Desolate World

Two hours before

A swarm of little bats flew through the misty forest. Although the mist made it harder to navigate for most creatures, for bats who used ultrasonic sound to help them scan objects around them, it was so simple.

However, as they were about to enter a clearance, they stopped. Some bats converged and transformed into a man. If Noah or Ace were there, they would know that he was Hugo the vampire player who led the vampire group. 

A second later a woman also appeared. It was Freya. She then asked, "What is it, Viscount? Why did you stop?"

"Shh… Didn't you detect something weird?" Hugo asked while looking ahead.

Freya then looked in the direction Hugo was looking. After a while, she shook her head. 

"I didn't find anything. Come on, please tell me!" Freya said in annoyance.

Hugo then looked at her with an excited expression, "It's okay. Your skill level isn't quite there yet. We are rich baby! We found a parasite."

Freya's expression also became excited, she then said a little loud, "You mean the bugs that were wanted by the higher up as you said before?"

"Shh… Don't be too loud! It was at the bottom. Although it was harder to see it, if you used your sonar well, you would 'see' it. I got a piece of information from my guild friend who follows the army in the East, the characteristics of parasites. 

Its host's definite feature was its body became disfigured after being parasitized for a long time. He said parasites love to transform their host to a weird form. What I got from my sonar was a strange image, a kind of snake with a pair of wings and a tail of fish.

It is laying down there. From its bulging stomach, it seems it just swallowed its prey. So it is in its weakest condition.

It is the best time to catch it. I heard Lord Zen Barton, the highest lich in the skeleton faction, needs a sample of the parasite. You know, many of his skeleton soldiers were controlled by the parasites and attacked their comrades. I heard there were more than 3 million skeleton soldiers that were controlled. It then forced the undead army to retreat temporarily.

I heard whoever can provide information about the existence of a parasite other than in the Eastern battlefield will get a million diracs. It is enough for me to hire a thousand skeleton soldiers or even zombies and ghosts. Then I can use them to kidnap some beastmen to be transformed into vampires. What do you think?" Hugo said.

"Then we can get revenge on them," Freya said while clenching her fist.

Hugo frowned. As he wanted to rebuke her, he gave up. He knew her character. She would ignore his words if she was that determined. It was just like yesterday night when she attacked the refugees that let the refugees know their nest.

He knew he was too soft on her. He would try to change her mind, but not at the moment. If not, she would be more rebellious.

"I have informed my guild. I'm sure some high-level undead will come immediately. As this place is near the Iron Gate Fortress," Hugo said to change the subject.

Freya pouted. But, she didn't say anything again.

Hugo and Freya waited there for an hour. Then he got a message from his guild colleague that had been positioned in the Iron Gate Fortress that he was already near and the NPCs on his side would start. They had confirmed the accuracy of his information and he could directly take his reward in the fortress.

Hugo didn't want to be dragged into the fight later. So, he and Freya took a detour to come back to Iron Gate Fortress. 

As they flew a few minutes, they heard a low pitch sound from the direction of the place they had left. Then all the monsters that roamed below them became crazy. 

Some birds type monsters also became insane, it forced the two of them to be careful. Fortunately, their bats form's size was pretty small, so by scattering at a safe distance, they didn't attract any monster's attention.

'We are lucky. We have gone before they started. If not, we will be besieged by the army of monsters,' Hugo said in his heart.

He didn't care if they succeeded or not to capture the parasite. As his information had been verified, his business was done there. 

The loss of his group made him depressed, and he didn't have the mood to participate in any dangerous mission. 

What he cared about at the moment was to take some rest for the time being with Freya and 'educated' her. She had screwed over him with her emotional action. And by doing so, he had lost all of his subordinates except Freya. 

Although he loved her, she had gone too far this time. He was more determined to make her more obedient.

As for the humans, he had a way to make them not feel better.

'Just you wait! Maybe I can't directly take revenge on you. But I will make many skeleton, ghost, and ghoul players mess with you. Hahaha… you don't know how crazy they are over human corpses and spirits,' Hugo then thought how he had to instigate those undead players to sweep the Misty Forest.

***

When Ace arrived at the entrance with the goblins, he saw the entrance of the cave almost being blocked by the carcasses of the killed monsters. 

Noah let the people make a half-ring defense with Red and Blue above them, while Cloud and Geo supported them from behind.

The crazy monsters continued to enter the cave to attack them. But Noah and the other refugees defended well. Red and Blue above them bombarded the entering monster with their AoE lightning attacks. 

He also saw the refugees who didn't participate in the defense looked at him and the goblins with curiosity. Ace greeted them with a nod. They then smiled at him, and some seemed to want to say something. 

However, he couldn't talk with them as the defense was quite busy. He then told the goblins to wait there with the other refugees, as he wanted to join the defense to block the monsters' advance.

***