Risen World

Chapter 205: Spirit Beast

Walking deeper into the new area Joshua was able to compare it to only one other place that he had come across in his travels up to this point. It was the area that they had found Cinder at that was surrounded by those centipede creatures. The trees and other foliage there looked like they were withering away do to the insects in the area poisoning the land. It was creepy, but at least under those circumstances it was easy to tell what the problem was. The large amount of webs in the area along with the poisonous fumes made it obvious why the landscape looked how it did.

This time around though Joshua couldn't tell why things seemed so lifeless in the area. As they marched their way deeper into the dead forest they hadn't come across any poisonous creatures that could be causing the damage to the surroundings. There wasn't any purple haze in the area like in the towns or cities that could explain the change to the surroundings. The only haze around the area was an extremely condensed fog that seemed to hover along the ground for as far as they could see into the surroundings. Unlike the purple haze this fog was dense enough for them to fill it as they waived their hands through it and it felt corporal instead of some weird change in the world like with the haze.

The trees themselves seemed completely dead as after a few minutes walking into the forest the entire group couldn't spot a single leaf on any of the trees. In fact Amy tapped one of them to see how well they were holding up and they could all here the wood on the inside cracking from something so little. Joshua wasn't certain that if he punched any of them with a little effort they would break apart like rotted out wood. There wasn't a single bush in the area so they didn't have to worry about stepping over things with their view of the ground being hidden by the fog. The entire scene just looked like something out of a supernatural movie of some sort with the dark clouds in the sky and the fog on the ground setting the perfect dreary mood to the place. Joshua was just hoping that his idea of the place seeming like some sort of supernatural flick was more on point than the one that both Amy and Lilly seemed to be thinking of.

From the looks on their faces Joshua could tell they both were thinking they were walking into some sort of horror film. Lilly's usual absent minded look was replaced with a slightly concerned one. Usually she'd be looking around with anticipation trying to find some sort of creature to tame, but at the moment she was more focused on sticking with the group and her heightened emotions seemed to be rubbing off on Cinder as the large spider seemed a bit more agitated than normal simply because of Lilly's current state of mind. With Amy it was more of just Joshua noticing the small things that his sister did whenever she was nervous. The pace of her walking would always seem a bit off from usual as if she was trying to move mechanically instead of naturally. Then there was the fact that the both of them were constantly looking around the area as if they expecting something horrible to happen at any moment.

Honestly the guys weren't that much better off with Adrian constantly having his hands on his swords ready to draw at any moment. Henry seemed to be mumbling something as he looked around and Joshua could occasionally see the hand that wasn't currently carrying his staff light up with a subtle glow as if he had a spell prepared for the moment they encountered anything out of the ordinary. The only person that didn't seem anymore tense than normal outside of Joshua was Aito. He still seemed ready to take out his weapons at any moment and fire away, but it seemed far more natural for him than the others. It wasn't to surprising considering he had spent the last four years in the military before the world changed, but it did show how strong minded he was along with how he was used to tense situations.

The further they went into the forest the higher the fog raised up from the ground. After a while it got to the point where it reached all the way up to Joshua's knees and he had a feeling it might get up to his waist by the time they reached the center of the forest. That was going to be a great hindrance since it was relatively difficult to see what exactly was inside the fog in the first place. Not being able to see attacks coming from below could be a problem if they came across creatures that could use that to their advantage, but at this point they had yet to come across anything. The only thing that let Joshua know that there were enemies around was the constant feeling of being watched that grew more and more the further they went into the forest.

It was when Joshua was thinking over this fact that he could feel something with his aura sense just near the edge of his vision. A floating figure seemed to glide by a tree in the distance and that immediately caught Joshua's attention as he came to a complete stop. Everyone else seemed to tense up when they noticed Joshua stopping and looking in a certain direction. "Did you sense something?" Henry asked as he tried to examine the area that Joshua was looking at.

"I thought I saw a figure gliding by in the distance, but it looked as if it was camouflaged or something." Joshua said getting everyone to frown a bit. If that were true then the heavy fog and bleak surroundings would make it hard for them to notice a heavily camouflaged enemy. "It was like noticing waves of heat in the desert, but it moved out of view quickly."

"I guess we need to stay on edge from this point on. We have no idea what these creatures can do, but we do know they must at least be over level sixty based off of the step up in territory." Adrian said as they all agreed and stayed prepared for any encounters. As they moved further into the forest Joshua was starting to notice more and more of the figures appear at the edge of his vision from time to time. They were always only there for a brief moment and only seemed to be watching them for the time being, but he had a feeling that would be changing soon based off of the fact that he was noticing more and more of the creatures. It was getting to the point that the others were even starting to notice the figures at the edge of their vision even without having an ability like aura sense.

The situation was incredibly off putting especially since they had to move at a fairly slow pace to avoid stepping on anything dangerous in the fog the whole way forward. Henry was using a small wind spell to push the fog out of the way and allow them to get a better vision of their footing. It helped them avoid tripping over the roots of the dead trees or stepping into dips in the ground that could hurt them if they ended up twisting an ankle or something. Of course they could easily heal themselves from something like that at this point, but even so, showing any sign of weakness to whatever had been watching them could just end up inviting trouble. The one problem with this method of moving forwards was the fact that billowing up all of the fog with the wind made it hard to see the creatures that were currently stalking them from a distance. So in the end they had to rely on Joshua's aura sense and Aito's amazing eyesight to keep a watch out.

After a while of the constant tense atmosphere one of the blurred creatures finally decided to make its approach to the group as it weaved its way around some dead trees at a fast pace. They were all barely able to see its figure, but once they zoned in on it they made sure not to let the thing out of their sights. The entire time Joshua made sure to use his aura to make sure none of the other creatures were trying to sneak up on them while the first one finally hovered in front of the group. Outside of the shimmer its body would occasionally give off it was hard to piece together what the creature looked like or what it planned to do. You couldn't even see any facial features to judge its emotions off of while the only hint that it was aggressive was the fact it was giving off small waves of killing intent.

It was then that a shrill sound seemed to emit from the creature and the killing intent it was giving off grew in size multiple times as it started to glow brightly. Before anything else could happen Joshua decided to observe it to see what he could learn about the creature before the fight even started. The first thing he noticed was the fact that it was only level sixty-one which meant in all likelihood it was one of the weaker level creatures in the area which was only proven even more by the fact that it only had two stars by its name. It was called a low level spirit beast and at the moment Joshua had no idea what that could possibly mean. Luckily it wasn't to powerful so they could get a good judge of what type of creatures they'd be up against.

While the creature was growing brightly its shape started to change as it grew in size and began to warp into the shape of something that seemed familiar to both Joshua and Lilly. The creature was now about two stories tall and stood over the group menacingly as its rapid growth in size seemed to displace the fog a bit, but surprisingly it didn't seem to tear down any of the trees which didn't make any sense. When the glow faded away both Joshua and Lilly were shocked as the creature before them now looked exactly like one of the large frogs from back in the marsh area.

The green color and giant mouth were the same as the first creature that Joshua had ever fought seriously during his exploration attempts. The major difference though from this creature in front of him and the one from his memories was the fact that this one seemed to still be fading in and out with its surroundings. Sometimes it seemed like it was in your face and ready to pounce at you, but at other times it seemed like it was trying to fade back into being one of the camouflaged creatures again. Before Joshua could think about the situation anymore the creature shot its tongue out directly towards Cinder since it seemed to think the large spider was most likely the biggest threat in front of it. Cinder was still shrunk down in size which made her smaller than the frog for the moment, but even so the frog still felt that she was the biggest threat. Cinder dodged the blow while Aito took a shot for one of the creature's eyes.

That's when something unexpected happened and the bullet went straight through its eyes confusing everyone as it didn't seem to effect the frog at all. In the next moment the frog looked as if it was about to spit a large glob of acid towards them, but Cinder decided to attack first and bombarded the creature with a large amount of flames that scorched its body and sent the creature hoping away into the distance in fear. Before any of them could tell what exactly was going on the large frog broke apart and the nearly invisible ghostly figure appeared once again before disappearing into the fog quickly.

"Was it testing us?" Adrian asked a bit confused at the situation.

"Probably. Although I'm not sure what to make of these weird creatures just yet. You got any ideas Josh." Henry said as he and the rest turned to look at Joshua.

"I have no clue, but I have an idea who might." Joshua said with a small smile.