Standing on the beach, the 100 soldiers, part of Commander Kieran's team, and Auren's own much smaller group, consisting of just him, Neffi, Vanessa, Konrad, Eren, Goreinu, and Leira, appear totally out of place.
Auren himself feels a little silly as he's carrying the egg on his back, a strange but exceptionally clear feeling telling him not to leave it behind and to keep it with him under any and all circumstances. That feeling started when he first got it, and ever since then, he has abided by it, even during this expedition; despite the danger, he didn't see a strong enough reason to change his behavior.
In front of them, just a short distance away, a few lone palms are growing, before almost instantly a thick jungle appears.
However, much to everyone's surprise, the trees and plants don't look like they belong to any one particular climate. Bushes, different trees, some looking like they belong in a typical, familiar forest. On closer inspection, it's a chaotic mix of a rainforest, a mixed forest, a broadleaf forest, a coniferous forest, and even something resembling a primeval forest, full of old-growth trees.
Leira immediately takes notes and slowly but surely walks towards it.
"Cut it out," Auren says, glaring at her. "I get that you are excited, but calm down."
He then turns to Kieran. "Commander... I'm in charge, but I'll adhere to your judgment, as you are much more experienced. We don't have to pretend I'm more qualified than you.... I know you spent much longer at the former landing points, so you are probably one of the most experienced people here. However, like we talked about... I don't see much sense in my group joining up with your larger team. If we're stomping through that unknown forest... or jungle with over 100 people, we're gonna be easy targets. Any beast weaker than us will flee, and only those confident and dangerous will be drawn to us. We'll probably end up sabotaging each other, and everything will turn to chaos."
"Indeed... I'm sending out scout parties, and the majority of my soldiers will start with the perimeter close to the beach. That's the safest start. If we can simply return to the beach, I'm confident we can take down anything with our weapons in the open terrain it provides," Kieran explains.
Since cellphones, even Auren's Beatle phone, have stopped working, being so far away from civilization, the group has set up a temporary communications network at their base and outfitted everyone with a transceiver, which is working in a relatively large radius around their camp.
"If we discover something, we'll inform you," Auren announces. "If you need help, you can tell me as well. Especially if you need my Hatsu."
"Hehe," Kieran snickers. "As impressive as you are, we've got a few people of our own with similar abilities, specifically selected for this mission. Wouldn't want to bother you all the time."
Good....
"Suit yourself," Auren replies, now stepping forward, swiftly followed by his group, except Konrad, who looks a little tense.
Similar to Auren's group, a few groups of soldiers also press forward, all of them outfitted in combat gear, machetes in hand, ready to conquer the jungle in front of them.
Auren, taking the lead for his group, draws Eternity, using Shu to strengthen it; however, he just relies on the Aura from his Ten.
Seeing wild bushes, grass, and towering trees in front of him, despite having only just entered it, he cuts away, Eternity acting like a sickle, easily clearing a path in front of him.
"Don't you want to save some Aura?" Konrad asks from behind.
"I can keep this up for a few days; the drain is almost zero," Auren explains, Leira immediately behind him, Oculus scanning anything close by, and Leira herself picking up a bunch of random leaves, plants, and even dirt.
"Don't pick up every piece of trash, Leira. You can do that on your own. This is primarily a mission to scout," Auren clarifies. "If you stop every two seconds, we'll never make progress."
Auren, waving Eternity around like an invisible sickle, cutting apart anything in his path, briefly stops as the path in front of him becomes less overgrown.
"The fewer plants... the more animals..." Auren mutters in front of him.
"Not always, but generally a logical conclusion," Leira quietly comments from behind.
En!
Auren, using the standard version of En, immediately senses a few foreign Auras close by, deciding not to overdo the radius so as to conserve Aura. He raises his hand to signal the others to stop.
Another group? Unlikely, we were quite quick. I need to focus.
The Auras are large... twice as tall as a human and round?! I sense at least 10 nearby... one is just ahead of us.
"At least 10 Auras... one directly ahead, let's find out what we're dealing with," Auren whispers.
Carefully pressing forward, Auren finally sees one of the Auras. It turns out to be a huge, almost perfectly round, hairy creature. One of them jumps from the ground into the air and reaches for the leaves of a tree, reaching at least ten meters into the air and taking a bite with its sharp teeth, mostly hidden by its fur. Its body, fully covered in purple fur, looks incredibly unreal, Auren almost unable to believe his eyes.
"No limbs... just a round, hairy beast... seems to eat plants," Auren notes. "Seems harmless enough, but I saw some teeth under that fur."
"Careful, Auren, there are quite a few omnivores around. Just because it eats plants does not mean it's any less dangerous," Leira warns him.
"Got it," Auren says, approaching the creature, which is still jumping into the air.
As it notices Auren, it stops its long jumps and switches to shorter jumps, as if it's excited.
"It's so cute," Neffi whispers from behind.
"Yes..." Unexpectedly, Vanessa agrees, but looks worried.
"It's unable to use Nen," she notes. "But I can sense from its Aura, even with its Aura nodes unopened, that it's quite powerful... don't be deceived."
"Good call," Auren says, a little surprised.
Suddenly, the beast stops jumping and rolls forward, quickly approaching Auren. As it's about to reach him, it jumps forward, revealing a colossal maw with two rows of teeth, aimed directly at him.
"Hmph," Auren mutters, swiftly activating Ren and Limitless Waters and cutting forward with Eternity, his blade cleaving through the beast without any effort.
Still in the air, the two halves of the round beast pass Auren on both sides before landing on the ground, no movement left in them.
"What?!" Konrad yells in surprise. "Damn evil things!" he curses.
"They're quite aggressive," Goreinu notes. "Their attitude shifted suddenly... that surprise attack was deadly."
Meanwhile, Leira squats down and analyzes the beast.
"These are... I have never seen anything like them," she notes.
"Well, duh," Vanessa replies, before softly looking at Auren. "But Auren handled them just fine... one slash and they're gone... we can do this!"
"Look at them!" Leira urges the group to look.
Auren looks at the bloody halves and discovers in shock and disgust that their blood is not red, but murky yellow, along with most of their organs. In addition to that, the round body is filled with half-digested leaves and what appear to be creatures similar to squirrels and rats, but easily three times as large. All in all, there are at least dozens of animals inside.
"This is weird..." Leira continues. "You saw its teeth, and its maw is large, but not that extremely large that it could easily swallow these whole. All of these little prey are dead, but they're not chewed up or ripped apart... they only have one injury. They've been bitten, to stop movement and then devoured alive..."
"Fucking disgusting," Neffi comments.
"I tend to agree... is that a beast with... a cruel nature?" Auren wonders.
"There could be other reasons," Leira explains. "Depending on the situation, prey that hasn't been chewed into smaller parts and is left alive might be digested more slowly. Perhaps it's... rationing? Who knows if these leaves are enough for it to survive or if they are even nutritious? Perhaps they are just eating them for enjoyment."
"As much as I respect your work, Leira," Neffi begins to speak. "Let's move on... this is disgusting. I don't want to see more. Pick up what you need, and then let's go."
"She is right," Auren agrees. "No use lingering. We will catch one alive later down the road anyway. I spotted more of them, so be ready... Konrad, be careful."
"I... okay," Konrad replies, drawing a machete from his back.
As Leira gathers some organs, blood, fur, teeth, and even an eyeball from the dead beast, Auren notices with a grin that more of them are approaching, probably smelling their dead comrade.
"Don't use firearms," Auren warns the group, briefly glancing at Eren, Vanessa, Konrad, Goreinu, and Leira, who each carry a specialized variety of weapons. Konrad and Goreinu each have a high-caliber revolver, Leira her shotgun, Vanessa and Eren rifles, as well as pistols.
"Living Poltergeist," Neffi yells, her thin mantle floating off her body, revealing a jacket below.
At the same time, two scarves she's wearing also rise into the air and float towards the beasts.
Eren also activates his Hatsu, briefly muttering, "Infinity Stinger," as he conjures the insect-like organ on his back, six sharp, tentacle-like legs appearing from it.
So it's named differently than the moderator called it... not hand, but stinger, seems accurate.
None of the others, including Vanessa, makes any move.
What is wrong with her? She's so well-behaved and rational.
With just Eren and Neffi charging forward, slashing and stabbing the beasts respectively, Auren remains behind, protecting the others.
Within just a few minutes, most of the beasts are annihilated. For some strange reason, the others don't flee, as if they do not possess any survival instinct.
Instead, they keep on fighting, rolling, and jumping towards Neffi and Eren, getting easily countered, as they do not possess any limbs, which severely restricts their range and limits their attacks to just tackles and bites.
A minute later, a total of 11 corpses lie close by, Eren's and Neffi's armor and clothes painted completely yellow.
"Weird..." Auren mutters.
"They don't have experience with humans; this is nothing out of the ordinary," Leira comments. "I also suspect they barely have any senses. Their organs are all centered in the middle, while they have a colossal gut. Their fur is also so thick that they don't feel much."
She then grabs a water bottle from her backpack along with a few herbs and plants from the ground and approaches Neffi and Eren, cleaning their clothes.
"We don't want to attract potential predators targeting these beasts. A little bit of smell is fine, especially if combined with the plants," She explains.
"Thank you," both Neffi and Eren blurt out at the same time.
"..."
The group progresses further inside, encountering more strange and unknown animals, but none of them are as hostile as the round-fur beasts. Leira dutifully analyzes every beast they manage to catch.
However, despite searching for hours, the group does not find anything of value.
While Leira picks up a few herbs and plants, she clearly hasn't found anything she deems worthy of making a report to Auren.
"This place..." Konrad mutters, his brows wrinkled, as he holds a compass. "It's just... wilderness... but there are no real predators around. Just the round things... I thought this would be a hell filled with beasts unlike anything seen before... but it's just... worthless wilderness. These trees are also useless. No fruits, and the wood looks low-quality. I smell mold and rot in the air. It's fucking gnarly and nasty. I even studied a little, focusing on wood specifically, hoping to recognize something special, but unlike the natural resources in the East, all of this looks worthless to me."
"The lack of predators is... curious indeed," Leira confirms.
Just as she finishes the sentence, Auren tenses up, his senses flaring and warning him.
En!
50 meters... nothing.
100 meters... still nothing... just small animals.
200 meters... maybe I was wrong?
Just for a second...
Auren goes all out, his En radius expanding to over 300 meters, which finally allows him to sense a strong Aura in front of him.
As if reacting to an attack, the beast immediately sprints towards his location, its speed so great that Auren can barely react.
He withdraws his En and uses Ren, dashing into the direction of the beast to shield the others.
"Be careful!" he yells, preparing for the incoming assault.
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