'Yeah, I can see that much.' Reign said in a serious tone before Aethion chuckled.
"Yes, I know you can see how such fog coming out from someplace is weird, but you don't understand just what it might be exactly," Aethion said to Reign, prompting him to raise his eyebrow.
'So you know?'
"No, until you guys go down there, I can't be sure what it is, but there are a couple of things that come to my mind, none of them really good for you or anyone else," Aethion says with a short laugh before going silent, making Reign stare at the fog with vigilance.
"Aethion says that the fog is bad news." Reign spoke out before sighing.
"Oh, the old zombie decided to speak up, huh?" Wolf asked with a smile on his face, making Aethion angry and making him curse him from inside Reign.
'Alright, alright, stop yelling for god's sake, you know he's just making a joke, sheesh.' Reign told Aethion before using his power to block the old man and his still-present yelling.
"Well then, shall we?" Reign asked the others as they all nodded with serious expressions visible on their faces.
They had already noticed the anomaly that the fog was, and Aethion's words only made them more apprehensive about it, even M'azgara who had just joined them. Reign had previously explained to her about Aethion's existence and how he was a powerful being that had been able to help them numerous times in the past.
He didn't go into details about how his soul was inside of Reign, and M'azgara knew better than to pry for information.
The four slowly made it down the mountain and went deeper inside the mountain range. They could feel the sinister feeling emanating from the fog before even getting inside it, but once they did, the sinister feeling was much more powerful.
It was some kind of energy, but one they had never come across before. The sinister energy inside the fog was not disruptive, at least not currently as they had just entered the fog. It wasn't that hard to see either, which was weird considering how it was incredibly hard to see through the fog from the outside.
It was as if they had entered a different place once they entered the fog as looking through it was much easier, and their field of view was barely affected.
"Well, this certainly doesn't seem normal," Wolf said in a calm manner as he observed the area they were in.
"Hard to penetrate through it from the outside, but no effect from the inside, hmmm." Aethion spoke out with an interested voice.
'Do you know what it is?'
"No, not yet, there are multiple answers without knowing more, it could be the Ethereal Fog that wanders through the universe, the Ghost Air of the Nether Realm, the Everlasting Fog of the Soul King, and many other things."
"It could even be something I had never seen or heard of before, after all, I was merely a Transcendent before my fall from grace, there is much of the universe I have not explored, many things I had never seen, I have to admit that my knowledge over all the wondrous and dangerous things the universe has is quite shallow," Aethion told Reign as the latter simply nodded.
After all, the universe is so vast that there are probably plenty of gods that don't know everything about it, how could Aethion, who was merely a Transcendent, know everything?
Most of the things that Reign had come across were things that were famous, or infamous in the universe and most people knew of them, allowing Reign to get information from Aethion quite easily.
The more powerful he became, the less help Aethion would be able to provide. One day, there would be a time when the old man was no longer able to help Reign out with anything, and at that time, there would be a choice Reign needed to make regarding him.
Reign and the others slowly made their way through the fog, and it didn't take them long to encounter a monster.
It was a snake-looking monster that was flying through the air, well, instead of flying, the more correct term would be that it was swimming through the air. Immediately upon noticing them, the monsters stared at them before screaming angrily and charging at them.
The speed at which the creature moved was incredible and its elongated mouth opened, showing several rows of teeth. The mouth didn't open normally, but split in four, showing a nasty sight to all four of them.
The monster's body was about 10 meters long and it was as thick as a normal human. The moment the monster charged at them, it was met with Reign who used his incredible speed to appear right above its head.
With a grunt, Reign punched down at the monster, using a fusion of his [ Lightning Fists ] and [ Compact Punch ] to increase the velocity of his punch immensely before allowing the mana stored inside of the punch to explode out.
It was as if a bolt of lightning had struck the monster as it crashed down on the ground headfirst. Lightning sparks flickered around and it was immediately after that that more attacks arrived.
Wolf had jumped high up with his sword slashing down at the monster while Greenie spun with his hammer in hand before letting go of it and launching it at the monster. A ball of invisible energy was coated around the head of the hammer and upon hitting the monster, the gravitational force smashed the bones and ripped apart the skin immediately.
M'azgara touched her head with the index finger of her left hand before pointing at the monster with her right hand, forcing the monster to scream and thrash about as immense pain assaulted it from inside its head.
Without waiting any longer, Wolf kicked the air behind him, causing an explosion to take place and he plummeted down at the monster. Before the hideous monster was able to do anything, its head was severed from the rest of its body, and the area was dyed red from all the blood that gushed out of the wound.
Even though the monster was a powerful Tier IV being, when faced with a combined assault of four Tier IV beings of incredible power, it wasn't able to do anything to them and died quickly.
"I guess it's my turn now," M'azgara said before walking calmly toward the monster. She first stopped at the severed head of the monster before extending her hand toward it.
"Devour," She softly whispered before a hole opened in her arm and a small tornado covered her hand. In mere moments, the tornado, as well as the head, were gone.
She then went to the giant body of the monster before doing the same thing and devouring the monster in 4 seconds. The larger, and more powerful a monster, the more time it would take M'azgara to devour it.
She luckily didn't need to eat the monster, otherwise, it would have taken a long time for that to be done, not to mention the gruesome and nasty sight Reign and the others would be subjected to if that had taken place.
With the monster devoured, Reign nodded at M'azgara before leading the way deeper inside the fog and the mountain range.
Noises could be heard throughout the mountain range, either screams of pain or angry shouts and growls of monsters fighting. The eerie depths of the mountain range had barely any vegetation present, only some gray trees and sparse plants that were gray as well.
As Reign and the others inspected the trees and plants, they found that there was nothing special about them. They grew from the soil and seemed perfectly normal, except for the gray color of course.
The deeper the party went in the mountain range, the more powerful the sinister energy that was found in the fog became. At first, it didn't bother them at all, but as they went deeper, they could sense an invisible pressure coming down at them, slowing down their movements.
Of course, the pressure was not big and their movements were slowed down by maybe 1%, not even that much, so they were all fine with continuing forward and going deeper in order to fight more monsters and see if there was anything interesting, or weird inside the mountain range.
Aethion would speak out from time to time, commenting about the vegetation and the pressure that Reign was under, but he was still unable to come to a conclusion about what was going on and what the fog was.
They slayed more monsters, each of them being different from the other. Some could fly, some burrowed in the ground and others just walked normally, but each of them was very distinct and looked different from the others. Some were small and incredibly fast, but then there were some monsters that seemed small and fragile but had incredibly tough bodies and great strength.
Some monsters were furry, some had scales, others were covered by thick skin…
It was as if there were no distinct races of monsters living here, but one thing that all of them had in common was the fact that they were all gray.
Follow current nov𝒆ls on freew(𝒆)bnov𝒆l.(c)om