Astartes of the Bear School

Chapter 1659 1631. Abandoned Mine

What else could the commotion that happened more than a year ago be?
It's the Tyrannosaurus Rex, the Lord of the Mist Nest, that ran over from the intersection of the celestial sphere.

At that time, it and Lan En fought from the section near the exit of the Pontar Valley to the middle section of the valley.

Along the way, the monster and Lan's body crushed rocks and broke giant trees in the confrontation.

The debris from the landslide alone caused siltation in the narrow part of the Pontar River Valley.

Of course, Vergen, who was far away at the entrance of the Pontar Valley, did not feel anything unusual at the time, but only vaguely heard that something was wrong in the Mahakam Mountains.

But the dragon turtle's perception is much more sensitive than that of ordinary people. When the [Mist Nest Master] Tyrannosaurus Rex was frantically hunting in the Mahakam Mountains, it probably sensed something was wrong and hid.

Since it was able to dig through the barrier between the silver mine and the underground water system, it could naturally also run around in the water system.

If I really wanted to hide, it would be very hard to find me.

Lan and his companions were lucky to be discovered by the Embers Knights. This guy must have felt there was no danger after more than a year, so he poked his head out and was discovered.

"My Lords," the local dwarf in the team still grumbled anxiously, "Are we really going to cause trouble for that dragon turtle?"

A human next to him, who was still wearing a farmer's hat, laughed at him: "Didn't you say that the dwarves of Vergen have a deep hatred for it? Now we are going to kill it, why are you hesitating?"

"Of course I want to kill it! Stab it, chop it, burn it! It would be best if I could do all of them! It caused so much trouble to the mines back then, and caused countless families to be separated from their wives!"

The dwarf scratched his thick beard, shouted angrily at first, then lowered his voice.

"But given the current situation of our rebel army, are we really going to provoke it for no reason? That would be a huge loss."

"Overall view." The elf, who looked more like a farmer than an elf and carried a hoe on his shoulder, mocked the dwarf, "This is a rare quality in dwarves."

"For the sake of the plague, please," the dwarf glared at the elf, "can't you just shut that ugly, beardless mouth of mine? Just for a moment!"

"Quiet."

Finally, it was the cloaked man, who had great prestige in the rebel army, who spoke up and calmed down this group of quarrelsome people.

Stuart turned around and spoke to the group of rebels who had been temporarily dragged up the mountain by them.

"Don't worry, everyone. We asked you to come here purely for logistical convenience. The fighting and hunting will be taken over by other people. Our people."

It could be vaguely seen that the tense bodies of the rebels behind him relaxed a lot.

Although they have all been on the battlefield of Aedirn for a long time, the psychological pressure they need to bear when facing monsters in the wild and facing humans on the battlefield is ultimately different.

"I'm not afraid of fighting that beast." The dwarf trudged his short legs on the rugged mountain road, "But if we can gather more powerful people to do this job, the risk should be reduced a lot."

In the last half of the sentence, his tone revealed a dwarven cunning.

This road was the original road from Vergen to the silver mine in the mountains. You can still vaguely see traces of frequent rolling by heavy vehicles.

However, the dragon turtle had been entrenched in the silver mine for a long time, and the road had gradually become deserted, with many weeds and wild flowers growing on it. Lan En picked some medicinal herbs such as fleawort and honeysuckle.

When the road reached a certain point, Lan's nose twitched slightly under his hood.

"Let's do this." He turned and said to the dozen or so rebels who had joined him, "Let's go up and kill the dragon turtle. You can first find some branches to make some planks or something."

The helpers nodded to show that they understood, and began to bustle around with the tools they were using to do farm work.

Lan En looked at Stuart and continued walking along the road towards the silver mine.

After turning a corner of the mountain, the ball of fluff poked its head out from the hood of Stuart's cloak. Its furry head shook like water, and then the whole kitten jumped out and started walking on the ground.

"Control your breathing, Stuart."

Today is a sunny day, the sun shines on the mountains, making all kinds of colors look very bright. But the temperature is still not high.

Lan reminded Stuart calmly.

"I understand, sir." Stuart responded, but before he could finish his words, he made another nausea sound, "But this tastes uh."

Stuart's performance made Lan En smile, and he recalled the embarrassing and painful situations when he first became a demon hunter.

"We have a highly developed sense of smell, but our tolerance is also high."

Lan En patted his adjutant on the shoulder and supplemented him with some knowledge that he was not very familiar with.

"Most monsters have body odor or the smell of their nests that is unbearable. This is due to their habits. But if it is just biological habits, the smell is just so-so at best."

"But the smell of some strange and powerful monsters is unbearable, and it also has the effect of chaos magic. For example, the feces of the Deer-Headed Demon has a poisonous smell."

"But after the trial mutation, our bodies can also produce chaos magic. So it's actually not a big deal."

"I know the smell won't hurt us." Stuart was obviously forcing himself to adapt, "but it still feels disgusting."

The group of helpers called from the rebels didn't feel anything yet, but Lan and Stuart had already smelled the odor of the silver mine occupied by the dragon turtle as its nest from a long distance away.

It was the smell of a rotting corpse mixed with a sickly metallic stench.

Although Stuart and the Embers Knights he led had been with the rebels for a long time and were all tough guys who had fought on the battlefield many times before.

But their experiences were mostly among humans. No matter how harsh the environment of a human battlefield was, it would not have such a strange and unpleasant smell as the monsters' nests.

Therefore, most Embers Knights are like novice demon hunters and are not very adaptable to this working environment.

As for the Fluff Ball, thanks to the blessing of the Lady of the Lake, it and the Qilin were protected from the radiation of chaos magic, so the kitten didn't feel anything at all at this moment.

Not far up, two tall figures, also wearing magic cloaks, were waiting by the gate of the collapsed silver mine.

Vergen is relatively stable at the moment, but the work of maintaining discipline and calming racial conflicts cannot stop, so Lan En only selected three Embers Knights to look for traces of the dragon turtle, and the rest are still working on their posts.

“It’s in there.”

The Embers Knight guarding the door spoke in a low voice.

The sound was rather muffled, probably because the smell had been making them both uncomfortable for a while, and they were just getting used to it.

Another Embers Knight spoke up, “But we think we should make sure we fish it out now. Otherwise, it’ll go back into the flooded mines and we’ll be dead.”

Lan En didn't waste any words and simply asked, "Do you have any ideas?"

The Embers nodded.

"Then do it."

With the tacit understanding between Lan and Embers Knight, they understood each other's intentions without saying much.

After getting Lan's approval, the three Embers Knights, including Stuart, took off their magic cloaks.

Three pairs of amber cat eyes were exposed to the sunlight.

Both men had elf-style long swords on their waists, but each had two.

Just like the two swords of a demon hunter, one is made of steel to fight ordinary creatures, and the other is made of steel with a silver core to hunt monsters.

Stuart held a long metal stick in his hand and a long knife at his waist.

The three men hung their cloaks on the dilapidated wooden pole at the mine gate and took out a few glass bottles from their waist bags.

[Enhanced Thunder], [Enhanced Blizzard].

The potion that enhances physical strength and reflexes was poured down the throat, entered the esophagus, and began to take effect in the digestive system.

[Enhanced] potion, this is basically the balance point between the current alchemical level of the Embers Knights and their body's tolerance to toxicity.

The three of them knelt down and used meditation techniques to speed up the absorption and effectiveness of the potion.

Soon, the toxins and medicinal properties began to show up in their bodies.

The black blood vessels spread from under the collar to the upper face, and finally accumulated around the eye sockets to form sickly and gloomy dark circles. Combined with the pale skin, it looks even more weird and cruel.

After the drug began to take effect, they took out a glass bottle, unscrewed the opening, and poured the amber oily liquid inside and smeared it on the weapons.

【High-grade dragon beast oil】

Sword oil does not cause any toxic burden to the body, so it is naturally as good as it can be used.

After everything was ready, the three men nodded to each other, smoothly crossed the wooden fence covered with ivy, and entered the old mine.

The mine is indeed severely flooded at the moment.

The mine that originally led directly underground into the mountain has now turned into a calm and silent lake.

However, around the lake, there were some corpses that had died in a miserable manner, with a lot of limbs and flesh missing, and had been rotten on the edge of the pool.

These are most likely the source of the stench.

After the three Ash Knights unabashedly stepped into the area surrounding the small lake, the calm surface of the lake began to ripple with tiny waves as if caused by a tremor.

Stuart pulled out a Valyrian steel knife from his waist and threw it to the ground, while forming a sigil with his hands.

"Igni."

With a hissing sound of high temperature, the entire blade of the knife turned red in an instant.

The Dragon Turtle is a rare but ferocious dragon-like creature.

According to the records of Kaer Morhen, it is keen on blood to fill its stomach, but at the same time, it also has a preference for metal ores.

This is also one of the reasons why this dragon turtle dug directly into the mine.

And now, the quality of Valyrian steel is much higher than silver ore, iron ore and the like!

The sound of fresh living footsteps and the smell of hot Valyrian steel spread out in an area that was imperceptible to ordinary people.

The ripples on the small lake that was originally a mine cave were even bigger!

(End of this chapter)