but his sister only said that he was seeing things.
"Even among the 'nocturnal prowlers,' there's nothing like what you saw. You must have mistaken the Crystal Stag for something else. In that case, we may be lucky. "These were her exact words.
But he knew that since that day, the number of hunters on night watch in town had doubled. The closer they got to the north, the easier it was to detect the tension in the air, and the conversations between people seemed to have become sparse.
It's just that Yaruta didn't understand. The people in the town didn't like them. Why did his sister have to tell them everything? Even if it was the Hunter's motto, "Only by working together can we overcome the difficulties", unity should not be one-sided.
He had never liked the townspeople, especially the way they looked at him with disgust.
Suddenly, he heard the sound of horses galloping from outside the hunter's camp. Only the nobles had horses. He looked up and saw a few tall knights leading a group of nobles' private soldiers to the front of their camp.
What happened? Were they done talking?
With such doubts, Yaruta's gaze pierced through the white steam rising from the iron pot. Behind the mist, a hunter walked towards the Knights, as if to ask what had happened. But a noble's private soldier walked up and pushed him to the ground.
Yaruta stood up immediately.
The noble's private soldiers began to spread out on both sides and surrounded the camp. He still didn't know what had happened. When he turned back, he saw a row of soldiers with longbows walking out of the forest. He saw the noble longbowmen in leather armor that almost completely covered their faces. They drew arrows from their backs and drew their bows.
An instinctive premonition of danger rose from the bottom of his heart.
A hunter ran in from the back of the camp with a pale face. He knew the guy. The guy had two little daughters, and once they threw sand at his head. He would remember the way the guy looked at him with contempt for the rest of his life. But the other party's expression must not have been as twisted as it was now.
"Those bastard nobles are going back on their word!" The hunter let out a hoarse cry. "Run!"
Then a sharp whistle sounded in the forest. As a hunter, Yaruta was very familiar with this long syllable. A sharp arrow pierced through the air and pierced the hunter's throat.
The sound came to a screeching halt.
The sharp tip of the arrow broke through the flesh and came out from the side of the chin. The blood pooled outward in a line, and the short feather remained on the other side of the man's neck, trembling slightly.
The hunter looked at him, his mouth opening and closing, showing a mixture of fear and unwillingness. He seemed to be trying to grab his throat with his hand, but just as he raised it above his chest, he fell to the ground.
Yaruta swallowed his saliva.
He had seen hunters shoot their prey in the throat with an arrow, and had even done it with their own hands. But when the target of human hunting was changed to his own kind, he realized that the same scene could be so terrifying.
A person who had been alive before seemed to have turned into a cold corpse in a moment.
His heart pounded as if he had just understood what had happened. He had never experienced such a thing, and he did not expect the nobles to dare to do this. Yaruta felt his hands and feet go cold for a moment, but the first thing he thought of was his sister, whom he depended on for survival.
"Sister …"
The longbowmen on the edge of the forest loosened the bowstrings in their hands, and the arrows swept through the camp like raindrops. Yaruta felt a pain in his calf and lost his balance and fell to his knees. He fell to the side of a hide tent and looked at what was happening around him at a loss.
Those who were familiar with him, even the most seasoned hunters in town, fell into pools of blood one after another, like fallen wooden stakes. Finally, someone began to resist, and he tried to open his eyes wide to see the leader of the hunters in town leaning against a carriage and shooting down two of the nobles' private soldiers.
Although he usually hated that guy, he could not help but cheer for him in his heart at this moment. But just as the leader of the hunters drew his bow for the third time, a figure fell from the sky. Yaruta saw with his own eyes the scene of the long sword cutting through a man's neck. The flesh separated, the head fell to the ground, and a column of blood shot up into the sky.
The memorable face rolled to the ground and smashed, and then was covered with grass ash and snow. It was as if the original appearance could not be distinguished in an instant.
The nobles' Knight also rushed into the camp.
Curses and screams suddenly sounded in the camp. Yaruta felt his head begin to become dizzy, and he shivered as he crawled back, but the horse's hooves swept past him, and then he felt a pain in his back, as if his whole body was nailed to the ground.
He could not help but scream.
There was a shrill laughter behind him, and he knew it was the nobles' private soldiers. The Knight pulled out his spear, and Yaruta immediately felt the strength in his body drain away, and his body became light.
He gasped for breath and used the last of his strength to look in the direction of the nobles' camp.
He saw those distorted smiling faces, with indifference, cruelty, or a look of schadenfreude. In the direction of the camp, there was also a shrill scream coming from afar.
"Sister … Sister …"
His vision seemed to begin to blur, and in the midst of the shadows, he saw a blue figure in the distance turning away.
… …
It had been nearly five days since they entered the Anserra Forest.
Brando stood at the top of the hill and looked at the forest that had become gray. In the distance, the Nugan River was like a slender belt of light looming in the forest. This area was called the Dead Land in the game, because there were neither animals nor monsters in the forest. It could be said that there were no living things in the forest except for these cedars covered in snow.
The reason for this situation was mostly because of the Stained Frost Forest. Because of special reasons, the monsters were restrained in the forest maze, and the creatures were unwilling to get close to this strange land. Naturally, such a scene was formed in the periphery of the Stained Frost Forest.
Brando stared at the other side of the Nugan River. Across the not so wide riverside woodland was the Stained Frost Forest dungeon group. "Across that forest is Milos' Final Breath," he thought to himself.
In the game, 'Milos' Final Breath ',' The Fall of the Gods', 'Forest of Tears', and 'Wolfblood Forest' four peripheral dungeons surrounded the central maze. Only by passing through any of these four peripheral dungeons could one reach the ring-shaped glacier. The ring-shaped glacier was actually a player's abbreviation. Its full name in The Amber Sword was Milos' River of Despair. Legend had it that when the Giant God Milos fell to the ground, the collapsed magic impacted the ground and formed this strange geography. The young dragon entrenched in the Falling Needle Hills in the game lived in this area.
He shook his head and felt that he was thinking too far ahead. This forest was from the direction of Viero Vallenden. The first challenge was the Forest of Tears, but this was the most difficult of the four dungeons. In theory, entering from the north of the Wolfblood Forest was the easiest, but he didn't have that much time to take a detour, so Milos' Final Breath, which was second only to the Wolfblood Forest in difficulty among the four dungeons, was the best choice.
Besides, Arreck seemed to have chosen this path as well.
But even the easier area of the four dungeons wasn't so easy to deal with. The comfortable pace of progress in the Anserra Forest before would probably be difficult to maintain here. Brando couldn't help but think so as he looked at the team moving down the hillside.
"Brando, come and look over here!"
Freya suddenly shouted from the bottom of the hill.
"What did you find?" Brando was slightly taken aback before he walked down the path opened by the guards. As always, Scarlet silently accompanied him. The two of them came to the bottom of the hill at a moderate pace before they saw that a large crowd had gathered where the convoy was. He even saw Laurenna and her husband squeezed into the crowd. Brando immediately thought of what had happened.
He parted the crowd and frowned slightly.
Another corpse.
… (To be continued. If you like this work, you are welcome to come to qidian.com to vote for me. Your support is my biggest motivation.)
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