In the early morning, sunlight once more fell upon the surface of the water. Amid the rippling waves, it should have been a beautiful scene, but it was ruined by the huge monster corpses in the shallows that had already lost all signs of life.
With the scorching heat rising once again, not a single fish dared risk coming from the deep water into the shallows to enjoy this "feast," knowing it might never make it back.
As for the plankton, they had long since been wiped out. In such an environment, even Revoltures, which form an important link in the New World's life cycle, did not dare appear in the marsh at this moment, and could only leave these corpses to shrivel and rot in the water.
The high-intensity battle that had lasted an entire day had finally come to an end. After a night's rest, although the energy Logan had consumed had not yet been restored to its peak, it was still enough for him to go up into the sky again and serve as a second sun.
The injured hunters and the Rathalos were receiving treatment on the mobile research base, and the entire marsh seemed to have returned to how it had been before.
At the mountaintop, Logan was waiting for the Rathalos that had gone outside the marsh to hunt food for him to return. At this moment, only a few listless Radiant Crystal Butterflies were still circling weakly at his side. After the battle with the Qurio and after replenishing Logan's life force, this was all that remained of the Radiant Crystal Butterflies he had brought with him this time.
Moreover, because they had been overexerted, they would be unable, in the short term, to reproduce rapidly through Logan's energy. This also led Logan to decide to postpone the cleansing plan for a while.
Having taken off his heavy armor and now wearing a simple short-sleeved beast-hide shirt, the Admiral jumped down from the wingdrake, which was panting so hard its tongue was practically lolling out. Under the wingdrake's delighted gaze, he waved it off.
Watching the way the wingdrake fled as if it wished it could grow an extra pair of wings, the Admiral took out the Cool Drink at his waist and gulped it down in a few swigs. Only after driving away the stifling heat did he walk over to Logan's side.
There was no denying that this kind of high-tech potion was truly formidable. In sixty-degree heat, an ordinary person, without any protective measures, would have their skin dehydrated and cracking after being exposed for just a short while. Yet in this world, after downing a single Cool Drink, the Admiral could calmly walk over to Logan without so much as breaking a sweat.
"I've already had someone deliver a message to Astera. All hunters entering the marsh to encircle and hunt the anomaly monsters will fire a signal flare the moment they discover any trace of Nergigante."
The Admiral looked at Logan, who was resting with his eyes closed. Thinking of that terrifying explosion, he did not know what to say for a moment.
At that time, because the mutated Qurio had wanted to complete its Symbiosis with Nergigante in one stroke, it directly drew out the remaining essence of those anomaly monsters. While accelerating their deaths, it also gave the hunters and the Fire Wyverns a chance to catch their breath.
The mobile research base had its line of sight blocked by the sea of Qurio and did not see that final scene, but both the Admiral and the Fire Wyverns had witnessed it with their own eyes.
Especially when, after the blinding light, Logan's figure fell from the sky, the Admiral's heart tightened. He even thought that, in order to completely resolve the problem of the marsh, Logan had been forced to risk his life and use this move that he himself had not fully mastered, going down together with Nergigante.
Fortunately, when he later heard Logan's dragon roar again coming from the direction where Logan had fallen, the Admiral finally relaxed and, working together with the Fire Wyverns, finished last night's cleanup.
However, early this morning, a hunter squad dug up Nergigante's severed tail in the shallow mudflat area and then dove underwater along the outlet where Nergigante had escaped. Only after they failed to find Nergigante's corpse did they confirm that Nergigante truly had not died
They marveled at an Elder Dragon's tenacious vitality while also feeling excited that Logan had been able to defeat Nergigante.
Listening to the Admiral's words, Logan lowered his head slightly. In fact, he did not have many thoughts about Nergigante's whereabouts. Although he had only briefly seen Nergigante's departing back last night, he had clearly seen the miserable state it was in.
Injuries like that were not something that could be healed in a short time, even with extremely powerful Regeneration. To say nothing of those massive horns, just that severed tail alone— even for Logan, after losing his tail and activating Regeneration, it would take at least about a week to grow back, and that was only possible in an environment rich in life energy.
The sea of Qurio that had gathered last night might not have contained eighty percent of the Qurio in the marsh, but it definitely had at least seventy percent.
The Qurio remaining in the marsh were now scattered everywhere, and on top of that, large numbers of hunters from Astera were pouring into the marsh, while the Rathalos under Logan's command were also conducting aerial patrols overhead.
If Nergigante wanted to replenish its energy by gathering the Qurio again, there was no way it could escape Logan's eyes; when that happened, he might even be able to use Nergigante to further speed up the cleansing of the Qurio.
...
As a few days passed, Logan's energy gradually recovered to almost full, and this time, he also began to take the field himself and launch attacks on the monsters in the marsh.
With a super Elder Dragon like this joining in, the cleansing progress within the marsh instantly sped up by quite a bit. Under the lead of the veteran hunter, the hunters of the Fourth Fleet also saw Logan's figure for the first time, and before they knew it, another group of fanatics had joined those chasing after Logan.
During the rest breaks between battles every day, there were always some people shouting that they needed to do more quests so they could exchange, as soon as possible at the Ancient Tree's quest center, for the Heavenly Scale that Logan shed—something that could serve as a core material for weapons or armor.
Whenever Logan, who occasionally landed on the mobile research base to rest, heard these remarks, he could not help but sigh inwardly: they really were a bunch of adorable tools~
This cleansing lasted for more than half a month. When the last anomaly monster finally fell upon the dried-up wasteland, Logan's mission was at long last fully completed.
The consciousness of nature was like a precise machine that constantly monitored every corner of the New World. In its judgment, the number of dead organisms in the marsh had already reached the necessary level. Even though a few Qurio had luckily escaped the cleansing, that amount was destined to be unable to form any threat.
Of course, the key point was that Nergigante—this unstable factor that actively cultivated Qurio—had already followed the underground currents far away from the marsh. Even now it remained lost in those intricate underground caverns, and no one knew when it would emerge.
As the temperature in the air gradually dropped, rumbling thunder came from afar. Dark clouds, carried by fierce winds, shrouded the marsh.
A long-awaited torrential rain suddenly poured down without the slightest warning. Logan's Sunlight effect had not even faded yet, and the bean-sized raindrops were already hammering mercilessly onto his scales, producing crisp, ringing sounds.
It was obvious that such an anomalous situation definitely had not formed naturally.
The Flame Rathalos, which disliked rain, raised its head to look at the churning clouds. Now that it had reached the level of a genuine Elder-Dragon-class monster, it no longer feared an Elder Dragon like the Kushala Daora, and was just about to let out a dragon roar toward the clouds—
When a silhouette, like a dragon and like a serpent, continuously stirring the clouds, with two golden horns extending backward atop its head, appeared for an instant within the flash of lightning.
The Flame Rathalos' voice halted abruptly. It silently closed its mouth and quickly flew into a natural stone cave not far away.
There was nothing it could do—its impression of that figure was simply far too deep.
Back in the Old World, that being had once caused a flood in the small volcanic region where the Flame Rathalos lived—it was a terrifying existence.
If the Flame Rathalos felt reverence toward Logan, then toward the being within the clouds, it felt fear—fear etched into its very bones!
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