Dark Magus Returns

Chapter 988: The Fortis’ Armies Secret? (Part 1)

The strange man known as Red-Lince still had no idea who he really was. Whether he was an individual searching for an item, a person who was a natural inhabitant of the island, or if he was someone working for the island’s sake.

There was one thing that was clear though: he was quite the powerful person, and now he meant business.

‘I was hoping that my last attack would have finished him off… and he has my dagger with him now as well.’ Reaching behind, Lince could feel he still had one more dagger on him, but just having one left him feeling rather vulnerable.

When Red lifted his hand in the air, red energy was gathering in the palm of his hand, but in the air itself, small red particles-small line-shaped beams like lasers-were coming toward the palm of his hand.

It made Lince wonder, was this energy like Qi, where it came from within his body, or was it like Mana, where one used energy to force the energies of the outside world to be controlled? It was hard to say at just a glance, but whatever it was, he didn’t like it.

‘Maybe I should stop him rather than let him go ahead with this final move of his. A throw of my second dagger would be a bit harder this time, but then it would be harder for me to fight hand to hand,’ Lince thought, considering if his attack didn’t work the second time.

Just then, from behind his ear, he could feel a tingling sensation. A low deep roar and the sound of slight banging.

“That can’t be?” Lince thought.

Turning his head, his thoughts had come true as he witnessed a giant white-furred monkey flying through the air. Moments later, it crashed in the middle of the sand and started to bang its chest again and again.

The monkey had a heavy landing, shaking the ground slightly and causing Red to stumble. Right after, the monkey spun its body and started to chuck sand all over the place, and even piles of rubble to the left and right.

Lince didn’t waste any time and took his chance to head back where he came from-into the dark green part of the jungle, searching other areas. He ran at a fast speed, and with his silent footsteps and techniques he would leave no trace, making it almost impossible for Red to keep up with him.

“You know, when I got rid of that monkey, I thought I would be happy to never see him again. It turns out I was wrong. That was a good monkey-I should treat him to a few bananas the next time I see him… if he doesn’t try to snap my head off, or try to eat me instead,” Lince thought as he continued on, hoping he would never run into Red again.

The sun was starting to set on his journey, and Lince really had no idea where he was going. He just knew that there was no point in turning to the light green-colored territory of the jungle.

There was likely nothing there, as it would just be the outer area of the jungle, whereas the dark green section of the jungle would lead to different places internally. At least that was what he had gathered from his observations.

Eventually though, Lince had come across a stream of fast-flowing water. Seeing it, he knew there had to be a strong source nearby, like a waterfall.

“That would be a good place to hide a special item, right? Aren’t there usually secret entrances to these things like behind the waterfall? If I was the one to hide the item, is that where I would hide it, or would that be much too obvious?”

The more Lince thought about it, if he really hid an item and didn’t want anyone to get their hands on it, on an island like this, there really was only one thing he would do, and that was to hide the item where the strongest beasts remained.

They wouldn’t have a clue what the item was, and Lince wasn’t even sure if beasts could activate these artifacts by accident on their own-unless they turned into Hybrid beasts.

A shiver ran down Lince’s entire body, just imagining how strong a Hybrid beast would be that had to live in this type of environment.

Judging by the level of beasts that Lince had come across already, he had figured out that it would be impossible to fight higher-level beasts than this on his own, and he had made the right choice to team up with Zon.

“The question is, where even is that guy? With the sun setting, it’s going to be hard for me to keep searching.”

So far, Lince had just gone down the river. If he came across the item, that wouldn’t be a bad thing either, and if there was some dangerous dragon-type beast protecting the treasure, then he could look for Zon after.

Or just point some of the Light Faction members in the right direction, while they were fighting the beast he could steal the item.

“Zon, where are you?” Lince sighed as he stopped walking.

“You called my name?”

Looking around, Lince was surprised to hear a response but could see no one next to him, until his eyes caught something floating in the river. Lince had gone the opposite direction from the stream so the current was far weaker, and he saw a man in a black skin-tight suit just floating by.

“What are you doing in the river, get out of there, come on!” Lince asked.

Zon had quickly gotten up and pushed himself out of the river to the stone bedding, and now Lince and Zon had reunited.

“It’s getting dark,” Zon said. “It might be best we camp for a while. The beasts in this place are too powerful, and at night we have less of an advantage.”

“I agree, and I think it’s better we stick together and not run off from each other like last time,” Lince stated. “But you’re going to have to explain why you were floating in the river

like that.”

Dark Magus Returns

Chapter 989: The Fortis’ Armies Secret? (Part 2)

Lince and Zon had decided to head into the dark green jungle area and looked for a location that would provide them decent cover. Eventually, they found a cliffside of sorts, where they could set up some type of camp.

Because Lince was a powerful warrior, and Zon was… whatever Zon was, it wasn’t as if a campfire was needed for heat or for them to see. Zon could see well at night, and Lince could use his other senses to help him in a fight.

The cliffside was chosen because they could at least see enemies coming from one direction toward them, and didn’t have to worry about their back or what was above at least at night. Still, there were a few things Zon had said to set up, and they were temporary measures to allow them to hear if beasts were heading their way. Breaking apart bark of the tree or heavy- duty leaves, setting them up so if beasts came then it would clack several dark black coconuts together, setting them awake.

While doing all of this, Lince had gotten his answer as to why Zon was just floating in the water. Eventually, the two of them sat down by their makeshift camp and decided to talk.

“So what’s the grand tale then? After you ran off and left me behind, it’s quite clear you didn’t find the item, so why were you floating?” Lince asked.

“I had a run-in with those from the Light Faction. From my database, they were Ricar and Beatrix,” Zon explained.

It was as expected for Lince. The ships they saw were certainly the Light Faction, and judging by who was sent, they didn’t send any weaklings either.

“You don’t look hurt, although it’s hard to tell if you are hurt or not,” Lince asked.

“I’m not,” Zon answered immediately, as if he would have been offended to say he had received a wound. But receiving one from two strong members from the Dawnblade Clan wouldn’t be a wound one should be embarrassed about.

“The reason I was floating in the water was because I was interrupted by a beast-it had to be at least a level 7 beast. It took a lot of my energy and power to defeat it, and by the end of it, I was low on reserves.”

“I managed to pull out its crystal though, but my body is having a hard time taking in the energy from the crystal. In order to not tire out and still travel around the island, I decided to allow the water to just let me float around while observing all the areas I hadn’t been to.”

Lince didn’t know what to say. He was thinking more and more that this partner of his was a madman. Who would even think to do such a thing? Was he not worried that there would be more beasts in the river where he fell from?

Or did he just not think that far ahead?

“Absorbing the crystal raw, not as a Qi pill? I know you’re not a Pagna warrior, so you don’t use Qi. So is that what you run on, power stones from the beasts?” Lince asked. He was curious for more reasons than one.

“A correction would be that’s a type of energy we can run on,” Zon explained. “In our world, those like us can use different forms of energy. The system has to run on something, and we can charge ourselves at certain places.”

“Coming to this world, I learned that we can use crystals to power the system, the suit, and other things that my body requires. However, it’s interesting, I gave a system to one of the warriors in Raze’s group.”

“It appears because the system integrated with him rather than someone from our world, that the energy being used to power his system is his own Qi, so he doesn’t have the same hurdles as us. I’m sure he can grow up to be very strong.” Zon smiled.

It was interesting to note, and it gave Lince an idea if he was ever to run into someone else like he did earlier in the day again.

“Are you not going to even ask what happened to me?” Lince asked.

“Did you find the item?” Zon asked.

Lince shook his head.

“Then relevant information should have already been gathered. The Light Faction are here, there are powerful beasts and we have no idea of the present location of the Golden Globe. If you had information that was important, you would have said it already.”

Lince’s eyes were twitching. Although Zon didn’t seem to be trying to antagonize him or make him angry, he was sure doing a good job of it.

“The reason why I was asking you questions was because I ran into someone on this island as well,” Lince explained. “And he had the exact same black suit that you have, heck his arms even lit up red like you did as well.”

Immediately, Zon’s eyes widened, looking at the ground. Numbers of images flashed in his head. So many questions were coming to mind, but he didn’t even know which to ask first, and multiple system screens were popping up in front of him, reacting to his mixed and various feelings inside.

“I think he said that he was from the Red Fortis army or something. Is he related to you then? Didn’t you say you were looking for someone, maybe this is your long-lost friend or something or brother?” Lince joked.

But his happy nature stopped as he saw the look on Zon’s face, and there was only one question on his mind.

“A name… did you manage to get his name?”

“Yeah…” Lince replied. “He called himself Red.”

Immediately, Zon clenched both of his hands. He had done so so tightly that his fingernails had carved into the palm of his hand drawing blood.

“He’s here… Red is really here, like I thought. The person I’ve been looking for is right here on this island… this isn’t good though. If you met with him and fought against him, how are you even still alive?” Zon asked.

Dark Magus Returns

Chapter 990: Raze okay?

With the night sky coming out, and the moon rising, it wasn’t just Zon and Lince that had decided it was best to camp. All of the other groups in different areas had decided to do the same.

Ricar and Beatrix still hadn’t found any of the others in the deep jungle and had camped on their own. They figured it was because they were in deeper compared to the others anyway, but the thought of how many managed to survive did run through their heads.

Krynic from the Aurora Clan, and Impress were still together and had managed to gather a few other surviving groups, and now they were around twenty in size-a fairly large number. They feared that being in such a large group would attract attention from beasts in the jungle.

But at the same time, a large size had its advantages in allowing many to keep watch for anything.

Then there was Red, who was wandering around the place on his own, and lastly there was also Lyon, one of the Elders from the Dawnblade Clan, who had gathered a group of ten individuals from the Light Faction. A mixture of Dawnblade clan members and others.

While traveling through the jungle, they had found smaller groups and a couple of survivors; that’s how his group had grown larger. As for the other members, they weren’t so fortunate. The first day on the island was rough for many, and without groups merging together, they had no way to tell each other what they had experienced or whether they had found the Golden Globe or not. Leaving everyone feeling partly defeated and left with their own thoughts on whether or not this whole thing was worth it.

With the first day on the island passing though, it didn’t mean things remained stagnant elsewhere. One person had been traveling non-stop through the towns, cities, and across the land.

Now, with a stick and a fairly large rucksack on his back, Brack had been endlessly traveling across the Demonic continent.

“You’re going to be okay, right Raze? You’re a strong warrior, Belil didn’t do anything weird to you, so it should all be fine, right, right?” Brack said to himself as he continued moving.

He was starting to remember why he had become so attached to Raze in the first place. How, at the Martial Arts Tournament, despite the two of them being the same age and in the same position, he had decided to stand up to Sha Mo.

For him, who was practically a stranger. His life after the Martial Arts Tournament would have been worse than death. He would have been kicked out of the clan and unable to go anywhere to progress his martial arts if Raze didn’t give him a place.

And in the end, Brack had hedged his bets right, as Sha Mo had been defeated by this individual. Now strange things were happening to Raze, and Brack was the only one there to help him.

The large outer rocks could be seen up ahead, meaning Brack was at the right location. He sped up with a spur of energy he had gotten and leapt, running up the rock and back down into the center.

Things appeared to be the same, and there was no sense of beasts or anything like that around the area. Not just that, but Raze was still on the floor.

Brack went over, and he was thankful for one thing, Raze didn’t seem to be in as much pain as before. The veins on his body were no longer bulging, but he still had other symptoms. Sweat was running down the side of his face, and his skin still looked slightly paler.

His breathing was quite heavy as well, but whatever it was he was going through, the worst of it seemed to be over.

“That’s good, it might give a chance for the medicine to work better,” Brack thought.

He pulled out the herbs and some special wraps, and started to wrap them around Raze’s body, allowing it to cool down. He even got a towel and hot water and was wiping the sweat away from his face, before placing a cooling towel on top of his head.

Afterward, he gave Raze a number of mixed herbs in a liquid format and poured it down his mouth. He could see Raze naturally swallowing the liquids, which was a good sign.

“These things usually take some time to get better, but this might be all I can do right now.” Lastly, Brack also gathered a bunch of bed quilts he had in his large sack, and placed it over Raze’s body. With the sun gone, it was quite cold, usually not a problem for a Pagna warrior, especially one at Raze’s level, but who knew what type of sickness they were going through.

There was one last thing that Brack did, and he decided to pull out the special red Qi pill that he bought. It had the marking of DM.

“You might laugh at me for using this on you, but the thing is I couldn’t find any of these pills on you, and they say the Dark Magus is the best at Alchemy, so here it goes,” Brack said, placing the pill in Raze’s mouth and then using his hands to shut his jaw, helping him chew the pill up.

“What is this!”

A voice was heard from behind, and immediately startled, Brack stood up and turned. There wasn’t meant to be anyone in the area. There was nothing here and no one knew of the training area, so why would they be here? Even if he was followed, there would be no reason for him to be followed.

When he saw who it was, or who the two were, things started to make sense to him.

“What happened to him!” Fing shouted. “What happened to our father!”

The two brothers had arrived, Fing and Han. After Belil, the strongest in the Neverfall Clan, and right now the two of them were standing over their father’s dead body.