Ughh, a guard that was running toward the Guards Captain and Village Chief fell down on a broken spear, his face crashing into the blood-soaked earth.
As his vision went dark, two explosive sounds thundered one after the other like a heavy hammer hitting metal, which made his heart almost explode. With trembling hands, he pushed himself off the ground, slowly raising his blood-soaked head to face forward. His eyes focused to see two armored bodies trampled to death. In that moment, everything went quiet.
A primal fear rushed from his heart to his head. Soon, a heart-wrenching scream escaped his throat, and his body tried to get up, stumbling continuously.
The other guards, hearing the fear-filled scream, also started screaming as though their backbone had been forcibly stripped. They all scattered like headless flies. With the brutal death of the only two Chaos warriors, the village guards lost all their hope.
Crunch!
Dravok rushed and crushed the head of the screaming guard on the ground.
So noisy. Even though I want you to feel fear, you don't have to make such an exaggerated sound. Dravok thought with disgust.
Well, now that these guys are completely terrified, there is no use in me killing them. I won't be able to make them more afraid than this.
It's time to go into that village. I am sure the fear I can gain there will be even more than this.
At this moment, a group of villagers numbering in the hundreds were running on the open plain toward Dark Storm City.
"Dad, when can we go back?" Aris asked his father in a hurried breath while holding his hand and running.
"Soon, son. Don't worry. Just keep running. We have to keep running," answered old Theno with a face full of worry.
Aris, hearing his father's words, nodded and kept running, though his eyes kept looking back at the village that he had spent the last two years in, growing smaller and smaller in the distance.
"Husband, I am tired. Can't we take a short rest? Little Rose can't keep running," old Theno's wife said in a worried voice.
"No. We can't rest right now. We are still too close to the village. We have to keep running. Wife, put little Rose on my back. I'll carry her."
Old Theno stopped and, with his wife's help, a little girl about six years old was placed on his back. Then he immediately got up and started running, holding his wife's and son's hands tightly, and followed the other desperately fleeing villagers.
"Dad, I see a horse," Aris said in an innocent voice to his father. To his surprise, upon hearing this, his father, who was running, suddenly stopped. Then he also turned his head to look behind.
Old Theno's heart started trembling, and his hands holding his wife and son clenched tightly.
His gaze, now filled with despair, was focused on a dark figure in the distance that was approaching with no hurry. Yet every step it took, the ground exploded.
"Husband, is that..?" Theno's wife asked in a terrified tone.
"RUN!!" old Theno screamed at the top of his lungs.
The other villagers, hearing the terrified scream, immediately looked back, seeing the figure that was almost upon them. They immediately started screaming and panicking. Those that fell down got stepped on by the running crowd.
Huff huff.
Oh, Divine Knight, are we all going to die today?! old Theno asked in his heart with sorrow, as he kept running, almost dragging his wife and son.
Thud! Thud!!
But how could normal people be faster than a demonic beast?
NIGHHH!!
The familiar sound appeared in Theno's ears, then the familiar screams followed.
"AHhh! Ughh! Save mee!!"
The slower villagers at the back could only scream a few bloody words before they got crushed by the dark hooves.
As the screams grew louder and louder and an aura of death and oppression spread from behind, the running villagers fell down one after the other, terrorized by fear. Wails and suppressed sobs could be heard all around from old and young.
"Dad, I am afraid, I can't run anymore..." Aris said in a sobbing voice to old Theno.
Old Theno, with tears in his eyes, looked at his crying son and daughter. His wife was sobbing uncontrollably, having already fallen down.
He moved his gaze onto that terrifying figure that just crushed the head of a young man. Its eyes carried no emotions. Its body, covered in blood and flesh, created an image from hell.
As though feeling his gaze, the demonic figure also fixed his gaze on him and slowly headed toward his direction.
"Son, take care of your mother and sister," old Theno said to the crying Aris while gently putting down his daughter from his back, who started crying even more beside him.
"Father... I..."
Old Theno patted Aris's head. A tear fell from his weathered eyes, which then changed into those of resolve. He stood up with trembling legs and slowly unsheathed his old hunting knife from his waist.
Even if I am to die today, I will fight to the death with this beast to protect my family! Old Theno, when it came to his family, found the courage to step forward and face an impossible enemy.
Thud. Thud. Heavy steps sounded as old Theno took one step after the other toward the approaching beast. The other villagers, seeing someone step toward the demonic beast, slowly stopped their wailing. In their dull eyes, a small spark emerged.
Hmm. Is this the old hunter that escaped from me? Dravok, who was slowly heading forward, pondered as he looked at this normal man that actually dared to stand up with trembling legs holding an old knife.
Does he want to fight me?
Confusion and a bit of amusement appeared in his dark eyes as he looked at the approaching figure.
After the distance became less than three meters, both stopped and stared at each other.
Should I kill him? Dravok thought. After all, with this person's help, his fear had spread to this village, which helped him grow stronger and affirm his suspicion of how to grow stronger.
In contrast to the amused and pondering Dravok, old Theno, who was now facing such a being drenched in blood and emanating a suffocating aura that carried the suppression of life, was already giving it his all just to stand, let alone have the time to think.
The only thing that kept him conscious was the thought of his family behind him.
All of a sudden, the pressure slowly receded like a tide, and with it, the dark figure turned around and, without looking back, left.
Old Theno, still in his confused state, was momentarily stunned, looking at the figure's back.
At the same time, a great amount of heat was being generated in Dravok's chaos stone as he kept running.
You're lucky, little guy, Dravok thought with some displeasure.
It seems something is happening to my body. Is it because of the huge amount of energy that I gained from these villagers' fear? I need to leave this place as soon as possible. I don't know what these changes mean. I can't stay here.
"LONG LIVE HERO THENO!!"
No one knows who started it, but the terrified villagers with bright eyes full of hope and gratitude started screaming one after the other, while crying tears of joy!
Seeing the terrifying demonic beast that had killed a dozen people actually run away as soon as Theno stood up and faced it head on, the villagers, in their terrified minds, believed that he scared the beast off to save them.
The stunned old Theno, with the villagers' screams, immediately woke up and turned, wanting to go and comfort his terrified family. But just as he took a step,
His body started to heat up. Beads of sweat started appearing all over his body, and an orb of white light emerged out of thin air in front of him, growing bigger and bigger with the villagers' shouts!!
"Whaa?! What is this?!" old Theno widened his eyes!!