Chapter 38 - Beneath the mountains

The big changes started at the first nighttime after Ulf departed for the central region of the southern forest.

During his meditation in the safe spot on the tree from the wild creatures' ambush, suddenly the ground started to shake violently. There was almost no living being that Ulf could sense or see, but this type of situation made him more attentive. The turbulence that came from the deep underground forced Ulf to stop the meditation.

'Earthquake?' Ulf was alarmed.

It was the first time he felt such a great impact from the ground in this life. Some small size trees were even uprooted and dropped on the ground.

There were a few small-scale earthquakes during the past twelve years or as his villagers called it, the wrath of the celestial mother, of all beings.

Hadda tribe venerated this planet and referred to it as the Celestial mother, which had given the birth of every existence. Because of that she had a right and could give the humans or wild creatures either great rewards or harsh punishments.

Even if, the Celestial mother wasn't the main target of worship of villagers, they respected her from the bottom of their hearts, as the creator of the primordial world and the mightiest goddess.

The tribesmen and women believed that the earthquake was one of the tools for the Celestial mother to teach 'ungrateful children' a lesson. The main centre of the earthquake was where the punishment would take place and as the tremor spread in the far territories, it was intended to remind the humans to be faithful servants of the gods and goddesses.

Usually, Ulf would think it was just a normal earthquake, but at that moment, it was logical to connect everything with an ongoing strange event on Howling mountain.

During the night, the earthquake happened two times again. However, they weren't strong enough to demolish other giant and tough trees in the forest. Even so, from time to time the branches were snapped and he had to be a bit careful to avoid them.

After a whole day of running, Ulf crossed a very long distance that was at least what a common peak rank hunter could accomplish with the max speed in 3-4 days.

Ulf was at peak warrior rank too. However, with a huge amount of inner qi, he was one another league compared to his teammates. His speed and strength increased several-fold.

Due to his newly advanced, much stronger peak warrior rank body, endurance and tolerance toward the qi also increased. If Ulf could somewhat control doses of supplied inner qi to his body, he would be able to lengthen the time of use of enhancement on any part of the body.

Because of that, his physique was overtired and when the sky turned dark, Ulf took a few hours to rest and lessen the accumulated stress and fatigue in his body.

The second day was the same as well. Only a little, harmless birds' songs and the sounds of a wind swaying the leaves could break the total silence.

Ulf had not been advancing aimlessly. Maybe, it was a hard task to observe the Howling mountains from the canyon, but as he was getting closer, the contours of the high grounds were getting cleaner. Ulf must have already been hundreds of kilometres away from the canyon.

After running for several hours, Ulf was only half a day away from his destination.

Ulf reached the top of the hill. In front of him was a huge valley. It covered entire lowlands leading the way toward the Howling mountains.

Nonetheless, when Ulf went down from the high hills he also noticed one particularly odd fact. Suddenly, the average height of the tree was reduced dramatically. Even if there were the same kind of pants, they were just much smaller, or to be more accurate - younger.

The most widely spread and also highest trees were the oak tree and beech in the entire southern forest. However, in this part of the central forest, together with other types of trees, they had only a quarter of other giant representatives of the same kind.

"Then why..."

Ulf was going to question his information if the inner part of the forest was really rich with resources, where the strongest beasts resided.

However, he instantly changed his course of thinking, after detecting additional transformations.

"The air is richer with raw qi here."

Ulf was amazed because cultivating in the same environment could make the hunters' cultivation two or three times faster. But it wasn't that easy to achieve because of the many powerful beasts, who occupied this area of forest. Even though they weren't anywhere to see now.

As Ulf was told, after a large-scale raid in the south several decades ago, almost every powerful beast was killed by the alliance of the tribes. But it didn't take long for the empty spots to be replenished from the surrounding even bigger forests. This case was making everything more mystical.

As for the second big change, it was that the drawing speed of qi toward the south with increased quantity was astonishingly hastened.

'The qi gravitational pull that came from the Howling mountain is fortified drastically. It seems this region of the forest is the main source of qi for producing that unknown event.' Ulf thought.

In some places, the unusually high concentration of raw qi resulted in a density that creates unnatural phenomena. Perhaps, for the naked eye, it would be very hard to notice, but Ulf could sense and see countless light blue streams drifting toward the far-away mountains.

Ulf wanted to study the reason for the richness of qi in this part of the forest. It would help him greatly in his cultivation and would provide him with information about how this world worked.

Though, due to a sense of urgency, Ulf kept going.

When the sunset was getting near, Ulf could clearly perceive the shapes of each gigantic mountain. He had a hard time observing what was happening on the top of the middle mountain, as the peaks of howling mountains were hidden in the thick fog because of a sudden change in the weather there.

However, the snow-capped visible upper parts were enough proof of their high altitude.

Bit by bit the mountains were getting bigger within Ulf's sight, but when he was rushing forward, stopped abruptly.

'Warning signals of spiritual energy?' Ulf was alarmed.

The plants were hindering him from better vision, so after two jumps up, Ulf emerged on the top of the tree.

What Ulf saw made his blood run cold. Until this moment, Ulf had been thinking about the disappearance of the apex beasts of the southern forest.

Even if the howling mountains were more than ten kilometres away from him, Ulf still could mark numerous dots beneath the highest peak. He was shocked.

"No wonder. During all these times, when I have been running like a crazy man, all these beasts were already waiting just near to the epicentre."