Chương 229: Chapter : 229

The clearing fell quiet again, except for the hiss of the purple flames and the low, droning hum of Vorath's chanting. The dark mana mist grew thicker, responding to his words, coiling around the altar like a living thing. Above the clearing, high in the canopy of the ancient trees, a faint shimmer of golden light appeared. It was barely visible, just the faintest ripple in the air, like a heat haze on a summer day. Nobody in the clearing noticed it. Nobody looked up. The shimmer solidified slowly, taking shape.

A tall figure materialized on a thick branch, his golden armor dim and his white cape folded tight against his back to minimize any movement. His burning white eyes swept across the clearing below, missing nothing. Karna had arrived. The legendary spirit who served Ken Eliot, the warrior who existed between dimensions and answered only to his master's call, had found the enemy. And he had found them exactly where his master's instincts had told him they would be. The legendary spirit moved with absolute silence.

Not a single leaf rustled. Not a single branch creaked. He crouched on the branch like a golden statue, watching the three Hollow cultists with the cold, calculating gaze of a predator studying its prey. He had been tracking this cell for three days. The dimensional signature of their dark mana had been faint but traceable, like a single drop of blood in an ocean. It had led him here, to this scorched clearing in the heart of the Silverleaf Jungle. Karna observed everything. The altar. The purple flames.

The bone construction. The dark mana mist. The clay jar in Seket's hands. And most importantly, the golden liquid inside it. The Glayin extract. He recognized it immediately from the briefings his master had given him. He also counted the enemies. Three cultists. One skeleton warrior in the village. Approximately forty enslaved tribesmen. A manageable number. But his master's orders had been specific. Observe first. Report. Wait for instructions. Karna closed his burning white eyes.

A faint pulse of mana rippled outward from his body, invisible and undetectable by anyone below. It was a telepathic signal, traveling through the dimensional channels that connected him to his master. The message was precise and efficient.

"Master. I have located the Hollow cell in the Silverleaf Jungle. Three cultists. One skeletal guardian. Approximately forty enslaved natives. They possess a Glayin extract and are preparing a ritual. The ritual requires a red moon, which rises in three nights. They are holding a live Glayin deer near a waterfall. I await your command."

Far away from the scorched clearing, the 13th Unit was making camp for the night in a different part of the Silverleaf Jungle. They had found a small clearing near the base of a massive tree, just big enough for everyone to sit down without being swallowed by mud or attacked by vines. You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. A small fire crackled in the center, tended by Laxmi's careful flames.

The orange glow pushed back the jungle darkness and provided a tiny circle of warmth in the cold, wet night. The team sat around it in exhausted silence, their clothes soaked, their faces streaked with dirt and sweat. Sayma was updating her notes by firelight, writing down everything they had seen and heard that day. Zinia was stretching her sore muscles with slow, methodical movements. Ira sat perfectly still with her eyes closed, conserving energy.

Laxmi poked the fire with a stick, watching the sparks fly up into the dark canopy above. Princess Iris sat near the fire, her knees drawn up to her chest, her violet eyes staring into the flames. She was thinking about Luna, alone in that bedroom with Dr. Chiha's fading suppression spell. She was thinking about the seven-day deadline that was already slipping away. She was thinking about whether they would find the Glayin deer in time.

Naomi sat apart from the group, her back against a tree trunk, her twin daggers laid across her lap. She was on watch, her green eyes scanning the dark jungle around them. Every rustle, every click, every distant howl was catalogued and assessed. She was alert despite her exhaustion, because that was who she was. And Ken was lying on the ground near the fire, his cheap suit jacket rolled up under his head as a pillow, his eyes closed. He looked like he was asleep. He usually looked like he was asleep.

His mouth was slightly open, and a tiny bit of drool glistened at the corner of his lips. Then, deep inside Ken's mind, a door opened. It was not a physical door. It was a dimensional channel, a private telepathic link that only he and Karna could access. The connection was instantaneous and crystal clear, as if Karna were standing right beside him whispering in his ear. Ken's body did not move. His breathing did not change.

His expression remained the same slack-jawed, drooling mess it always was when he was pretending to sleep. But behind his half-closed eyelids, his eyes shifted. The lazy, goofy light in them was gone, replaced by something cold and sharp. Karna's report played through his mind like a military briefing. Three cultists. Skeletal guardian. Forty enslaved natives. Glayin extract. Ritual in three nights. Live Glayin deer near the waterfall.

Every word was absorbed, processed, and filed away with the precision of a master strategist. Ken processed the information in less than a second. His mind was not the mind of a lazy commoner. It was the mind of a sovereign, a chess player who saw the entire board while everyone else was still looking at a single piece. The Glayin deer was alive. That was the most important piece of information. If the deer was alive and producing extract, then the cure for Blue Decay was still possible. Luna still had a chance.

That was the only thing that mattered. But there were complications. Three cultists and a skeleton warrior meant four enemies. The 13th Unit could handle four enemies without too much trouble, but the enslaved tribe complicated things. The girls could not fight freely when the people they were trying to save were being used as weapons against them. And there was the ritual. If the cult completed it in three nights, whatever power they gained would make everything much harder.

The ritual had to be stopped before the red moon rose. Ken made his decision in the span of a single heartbeat. He sent his response through the telepathic link with the same cold efficiency that Karna had used in his report.

"Do not engage. Maintain observation. Report any changes. I will handle the rest." The words were not spoken aloud. They were transmitted directly from Ken's mind to Karna's, traveling through the dimensional channel at the speed of thought. There was no hesitation in the command. No uncertainty. No warmth. Just the absolute, iron-firm authority of a sovereign passing judgment on a battlefield.