Starting with the goblin extermination

Chapter 95 Reuniting with an Old Friend (Part 1)

She's here...

'

Alita picked up the hair clip, and a grayish-white slime slid off its surface and stuck to her fingers. The disgusting sensation made her heart race.

Cimitus approached with a grim face. The choking dust made the scar on his nose twitch, and brought a lump to his throat. Before coming, he had imagined all sorts of worst-case scenarios, but seeing the hairpin still made his throat tighten, and a desperate, bitter feeling welled up inside him.

Just now.

The night wind blew in through the hole in the roof, and the tattered cloth-like things on the wooden beams rustled in the wind.

Immediately afterwards, something seemed to be scraped off, piece by piece, slowly drifting down in the air like dry leaves, landing on the candle that Chimiusto was holding.

A few sparks ignited one of the leaves, causing it to curl slightly, and the details on it gradually became clear in the firelight: the mouth.

On the palm-sized fragment, only a human mouth was drawn. Lacking three-dimensionality and skill, it resembled a person flattened by immense force, grotesque and distorted. It instantly burned to ashes under the candlelight, emitting a pungent stench of decay.

More fragments drifted down slowly, palms, eyes, ears... The fragments landed on Chimius's skin, the sticky touch like cold snake molting sent chills down one's spine.

From the darkness overhead, there was a rustling sound, like dry leaves rubbing together.

Chimius pulled Alita behind him, drawing his short sword from his waist, which gleamed with a blinding cold light.

An eerie atmosphere permeated the place. Just then, the wind stopped, but the rustling sound did not cease. It didn't sound like the wind; rather, it was like a broken bellows leaking air, or like someone with sand stuffed in their throat, desperately trying to squeeze out short, abrupt words.

Intermittently, a few words drifted down from above their heads.

"Go...go...go..."

'

Alita suddenly raised the candle in Chimius's hand high, freezing it on the tattered cloth high above.

In the dim light, they saw the truth behind the tattered cloth.

That wasn't some rag at all.

It had Alita's favorite red hair, Chimius's once-familiar but now empty and lifeless blue eyes, and the gaunt cheeks that the siblings used to knead. It was their friend's face, only now it was flat, distorted and elongated, as if it had been forcibly flattened and imprinted on the canvas.

That dry, hoarse voice, filled with endless pain, came from those paper-thin lips.

"Run...up...run..."

""

Grief and fear struck the two children instantly. Cimius could hardly breathe. Suddenly, his friend of many years had become a miserable sight, barely recognizable as a corpse. A flood of questions rushed into his mind, but then, fear and the will to survive ignited within him.

"run!"

Chimius shoved Alita toward the gap.

At the same time, a deep shadow above the beam suddenly began to writhe wildly. A figure, propelled by a tentacle-like, thick mouth, swiftly dangled upside down from the top of the beam.

Pale skin, ghostly face, deformed, supple long arms, and a thick, grayish-white tube covered with fleshy rings and tiny barbs, with undried grayish-white mucus dripping from its opening.

"elder brother!"

puff!

The monster's long arm thrashed violently like a venomous snake emerging from its hole, and five tentacled claws instantly wrapped around Alita behind Chimius. Before he could react, his sister was violently pulled away by the monstrous wolf.

"Waaaaah... Waaaah..."

'

The tattered cloth named Elena rustled in the air, weeping for her friend's tragic future.

The monster clung tightly to Alita, its two sharp claws gripping her neck with a light touch that rendered her speechless. Then, a long, writhing tube with sharp teeth slowly extended toward the girl's mouth.

Chimius roared and charged at the monster. Just as the monster's terrifying maw was about to pierce his sister's body and drain her dry, Wolf ruthlessly threw the prepared powder packet at the monster's ugly face.

Dust-breath grass fragments exploded on the monster's face. This special herb produced a lot of smoke and a burning sensation. The monster let out a piercing scream. Although it was not injured, it instinctively loosened its grip.

"Stay away from my sister—!!"

Taking advantage of the brief opening, the fourteen-year-old boy suddenly stood in front of his sister, gripping the dagger he treasured tightly with both hands, and thrust it at the monster's terrifying mouth with the posture he had practiced countless times.

The expected sound of flesh tearing did not occur. The small, sharp teeth at the tip of the mouthparts firmly jammed the blade of the short sword. In the smoke and dust, the short sword that Chimius had honed day and night gradually shattered amidst the heartbreaking sound of metal scraping against metal, breaking into pieces and scattering metal fragments on the ground.

Chimius could see the monster's eyes, which held a mocking expression.

A tremendous force struck from the left side of his body. Cimius's body slammed into the hard stone wall instantly.

Fortunately, the monster did not like to drink the blood of corpses, which saved Chimius's life, but blood still gushed out wildly from his ruptured forehead, covering his left eye.

"elder brother!"

Fear of the monster paralyzed Alita's limbs, and worry for her brother made her cry out, but a remnant of reason compelled her to crawl deeper into the opening. Tears streaming down her face, she crawled with all her might, hoping to find reinforcements, hoping to save Chimius, hoping...

Elena's intermittent sobs echoed mournfully through the windmill at midnight.

The monster let out a sharp laugh, filled with the joy of hunting. It slowly stepped forward, its long arms hanging on the ground swinging back slowly, ready to grab Alita, who was wriggling at the gap.

But the long arm was pulled hard.

The young boy, his face covered in blood, dragged his mutilated body and clung tightly to the monster's pale arm. Using both hands and feet, he pressed his entire weight onto it, like a wolf that had bitten its prey and refused to let go.

Elena has already met a tragic end, and the thought of Alita becoming just a withered, shriveled skin...

He so regretted bringing Alita along.

"Run!" Chimius coughed up blood and screamed.

"Hiss!" the monster roared at Chimius.

The boy's procrastination lasted only an unbearable moment.

The excruciating pain slowly flowed from the ruptured wound, and the boy's left leg twisted abnormally outward, but he still tried his best to lock the monster's right arm, attempting to slow the monster down even by half a second.

But his efforts were in vain for the monster, and instead fueled its ferocity.

The monster stretched out its other large hand and tightly gripped Chimius's neck. With both hands, it slowly lifted the boy in front of it, allowing Chimius to witness the pale and terrifying face before him, as well as the huge mouth that was raised high.

Chimius stared wide-eyed, barely able to breathe. All around him was quiet. Behind him, the sound of Elena's footsteps as she stepped out of the gap gradually faded away, and the boy smiled with relief.

With all his might, he raised his sword-wielding arm. Just as the monster's mouth was forced open, the shattered blade lightly touched its chest, but it couldn't advance an inch. In a daze, he remembered something his mother had once told him: "The adventurer's end is always death, just like your father, who died a gruesome death."

The rag doll named Elena cried louder and louder, its mouthparts being forced down its esophagus. Chimius's consciousness faded; he knew the boy named Chimius was dying—

"Save him! Save my brother!! Please!!!"

Three arrows, enveloped in a faint green light, descended from the sky, striking the monster's joints with pinpoint accuracy and forcibly forcing it back from its feeding spree.

A wanderer named Elsa fell into the shadows along with the rain of arrows, appearing behind the monster. A blue-glowing dagger pierced its pale back, eliciting a violent scream.

boom-!!

A man named Logan rudely burst through the door and charged at the monster, his grey-white longsword gleaming with silver light as it pierced its gaping maw.

The sharp blade shredded flesh, and black blood gushed out from behind the monster's head.

The boy named Cimius is not yet dead.