38 Blue Link

The Forest Will people felt cold shivers running down their spines. The Great Snake Devil won! How? Nobody knew. He literally disappeared into nothing and then reappeared ready to strike like an evil ghost. The people spectating the fight had no idea on how this was possible and just inscribed this new ability that they saw to the list of the arcane and mysterious powers of the creature.

He could heal himself, create giant holes in the sky, eat specks of light that came from the bodies of the dead and even disappear into thin air.

Monstrous! How could a creature like that be defeated?

Plus, contrary to what they were expecting, he didn't seem wounded at all. He was breathing heavily but that was all. His body was completely healthy; not a dent or a scrap could be seen on his black scales covered in blood. Not his, Godermo's.

When the serpent stopped looking at the body of the man that he just executed and moved his gaze to them, they all started to panic.

"Great Demon if you work with us-"

Star Leaf was the only one that didn't seem to be scared of the serpent. Her eyes shined with a strange light as she started moving towards the blood covered serpent.

However, what happened left the Forest Will bewildered.

The snake didn't even let the girl finish her words and dashed from his position like a black arrow. Before anyone could do anything about it he was before the green haired youth, his open mouth trying to bite her jugular.

At the moment before the snake's sharp teeth could close around the neck of the young maiden, a stream of blue light emerged from inside of his body and mixed with a completely identical energy coming out from the human! The two stream of blue light formed a shield that protected the woman from Darkscale's attack, blocking his assault and bouncing him back violently.

Star Leaf's eyes opened wide, looking at the ball of blue light that appeared around her. For a moment she had believed that her bet had turned out to be her greatest mistake in her life.

When the serpent appeared before her, with those fangs ready to close themselves on her, she thought that she would really die. In the end, she survived, but she didn't quite understand how. However, that blue energy... the woman's face lit up when she realized that it had something to do with the strange monk and the energy that he sent inside her.

"A gift for the golden couple" as he called it.

The ball stood in its place for a second before distorting and dividing into two different streams: one darted towards her body, disappearing inside it; the other moved towards the landing spot of Dakscale, targeting his body.

Darkscale tried to avoid the incoming blue light, but it was so fast that even someone like him couldn't manage to escape it. This didn't happen just because he was completely exhausted after the fight against the Fire Earth chieftain. In fact, even if his body was in his most ready and pristine condition, he still wouldn't have been able to avoid it.

That was insane! He had been using the Pretorian's Breath for months and had an incredibly powerful body, fast and reactive. This only showed that the energy wasn't something simple if it could be faster than a creature like Darkscale.

When the blue light touched his scales, it immediately penetrated them and started to move inside his body. He sensed while it traveled towards his Natural Hearth, disappearing inside it.

There, no matter how many times he tried, he didn't manage to find it. If he didn't know that it was there, if he hadn't directly sensed it personally enter and hide inside his energy container, he wouldn't believe that it even existed.

The serpent couldn't believe that something that existed inside his own cultivation base was able to hide so well.

'What the hell was that' he thought, bewildered.

'It seems like some sort of restrictive seal, Master.' Carelia responded to him.

'I can't feel it anymore... it entered my Natural Heart!' Darkscale murmured, examining his damaged Natural Hearth over and over again with his very basic Will Manipulation.

'That's because it's made of energy that you can't perceive with your level of cultivation...' explained the MAID.

'I can't? What about you? Why didn't you tell me about it?' asked suddenly the serpent, his face darkening.

'I didn't sense it too! My energy sensing abilities are limited to those of the arrays of the Blue Cave,' said the Artificial Intelligence.

Darkscale didn't believe her, but again why would she lie? Was she even able to lie to him? He felt that it would be very weird for cultivators to create a tool that could lie and do whatever it pleases and then put it in charge of their precious cultivator caves.

Nah, that didn't seem right.

The snake coiled on himself, looking at the now distant Star Leaf. He wasn't a fool: he already could tell if that one time it didn't work, probably trying a second time wouldn't work either. The force that hit him when the golden shield activated wasn't that dangerous, it only pushed him away and didn't harm him much, but he didn't enjoy being bounced around so he didn't attack again.

'Dammit, that fucking old bitch ass fogey... I will take my revenge on him sooner or later!' promised the reptile to himself.

'Master, you should take control of the human to better study the seal... ' Carelia suggested.

"Plus, she is from the Leaf clan and seems to be important to the other humans. You could use her to get your hands on the items that you need since the previous human is... unavailable," continued the AI.

Darkscale's eyes scanned the area around him, realizing that Winter Leaf was gone from the battleground.

'Dammit!'

Meanwhile, Star Leaf was also looking at the snake, waiting to see what would his next move be. She was afraid that he would try to kill her again even though something told her that the blue energy would stop him from doing so.

The old monk did imply that the gift he left behind wasn't easy to get rid of. However, she wasn't sure about it and the fright from her previous encounter with the open maws of the black devil was still fresh in her mind.

Even so, she managed to beat again her fears and address the serpent that just almost ended her life.

"Great Devil, please stop I-"

"I accept, now bow to me" said suddenly a juvenile sharp voice, echoing in her mind.

Star Leaf looked at the snake, understanding that what he was saying was that he was willing to accept her as a servant. This was the deal that she wanted to strike when she first decided to risk everything and talk with him. If this had been even ten minutes earlier, she would have accepted with joy. However now, she understood a little more about the nature of the creature.

"You cannot kill me" murmured the young woman, almost talking to herself.

There was no way that he was suddenly accepting her previous offer out of the blue. No, this was a creature that could put its life on the line and almost get killed just to kill an enemy. It was devious, and it was meticulous. Not someone that changed ideas from a moment to another.

"Mph! Are you bowing or not?" ordered again by the voice in her head, snickering loudly.

Star Leaf gave a long look to the serpent before her, then gritted her teeth and shook her head.

"No" she said, her body trembling lightly.

A sharp look appeared in the eyes of the serpent. His tail fell heavily on the ground, forming a deep dent on the hard dark ground.

" You... what did you just say?"

"I said no" responded the girl with more courage this time.

" That was my previous offer. Now I want more." she continued immediately after.

"I will kill all your people until you submit" sassed the young voice with a hint of veiled killing intent.

Darkscale laughed internally, waiting to see how the human would solve the problem. Playing tricks with him? Who did she think she was? Humans, in the end, they were all morons. Maybe some of them could fight well, like that one that he killed after a long and strenuous fight, but they were all stupid like rocks.

However, contrary to all his expectation, the woman didn't even seem to falter to his menace.

"Okay" she simply said. "When you're done killing everything that moves like a retard, can we talk business?"