Nolan rejoiced at the sight of the worn road of weathered cobblestones that he and the others had only just laid eyes on, an old pathway that followed the base of several mountains throughout the countless valleys that perpetuated his vision. He recognized the same type of stone that was used to pave the ancient highways that seemed to connect the entirety of the easterly kingdoms, and was surprised to observe their presence so deep into this vast mountain range. They had been walking along the sloping floor of the forest due to the large river that ran along the centre of this particular valley, which extended far enough into the distance to assure that nobody present was able to determine the exact length of the extensive dale.

How long had it been since they’d seen any signs of civilization? Up until now Nolan had fostered the impression that the Dragon’s Tail was congested with a large amount of hidden settlements, though they had only passed a single city that had been formed around the base of a smaller mountain, where they had been denied entry without dispute. Ian filled them in on the fact that most populated areas that he had heard of were completely closed off to outsiders, as had been the case with Three-River Valley. He’d assured everyone that there was no need to worry, that locating the city had helped him to work out where exactly they had wandered within the region.

“So you’re hundred percent on where we are?” Nolan ripped a demonic core free from a rampaging elk that had lost its mind to its recent demonization. “As much as I love being ambushed by animals every goddamn minute, I was kind of hoping that we’d have found that mountain that you’ve been talking about.”

“It should be at the end of this valley,” the other boy shrugged. “Honestly, I’ve never been there. Still, word around my hometown is that these roads usually lead to large communities, and I know that High Rock Mountain is only a hundred leagues or so north of where I live.”

“What I’d give for a GPS right now…”

“No kidding,” Sean panted, his thin face coloured with the flush of exhaustion. “If I knew these forests were filled with monsters then I probably wouldn’t have tagged along with you guys.”

“We told you.”

“Yeah, but this? Shit kid, I feel like I bought a car on eBay only to get a picture of the car in the mail.”

Esteban said nothing as he jogged beside the black-haired man, his eyes sunken and filled with fright after the constant attacks that the group had suffered at the hands of countless creatures throughout their journey.

“It’s only been two days,” said Nolan. “You guys better sack up, we’ve still got a long way to go.”

The first checkpoint that they had set for themselves was a large mountain community that Ian’s mother had often visited when she was alive. Her best friend supposedly hailed from one of the prominent clans that populated the broad mountainside, which overlooked a vast stretch of open fields that surrounded the base of the natural body.

“How many cores does that make?” Ian asked. “Should be around eighty, right?”

“Seventy-four, actually.”

Sean gave them an exasperated look. “With how many animals you guys have taken down, I figured there’d be hundreds.”

“Not all animals are demonic beasts,” Nolan explained for the third time. “Which means not all of them have cores. Demonic beasts kind of kill indiscriminately—think of some type of super rabies, and there you go. Basically, if their eyes are glowing orange or red or some other creepy-ass colour, then it’s probably a demonic beast.”

The old road was poorly lit by a midday sun, for so thick was the upper canopy of leaves that Nolan had only spied a dozen or so breaks in the natural ceiling all throughout their travels. They followed the winding strip of elevated pavement in relative silence, someone speaking up every now and then, mostly in warning, or else to comfort Esteban when he broke out into frightened tears.

Nolan couldn’t believe how many dangerous animals they encountered, as the number of hungry beasts increased by several fold the further down the road they travelled. He or Ian had to detach from the group whenever they sensed a powerful aura within the bounds of their awareness, for they had agreed that it would be too risky to fight any creatures above the Profound Entry stage with the others nearby. All it would take was a quick dash and a violent slash, and then one if not two of their party would lose their lives in but an instant.

Luckily they only encountered two animals at the Integration stage, both at the first level and neither of them demonized. One let them pass in silence from where it sat crouched behind a large thicket about fifty metres away from the roadway, though the other almost killed Sean and Esteban when it hurled a small tree trunk in their direction from farther up the mountain.

They had been sprinting forward in silence when they encountered a significant obstruction in their path; at least a dozen toppled trees and a giant accumulation of mismatched branches that completely sealed off the road. It didn’t take long for Nolan to notice that there were no patches of uprooted earth in the area, which told him that the trees had been dragged here from elsewhere, not to mention that these were much smaller than the ones that lined the roadsides. Not ten seconds after he pointed this out to the others a gnarled log that was nearly four times as long as he was tall came whistling down in a symphony of snapping branches, and would have barrelled right into the weaker members of the group had Ian not dashed over to grab hold of them and then quickly jumped out of the way.

Nolan had no choice but to run off and challenge a large dark ape that stood well over four metres tall with shoulders half as broad, the intelligent creature waiting quietly from a thick branch near the top of one of the taller trees. The beast was almost as strong as him despite possessing a cultivation that was several levels lower than what he should have been able to handle, at least in regards to an average human.

He fought it for a while, cautiously as it had clicked in his mind that the roadblock was most likely a trap that this creature had laid.

He didn’t succeed in killing it, as the damn thing swung from branch to branch in a skillfully elusive series of well-timed movements. He’d managed to nail nearly a dozen of his largest needles into its body, though half of them remained stuck within its thick skin. He finally managed to tear his projectiles free from its hulking figure with a strong exertion of spiritual energy, as he ducked and dodged an onslaught of powerful punches, though the creature used this moment of singular focus to quickly flee the scene.

A bit uneasy, Nolan returned to the others with an air of contemplative silence as he quietly remarked in his mind that the ape hadn’t shown any signs of anguish despite the four poisoned needles that had punctured its rough hide.

“You okay, Nolan?” Sean said as he and the others ran up to greet him.

“No,” he breathed. “That was scary as fuck man. That thing was pretty much as strong as I am, and a hundred percent sentient.”

Ian stared at the huge mound of leaves and lumber before them. “Let’s keep moving.”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

Nolan remained vigilant as they climbed the sloping mountainside in order to circumnavigate the obstruction. He could still sense the aura of the ape, which paralleled their direction from some three hundred metres into the upper forest.

“We’re being followed,” Ian told the group as they rounded their way back onto the ancient road.

Esteban gave their surroundings a nervous sweep.

“By who?” said Sean. “Wait. Don’t tell me it’s that monkey that Nolan just fought?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Nolan said. A dozen fresh needles appeared a few metres above them, each coated in slick layers of the deadly poison that he had harvested from the huge demonic toad back in Three-River Valley. “Come on, let’s pick up the pace.”

“Don’t worry about it, he says…” Sean glanced at the kid and sighed, both of them pushing their speed to the limit.

They encountered another roadblock about ten kilometres ahead of the last one, this one much larger, the miscellaneous mix of branches, torso-sized leaves and toppled trees filled in with crushed rock and broken stone.

“I don’t like this,” said Sean with a shifty glare into the woods. He grabbed Esteban by the arm and pulled him in close, as if expecting another soaring log to enter his line of sight.

Ian stared at Nolan, uneasy. “It’s still there.”

Both of them directed their gazes toward the forest as the aura that they had been tracking suddenly fluctuated in a drastic manner. A few moments later a series of terrible, guttural roars suddenly reverberated throughout the mountainous forest, accompanied by the frightening sounds of snapping wood and screaming foliage.

“What was that?” Esteban grabbed at Sean’s piny robe with large, watering eyes.

“It’s fighting something,” said Nolan. “Has to be.”

“I only sense one creature.” Ian grabbed Sean without warning and tossed him over his shoulder, giving Nolan a look before he leapt over the newest roadblock with a whisper of his flapping robes.

Nolan did the same with the kid and then chased after Ian, who had foregone sprinting for long and powerful jumps that carried him and his passenger over fifty metres between each footfall. Nolan sensed the ape’s life signal abruptly disappear despite the fact that it had still been within the bounds of his spiritual sense, an indicator that they had to get as far away from this area as possible.

Careful, Nolan.

Uncle Grey, where were you twenty minutes ago when King Kong jumped me?

It takes at least a month to activate the arrayment that lets my consciousness reside within your spiritual space. I explained this to you.

Oh yeah, my bad. A very loud sound echoed throughout the forest, alongside a pervasive, high-pitched screech. Do you know what that is?

It’s whatever blocked the road, I suppose.

Not the ape? But wait, what is it?

They covered nearly ten kilometres in just over five minutes, neither he nor Ian showing any intention of slowing down.

Not something that you can fight, at least not by yourself—careful, it’s coming!

“Ian!”

Nolan dashed beside his friend and carefully deposited Esteban onto his free shoulder, the kid almost falling off as Ian scrambled to grab hold of him mid-sprint.

“Nolan, what are you—”

He lessened his pace so that he would be the sole focus of whatever it was that Uncle Grey had warned him about. The gap that he had created between him and his friends had only reached about eighty metres when a giant blur of blackness suddenly exploded forth from the upper canopy and plummeted downward towards where he was about to touch down after a particularly long leap.