"Lord Rykard's orders?" Ghiza seemed to hesitate.
"What? You don't believe me? Do I need to provide proof?" Raven took a step forward.
"No," Ghiza lowered the wheel saw. "Since you are indeed Lord Rykard's brother—"
Ghiza's hand snapped up, a short bolt firing from a hidden sleeve crossbow. Unbeknownst to him, Raven had acted even faster. Tensing the muscles in his hand, Raven squeezed a spray of blood from his wounds directly toward Ghiza's eyes, matching his treachery with a surprise of his own.
Blinded by blood!
Raven jerked his head to the side, the cold groove of the bolt grazing his ear. He had a poisoned throwing knife ready between his fingers, but just as he was about to throw, a massive rush of wind whistled behind him, carrying a foul, reptilian stench.
Raven's expression finally changed. He bent his knees, attempting to trigger a Hound's Step. However, he was not the Bloodhound Knight Flo; his simulated technique was nowhere near as refined as the original's. Before he could phase out, a cavernous, bloody maw clamped down and swallowed him whole.
The Man-Serpent that had been put to sleep by the pot had woken up at some point. Its neck had extended over ten meters, and it had gulped Raven down in a single bite.
Ghiza let out a series of sharp hisses through his lips and walked forward, shouldering his wheel saw.
"Didn't see that coming, did you! In a battle of wits, you are still no match for me! The chance to flay a demigod doesn't come often. I'll be sure to handle you with care."
"You dare kill me?" Raven's dying voice echoed from within the serpent's throat.
"Rykard will never know what happened to you. Only you, me, and this serpent are here. The Man-Serpents' linguistic functions have mutated; they only understand simple commands in the serpent tongue. They can't comprehend our conversation, and they certainly don't know who you are."
"I've already told this serpent not to chew you up," Ghiza said with a gleeful grin. "I'm going to skin you and turn you into a Man-Serpent as well. Rykard's own brother serving as a serpentine soldier... how delightfully ironic— What!"
The serpent's mouth suddenly snapped open, and a dagger plunged like a lightning bolt into Ghiza's heart. Raven lunged forward with the speed of the wind, his gaze sharp and piercing—not a trace of a dying man remained.
Dropping the wheel saw, Ghiza clamped both hands onto Raven's wrist, and the two locked in a desperate struggle of strength.
Ghiza bared his teeth, the intact half of his mouth twisted into a distorted smile. He hissed again, calling for the Man-Serpent to help.
The shadow of the serpent's maw loomed over them once more, but Ghiza's smile froze.
"Oh... damn it."
He only managed that single sentence before his upper body was swallowed by the snake.
A series of shrill, agonizing screeches came from within the serpent's throat, followed by the sickening sound of countless bones being crushed. All that remained on the ground was Ghiza's lower half, spurting blood. It swayed for a moment before collapsing powerlessly into the dirt.
"Pah!" The Man-Serpent jerked its head, spitting out Ghiza's mangled remains.
"Thank you for the help." Raven took a cautious step back. This strange serpent had held him in its mouth without applying any pressure, and had even created the opening for him to ambush Ghiza. Its allegiance was inscrutable.
The serpent reared up, revealing a creamy-white belly covered in scales. It slithered toward Raven, its tail twitching. Raven watched as it extended a skeletal claw and flicked its purple, forked tongue. In a hissing, hollow voice, it forced out two syllables.
Raven froze.
The Man-Serpent repeated the two syllables.
"Are you... Rudy?" Raven asked. "How did you become— Why are you even here?"
The serpent nodded, speaking with a bizarre accent: "At the Manor... I smelled the blood of our kin on Ghiza. When I questioned him... I was taken."
"Alright, I understand. I came to—" Raven hesitated for a heartbeat before continuing, "I came to rescue you. we need to get out of here quickly. We can talk about everything else later."
He stepped forward and took the serpent's claw, but Rudy didn't move. He simply lowered his head. "I fear... we cannot leave."
A series of heavy thuds echoed from all directions, followed by a rising chorus of hisses.
"Before he died, Ghiza woke them all," Rudy said.
"We're surrounded." Raven scanned the perimeter. In the darkness, countless pairs of glowing red eyes appeared.
"Move!"
Raven snatched up Ghiza's Wheel and sprinted toward the largest, thickest mushroom stalk. He had only run a few steps vertically up the stem when the sheer weight of the saw pulled his upper body backward, forcing him to flip and land back on the ground.
"Damn it, it's too heavy," Raven hissed through grit teeth. Ghiza's Wheel weighed at least half a ton. Even if the Ringleader of the Black Knives were here in person, they wouldn't be able to run vertically while carrying this thing.
The light of Glintstone magic glowed in his hand as he pressed it against the stalk, intending to climb the old-fashioned way. But just then, the weight on his shoulder vanished. Rudy had reached out and clamped the wheel saw in his jaws.
"Good! Keep up with me!" Raven sprinted up the stalk again. Rudy's serpentine body coiled around the stem, slithering upward at a speed that nearly matched Raven's.
In just thirty seconds, the two had surged hundreds of meters high, reaching the underside of the mushroom cap.
"Brace me!" Raven barked, leaping toward Rudy's head.
Rudy instantly grasped Raven's intent. He thrust his head upward to catch Raven's feet, using his neck muscles to heave him toward the ceiling.
Kneeling on Rudy's flat head, Raven grabbed the wheel saw from the serpent's mouth. He flipped the switch and stood tall, swinging the weapon in a wide, sweeping arc.
The mushroom's density far exceeded that of ordinary wood, but against the wheel, it was like paper. Massive chunks of the fungal cap fell away, and Raven quickly carved out a hole nearly eight meters deep.
Finally, a glimmer of red light broke through from above. Raven put more strength into his strike, finally puncturing the entire cap. He leaped through the opening, seeing the clouds above the dome reflecting the magma lake, glowing a deep, blood-red.
He turned off the saw and lowered it back through the hole, letting Rudy bite onto it.
"Hold on tight!" Raven gripped the handle of the saw and hauled backward with all his might, like he was in a tug-of-war. Rudy's serpentine body twisted in the hole, his limbs scrambling against the walls, until Raven finally dragged him out.
Raven exhaled sharply and looked out into the distance. "We're at the highest point of the forest now. If we time our route right, we can run across the caps to get out of the forest. Rudy, we—"
He suddenly stopped.
Below them, countless mushroom caps reflected the blood-red sky like a sea of Equinox flowers, stretching endlessly into the distance. Man-Serpents were crawling up from the edges of the caps, gathering in a dark, swarming mass, their long necks craned toward the cap where Raven stood.
The sound of hissing rose from every direction. For a fleeting moment, Raven felt as if he were trapped inside a boiling kettle, with the cavern dome serving as the red-hot lid.
He looked around. There weren't just hundreds of Man-Serpents—there were thousands.
"So many of them," Raven whispered to himself.
"The entire forest has been awakened," Rudy hissed. "What will you do?"
"Good question." Raven flipped the switch on the wheel saw. "I'm going to carve a path of blood!"
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Elden Ring: The Unborn One's Journey Through Elden Ring(155 Chapter - Ongoing)
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