Chapter 409: The Descent of the Demonic Tide_2
Xize had no time to think, hurriedly trying to escape with his True Spirit!
Swish!
However, the next moment, the True Spirit, invisible to the naked eye, was suddenly grasped by Colin as he extended his five fingers!
"Can you perceive the True Spirit?!"
From the intense fluctuations in the palm of his hand, came such a message, and Colin was startled... Was this thing not supposed to be perceptible?
"The plan has already begun, and you can't stop anything!" The voice from the palm, frantic and clearly panicked, came again.
Colin didn't celebrate too soon, swiftly binding Xize's True Spirit with his will, blocking the continuous cursing coming from him, and hastily flying towards Golden Barley!
And by the time he ascended into the sky, the large hole in his chest had already closed by more than half... For him now, losing just a heart, and not a shattered brain, was no longer a fatal wound.
...
Golden Barley, Grain Ear District.
The night breeze was gentle, and the clear moonlight fell, Shelley was in the study-turned-research lab of the villa, deeply furrowing his brows in thought.
June had just passed, and the harvest day for wheat and other crops was not far away.
She and the other researchers from the Truth Society were further improving the agricultural tools used for harvesting.
However, this was not an easy task. No matter how good the tools were, in the end, they were to be used by the serfs, who were neither knights nor wizards.
Most lacked the talent to perceive Magic Power, so their strength was limited, and so were the tools they could use.
Otherwise, creating some farm tools driven by Magic Stones would certainly greatly increase the efficiency of the harvest.
Shelley couldn't help but let out a soft sigh, then suddenly raised her head to look out the window.
The branches of the large tree in the courtyard extended, looking like sculptures rimmed with silver under the moonlight.
Rustle.
However, for some reason, the tree shadows began to move on their own without any wind, and a rustling sound came from within the dense canopy.
Swish!
Then, a beetle with a silver vertical line on its forehead suddenly rushed out in a panic, and then quickly flew up into the sky.
Following it, several more flying insects chaotically burst out, and ants poured out from their nests below, their antennae trembling rapidly as they circled endlessly on the ground.
Shelley frowned slightly and then, in the next second, her expression subtly changed as she instinctively looked towards the outskirts of the city.
The night was tranquil, and the moon hung high.
Aside from the abnormalities of some small creatures, there was nothing odd in sight.
Everything seemed to be an illusion.
Shelley's thoughts flickered slightly, and her snowy hair moved without wind, her fair skin gradually becoming a translucent azure.
As an Ice Elf from the Extreme North, her power greatly diminished after leaving the land of ice.
In the glacial land, even a Fourth Rank Wizard might fight her, but now she was merely at the level of a Second Rank Wizard.
However, even though her strength was greatly reduced, she was still an Ice Elf, and some of her unique attributes had not diminished too much.
At this moment, once Shelley released her constraints, she clearly perceived that outside the city of Golden Barley... no, even far away, the entire Roon Kingdom, and perhaps not just the Roon Kingdom, seemed to have developed some faint abnormalities.
...
Outside the city.
The moonlight was clear, casting upon a boundless sea of wheat swaying in the wind, resembling a tranquil silver ocean.
But upon closer observation, one could notice that the ground seemed to be trembling slightly.
"Is there an earthquake coming?"
The knight patrolling through the wheat fields noticed something amiss, stopped in his tracks, looking somewhat panicked.
"Charlie, do you feel that?" He instinctively shouted loudly to his companion not far away.
Pop!
Pop, pop, pop!
However, at that moment, several black worms suddenly burst up from the ground, one of them appearing right in front of the knight, scaring him pale as Golden Paper, his legs trembling uncontrollably.
"Ahh!!"
Charlie, the companion, had worse luck, standing just above one of the black worms, and now he was sent flying into the air.
Then, the screams abruptly stopped as the black worm opened its dahlia-like oral cavity and swallowed Charlie whole, like a snake.
"Gulp." The knight couldn't help but swallow hard, the black worms around him swaying erect like seaweed, making him feel as if he was in the midst of some mad dream underwater.
Bang!
A red Communication Firework burst open not far away.
The knight recognized this red firework; this was what they used to summon for help from wizards when they encountered a situation they couldn't handle themselves, and he had an identical one on his waist.
But the knight, frozen in fear, didn't have the courage to use it, only holding his breath, crouching low, trying to escape through the 'Insect Forest'.
"Perfect chance!"
Whirr.
The black worm in front of him suddenly spat out a stream of unknown substance, then completely burrowed out of the ground, leaving behind a deep cave and also a gap large enough for escape.
The knight's face lit up with ecstasy, cautiously taking a step forward.
Yet, no matter how careful he was, when the iron-clad boot hit the ground, the imperceptible vibration still transmitted through the soil to the surrounding worms.
Swish!
"Ah!!" The knight let out a desperate scream.
But the creature that now clasped his thigh ready to end his life was not a black worm.
It was a bizarre beetle.
'Is this... a creature from a cave?' In the last second before his death, the knight who grew up in Intuo City suddenly recognized the beetle's true identity.
'Creatures from a cave... how did they come here?'
Whirr!
As the first worm completely emerged from the ground, the rest followed in quick succession, leaving behind a series of caves.
Among them, the most conspicuous were several caves dug by a group of worms together, noticeably larger than the others, and spread uniformly throughout the field at regular intervals.