Hey, I was the one that was actually hurt!
To think I actually thought that you guys had a human side and weren’t all cold blooded animals, I was such an idiot! If a human couple ever had a situation where one side feared the other, the most that would happen was domestic violence or a divorce.
You guys actually ate your husband and even put on a [I’ve been wronged] expression…in all my three lifetimes, I’ve never seen such a shameless display. Today, I’ve finally learnt something new.
This brother finally understands, for an honor student like me, there’s simply no way to communicate with these medusas. We aren’t even on the same page, the same dimension…
The mission to rescue Harlow was one that required speed, and so the only people we had all together were namely me, Habona, Majosha and Manasha. With the slowest being me, Habona picked me up without a second thought and carried me all the way. On her sides, the two medusas slithered along, keeping pace with the anxious werewolf without much difficulty.
Roughly half a day of sprinting later, we arrived at the spot where Harlow was kidnapped. There was no signs of blood or corpses nearby but judging from the remaining murderous aura, a battle had definitely happened here recently.
Violet Snow had mentioned that the patrolling undead were essentially the janitors of the Prison of the Dead. This must’ve been their handiwork.
I had to admit these hardworking fellows were truly model workers. They toiled tirelessly without rest or respite to maintain the cleanliness of this massive maze despite of the constant battles.
In my opinion, the Prison of the Dead was just a giant arena where countless organisms including the undead, lived together, fought against each other and suppressed each other. Every day was a bloody affair for the residents here and while this might seem like a meaningless endeavor, it helped to maintain the life of these lowly life forms.
In actuality, not everyone here could evolve into a four-star. After all, the issue of talent existed here as well. An analogy would be human society, while there were resources available for people to cultivate, not everyone had the talent to reach four-star. Instead, the majority would be stuck at one to two-star, doomed to be fodder on the battlefield. The best they could hope to achieve was being a squad leader of 10.
Going back to the matter of my subordinates, under normal circumstances, we should’ve had a large number of two-stars by now, given the amount of battles and food they’ve consumed. However, we had less than 10 two-stars as of now, and as for three-star, not even one of them showed any sign of evolving anytime soon.
This was an issue of talent, if they weren’t talented enough, no amount of hard work would allow them to escape the fate of being cannon fodder.
With this in mind, the rule which allowed a four-star to leave unhindered was a problematic one. While it wasn’t impossible to achieve, only the few sitting atop this bloody pyramid could get to enjoy this privilege.
“Hey, don’t just stand, start singing, quick!” She roughly lowered me onto the floor, which forcibly interrupted my ruminations and brought me back to reality.
Ah, I went off track again…
I shook my head and gazed at Habona: “What should I do now?”
“Sing. Any song will do.” She hurried me, sounding more impatient than before. “Harpies are jealous creatures; having someone sing better than them is the one thing they can’t stand. As long as you sing well, those despicable birds will appear.”
“If that’s the case, I’ll just sing that previous song, *cough cough* mhm.” I cleared my throat with a light cough and immersed myself in the lyrics once more:
Turn on the lights, the scene in front of my eyes
The spacious room, the lonely bed
Turn off the lights, it’s all the same
The wound in my heart, unable to be shared
…
…
As the last words left my mouth, there were still no signs of the harpies anywhere.
I opened my eyes, waking up from the sorrowful trance: “Where are the harpies?”
“They’re probably too far away to hear you.” Majosha’s face fell as she shook her head. A strange sight occurred as her head swung from left to right, the little snake heads at the end of her hair actually shook their heads in tandem with her.
“They were definitely here recently. Their scent is still strong amidst the smell of battle.” Habona furrowed her brows as she looked around. “ Perhaps we are simply just too far from their nest. Why don’t we change locations?”
“They flew off in that direction with Harlow.” Majosha took the lead as she slithered off. A few hundred meters and a few patrols later, we came upon some crossroads. As there were traces of the harpies’ scent on all three routes, Habona was unable to determine which way they took and so it fell onto me to try once more.
Without much choice, I began singing once more, this time, I chose a happier song. While it wasn’t as moving as the previous song, it had an energetic feel to its beat. Even the two worrywarts were infected with its energy and began swaying to the rhythm. Clearly , they enjoyed the song as well.
Manasha even tried to learn a few lines from me but unfortunately her voice was slightly on the impaired side…she sounded like a siren, a siren who could kill with just her voice.
Seeing it fail to attract the harpies, I tried a different style of song but the result was still the same.
Our brows tightened as we faced the same dilemma once more. With three choices to choose from, the likelihood of choosing the right one was low. While there was still some time before Harlow gets drained completely and loses his will, it might be time for us to take this risky gamble.
Even though she had faith in Harlow’s mental fortitude, Majosha couldn’t help but cry as the thought of potentially losing her lover wrecked her heart. At the side, Habona busied herself with sniffing the surroundings once more, hoping to get a better lock on Harlow’s scent.
However, the harpies’ scent were too strong and ended up overwhelming Harlow’s scent. Even with their sensitive noses, such a cacophony of scents wasn’t an easy mass to dissect.
In the end, we had no choice but to try my songs once more, praying that we were close enough to attract the harpies. If it failed once more, we would have no choice but to try our luck.
“By the way, why did you all capture Harlow? Was his genes that superior?” I suddenly blurted out an irrelevant and seemingly useless question.
“What’s genes?” Majosha turned towards me with a curious look having never heard of this term before.
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