Forests Don't Support Idle Goblins

"Your people have discovered that humans and monsters have attacked them?" Charles paused for a moment, looking at the little ant queen in front of him, pondering what she had just said.

Previously, after Nine Fingers and his men carried several crates of honey to the ant nest, the queen ant found him and asked him to deliver a message to Charles. When Charles and his men met the queen ant, she told him directly that someone had attacked the worker ants and killed several of them in the collapsed depression.

"That area used to be the lair of giant spiders and cave bees. Who would go there specifically?" Charles stroked his chin. "Could it be that Valentine is back? But we haven't heard anything about it."

"What does that monster look like?" He thought for a few seconds, then asked directly.

The little ant queen in front of him had grown quite a bit, and her abdomen was beginning to swell. She still looked a little thin, but Charles thought she would soon become the true queen of the anthill.

"That monster was huge, and there was more than one. It had three heads. The middle head was like a forest leopard, but bigger than a leopard. And one of the heads looked like a deer with curved antlers," the little queen ant said, gently touching Shire with her antennae. "Its whole body was yellow, and it had a pair of huge wings on its back, like bat wings. It would swoop down from the sky and pounce on a worker ant, and it would also breathe fire."

"Three heads?" Charles frowned. "It can fly and breathe fire? This thing feels like a Frankenstein's monster."

"Frankenstein's monster?" The moment he thought of that word, he immediately thought of a famous monster he had heard of before—the chimera.

Although these monsters are not commonly seen, many people have witnessed them. It is rumored that they are the product of biological experiments conducted by some high-level archmages. They are huge in size and usually have the heads of lions, sheep, and pseudo-dragons. Some chimeras also have snake-like tails.

Chimeras are generally described as being as brutal as demons. Some even say that their creation method was given to archmages by demons. Their lion-like nature arouses their powerful hunting desire, while the false dragon head makes them exceptionally greedy. Finally, the goat's head endows them with viciousness, stubbornness, and a fighting spirit to the death.

"Who came here to inspect? And even went to that collapsed area. Could those giant spiders and bees have been created by humans?" Charles's lips twitched, feeling that he had provoked a troublesome opponent.

"What did that human look like?" Charles gestured with his hands in front of the Queen Ant. "Was it a human with a beard that long?"

The queen ant paused for a moment, thought for a few seconds, and then said, "No whiskers."

"No beard?" Charles looked up and pondered. "Isn't the other party an archmage? Those archmages care a lot about their beards, no less than those dwarves."

"Perhaps Valentine sent them on a 'return visit'?" He crossed his arms and paced in front of the queen ant. "That's possible. Let's check if the giant spiders and bees have resurfaced."

"Although Valentine's reputation for governing the territory was not very good in the past, he should still care about whether his rear is safe and secure. He even hired a mage to come here to take a look."

Charles was getting a headache just thinking about when the other party would leave. The herbs in this area hadn't been gathered yet, and the skeleton warriors had already started trying to brew potions under Little Claw's "training." He had also asked Mary to order more potion-making crucibles and twelve long bathtubs for the skeletons to soak in.

Everything was almost on track, and we were just waiting to start collecting data from this area when a patrolling mage arrived. If he spotted us, we would definitely be exposed.

"This is really troublesome." Charles rubbed his temples and asked again, "Is that guy just wandering around that area?"

After receiving the queen ant's confirmation, Charles decided to sneak over with his men and observe from a distance using binoculars. If they determined that the other party had no particular intentions, there should be no danger, unless it was determined to harm the ant nest. In that case, they would need to deal with it as soon as possible.

Thinking of this, Charles stroked the queen ant's tentacles and nodded, saying, "Don't worry too much. I'll go check the situation first. If the ant is troublesome, I'll take care of it for you."

After saying this, Charles led his men to bid farewell to the queen ant. Instead of riding the worker ants, he walked out of the ant's underground kingdom and headed straight for that "old battlefield".

…………

As they approached, Xia Er instructed everyone to hide under the trees as much as possible. The worker ants hadn't gathered many leaves yet, and the forest was still quite dense. In front of them was the collapsed pit, which covered a rather large area because it contained the nest of the giant spider's burrowing wasp and the underground stone chamber.

Hiding behind a tree, Charles scanned the sky above the crater and the surrounding area through his binoculars. According to the ant queen's description, the mage should be patrolling around this area.

"Nobody's here. Did they go back to report?" he muttered to himself. Behind him, a group of goblins, Evita's centaurs, and a few skeleton warriors sat in the shade of trees or in the grass, trying their best not to reveal themselves.

The goblins were whispering amongst themselves, and judging from their gestures, they were probably deciding whether to eat the smoked meat sandwiched between the tree-man fruit cakes or to eat a bite of smoked meat followed by a bite of fruit cake, and which way of eating would be more delicious.

The centaurs all held bows and arrows, ready to fire at any moment. They had just fought a battle with the earth spirits and hadn't had a few days of peace. Hearing Sansio recount the horrors of the giant spiders and bees, their fighting spirit was rekindled.

As for the six skeleton warriors, they were polishing their longswords. Their original longswords were already rusted and would break after a few collisions. These longswords were specially provided for them by Sharl. Compared to the tense centaurs and the relaxed goblins, these skeleton warriors looked quite calm and composed.

"It seems there's nothing to worry about for now," Charles observed for a few minutes before deciding to go back and talk to the Queen Ant. He would bring people back to check on things again in the next few days.

This time, he specifically brought the centaurs and the skeleton warrior Elton along, just to let these guys know about his relationship with the giant ants, and to make them more determined to cooperate with him.

"Let's go back first." Charles clasped his hands together and put the binoculars back into his pouch. "We'll come back to check on them tomorrow."

He turned and walked toward the centaur under the tree, but Evita suddenly widened her eyes, drew her bow and arrow, and pointed it directly at Ciel.

With a "thud," the bowstring vibrated, and an arrow whistled through the air past Charles, startling him so much that he immediately fell forward to the ground. With a "thud," he heard the sound of an arrow piercing his body behind him, followed by the angry howl of a wild beast.

"Awooo!" The sound immediately startled the surrounding goblins, who began to haphazardly form a battle formation, holding their spears, while the skeleton warriors had already run to the centaurs with their swords.

Hearing the howls behind him, Charles ran forward quickly, using both hands and feet. Centaurs kept shooting arrows at him. Only when he reached the front of the group did he turn around and see that two huge chimeras had appeared in front of his group at some point.

One chimera had already been hit by several arrows, while the other was still flying in mid-air. Their huge membranous wings flapped without making much noise, which was one of the reasons why they were able to successfully ambush their prey.

"These two are here, and that mage shouldn't be far away either." Charles ran to the back of the group and began scanning the surroundings. "Looks like we'll have to face them today."

As the centaur fired arrows from its quiver, the two chimeras angrily landed on the ground. They slightly raised their upper bodies and then spewed out a burst of blazing flames. However, these creatures were artificially modified and did not have large fire sacs, so the range and duration of the flames were very limited.

But this was enough to make the centaurs and goblins retreat quickly to avoid being hurt.

"Crackling," a sound of bones grinding rang out. "Veteran" Elton and his five comrades did not retreat, but went straight to meet them. They quickly rolled on the spot, passed through the flames spewed by the chimera, and then split into two teams to attack the two big guys with their swords.

The chimeras' fire-breathing was interrupted by the continuous thrusts, forcing them to fight the skeleton warriors while wagging their tails. Although the two sides were vastly different in size and strength, the skeleton warriors' agile swordsmanship and teamwork made the battle a draw for a time.

"Don't stop, keep firing!" Charles shouted, ordering his goblins to stand in front of the centaur, raising their spears to form a spear formation, like a hedgehog protecting the centaur drawing its bow behind it.

"Whoosh whoosh whoosh," a series of arrows were fired. Evita and her people had switched to shovel-shaped arrows designed to deal with large creatures. These arrows were aimed directly at the two chimeras, completely disregarding the skeleton warriors around them.

"They won't die. If they get injured, they can soak in magic potions. I can also move them to the Treant area to recuperate," Charles said loudly, reassuring his subordinates.

Hearing these words, the centaurs drew their bows without hesitation, and the two chimeras let out even more mournful cries.

Just as Charles was nervously observing the battlefield situation and scanning his surroundings, a chimera was finally stabbed in the heart with a sword, and then a goat's head was chopped off.

The remaining chimera was quickly surrounded and killed by the skeleton warriors.

Seeing the still convulsing chimera corpse on the ground, Sharl immediately ordered his men to regroup and be on guard against any possible magical attacks.

After waiting for a long time, only the breeze in the forest rustled by; the monk did not seem to be present.

Currently reading: Chapter 158 Chimera, latest chapters available here.