The Record of Unusual Creatures

The amount of Festered at the central plaza not only shocked Hao Ren, but even Veronica who was a seasoned local veteran was also caught by surprise. That intrigued Hao Ren.

“It’s not usually like this?” Hao Ren looked at the knight princess. “Didn’t the old man said that once the furnace has been lit, that the wandering monsters will be attracted?”

“That we did, but the Festered have always been far lesser in number than the Servants of Chaos,” Veronica spoke with a hushed tone and she could barely hide her nervousness. Turning her head over, Hao Ren saw her amethyst-colored eyes flickered in the dark. “The Festered are the beings of Order that had been corrupted by Chaos, but not everything can become a Festered. Most of the time the corrupted are consumed whole and assimilated by the power of Chaos, and it is very rare for one to be fully corrupted. In the realm of Chaos, only the Servants of Chaos are the main menace.”

As words left the princess’ lips, she carefully poked her head out to take a peek at the central plaza before turning back to Hao Ren again. “And we are deep within the realm of Chaos, the number of Festered should even be lesser.”

Veronica pretty much skimmed through the last part of the explanation but Hao Ren had pretty much understood what she meant.

The nature of the Festered meant that they would only appear in numbers at the borderlands between Order and Chaos because that was the only place with sufficient ‘materials’ to be corrupted. Deeper into the realm of Chaos, the number of Festered should significantly diminish, and even if the roll of dice was bad, the monsters should be dime a dozen. However, the horde before them was something beyond common knowledge.

“Perhaps they’ve wandered over from the border?” Hao Ren guessed out loud as he looked about.

“Wandered over?” Veronica eyed Hao Ren for a bit, while this ‘ancient guardian’s fuzzy memory would have been forgiven given his long slumber, but his ignorance and mistake of the many common knowledge started to give her grounds to be suspicious. And truth be told, the princess had already started doubting Hao Ren’s origins, but she knew that this powerful ‘hermit’ was the lifeline that she and her soldiers depend on. Wisely, she kept her thoughts to herself and shook her head. “The Festered rarely ever wanders off. They would always congregate at the place that they had fallen. Those that would move were all-powerful before their fall, and they would still retain some sort of thought process when they transformed and could take some unexpected autonomous action. But the ones ahead… are not those type.”

“Sounds like a bunch of lost souls.” Hao Ren muttered to himself. “Let’s not bother too much on how did they gathered around here. The key question is why. Aren’t they crowding towards something?”

Hao Ren pointed towards the focal point of the Festered’s convergence. The innumerable monsters surrounding the item had formed multiple rings around the item. There was an empty patch of land in the middle of the monsters, and on that patch of land stood a pitch black object. It was a stone obelisk about ten meters tall, and the obelisk had three distinct levels, tapering towards the highest point. Mystical patterns were embossed on the two upper levels of the tower, while the bottom part had a structure of a bell tower, with a spacious interior.

“That’s the furnace,” Veronica said.

“Furnace?” Hao Ren blurted out by reflex before recovering quickly. “Oh, the ones we used back then were different.”

Veronica had by now gotten used to Hao Ren’s ‘condition’ and she simply nodded. “The current pattern was innovated by Archbishop Pullman from the Theocracy 655 years ago. It had an additional level of runic bastion and is much like the Spire of Flames in the cities. It’s not a surprise that you don’t know about it.”

Hao Ren quickly made a mental note of the new things he learned. The furnaces seemed like the protective system used for smaller settlements while the bigger cities used the Spire of Flames, a powerful system to resist the encroaching Chaos. Based on this principle, there should be a nation-wide defense system, and the technology of this system is being monopolized by the country named the Theocracy. He, however, did not have any idea how the Theocracy functioned as an organization, or how interlinked their religion was to the goddess of creation.

A few thousand Festered continued to surround the already burnt out furnace but weirdly enough they did not do anything else. The twisted monsters only stood silently in the dark, and their eyes were fixed towards the black obelisk. This unusual scene caused goosebumps to run all over both Hao Ren and Veronica.

Hao Ren frowned. “Was this the furnace you guys lit up earlier on? And they were attracted by it?”

“Logically yes, but I’ve never seen the attracted Festereds would react…this way.” Veronica shook her head. “You can see for yourself that the furnace has burnt out, and the monsters should have dispersed by now. But yet they are still here standing in place… I think there’s something wrong with that furnace tower.

Hao Ren pondered for a moment before shaking his head. “We have no time to waste against them. We need to get going. And seems like they are entranced by it so we can just circle around the town and save us a lot of trouble.”

But Veronica demurred as she heard that. The princess was pondering her options before turning towards Hao Ren with an wordless expression.

“What’s wrong?” Hao Ren asked.

“I know that this is an unreasonable request.” Veronica said. “But I wish to investigate the phenomenon before us. Every information in the realm of Chaos is important to the realm of Order. And we normally would need to pay a dear price to get even a morsel of information…”

Hao Ren did not need to wait for Veronica to finish before he caught the princess’ intentions. She intend to check out the furnace’s condition.

With the horde of monsters surrounding it.

A local would have flinched and rejected Veronica’s request outright. Bravery does not equate recklessness.

But Hao Ren was different and nodded after some consideration. He too was interested with the furnace’s system. And to be honest, if he did not have a group of wounded knights with him, he would have came here alone to study the whole place.

This was the drive of an Inspector. The drive of inspections.

“You’re agreeable to this?” Veronica looked at Hao Ren in surprise and her tone immediately took a respectful turn. “But just as you’ve said, we do not need to linger…”

Hao Ren waved his hand and stopped Veronica half way through. “I agreed because I’m capable of doing it. But this monsters are indeed a handful. Just too many of them. There’s probably thousands there, and I suspect more are hiding in the shadows. I need to launch a wide-area attack against so many, but that would need the zone of collateral damage is equally wide.”

Veronica gulped hard and the ‘ancient’ seemed much much more mysterious to her. But she quickly shifted her attention to the task at hand. “You’re right. Fighting here would mean damaging the furnace. So it’s best if we can draw them away. Even for a moment. I can light the furnace up again if I can get close, and even temporarily, the furnace’s power is much stronger than the holy relics, and we can use the furnace’s power against the monsters.

Hao Ren raised his eyebrow. “So the plan is for me to lure them away, and you think of a way to get to the central plaza to light the furnace up?”

Veronica nodded, with an shameful expression etched on her face.

The plan was demanding, especially to someone she just knew, and have been her savior to boot. It was against her code of chivalry to let the person perform such a suicidal role.

That said, the ‘ancient guardian’ capabilities alone would have made this task a rather trivial one.

Hao Ren did not put too much thought into it and after running through his memories of his past fights, he nodded. “Alright. I’ll think of a way to lure them away. Pulling mobs happens to be my specialty.”

Veronica titled her head in confusion. “Pulling mobs?”

“That means getting the enemies’ attention.” Hao Ren rubbed his chin. “That said, it’s dangerous for you to go alone. Better get your men here as well. My threat generation is still not that stable…”

Veronica could not spin her head around. “Threat generation… not stable?”

“That means I might not be able to get all attention of all of them. Many monsters are immune to taunts.”

Veronica thought for a bit, and found that the ancient lingo was indeed quite something.