novelraw Chapter 328 324: A Blood-Red World!
Chapter 328 324: A Blood-Red World!
In the forested stretch of the canyon—
A pack of gnolls was slitting the throats of several antelopes, letting the thick blood spill and splatter across a stone altar.
As they worked, the previously dull stone underfoot slowly lit up with crimson lines.
The blood seeped into the granite floor like a hungry mouth greedily drinking its fill.
Bathed in this ominous red glow, every gnoll wore a disturbingly human expression of "bliss." Their eyes went hazy, as if they were consuming some potent tonic—or slipping into a euphoric trance.
Just as the gnolls were lost in their "pleasure," snow began drifting down from the sky.
At first, none of them paid the strange snowfall much mind.
A few gnolls tilted their heads up, but soon lowered them again.
Until the snow started to intensify.
A layer of white began piling up across their corded bodies; the biting chill in the flakes melted into their hot flesh and kept boring inward, bringing a constant stabbing pain. One by one, the gnolls let out pained howls.
"Enemies!"
"Watch the snow!"
Their barking cries rang out as the startled gnolls hurriedly scattered from the clearing.
They tried to take shelter beneath the trees, hoping to lessen the damage from the storm.
But—
The temperature was dropping far faster than they'd expected.
Blue-tinged gale winds howled through the lair, carrying needle-fine ice shards and freezing rain.
There was nowhere to hide from the magical cold.
"Run! Get out!"
Among the gnolls there were a few smarter ones, and they quickly realized that if the tribe stayed in this rapidly freezing ground much longer, they'd soon have allies literally frozen to death.
Even if they survived, their physical condition would plummet—and when the unknown enemy finally revealed themselves, the tribe would be wiped out with ease.
They couldn't stay.
"Awooo!!!"
The largest gnolls threw back their heads and howled.
As their roar died away, the muscles beneath their hide turned rock-hard and bulged, blood racing through their veins. Their bodies entered a bizarre "overcharged" state.
Faint red steam and heat rose from their pores.
Their bestial eyes burned a deeper, more feral red.
Crack!
With one mighty swipe, they shattered frost-stiff bushes under their paws.
Led by these warped gnoll elites, the shivering tribe pushed hard for a breakout, charging toward the edge of the grove.
As for those in the center—frozen purple and stiff, unable to move—they were simply abandoned. Not one gnoll spared a paw to help them.
Up in the air—
Gauss watched the forest from afar.
From the sounds rising through the trees he could pinpoint exactly where the gnolls were breaking out.
There, Albena and the others were already lying in ambush.
He was about to turn away when a splash of crimson shot up from below.
…
"Awoo!!"
One gnoll, its entire body wrapped in red mist, dropped to all fours and sprinted.
Just as it broke free of the freezing storm and burst from the trees, a massive battle-axe—long waiting in silence—came down from above.
Boom!!!
The gnoll's paws had barely touched solid ground.
The terrifying axe's surface flared with a blinding silver edge, the kind that promised to cleave anything in its path in two.
And indeed—at the moment of impact, the axe unleashed terrifying force.
Crack, crack!
The gnoll's skull shattered almost instantly.
The red aura clinging to its body did grant some defense, but against that mountain-crushing blow it couldn't turn the tide.
The crimson shroud blew apart.
The axe punched straight through: skull, brains, neck—and finally buried itself deep in the gnoll's powerful chest.
Sizzle!
The friction was so intense that wisps of smoke rose where metal met flesh.
Albena ripped her axe free and gave the gnoll's corpse a hard kick, sending it tumbling aside.
It was as dead as dead gets.
More gnolls were pouring out behind it.
"Moonlight Glow!"
A sheet of pale frost-white light poured down, leaving a cool, glowing circle upon the ground.
The moonlight, appearing in broad daylight, looked harmless—but every gnoll that stepped into it howled in pain.
On their bruised and frostbitten hides, the silver glow stung like salt on an open wound.
Two black silhouettes appeared unnoticed at the gnolls' feet.
Shff!
Pitch-black human-shaped shadows began to dance.
They burst into jagged shadow-spikes from below, cutting off any route back into the woods and skewering fleeing gnolls from the ground up, pinning them in place.
Selandur and the clay constructs held the other flanks, blocking any escape.
"Those big ones are mine!"
Albena's voice thundered across the battlefield as she hurtled forward like a fired cannon shell.
To her, the regular gnolls were like children—not a real threat.
Her roar alone made several gnolls flinch, shoulders hunching in instinctive fear.
Dry, hard-packed earth slowly turned dark red under the slaughter.
"Where's Gauss?"
"And even if he ran into something, why's there no sound from over there at all?"
Even as they fought hard, Alia and the others all reached the same uneasy thought.
With two Level 6 powerhouses—Albena and Shadow—leading the charge, they were handling the gnoll warband handily despite being outnumbered.
But this wasn't what the plan had been.
According to the plan, once Gauss cast Snowstorm and drove the gnolls out, he was supposed to return to the main ambush, where the team would crush the fleeing gnoll pack together.
Having worked together for so long, they all knew Gauss was the type to follow his own plan precisely; he wasn't the "wing it and improvise everything" kind.
So…
If Gauss hadn't come back, something must have happened.
Something inside the grove had kept him occupied.
"I'll handle this!!"
Albena's axe whistled through the air like a storm.
Her hair had come loose, whipping around her face and making her look downright feral.
She shot a quick glance into the depths of the trees, anxiety flashing across her features.
She needed to finish this as quickly as possible and rush to Gauss's aid.
"You annoying beasts! Die! All of you, DIE!!!"
A gnoll blocking her path was reduced to minced meat under a single sideways swing.
Faster!
Faster!
The regular gnolls never lasted more than a few exchanges against her and Shadow.
Even the big, red-hazed elites couldn't withstand more than a handful of heavy strikes before falling apart.
"Dead. Dead."
By the time Albena split the last gnoll—already snared by Alia's control spells—clean in half, the others were breathing hard and scanning their surroundings.
Satisfied that none of the gnolls remained, every gaze turned toward the treeline.
…
Back in the canyon's grove—
The scenery before Gauss shifted abruptly.
It was as if he'd been dragged into a world of blood; everything around him was wrapped in scarlet.
Of course, on closer look the ground was still the same forest floor—it was just smothered in a cloying, blood-red mist.
The stone in his pocket was shining with a blinding red blaze now.
Clearly, this distortion was the work of Yeenoghu's power.
He tried to fly clear of the area but found nothing but endless, repeating scarlet scenes in every direction.
"No need to panic," Gauss told himself silently.
The main force of the demon lords had been driven from this world long ago, and what remained of their power here was just a sliver.
If they could casually project their full strength into the prime material, the world would've descended into chaos ages ago.
This wasn't his first time dealing with demons.
Last year, during the Winter Hunt in Grayrock, when he helped wipe out the ogre shaman's beast horde, he'd killed some dretches.
Dretches were among the weakest of demons.
But even the weakest demon was still a demon.
Once they arrived in the prime, their abilities were cut even further; they were terrifying in appearance, but still made of flesh—and that meant they could die.
He kept his gaze locked on the blood-fogged grove below.
A foul stench was growing steadily stronger.
Something was moving down there.
"Magic Missile."
Gauss's eyes narrowed; Dragon Speech rolled smoothly off his tongue.
Blue bolts streaked downward, tearing through mist and foliage to blast into the ground.
Miss.
But he only became more certain: the enemy was down there, watching him.
Since it wasn't in a hurry, neither was Gauss.
He trusted that when Albena and the others finished off the gnolls, they'd come looking for him and maybe help from the outside.
Just as he settled his nerves and kept his guard up, the crimson forest below began to change.
"So, you can't hold back after all," Gauss murmured.
The blood mist churned violently, as if stirred by a giant unseen hand.
A massive, twisted shape slowly emerged.
It was a hulking beast, something between a wolf and a hound, black and red from head to tail.
Four-legged, its body was covered in scars, its back lined with jagged black spikes, and in its eye sockets burned eerie green flames.
"A projection of Yeenoghu's power… or one of his favored spawn?" Gauss wondered.
"Awooooo!!!"
The beast threw back its head and howled, ring after ring of red energy pulsing from its gaping maw.
All around it, the blood mist surged; several floating hounds, made of shadow and black fog, coalesced at its side.
Anti-air, huh?
Gauss fired off several empowered Magic Missiles.
They tore through the nearest shadow-hounds, shattering them into black vapor.
But in the next breath, that black mist drew in energy from the environment and formed them again, whole as ever.
"Can't be permanently killed, then…"
Gauss quickly drew his conclusion.
His eyes shifted to the giant wolf-beast itself.
Its eyes stared right back at him.
In those green flames burned pure bloodlust and savage joy in slaughter.
So this was what you'd expect from a spawn of "the Beast of Butchery" Yeenoghu.
Legend said Yeenoghu longed for slaughter and ruin, wished to turn the living world into a dead wasteland; the sorrow, terror, and despair of the dying were the sweetest delicacies to him.
"ROAR!!!"
The beast's jaws opened wide.
A black light flared deep in its throat.
It sucked in more of the surrounding hateful energy as it charged the attack.
In the space of a blink, the charge was complete.
Fast.
But Gauss had been ready.
He spat a Cloud of Daggers.
The razor-edged cloud streaked toward the beast and only expanded when it neared.
Shhh, shhh, shhh!
A thousand invisible blades slashed across its already scarred hide.
New cuts gaped open and blood poured down its flanks.
Got it? Gauss thought for an instant.
Then dismissed it.
No. That did nothing.
Or rather, the spell's cutting speed couldn't keep up with the monster's regeneration.
Superficially, it looked badly mangled—but its healing was terrifying, and the surging sea of blood-mist beneath it seemed like an endless well.
"BOOM!!!"
The beast finished charging.
That black light in its throat flashed, and a straight-line beam of pure darkness shot outward, crossing tens of meters in an instant and lancing toward Gauss.
He'd already begun to dodge, but the beam seemed to track him.
Fortunately, he'd prepared for this too.
A blue, watery shield appeared on his arm.
The delicate, wave-like surface rose to meet the beam.
Ssszzzzttt!!!
The two energies collided with a shriek.
Gauss adjusted course and used the backlash to fling himself sideways, narrowly avoiding the brunt of the beam.
"Just as I thought…"
His suspicions were confirmed.
This water-forged weapon gifted by the lake spirit was divine water — and it clashed directly with demonic power.
The whole way here, he'd suspected it would shine against demon-tainted foes.
It was one of the reasons he'd been willing to take Leman's contract.
"So that means a water-formed blade should be able to cut it in a way that limits its regeneration, right?"
This wasn't a baseless guess.
Even in that brief clash, he'd sensed the beam's energy being neutralized by the water shield.
If he hadn't been worried about draining it too much, he might not have needed to dodge at all.
"AWOO!!!"
While he'd been pondering, the floating shadow-hounds lunged, jaws gaping toward his limbs.
The protective layer of the Moonlight Robe flared, resisting the bite with a flash—and the hounds whimpered as their snouts smoked as if scalded.
"Light!"
Gauss invoked the spell in Dragon Speech.
The water shield in his hand seemed to liquefy and stretch, reshaping into a slender blade.
The Light spell snapped onto it like an enchantment, making the blade blaze so bright it was painful to look at.
Slash!
Gauss swung.
The glowing water-sword cut a shadow-hound cleanly in half.
"AWOOOO!!"
It howled.
Blood-mist surged around it, rushing in to heal the wound—
But the cut was still there.
A stubborn, gnawing force clung to the torn edge, resisting the regenerating power and stopping the flesh from sealing.
He'd been right.
So then, monster, Gauss thought, his golden eyes burning brighter behind the lenses, let's see how long you can stand against me.
~~~
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