The forest elves might be the owners of Garan, but traveling through Fantasy Forest during the night was still a perilous thing to do.
The wild beasts that ordinarily hid within their caves during the day would all pour out of their dens come nightfall, roaming the dark forest for fresh meat. Most wild beasts were affected by the power of nature and would not actively attack the forest elves. However, there was no preventing wild animals under the effects of starvation or malice to suddenly lash out at the elves.
That was why, under ordinary circumstances, the forest elves would also keep to some unspoke rules, such as never going near or passing through the territories of wild beasts during the night.
However, these rules were seemingly non-existent for Eijae. She even let out a long roar as she ran, actively challenging the kings among magical beasts.
Sadly, her voice and aura were well-known among the magical beasts. Consequently, not only were the forests she passed absent of any responses from the magical beasts, they even became absurdly quiet. All magical beasts temporarily halted their hunts and hid in the bushes, praying that this demon of a female would leave their territory as soon as possible.
One hundred kilometers of winding forest roads tired even Eijae after running all that distance in one go. She was soaked in sweat.
By the time she gradually approached Quel'Lithien, she started to meet elves that had escaped from that place. Eijae was heartbroken to hear the worst of news from their mouths.
A roaring blaze had turned this former elven town into a sweltering sea of fire.
The overwhelming waves of heat and licking tongues of flames forced anyone away before they could even enter Quel'Lithien Lodge.
Several elves that had escaped from the town knelt at the edge of the fire in agony, crying, wailing, and drowning in their sorrow.
Beside them, Eijae's body started to give off purple waves of air. She walked into the field of fire one step at a time with all her determination.
Quel'Lithien Lodge was a mid-sized elven town. Almost three dozen giant ancient trees that reached up to a hundred meters tall formed its core area.
Unlike the broad, straight roads of human settlements, no such structures were ever seen in the elven towns and cities. The homes and buildings of the elves were all constructed upon the base of the ancient treetops where all the branches converged. Tree bridges and vines were what were used to connect these structures.
Today, this prosperous and beautiful elven town had been put to the torch by the evil enemy. Every single tree in a radius of one and a half kilometers had been devoured by the sea of fire, twisting and struggling painfully in the unrelenting blaze.
Eijae walked through the flames solemnly as the fire lit up her face.
She used her violent sacrificial inner power to force back the flames shrouding her sides and quickly scanned the place with her eyes, trying to find the enemy's location.
The enemy clearly hadn't gone far!
The flames might be ferocious, but Eijae could still see large patches of black blood stains on the branches, grounds, and the leaves. Eijae also saw plenty of black beetle corpses covering the ground around the few treant warriors at the center of the town.
The treant warriors had obviously fought until the last moment of their lives.
A thick pile of insect corpses buried their collapsed bodies. Numerous wounds of various sizes could be seen all over their bodies.
Even more strange was Eijae's discovery of a small handful of ashes at the edge of this tragic battlefield.
Eijae squatted by the ashes and picked up some of them with her right hand. She rubbed the ashes in her hand.
They took to the air, so light it was like they were weightless.
It was a small handful of ashes that was the product of something wholly burned.
Eijae couldn't help but narrow her eyes.
It wasn't uncommon for ashes to appear in such a ferocious field of fire. However, it was odd to burn anything so thoroughly that no bone shards or minerals remained.
In Eijae's impression, only unique spirits or undead could produce such a strange phenomenon upon death. If her deduction was correct, it was proof that some powerful undead creatures had appeared in the ranks of these witches.
Undead creatures were evil, and the witches were evil as well.
It wasn't all that surprising for them to collaborate!
The only thing that confused Eijae was how the evil witches had managed to create such a dizzying number of insects. If the scale of the insect army was so large, then what method was it that they had used to avoid the elven patrol and the aerial scouts that were everywhere?
Eijae's face turned while she was still wondering. Her eagle-like eyes quickly focused upon a spot on the forest ground. There was a small pile of dirt and what seemed to be an insect cave there. That place seemed to have experienced the most concentrated blazes of fire.
It seemed as if the departing witches were trying to use the fire to hide something.
Eijae's feet tapped the ground, and she quickly arrived at that empty space.
Her expression shifted slightly when her feet stepped on the ground.
There was a cave underneath. The sound of her step was slightly different from solid ground.
Eijae didn't hesitate. She jumped into the air as a throwing spear from the leather sack behind her back immediately appeared in her hand. She inhaled in midair and started drawing upon her power. Violent purple sacrificial inner-power rapidly gathered upon the throwing spear.
The next second, a purple afterimage that could hardly be captured by the naked eye blasted across a distance of a dozen meters and exploded in the center of the space.
The savage and ferocious shockwave momentarily extinguished the fires around the area, and the scorched earth collapsed into a massive pit. Once the ashes had dispersed, a horrifying scene appeared within the hole. Spear of Vengeance Eijae almost spontaneously flew into a mad rage.
The bottom of the pit was filled with a large pile of flesh and withered bones, along with a pungent slime. Plenty of white cocoon shards and dying larvae that had yet to mature could be seen amidst all this 'waste.'
When EIjae looked upon these twisted corpses, she could almost imagine how they looked while they were still alive; she could envision the immense suffering that they'd had to endure at that moment.
Eijae let out a furious roar into the sky and kicked against the ground with a single leg. She leaped into the air, and the Spear of Vengeance in her hand quickly flashed. A circular ring of explosions blew up around the pit. Under her intentional control, the shockwaves of the blast were all spread outward, instantly clearing out the center of the fire in the town.
The witches had set fire to this place because they didn't want the elves discovering their deeds. They just hadn't accounted for Eijae appearing as fast as she did.
The Spear of Vengeance's destructive strength forcefully extinguished the fires around the pit. She then turned with lightning speed and sprinted toward the southwest of the town.
The enemy hadn't gone far!
If they were still carrying their spoils with them, she would definitely be able to catch up!
Chapter 668 Secret Battle in the Woods
The dark forest was deathly silent. Only an odd chattering sound remained.
A vast army of insects traveled within the Fantasy Forest. The roars of ferocious magical beasts fighting with magical mantises rang out every so often from the darkness in the distance.
The weak beasts were smart enough to run far away the moment they sensed the arrival of the swarm. Only those brainless magical beasts that lacked sharp instincts would ignore the strength of the swarm and charge out of their dens to 'defend' their homes.
Sadly, they were fated never to return!
It seemed Lady Mary was not optimistic about this hunt. She had quickly cleared the battlefield once the fighting had ended and left with all her vampires. Bug Adept Bi
llis was left behind and despite all of his efforts, clearing out the elven town still took up one and a half hours of his time.
Now, as he commanded the swarm to take away the three dozen elves he had specially selected, along with the troves of previous resources, it was difficult for him to move as stealthily as he had arrived. Thus, Billis had no choice but to march above ground, spreading the magical mantises around the perimeter to chase away and exterminate any idiotic magical beasts that couldn't recognize the threat that he posed.
As the insect army quickly traversed a clear and shallow stream, Billis suddenly turned his head and looked back at the blazing battlefield in the distance.
Fifteen kilometers of obstructing forests made it impossible for him to see what was happening there directly, but the explosion of energy caused him to frown deeply.
So fast?
A commotion had started in the sea of fire less than half an hour since he had led the insect army away from Quel'Lithien. That could never be considered a good thing!
Billis had traveled fifteen kilometers in half an hour. Taking into consideration how dangerous the forest was in the night, there was no way an ordinary person could track down the insect army. However, Billis wasn't so sure about this when they were dealing with elves.
The bug adept sensed the traces of energy fluctuations from a distance, and his face turned solemn.
To think he could sense the shockwave of the energy explosion from fifteen kilometers of forest away! It wasn't hard to imagine how much fury was contained in that one attack of the enemy! Judging from the energy intensity, the chance of it being a peak Second Grade was seventy percent. There was even a thirty percent chance of it being a Third Grade.
It didn't matter which it was. Neither were enemies that Billis could defeat at his current strength!
Billis wordlessly gave up a series of orders to every corner of the swarm.
Upon crossing the stream, the large swarm continued marching while a cluster of several thousand black beetles stopped. These beetles then started to prepare for an ambush on this side of the shore.
Billis even left behind a magical mantis for good measure.
The swarm hadn't even made it seven kilometers away from the stream when the ambush found their prey.
Sadly, this prey was practically a berserk beast. She exterminated the 'tail' that Billis had left behind almost instantly.
The other black beetles had died far too quickly. They were greeted with a shower of energy throwing spears before they could even charge out of their hiding spots.
Indeed, they were energy spears, not actual physical throwing spears!
These energy throwing spears were soaked with incomparably savage purple inner-power and would turn into terrifying energy explosions upon contact. The lithe and muscular female elf simply jumped into the air. The Spear of Vengeance that she held tightly in her grip merely trembled slightly as several projections of purple throwing spears shot into the swarm.
These beetles that Billis had hatched all possessed tough shells and could endure quite a lot of physical damage. However, they appeared inadequate before such savage and ferocious inner-power energy attacks.
The exploding energy spears had completely exterminated the over one thousand black insects before they could completely swarm out of their hiding spots.
Meanwhile, Billis also managed to rely on the eyes of the magical mantis hiding in the canopy to see the true face of the enemy, even from six kilometers away.
A female elf; a muscular female elf whose body would not lose to any male.
In particular, the dominant aura of that ferocious form as she leaped through the sky, tossed her throwing spear, and roared frightened even Billis.
Just as Billis was secretly spying on the enemy, the strong female elf's eyes quickly swept across the area. An incredibly sharp, piercing, and furious gaze landed upon the magical mantis through the dense foliage.
Not good.
Billis immediately knew things were turning south. He quickly controlled the magical mantis and had it dodge.
But it was too late!
A wooden spear shrouded in violent purple inner-power cut through a hundred meters of woods under his terrified gaze and pierced right through the magical mantis, pinning it to a tree trunk. The savage inner-power attached to the spear instantly erupted, engulfing everything within three meters in a tide of purple.
Nothing remained of the magical mantis! Not even a corpse or a bone!
Billis' body stumbled. He was almost directly affected by the purple tide that almost managed to reach him through the mental connection.
The enemy had actually killed an intermediate First Grade magical mantis in a single hit!
This terrifying reality caused Billis' hairs to stand on end.
Third Grade; absolutely a Third Grade. In fact, it was even possible for her to be a Fourth Grade.
The insect army that was hauling the elven prisoners and resources immediately started stirring. Twenty-three magical mantises charged into the midst of the elven prisoners, quickly stabbing with their sharp scythe-limbs, piercing holes into the thighs and stomachs of the elves.
All the prisoners fell to the ground, grunting and screaming in pain.
For a moment, the entire forest was filld with their moans of agony!
Still, while the magical mantises had been extremely vicious with their attacks, none of them seemed to have caused the elves to die directly.
The magical mantises and the swarm abandoned all prisoners and resources after inflicting sufficient injuries upon them. They then charged into the dark forest without turning back.
Five minutes later, Spear of Vengeance Eijae charged into this part of the woods, still shrouded in a layer of purple light.
The scene that came into her sight caused her to pause for a moment before stomping her feet in absolute fury.
What cunning and sly and enemies!
The enemy would definitely not be able to flee too far if they brought the prisoners and the spoils along with them.
If the enemy had chosen to kill all of the elves, Eijae would only have increased the intensity of her pursuit, even as she boiled with even more rage.
Wasn't it just perfect now? The enemy had left her with a ground sprawled full of critically injured elves. If she didn't quickly attempt to save them, several of these elves might bleed to death here. However, if she were to stay here and rescue the injured, then the enemy would be able to escape her grasp at leisure.
Eijae angrily gritted her teeth. She wanted nothing more than to eat the enemy alive at this moment. Just then, a crisp and loud call came from the distant horizon.
As a veteran elven powerhouse, Eijae immediately broke into a smile upon hearing this call.
It was a hippogryph!
Eijae's wrist waved, and a blinding purple light pierced through the canopy and shot straight up into the skies.
The bird calls quickly converged upon the spot with this clear signal as a guide.
A short moment later, the ancient tree above her shook as several lithe silhouettes descended from above.
"It's Lady Eijae."
"We found Lady Eijae."
"The prisoners that were taken away are here as well! Everyone come down!"
Rustling noises rang out, and more forest elves leaped down from the trees.
These elves were clearly from Skywater City. They might not be very powerful, but their speed when riding upon the hippogryphs wasn't much slower compared to Eijae.
Their arrival had helped Eijae deal with this tremendous trouble. At least she, the 'butcher,' no longer needed to tend to a chore like saving the wounded.
"Leave some people behind to save the injured. The rest follow me to chase after those bastards!" Eijae roared furiously and immediately leaped up the canopy.
There, upon the canopy, several four-meter-long hippogryphs with bodies full of tough feathers were peacefully resting upon the branches. All these hipp
ogryphs shifted uncomfortably upon seeing Eijae close in on them. Their eagle-like gazes focused sharply on this crass intruder.
The hippogryphs might be the tamed mounts of the elves, but they weren't creatures that ordinary people could hope to ride. Hippogryphs were plenty hostile toward strangers that they weren't familiar with.
Still, due to the urgency of the situation, Eijae had no time to stare down this bunch of 'livestock.' She grunted, and her entire body was shrouded in purple inner power. The powerful aura of a Third Grade powerhouse was instantly invoked to suppress this rowdy bunch of beasts.
Her outline flashed as she leaped onto the largest and most muscular hippogryph of the flock.
"Go."
The hippogryph was extremely unwilling, but under her cold and unyielding coercion, it had no choice but to kick off with its legs and beat its massive wings. It took the bird all it had to ascend to the skies, barely.
Those who were selected as hippogryph riders were typically light and slender elven girls. They also usually only wore light leather armor and carried bows and arrows. That was the only way to limit their weight to a range tolerable for hippogryphs. Meanwhile, the Spear of Vengeance was a barbaric person whose body could put to shame even the most muscular of males. Her body was also covered in all sorts of belts, shoulder knives, shortswords, throwing spears, daggers, and other melee weapons.
This particular hippogryph was in for a lousy time when such a severely overweight giantess with so many weapons rode upon it!
It flapped its wings painfully and tried to maintain its height, desperately gliding in the night sky.
Eijae seemed to be utterly ignorant of the calls of protests from the hippogryph beneath her; she just scanned the dark Fantasy Forest below with her sharp eyes.
All of a sudden she turned her head as if she had heard something strange in the forest.
She tugged at the hippogryph's head with her throwing spear and the beast intelligently changed directions.
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