Chapter 144 An Encounter

These bizarre creatures called Fleshbeasts sent chills down one's spine. It wasn't so obvious when viewed from afar, but after engaging in combat, Hao Ren decided he would avoid fighting these things whenever possible in the future.

Their contorted and flexible bodies resembled misshapen chunks of meat. The two tentacles on their backs were covered in teeth and barbs. When killed, these monsters would release an unbearable stench. Hao Ren had it worse than others: he didn't even have a long weapon, so he had to box with these monsters. Getting this close was disgusting.

Fortunately, he managed to borrow a "magic sword" (one of those made from demon stones) from Izhaks in his haste, which finally prevented him from being splattered with the monsters' stinky bodily fluids.

Luckily, these monsters had obvious weaknesses: they feared fire, and Vivian's lightning strikes could easily scorch them. Overall, they were much easier to deal with than the stone giants.

Becky's magic sword burned with raging magical flames, and she was like a whirlwind, dashing back and forth through the Fleshbeast horde. Wherever she went, charred chunks of meat flew everywhere, accompanied by the Fleshbeasts' strange howls. During the previous battle against the stone giants, this mercenary girl hadn't been very effective, but now, against these more "traditional" monsters, her swordsmanship and magic finally shone.

Lily's ice and fire dual blades were also surprisingly effective against these monsters, and after watching Becky's fighting style, she was inspired. She roared and followed Becky, imitating the peculiar swordsmanship of using spinning slashes to kill enemies. She possessed far superior innate physical qualities than Becky, so her knock-off sword-blade storm was equally impressive. Lily and Becky became the most dazzling presences on the battlefield, with storms of fire and ice swirling around them as they spun rapidly through the monsters, quickly sweeping away the enemies like two out-of-control tornadoes. Soon, only three or five dying Fleshbeasts remained on the field. Hao Ren hardly intervened, and couldn't help but admire from the sidelines: "What a duo!"

Lily shouted in her busy schedule: "Landlord, stop making up names!"

The Fleshbeasts on the field were soon cleared away. Although these monsters were strange, they were ultimately just common magical creatures in the Twisted Woodland and not too troublesome. On the other side, Izhaks' battle with the giant treant was also coming to an end.

The giant treant, nearly ten meters tall, looked terrifying, but it didn't have such troublesome regenerative abilities, and as long as it couldn't regenerate, it was easy for Izhaks to deal with.

With a "boom," another explosion erupted from the treant's body. Izhaks was surrounded by raging flames, looking as terrifying as if he had just emerged from a lava pool. He casually created huge explosions and endless flames, blasting the nearly three-story-high treant with no chance to fight back. And this was the result of Izhaks deliberately controlling the power to prevent a forest fire. The giant treant's weakness was quite obvious: it feared fire. Although it seemed to store large amounts of water to counteract this weakness, the liquid used to resist fire within the treant's body was limited, while the flames that the great demon could summon were endless. The battle ended in just a few minutes.

Smoke billowed from the treant's body, and inextinguishable flames erupted from within. After a series of creaking sounds, this violent giant monster finally crashed to the ground with a loud bang, sending sparks flying and shaking the earth.

"Siren girl, quickly sprinkle some water, sprinkle some water!" Seeing that the enemy had fallen, Izhaks loudly called out to Nangong Wuyue, who was outside the battlefield, to help prevent a forest fire. "It's about to catch fire nearby!"

A large cloud of water mixed with ice crystals quickly gathered around the treant, suppressing the raging flames. For a time, nothing could be seen on the scene. Vivian created a strong wind to blow away the water vapor, and the situation improved slightly. The strange treant was now just a large piece of charcoal, still faintly recognizable in its former shape, but burned through from the inside out.

Lily was also dizzy at this time. She gasped for breath and came over to watch the excitement, looking in surprise at the huge, charred remains: "What exactly is this thing? Like those rock giants, is it also the result of mutation?"

"I feel like it's a bit like a forest warrior summoned by an elf," Becky also approached, feeling dizzy. "But I've seen treants summoned by elves, and the tallest are only three or four meters – any taller and they can't form quickly."

Hao Ren looked at the surrounding wreckage. The Fleshbeasts were fine, but this giant treant was really troublesome. If it weren't for Izhaks' extraordinary combat power, he really didn't know how to deal with this monster. At this time, he vaguely guessed what was going on with the unusual quietness in the forest: "There weren't any monsters appearing along the way just now. Could it be that they were scared away by this big guy?"

"Hard to say," Izhaks frowned. "I noticed something abnormal when I fought it. This guy was too violent – treants are mostly very gentle. Anyway, the treants on 'my side' are generally only used to protect the forest, and they never attack randomly. But this one… you saw it, it was coming straight for us, as if it were crazy."

Hao Ren looked at Becky: "There weren't any treants in this forest before, right?"

"No," Becky shook her head. "If there were such things here, there wouldn't be much room for other monsters to survive."

Hao Ren still wanted to ask something, but at this moment, the rustling sound of footsteps treading on fallen leaves suddenly came from not far away.

The tension from the previous battle hadn't passed yet, and everyone subconsciously adopted a defensive posture facing the source of the sound, but they soon realized that this time it wasn't a monster: a woman in white clothes was running towards them.

The other person was tall and slender, wearing a strange white outfit. This hooded garment seemed to have originally been a gorgeous long trench coat, but to facilitate movement in the woodland, the owner of the trench coat had shortened its edges and added a belt around the waist. This strange woman looked about the same age as Vivian, with delicate and beautiful features. She was wearing a hood, and a strand of golden hair peeked out from the edge of the hood, draped across her chest, which completely matched the image of the interdimensional traveler they had heard about in the mountain village.

She ran anxiously from the south of the forest, and after seeing Hao Ren and his group, she paused for a moment. Then her gaze fell on the still-smoking remains of the treant behind them.

Hao Ren suddenly realized: Could this be the mysterious interdimensional traveler?!

But before he could open his mouth to greet her and confirm her identity, he saw the other party hurriedly run up to the group and point to the treant remains lying on the ground: "Did you do this?"

Hao Ren nodded subconsciously: "Uh, yes…"

"It was my summoned treant guardian," the blonde woman said quietly, "But it went out of control."

Hao Ren suddenly felt a little棘手(jíshǒu:棘手; thorny, troublesome). He didn't expect the treant to come from this source, and wondered if this person was going to ask them for compensation: "Oh, oh, sorry, we didn't know, but this guy just attacked…"

"I know," the blonde woman nodded. "It went out of control, attacking randomly. I've been tracking its whereabouts, wanting to solve it myself – I didn't expect you to kill it. I'm sorry for the trouble this caused you, and I hope none of you were injured."

Hao Ren breathed a sigh of relief. So this person wasn't here to ask for compensation. Then he cleared his throat, preparing to ask about the other party's identity, but the blonde woman was even more anxious than him: "Sorry, I have important matters to attend to. Now that the matter has been resolved, I'll take my leave."

After saying this, the other party turned around and left, not giving anyone time to react.

Vivian quickly ran over to block her path: "Wait! We have something to ask…"

"Sorry, I'm in a hurry." The blonde woman politely nodded an apology to Vivian, but she didn't stop moving. By the time her voice fell, she had already deftly bypassed Vivian. Hao Ren glanced at Becky next to him, quickly weighed his words, and shouted before the blonde woman left: "Wait! Are you going home?"

This time, the other party finally stopped.

The blonde woman turned around, looking curiously at Hao Ren: "How did you know?"