Chris not only failed to kill Daniel, he somehow got killed by his own move.
The dozen or so mercs, thieves, and bounty hunters left totally fell apart.
"Run! He's a monster!"
"Move! Don't block me, I don't want to die!"
"Damn it! That old witch tricked us! Her intel was all wrong!"
Eric looked at the shattered Mad War Mercenary Group and those beasts that gave off a savage vibe, especially the boy who was smiling at him, and he finally knew how bad this was.
Taking this job was straight-up asking for death!
"Fall back!" Eric roared and took off running. He was a brute, not an idiot!
But Daniel was ready, and he wasn't about to let them get away.
"You think you can come and go as you want? Did you ask my beasts?" Daniel gave a cold smile and used beast speech to give the final order. "Kill! Don't let a single one get away!"
Abraham slipped into the night, weaving through the fleeing enemies, his razor claws and fangs taking lives nonstop.
The ground-dwelling scaled beast dove into the earth and kept raising spikes from the ground with Max's power, piercing the enemies in its path.
The griffin circled above and guided the beasts to box in the Mad War Mercenary Group, and it grabbed any merc who was alone, flew high, and dropped him hard.
With the berserk bloodline healing him, Alexander's wounds started to close.
After a short rest, it saw the three beasts going wild and jumped back into the fight.
Each swing of its huge bear paws could take a life, yet its eyes never left Daniel.
"Don't come over, don't come over, I don't want to die!" A thief who was surrounded kept backing up, and when he had nowhere to go, he dropped to his knees and begged, "Don't kill me, I still have kids and an old mother to feed!"
Daniel didn't stop. He looked calmly at the thief who was crying and said with a sneer, "When you guys decided to 'kill the men, steal everything, and mess with the women,' did you ever think they were innocent and didn't want to die?"
"I... I..." The thief went pale and could not get a word out. It wasn't that he knew he was wrong. He knew he was going to die.
"Since you chose this road and loved the thrill of doing evil, you should be ready to die anytime." Daniel waved his hand and kept walking.
Abraham got it, flashed behind the thief, bit through his throat, and gave him a quick end.
In the end, only Eric, a fifth-level berserker with solid skill and lots of battle experience, was left alive from the whole Mad War Mercenary Group.
The giant axe in his hands had several chips, he had no unbroken skin anywhere, and his dark red armor was in shreds.
"Kid... what are you, really?" Eric gripped his giant axe, panting hard, his eyes full of frustration, and asked, "With this kind of power... why are you in a town this remote?"
Daniel didn't answer Eric's question. Instead, he backed up a few meters and signaled the four beasts to close in.
The four beasts who got the order circled Eric and trapped him, but they didn't move again. They waited for Daniel's command.
"Who I am doesn't matter at all!" Daniel said calmly. "What matters is that scum like you and those nobles on their high thrones should die! I'll kill you all, one by one!"
"Hahaha!" Eric burst out laughing like he'd heard the funniest joke. "Just you? There are countless guys like me in the whole Elden Kingdom, and nobles are everywhere in this country. Can you kill them all?"
Hearing that, Daniel's eyes went cold. "Can't kill them all?"
Then he suddenly laughed, his eyes full of madness. "Then I'll lead a beast army to wipe out cities and lands, and kill until there's no more oppression in this world!"
"Maniac! You're a total maniac!" Eric roared. He felt fear, a kind he hadn't felt even when he once faced a fifth-level Berserk Iron Bull alone. The world was about to change.
"Maybe." Daniel nodded, still calm. "I just wanted a quiet life. You drove me mad."
After he said that, Daniel turned to leave, and the four raging beasts pounced on Eric at the same time.
Even as a fifth-level berserker, facing two fourth-level, one third-level, and one second-level beasts who had awakened the berserk bloodline, he only lasted three minutes before he was torn to pieces.
With Eric's death, the whole Mad War Mercenary Group was wiped out.
The once peaceful and quiet White Cloud Town now had only Daniel and his four beasts standing on a battlefield full of bodies.
[System prompt: the beasts' berserk bloodline has calmed. Phrase on cooldown: 23:59:59]
The red light on the four beasts faded. Their bodies went back to their normal size. Their eyes cleared up. The way they looked at Daniel was even more full of awe.
Daniel carefully checked Alexander's wounds. Luckily, that arrow didn't hit a vital spot. With the berserk bloodline's healing and the life force Akasha left, the wound had already started to close.
"Alexander, if anything feels bad, tell me right away," Daniel said, rubbing Alexander's head.
"Roar—" Alexander growled low, then stood up and patted his belly. He meant: he was fine, just hungry.
Daniel finally let out the breath he was holding. He rubbed Alexander's head with a small laugh. You really don't worry much.
Then Daniel had the four beasts start cleaning the battlefield. These mercs, thieves, and bounty hunters were super poor, or they wouldn't have rushed in first. But their weapons and gear were pretty good. He could collect them. Maybe he'd need them soon.
More important, Daniel got a key piece of info from their talk—the Governor's office put out a Governor's Order and a bounty notice. That meant not only mercenary groups would come. The guards would join in too.
At this rate, trouble would keep coming soon.
Daniel sorted the info in his head and thought about his next move.
Right when Daniel fell into deep thought, Max suddenly let out a sharp alarm, pointing toward the distant Beast Mountains.
Daniel looked in the direction Max pointed, and a few dark shapes quickly disappeared into the sea of trees; even though they flashed by, Daniel still felt a dangerous vibe from them.
Daniel's alarm bells went off, but he didn't act rashly, because Chris's weird death kept them from figuring out his strength, and he was in the open while they were in the dark, so the best plan was: if they don't move, I don't move.
"Abraham, can you find their trail?" Daniel didn't use beast speech this time and asked through the mental link.
Abraham sniffed the air, then sent a message through the mental link to Daniel, and the gist was: the area is full of our scent and the Mad War Mercenary Group's scent, and there's no scent from a third party.
This meant the other side had done something special to avoid being found by his beasts, and they were only watching in secret without making a move, which showed they were careful and professional.
This was a tough opponent, which was trouble.
Daniel started weighing his own strength, and the system had already triggered Emergency Mode and couldn't be used again for a while, so he had one less life-saving option.
Rampage Mode hadn't been used yet and could be used once in a deadly crisis, but the price was too high, since the system would sleep for three days and Phrase couldn't be called during those three days.
The Phrases he still had were: God-Level Affinity, Dragon Emperor's Heart, Berserk Bloodline, and Dragon Roar to the Sky.
God-Level Affinity had already been used on the Max and the griffin, and this Phrase didn't work on people; Berserk Bloodline was on cooldown, with [22:45:36] left, so he couldn't use it now.
Then that left Dragon Emperor's Heart and Dragon Roar to the Sky.
[Dragon Emperor's Heart. Effect: All beasts respect you, and it puts pressure straight into their souls. Beasts within ten kilometers get obedience +300%, and it can be used once per day.]
[Dragon Roar to the Sky. Effect: Summon a huge dragon phantom that suppresses all non-dragon creatures and causes a soul shock. Note: cooldown is eight hours.]
Right then, hoofbeats came again from far away, and it wasn't one or two horses but a big group of horses!
"Looks like they think they already got me," Daniel said with a smile, then a flash of madness passed through his eyes, "So let's go big and see who makes it out alive!"