Chapter 66 - Reunion
Hashirama and the 30 mad saints under him slowly made their way to the source of the loud noises which had never stopped even once and kept ringing out like a constant bombardment from military planes.
"Careful, there are way too many spirit beasts and many demonic beasts as well. Try to not to aggravate them," Hashirama looked at the moving trees and ordered. The jungle actually looked like it was moving. All the massive trees were rocking back and forth as if the ground was about to be turned upside down.
*Rumble*
The ground started to shake making everyone go on full alert.
*ROAAAAAAAAAR*
Towards the left, an extremely loud monsters roar sounded and sent a few of the lower leveled soldiers flying several meters in the air. For the first time, Hashirama's expression changed.
"Stay here, I'll go take a look," he said looking at the source of the roar and disappeared in a second. Staying in the canopy for cover, he jumped from one tree to another for several minutes until he finally got a glimpse of the monster.
"Impossible, how can it be here?! There is no death energy in this place!" sweat started to pour down his face. "I must find the others and warn them, we have to leave this place right now!" he suddenly turned around and ran straight back to the soldiers.
"Quickly, we must move!" without explaining anything he commanded.
Without trying to hide their presence anymore they rushed towards the noise.
Fortunately, Hashirama's team wasn't alone in the assumption that the original noise might be from one of them. Others had the exact same ideas and they were slowly making their way to Hao Xuan's location as well.
"Kill them all! Quickly, we don't have time to waste!" a voice shouted from his right this time.
"Hmm?" he turned around and followed the voice and was delighted, it was Maddy's team!
"Hash?!" Maddy sensed him coming before he could actually see him. "Just in time, come help us clear these worms away," he said with a laugh and jumped towards a 7-meter long white worm coming out of the ground.
The worm had hundreds of small pointy arms all along the underbelly, and if any of them got a hold of their prey, death was all but guaranteed. Their faces completely opened up exposing the multitude of teeth and tentacles. Along with their 4 beady eyes, they were hated by almost every single creature. The bodies were hard with extremely sensitive hairs on them, appendages were mostly poisonous.
They were able to lie dormant for months underground until someone passed by and they would jump into action.
Hashirama nodded and jumped in the monster crowd with his dual scimitars. Wherever he went blood flowed. He was an expert in 1vsMany battles and did extremely well in battles.
Maddy, on the other hand, was the exact opposite and was a force to be reckoned with one-on-one but was much less 'efficient' in a crowd.
Hashirama's party reached as well and together they killed most of the beasts while a few like the worm escaped.
"Let's go, we need to leave the Quarry as soon as possible," Hash said putting away the scimitars.
"Why?" Maddy asked with a frown.
"I'll tell you later. We have to find the others. Going to the source of the original noise is the best option we currently have. since it wasn't you then it could be one of the others."
"...Alright," Maddy looked at him with a suspicious face and agreed after a couple of seconds of silence. Hash was the second strongest person Mad Saints other than Kuo so if there was something that could make him worry then he definitely wouldn't be able to handle it.
*RUUUUUMBBBBLLLLE*
The ground shook even harder this time. "What the fuck is it this time?!?!" Hash blurted out unconsciously.
"There's someone fighting towards the west, 10 kilometers away? I can't be sure," Maddy said with closed eyes. This was one of his abilities. He was extraordinarily sensitive to the changes in Qi.
"Let's check it out then," Hash said and they all started running. As they got closer, the rumbling eased up more and more until it finally stopped.
"You're late," a loud voice came from the front. Hash's face lighted up when he heard it and he ran even faster until a clearing appeared with the bodies of a dozen or so gigantic turtles with their heads cut off.
"Lieutenant!" Maddy and Hash shouted at almost the exact same time.
Kuo was sitting down with a bloodied left arm and Jin Wang was behind him just standing casually.
Hash frowned looking at his injury.
"I'm fine. One of the turtles had a mutation and caught me by surprise," Kuo pointed at the smallest shell. It had a strange glowing mark on the shell and a snake as a tail.
"The bloodline of Xuandi?!!" everyone's expression changed when they saw it.
"Mhm," Kuo just nodded back in response. Xuandi was an extremely old being. It was neither human nor beast or of any other known races. Some said it had existed since time immemorial and would still exist after the universe had come to an end.
No one knew what it looked like. It could take any form and become anything and had no set objective. The only thing known about it was that it liked to mess around. It was a magical being with powers far exceeding the ancients. Some called it a god while some were too afraid to utter its very name.
Hash stared at the turtle's body for a moment and then remembered the other creature he saw.
"Lt. Kuo, we have to leave this place as quickly as possible.. Something strange is going on," he went up to Kuo and said in a low voice.