Green Monster Epic

Chapter 316: A Bountiful Harvest

The two fallen paladins were no slouches in combat. Although they didn't possess the strength of high-tier peak experts, as unconventional advanced individuals with considerable divine spellcasting abilities, they were indeed difficult opponents.

However, facing Allen and Alba, four high-tier peak professionals with a well-coordinated team, no matter how hard they struggled, they couldn't escape Allen's grasp.

Finally, in desperation, the two resolute individuals suddenly turned their weapons on each other, their eyes filled with death intent, determined to seek death.

“Hmph, wishful thinking!!”

Richard had long sensed something amiss in their eyes. A well-prepared Feeblemind spell was cast directly at them. Simultaneously, his staff moved incessantly, sketching mysterious diagrams in the air, and a Charm Person spell followed closely behind Feeblemind, targeting the same individual.

The targeted fallen paladin, seeing his weapon about to strike his companion's poorly defended neck, though his willpower was strong enough to resist Feeblemind's full effect,

was stunned for a moment. That brief hesitation allowed Alba to slam a spear into his waist and abdomen, skillfully sending him flying. Though he couldn't evade his companion's almost certain fatal blow, at least it didn't hit a vital spot, while his own heavy strike landed on his companion's armor.

The weapons left deep marks on each other's heavy armor before Allen and Alba separated them.

What followed was even easier. The charmed human was disarmed by Alba, who, worried about his suicidal tendencies, skillfully dislocated all four of his limbs.

Allen, now without restraint, swung Bonecleaver with mighty force, suppressing his target with power, leaving deeper and deeper sword marks on the heavy armor. By the time Albian dragged back the corpse of an assassin demon, he arrived just in time to witness Allen deliver an enraged heavy strike, cleaving the fine armor in two and sending a thick thigh flying.

“Bang!!”

The last fallen paladin, in a daze, was struck on the back of the head by Allen's sword. It was unclear if he suffered a concussion, but he obediently fell to the ground, unable to rise again.

“The rest is up to you.”

Kaiya looked at the two middle-aged human males, now reawakened and restrained on the ground. Occasional flashes of insane killing intent flickered in their eyes, and their faces appeared to have been burned or scalded, the entire visage melted, clearly an attempt to conceal their true identities.

Although Richard and the others had them under control, the despair leaking from their pupils was evident. Albian rubbed his hands, excitedly brandishing his dagger, preparing to use the methods of slow slicing he learned from Allen to practice on these excellent specimens.

“Take this one aside first, we'll interrogate him later.”

Richard pointed at the unscathed captive on the ground and said to Kaiya and Alba, then turned to Allen and the others, focusing on the other human captive who had lost an arm.

“Richard, do you have any drugs or spells to enhance sensory perception?”

After stripping the human of all his clothes, revealing his bronze-colored flesh, Albian suddenly asked.

“……”

The subsequent torture was too gruesome. Even Kaiya, who had experienced it once before, couldn't help but turn away, covering her eyes and ears, refusing to watch Allen and the others' actions.

Only Allen and Richard remained calm, not finding anything particularly cruel about it. They watched as the man watched his remaining arm and two legs stripped of every piece of flesh clinging to the bone. Finally, on the verge of collapse, he revealed all the inside information he knew, begging Albian for a quick death.

The cruel methods were not only used on this unlucky fellow but also on the other human captive. After propping the first human against a tree trunk and knocking him unconscious, Allen and the others brought over the second live subject. They then made him watch the first victim's misery, while Albian calmly described all sorts of horrific things as he scraped and sliced away flesh. In the end, even the toughest man couldn't escape such a tragic punishment.

Of course, this was also thanks to the drugs Richard had forced down their throats, enhancing their senses. Even the slightest sensation of a knife peeling away a thin layer of skin was felt by the tortured human. The pain, despair, and other emotions were amplified infinitely under the drug's stimulation, complementing Albian's slow slicing interrogation.

With these two methods combined, even if these two deathsworn were trying to hide some important clues, they were gradually questioned by Allen and the others without being able to cross-reference their stories.

“…It seems that the assassination by these cultists wasn't aimless. Their assassination targets were for the sake of their next step.”

“It's a pity that these two paladins didn't know much. They were only following the arrangements of Alva, the evil god priest, and didn't know the specific details of this next action.”

“However, we still have some gains, which is who the Abyss Lord these cultists worship is.”

Richard frowned. If Alva were still alive, he and the others could have gathered more information, which would have been more useful. However, with his accidental death at Kaiya's hands, the information revealed by these two live subjects only confirmed some of his guesses.

Allen was holding a dagger, delivering a knife to the heart of each of the two nearly-collapsed humans, finally granting them release.

“Who is it?”

Allen didn't know much about the Abyss. If it weren't for this chaos of the evil god, perhaps he would still think that demons and devils were just legendary creatures.

“The powerful Abyss Lord who rules three planes of the endless Abyss—Graz'zt, the Dark Prince.”

Richard's eyes were heavy. Just saying the name of this Abyss Lord made him feel as if he was being stared at by a gaze from the stars. This feeling slowly dissipated after a long time.

“He is one of the most powerful lords in the Abyss and the one with the strongest desire for the world of Feman. Tens of thousands of years ago, he wanted to pull the world of Feman into the endless Abyss, making it the fourth Abyss plane he rules.”

“……”

Allen listened carefully to Richard's statement, keeping these contents firmly in his mind. With the appearance of the chaos of the evil god and the tide of demons, he realized that there were too many things he needed to understand.

“Who cares so much about them! If something happens, the strong men of the wilderness will naturally stand up. The high priests of the natural temple will not let these guys cause damage to the wilderness again. We just need to hand over the heads of these guys to the city guard and get the rewards that belong to us, right?”

Kaiya was a little impatient. The reward for this mission was not bad, but the time wasted was also considerable. The five of them had run for half the wilderness to track them, spending more than two months. The wounds on Alba and Allen's bodies, although not affecting their combat power, still needed to be recuperated for a while.

Now that the mission was finally completed, Richard was still frowning, as if dissatisfied with something. But in Kaiya's opinion, completing the mission was the most worthy thing to celebrate. As for other things, such as the purpose of the assassination by these cultists, and the conspiracy behind the assassination, were not problems that they adventurers should worry about.

“Hehehe!”

Alba smiled honestly, nodding slightly under Kaiya's gaze, supporting his companion of many years.

“Okay, let's not think too much, let's think about how to distribute everyone's spoils and rewards after handing in the mission!”

The mission reward was two crystal inheritances, or two high-level weapons, plus the spoils and demon heads and materials obtained in the battle along the way. How to distribute them among the five people was indeed a difficult problem.

“I can give up the distribution of the spoils, but I hope to get one of the inheritance crystals. If there is a difference, I am willing to pay the difference with gems.”

Allen first stated his attitude. One of the reasons he was willing to cooperate with Kaiya and the others and accept this mission was that the reward for this mission was the inheritance crystal, which Allen needed to collect.

“Okay, no problem, does anyone else have any requirements?”

Kaiya and Richard looked at each other, and they had no objections. Finally, they nodded, which was regarded as agreeing to Allen's request.

“Hurry up, all of you keep up, find the bastards who assassinated the patriarch, I want to dig out his heart to pay tribute to the patriarch…”

Just as Allen and the others were still discussing, a commotion gradually came from the distance, as well as the sound of countless footsteps running. After Allen and the five of them looked at each other, they quickly got up and ran towards the north without looking back.

A month and a half later, outside Mansha City, five dusty figures appeared in front of the south gate, and were stopped by a kobold tax officer.

Raising his head, Allen's flat bear nose and furry face appeared in front of the world. His python scale armor was now tattered, and his exposed skin was covered with shallow and deep scars.

Behind him, Kaiya and the others were also exhausted, with scars all over their bodies, because the news that they had killed Alva was somehow leaked. Then, some unwilling guys and adventure teams suddenly launched a pursuit against them, forcing Allen and Kaiya to speed up their pace and rush back to Mansha City from the nearest route in the wilderness without stopping.

This is the adventure rule of the wilderness. Even if a team completes the task, as long as they do not bring the task certificate back to Mansha City and complete the task, then other competitors will still have the opportunity to snatch the task certificate from the other party.

As for the means and methods used, there is no need for everyone to say more. Anyway, except for Mansha City, which has some rules, other places rely on fists to speak.

After all, a task worth two inheritance crystals may only be those legendary figures and above who will not be tempted.

“This is our harvest this time. You all check to see if anything is missing.”

As someone who has lived in Mansha City for nearly 20 years, Kaiya naturally has a comfortable nest of her own. After all, women inherently lack a sense of security, so they pay more attention to a fixed residence.

At this time, Allen and the other four were gathered in Kaiya's residence. This was a relatively intact small courtyard in the slums. The west wing of the courtyard was inhabited by the true owner of the courtyard, a family of six gnome goblins. Kaiya rented two rooms in the east wing for a fee.

Everyone leaned against the door. Inside the door, in the cleared-out living room, were various trophies, as well as twenty or so demon heads exuding a faint, rotten stench, all encased in ice.

Of course, there was also a large piece of obsidian material, which Allen and the others had not taken out due to limited space. Even so, Kaiya's not-so-spacious living room was filled with trophies piled nearly a meter high. The group looked at the room full of trophies, their eyes filled with satisfaction.

Allen held two inheritance crystals in his hand, struggling to make a choice. It was really hard to decide which crystal would be better to choose.

After discussing it together, they finally chose the crystal as a reward over the magical equipment. The fluctuations of magical equipment were too great. Perhaps some people would think that a certain piece of magical equipment was most suitable for them and would offer a higher price, but in the eyes of most people, the spells and effects attached to these equipment were just like chicken ribs, so the fluctuations of magical equipment were very large, unlike inheritance crystals, which had a stable price.

Two crystals, one was a Druid's advanced Nature Healer crystal inheritance, and the other was a Warlock's ordinary advanced Hexblade. Each one was a huge temptation for Allen, who had always hoped that his clan would have a spellcaster inheritance, which was why he was so conflicted now.

“Allen, if you really decide to choose the inheritance crystal, then you probably have to prepare the funds in advance. Even after deducting your share of the reward, you probably still have to subsidize about 2000 gold coins.”

Two non-ordinary combat profession inheritance crystals, if put on the market, would be worth at least ten thousand gold coins. However, because the Temple of Nature and the Mansha City Guard have been issuing tasks related to crystals for more than a year, the price of inheritance crystals has dropped somewhat, but the two crystals in Allen's hands are probably worth more than 7000 gold coins to be considered reasonable. Even so, it was because Richard, Kaiya, and the others, as teammates, did not compete with Allen, otherwise the price might have increased.

“Okay!”

Allen nodded heavily. At this time, he had 15 ruby ​​rough stones given from the previous mission, worth about 1500 gold coins, plus the funds he brought out from the clan, it should be enough to exchange for this crystal.

Finally, through Kaiya's channels, everyone cleared out the materials and trophies in the room, and exchanged them for nearly 20,000 gold coins. Among them, the set of magical equipment on Alva, the combat priest, accounted for the bulk of the money. The other two fallen holy warriors also contributed nearly 3,000 gold coins worth of wealth. The assassin demon and the human archer, as well as the unlucky Roble tribe chief Frank, contributed nearly 4,000 gold coins in total. The rest came from the sale of obsidian, demon heads, and other materials.

When Alba heard this number, his eyes were shining, and he imagined how long this would allow him to eat and drink to his heart's content, and a trace of saliva had already flowed from the corner of his mouth. Albyan and Kaiya also had some excitement in their eyes. If you add the estimated value of the two inheritance crystals, then each of their five people can get at least 6,500 gold coins or more.

Such a rewarding mission, no wonder so many adventurers flocked to it, and even after Allen and the others had completed the mission, they still relentlessly pursued them. If it were Allen himself, if he knew that a certain team had such a huge wealth, he probably couldn't guarantee that he wouldn't chase and kill the other party.

Of course, as the leader of the Green Field Tribe, although the tribe has never had such a large income in these years, the clan's accounts have never been short of 2-3,000 gold coins worth of wealth, so Allen did not have too much change in expression because of the sudden appearance of these 200 ruby ​​wealth.

As for Richard, as the most money-consuming profession, although these wealths are tempting, compared to his own wealth, it may not really be able to impress him. You must know that Richard's palm-sized dimensional bag is an expensive magic item with a base price of 10,000 gold coins, not to mention the various priceless spellcasting materials in the dimensional bag.

“In this mission, everyone cooperated tacitly, and no one's contribution was greater. Except for subsidizing Richard's 200 gold coins for spellcasting materials, we will divide the rest equally. Does everyone have any objections?”

This mission was indeed quite smooth. Although everyone wasted some time searching for the whereabouts of Alva and his group, the subsequent process did not have too many twists and turns.

“It's okay, I have no objection.”

“Okay, let's do it this way.”

Even Richard, who planned and correctly judged Alva's final assassination target, had no objections, and naturally no one else had anything to say.

Whether the members of a team can cooperate again depends on their cooperation during the mission and whether there are any disharmonious factors in the distribution after the mission is completed, and so on. Now it seems that the cooperative relationship between Kaiya, Richard, and the others may become an opportunity for the next cooperation.

After the distribution, Allen harvested a Hexblade crystal inheritance, but cruelly gave up the Nature Healer crystal inheritance. After subsidizing everyone with 3 rubies, he put the Hexblade crystal into his pocket.

The reason why he chose Hexblade instead of Nature Healer with the Druid youth, Allen's plan was very simple.

First of all, the path that Linnaeus chose to take was the Claw Druid. Even if Allen forcibly used the prestige of the clan leader to ask Linnaeus to re-choose the Nature Healer, even if Linnaeus finally bowed his head, it would make him stagnate in the Druid path from now on.

Secondly, the relationship between the Green Field Tribe and the Oak Temple has always been harmonious. Even if Allen does not have the Druid crystal inheritance, he can send the children in the clan who have Druid talent to the temple's affiliated school and monastery to study through the relationship between Master Oscar and High Priest Clay, but it is just a little more troublesome.

However, if you miss this opportunity for the Warlock profession's advancement, I am afraid that Allen will have very little hope of obtaining such a crystal again.

Although Warlocks are also spellcasters, they are different from spellcasters like mages and druids. They have a high probability of naturally awakening like Shadow Energy talent holders. For example, the Bonecrusher who made Allen grit his teeth was a naturally awakened Warlock. Then his level improvement, spellcasting understanding, etc., were all gradually developed in his own exploration.

If Bonecrusher had a Dragon Vein Warlock crystal inheritance back then, I am afraid his level would not have been stuck in the middle rank. If that were the case, even if Allen could kill Bonecrusher in the end, he would have been replaced by Bonecrusher's suicidal method.

Finally, there would be no Allen as he is now.

Therefore, after thinking for a long time and constantly struggling, Allen resolutely chose the Hexblade crystal inheritance, only hoping that one day the children in the clan can live up to expectations and give birth to a Warlock talent holder.

The remaining crystal was taken into Richard's pocket. Albyan and Kaiya were both loners, and their pursuit of non-professional crystal inheritance was not strong. Alba himself came from a large clan, and his clan was also not short of inheritance crystals, so he naturally would not need this thing, so it was finally taken by Richard.

“Next, what are everyone's plans?”

After the mission came to an end, Kaiya gently stroked the bulging money bag around her waist, which contained more than 60 rubies, and then asked the temporary partners around her who were also satisfied.

“Hehehe, I want to have a good meal. I haven’t had enough to eat in these days in the wilderness.”

Alba's eyes were obsessed, and then he imagined the happy days to come, and a glow appeared on his face.

“I plan to rest for a while and see if there are any other suitable missions.”

Albyan had just completed a mission, and at this time, he had already begun to prepare for the next mission, completely unlike the indifferent personality that an elf should have.

Allen shrugged and said indifferently: “I’ll go see if the teenagers in the clan have returned first. If they haven’t returned, I plan to go to their mission location to take a look and see what’s going on.”

When he returned to Mansha City, Allen once again took up his responsibility as the tribal leader and began to worry about the safety of Cole and the other young goblins.

Cole and the others took on a clearing mission. At the place they rented in the monastery, they left Allen a letter. It has been more than a month since they left Mansha City to carry out the mission, and they have not returned yet, so Allen had the idea of ​​going to take a look and secretly observe their actions.

“Oh, it seems everyone has their own things to do!!”

Kaiya was a little regretful, but this emotion quickly dissipated. She herself was now thinking about taking a hot bath and then taking a beauty sleep.

“Then next time, if there is a suitable mission, let's act together again?”

Just when everyone was about to leave and do their own things, Kaiya suddenly asked again, looking at Allen and the others with a hopeful expression, and then received a happy nod from Allen and Albyan.

“Okay!! Then it's settled!!”

“I will be responsible for contacting everyone then.”

“Okay.”

“No problem.”