Chapter 124: The Unexpected Help
Chapter 124: The Unexpected Help
ROAR!!!
The treeline to the east exploded outward as a wave of wild Terra Beasts burst through it, hundreds of them, pouring into the clearing in every direction. Bronze-Tier, Silver-Tier, Gold-Tier, all of them still half-frenzied from the Beast Attracting powder, rushing towards the same target.
Raiden.
But Raiden was now surrounded on all sides by thirty humans, and their Terra Beasts, and the wild horde did not distinguish between targets.
It hit the encirclement like a flood hitting a sandwall.
"WHAT THE!!"
"RETREAT!! FALL BACK!!"
"BLACKIE!! BLACKIE NO—"
The clearing became chaos in an instant. The carefully maintained encirclement collapsed as the bounty hunters scrambled to deal with the wave of wild Terra Beasts crashing into their flanks from all sides. Gold-Tier Terra Beasts that had been coordinating against Woolie suddenly had three wild Silver-Tiers on their backs. The multiple men who had been closing in on Raiden turned around to find something large and extremely angry bearing down on them from the treeline.
Woolie, who had been buried under a pile of Gold-Tier beasts, felt the weight on him suddenly lighten as his opponents peeled away to deal with more immediate threats.
He shook himself off, looked at the chaos surrounding him, and his eyes lit up.
"Woolie Woo!!" NOW THIS is a real fight!!
He threw himself back into the fray with twice the enthusiasm, this time without any coordination against him, hitting everything that wasn’t Raiden or Neva with indiscriminate thunder.
Neva, whose line of sight had been blocked by three Terra Beasts, found all three of them suddenly occupied with a wild Gold-Tier rhino that had charged in from the west. She hopped up onto Raiden’s shoulder and surveyed the battlefield with excitement.
"Sha Sha~" This is so fun! I am going to join in the battle!!
The bald man, who had been smiling thirty seconds ago, was now standing in the middle of a collapsing operation, watching his eighteen Gold Battle Masters scatter in every direction as the Beast Attracting powder drew the entire western region’s wild population straight into the centre of his ambush.
He turned slowly back to Raiden.
Raiden was still walking toward him.
Among the chaos that was unfolding around him, he looked like he was cut off from it, weaving between the attacks of wild Terra Beasts and the people who encircled him with finesse, using bizarre footsteps. The Metal Claw extended from his hands as he lunged at the baldy.
"You—stay back!!" The man took a full step back, his voice cracking.
"Oh?? Are you scared of little old me? I am just a Silver Tier, you know. " Raiden tilted his head slightly. "You are the one who set this up. I am just the guy walking toward you."
"What?! We never set this up?! How did you summon these wild Terra Beasts!!"
"So you are not the one who put that sweet scent on me?" Raiden asked with surprise.
The bald man’s Gold-Tier Terra Beast — a dark red bear — stepped in front of him, roaring.
"Sha!!"
A single blade of light dropped from Neva’s position.
The bear lurched sideways, a clean burn through its left shoulder, not fatal but enough to send it crashing to one knee with a howl of pain.
Raiden was in front of the bald man before he could react.
One hand grabbed his collar. The other pressed a single claw against his throat, not enough to cut, just enough to feel.
"Tell me, who sent you or..." Raiden said quietly. "I’ll cut off your balls, right here, right now."
The bald man looked into his eyes for a moment with fear. Something told him this boy was not joking.
But instead of answering, he started laughing loudly, looking like a man who had already lost everything.
"It doesn’t matter who is after you, boy. You can’t escape here anyway. You have offended someone you shouldn’t have, and he will spend everything to hunt you down. Verdent Hollow is his playground, and you are just a small little shit!! You think you can take on all of us?! Or are we the only people he sent after you!! Platinum!! A Platinum master is going to be here any second now!! And when he arrives, you will die with your—"
Squech!!
"You talk too much." Raiden withdrew his claws from the skull of the bald man, letting his body fall backwards as a grim expression appeared on his face.
Raiden looked at the battlefield around him — hundreds of wild Terra Beasts still rampaging, Woolie somewhere in the middle of them, absolutely delighted, Neva on his shoulder tracking fifteen different targets simultaneously with her six eyes. Even now, there were hundreds of Terra Beasts arriving from all sides, making the crowd bigger and bigger.
He exhaled slowly. He needed to get out of here before Platinum One arrived.
"Woolie!! Neva!! We are falling back NOW. Don’t chase them!!"
"Woolie!!" Aww, but human—!!
"NOW."
A reluctant rumble of thunder sounded from somewhere deep in the chaos.
"These people, they are not with Bai Zang." Raiden thought with a grim face.
There were two groups of people targeting him, and he didn’t know why, but his priority right now was clear: he needed to get out of here fast.
Raiden looked at the Woolie in front of him and thought of doing something he never thought he would ever do in his life.
He took a deep breath and called out.
"Woolie!! Increase your size!!"
"Woolie??" What do you want, human?
A confused Woolie called back, but did it anyway. The small body went from barely a meter long to 5 Meters big in an instant.
"Stop, stop!! That’s enough!!" Raiden called out in a hurry, making him pause.
Before Woolie could register what had happened, Raiden climbed on top of his body expertly and sat on him like he was sitting on a throne.
"All right!! Go Woolie go!!! Rush towards the horizon. Let’s break out of here!!"
Woolie: ???
What just happened?!
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