Inside the outpost compound, a flexible silhouette squirmed through several sheets of rusted metal plates resting on the side of the inner wall of the outpost.
This silhouette looked rather timid, its body shaped like a fish and its movements slow and steady.
It was in a danger zone, so it made sense.
’My count is accurate, two dozen sacred beasts and… oh, eight grand ones?’
Guilliman thought to himself.
The day they had been brought here by Cyrus, he used soul pulse to immediately get an accurate number of beasts in the outpost.
It was an overwhelming number; fighting against sacred beasts was much easier now, but by no means was it simple. Even he had to struggle to kill one; now there seemed to be more than two dozen in this place.
"The number increased, for some reason there are more mutant beasts and one more grand," back outside, Guilliman muttered.
This made Cyrus and Victoria frown; it was within expectations but also dreadful information.
"Keep checking," Victoria said, with a calm look on her face.
Additions were okay; however, she wanted to know how and why the numbers were increasing. Did weaker beasts cross ranks into stronger ranks? Did they migrate here?
They had to be sure before putting themselves at harm’s way. The unknown was a deadly assassin.
Inside the outpost, Guilliman gave the command, and the little flying swordfish squirmed around through the shadows, meddling into the walls as he surveyed the area.
After a few minutes, he decided it was time to go deeper and see what was really going on, and to do that, he needed to enter the main outpost, or at least view it from the outside.
So he pushed the swordfish beastsoul to cross the area between the wall and the main outpost building.
Quietly moving around, the swordfish made its way through the crossing… however, just as he did that
—Woom
From out of nowhere, a spike of hardened vine shot out and immediately shot through his swordfish, causing it to dissipate.
"Shit!!" Guilliman cursed; he saw it coming, but wasn’t able to act on time.
Before long, the outpost’s main ground was covered in poisonous air as soon as that exchange happened.
"Let’s move back a little," Cyrus, seeing the situation, said, grabbing his brother by the arm and moving him backwards.
That poison was enough to chase away so many beasts from the outpost perimeters. They couldn’t risk inhaling that.
So they pulled back by a dozen meters.
"You sure you can try again?" Victoria asked Guilliman, seeing a paleness on his face.
Clearly, the death of his beastsoul had an effect on him; that was one of the limitations of his aspect.
"Sure, I’ve not reached my limit yet," Guilliman smiled, seated cross-legged as he summoned the swordfish once more.
Before they knew it, the beast soul made its way back into the outpost and started slithering around; he had done this once before, so he knew what he was doing.
Moving through the corners and shades of the wall, the swordfish was steady and well controlled; however, once again, after trying to cross, it was destroyed.
"Again!!" Guilliman cursed, sending out another swordfish, this time with a completely different approach.
Instead of sneakily trying to cross, it flew overhead, barreling to the other side from the sky.
But the moment he descended to a certain altitude, the spikes came flying forward once again, destroying it.
’Frustrating.’
Guilliman didn’t stop trying, though; he kept sending beast souls into the outpost using different methods to cross. But each time he tried, each time he failed, Quinn even came back at some point after successfully scouting his area.
He even offered to try scouting that area, but Guilliman refused. It was his duty.
Thankfully, Cyrus understood and left with his brother. They would come back the next day to scout the area if Guilliman didn’t succeed on his own.
"How’s it going?"
Victoria’s voice sounded right next to Guilliman as she leaned forward, breaking his concentration.
He was pale, his face looked like it was devoid of blood, but he pressed on. Victoria didn’t know why this was… he overdid things, yes, but he wasn’t irrational… was this pride?
No, that wasn’t it… but then what was it.
"I’m trying, I’ve gotten the correct patterns—pretty sure it’ll work out this time," Guilliman looked at her and nodded.
Trial and error, constantly going forward, relentless grit—these things had been beaten into Guilliman since he was a child; bailouts weren’t something he welcomed.
Of course, it didn’t mean he was irrational; if he felt there was no way for him to actually win this, he would gladly give up.
However, he knew for a fact that he could do this.
"Step back, princess," Guilliman muttered, a look of determination painted all over his face.
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With a wave of his hand, 15 swordfish silhouettes appeared from thin air and hovered in the dark.
He had learned not only the patterns of the attacks, he also came to realize that these beasts were weaker at night; there was no better time to go all out.
"Hmm, be quick with it, the fog is coming," Victoria said, her gaze lingering on the trees not too far away.
The fog was building up; it didn’t enter the outpost or its perimeter, but if they stayed here all night, they would risk attack from monsters that strayed from within the fog… or poison.
"It’ll take 30 seconds tops," Guilliman broke into a smile, and all of a sudden, all 15 swordfish blasted out—some taking to the sky and others scaling the walls.
In a second, they were in place in all directions, all ready to sprint forward…
—woosh
They were off, each slithering and moving extremely fast from all directions. At the exact moment, the spikes shot out from a bunch of plant beasts, barreling towards all 15.
But Guilliman took no precautions; instead, he sent some of them headfirst towards the approaching vine spikes. It looked like a suicidal rush, but the swordfish were extremely nimble.
They weaved through the spikes, with five of them heading directly toward one of the beasts, the swordfish threatening to kill it.
Immediately, they consolidated their strength, pulling back their vines as they prepared to defend against the swordfish.
However, one swordfish remained behind, looking directly through the window of the main outpost.
It was all a distraction.
Before the attacking swordfish even got into close proximity of the plant beasts, they dissipated, followed by the rest.
Just outside the outpost, Guilliman had a look of shock on his face. He then looked over at Victoria and said,
"They are more, a lot more."