Chapter 559 - Progress
Chapter 559: Progress
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Kurisu
For any normal person, the Chaos Abyss would be the most terrible environment possible to live in. But, for the insane who were addicted to blood and slaughter, the Chaos Abyss would be a paradise.
Here, you would never worry that you couldn’t find a fight…
“Do these guys not have any semblance of intelligence whatsoever?”
The rain was now only at the level of a sprinkle. Everything around was completely wet. Behind me was a group of dead demonized sea giants. This was already the fourth wave of attacks that I had to deal with today, even though I had just barely finished breakfast and the day was just beginning.
Demonized sea giants, snake demons, regular demons, raksha demons, and so on. In just a short two hours, the Chaos Abyss seemed like it wanted to show me what a great variety of demon and magical beast species was in it, along with how aggressive they all were.
“Two snake demons will jump out whenever I want to go to the bathroom and take off my pants, and I’ll get attacked whenever I finish cooking some meat. There’s even some that will dig tunnels to attack me from underground while I’m sleeping. Could they please let me have some rest!”
Yet, I could sense that as I slaughtered these demons, I could feel a mysterious sensation of joy from the action, along with the fact that my magic power and physical stamina were both slowly improving.
That was just one of the side effects of being in the Chaos Abyss. Even the purest Holy Knight would eventually become addicted to the “pleasure of cleansing evil” and continuously becoming stronger. And, the only end result of becoming addicted to such slaughter would be to become a true member of the Chaos Abyss yourself.
This entire land desired to see blood flow…
I could sense the desire of the Chaos Abyss itself as I looked at all the demon corpses strewn around me.
“Is Cynthia truly dead? The Chaos Abyss doesn’t seem any different from before.”
The Chaos Abyss instinctively desired to see blood and slaughter. It would reward the victorious with evolution that granted concrete power. Demons had basically taken this to a unique art form. Apart from the most basic demon attributes, the constant evolution and devouring made it impossible to find two identical demons.
And, this evolutionary gift from the Chaos Abyss had a rather descriptive term in the mortal plane—”demonization.”
“Indeed, I need more power, but I think I’ll pass on this type of insurance scam where they invite you in for free and only ask for money later, bringing along so many troubles and hidden pitfalls.”
I illuminated myself with Holy Light and cleansed the entire area. What happened next was that I lost the minor amount of power that I had just gained.
Power could always be used, no matter what type it was. If I had the free time, I could slowly purify this power to become a source of power that I could use. But, right now was a critical moment for me as I intended to progress to Myth rank soon. This type of tainted power would bring all sorts of trouble for me, so I decided to discard it.
I had left Hakas’s dragon nest two days ago. Without the presence of the dragon around to suppress the demons in the area anymore, even more small fries were constantly bothering me. While I could indeed release a powerful aura which would drive them away, that would only attract the attention of far more powerful demons.
The enemies here ranged from as weak as lizardmen, who were so weak that a normal Silver-ranked adventurer could easily defeat a dozen, to fallen sea giants that would require an entire team of Legend ranks to handle. It seemed as if this map was filled with monsters of widely varying power levels. Meeting something from any power level wouldn’t be too surprising.
I had long since gotten tired of this endless rain, mud, and swamp. Perhaps demons in other levels would be a lot stronger, but at least my shoes wouldn’t be constantly waterlogged and my pants wouldn’t grow mold.
However, going to the next level of the Chaos Abyss would be slightly troublesome.
Every dimensional level had two gigantic Dimensional Doors, one each for the next level up or down.
Still, constantly going down would be far too foolish and a waste of time and effort.
All the Dimensional Doors were quite convenient for connecting the Chaos Abyss levels. But as they were highly important strategic objectives, their locations were either under the direct control of each level’s ruler, or their locations would be unknown to most.
In other levels, I would have been able to spend some money at any city where lots of demons gathered. I would then be able to purchase information about the teleportation portal’s location. But in this dimension, even money was useless with only the low intelligence demons around here.
“So, why not go visit the ruler of this level?” Harloys offered a simple solution. But, after I learned from that black dragon that this was the 75th level of the Chaos Abyss, I truly didn’t want to go visit the ruler of this level.
“Snake God Voka, the Guardian God of lizardmen and snake demons. No wonder there were so many of these disgusting things on this level.”
Although he wasn’t a particularly powerful god, he was still a veteran Chaos Evil God. And, any God who fought in his home territory would basically have their power level doubled since the entire dimension would act as his Divine Kingdom.
If I had been a witch doctor or warlock whose powers were primarily based on poison, then perhaps I would’ve considered meeting the most venomous existence in the universe. But right now, I only wanted to stay as far away from Voka as possible.
“Don’t you know that there’s other teleportation portals to other levels, apart from the level up and the level down? How did you become the ruler of this swamp without even knowing this basic information?”
When I asked this question to black dragon Hakas, he looked back at me with an obvious look of confusion.
“Why would you ever bother going to any other level? Isn’t this level the most wonderful place in the entire universe?”
Alright, this might be a living hell to any other creature, but he actually truly believed that this was the warmest and most comfortable home possible. For any black dragon, a stinky death swamp like this one would smell like the freshest air possible. If he left this murky swamp filled with mud, where else would he hunt so easily and wash in swamp water so comfortably?
“Tsk, every country bumpkin thinks that their hometown is the best, even if outsiders think that it’s a living hell.”
The silly cat’s venom-tongued comment came as always, yet I felt like I took a blow from it even though it wasn’t aimed at me this time. That was because I also felt like the Northlands’ endless frigid winds would always make me feel so spirited, and that the great snow mountain was such a wonderful place.
“It would seem that we’ll have to go down to the next level.”
Since we were unable to locate any teleportation portals going down to much lower levels, we would have to descend one level at a time. But right when I made my decision and was about to command my steed to head out, my steed had a different opinion.
“…Milord, although I don’t know where any other teleportation portals are, I know a place where someone will know.”
Considering the swamp terrain, a black dragon would doubtlessly be the best transportation tool. In this stinky air and dirty rain, Frigid Nightmare soul creatures wouldn’t even want to move.
However, our current problem was that we didn’t know where to go even for the teleportation portal to the next level down. Randomly running around would be completely meaningless. And, the black dragon Hakas didn’t even dare to fly too high, as he told me that there were ancient entities here that he didn’t dare to catch the attention of.
“Okay, lead the way.”
I was thus rather surprised that Hakas volunteered such seemingly useful information. It sounded too good to be true.
“…However, those onibabas are incredibly greedy. They won’t tell you a single thing unless you pay them enough.”
“Pay them enough? In gold coins?”
“No, gold coins are useless in this level. They highly value magical scrolls and magical weapons and so on.”
I followed the black dragon’s line of sight and noticed that he was staring greedily at the magic sword I was holding, which was made out of completely ordinary ice.
Perhaps he thought that this crystal-clear sword was something highly valuable. When he was defeated by me two days ago, this magic sword had seemingly proved its power. He must have believed that it possessed powerful ice magic enchantments.
As for the plain war hammer on my back, Hakas didn’t give it a second glance. It was likely that he wouldn’t accept it even if I gave it to him for free.
It seemed likely that he wanted me to go meet the onibabas because he wanted the onibabas to rob and kill me over the “treasures” in my possession, which would help give him his freedom in the process.
I chuckled as I thought of all this.
“They like ice magic swords? Haha, I got it. I hope that those onibabas will enjoy my presents.”