Chapter 159. The hunt 4

The third group moved deeper into a region. Unlike the areas where the other two groups had perished, this area was only full of dense tropical trees. Skyscrapers had been buried beneath the forest floor.

The group looked ahead. Ahead of them was a dense, eerie forest filled with towering green trees. The leaves were thick. The silence here was heavy and suffocating.

This was the main squad, led by the overall team leader—a formidable advanced rank 3 warrior—along with his most experienced operatives.

"Stay on high alert," the team leader said, as wooden arrows floated across his figure. He had the wood affinity.

"Team one and team two have completely lost contact. Something is very wrong," the team leader said.

"Leader, look at this terrain," one of the advanced rank 3 operatives said, scanning the lush green trees. "The temperature here is normal. There is no fog, no ice, and no signs of marshland."

"Don’t let your guard down," the team leader said. "Zone zero is unpredictable. The corpses of chaotic beasts that led us here belonged into intermediate rank 3 chaotic beasts. Either a very powerful advanced rank 3 chaotic beast hiding here killed them, or an intermediate rank 3 chaotic beast hiding here killed them. If we manage to get rid of them, we will hasten the success of our mission. But you have a point, something is off about this place. Everyone ready the expert and legendary rank 3 poisons and stay alert."

Everyone nodded quietly and did as the team leader commanded. Several vials appeared in the hands of five of the intermediate rank 3 warriors.

"Maybe we should turn around. My instincts are telling me being here is not a good thing," the team leader said.

Back in Aiden’s hiding spot, a glint flashed in his eyes. They wanted to turn back? That was not happening.

Beneath the corpses of some chaotic beasts in the vicinity, the poison vials of Aiden moved. The tiny crimson threads crushed the poisons. A transparent gas spread across the place. The five intermediate rank 3 warriors lost their balance as they inhaled the poison. They could not see, smell or feel anymore. What the hell was happening? Suddenly, their skins turned greenish as they fell on the ground. Their eyes lost signs of life. They were dead. Aiden’s microscopic crimson threads covertly snapped towards the expert and legendary rank 3 poisons in their dead hands and crushed them. Right after that, the microscopic threads disappeared.

The team leader and the other operatives turned back.

What they saw left them shocked.

The five operatives lay dead on the ground.

The team leader and the remaining four operatives saw the poison vials were empty.

"These fuckers... they crushed the vials? Shit, we are all gonna die. The poisons are spreading towards us, head deeper."

The team leader and the remaining four operatives headed deeper into the forest with extreme speed. If they turn back, the gaseous expert and legendary rank 3 poisons will kill them.

"It worked," Aiden nodded.

He had baited the team leader to change his decision about turning back.

The five operatives furthered deeper into the green forest, keeping a tight, defensive formation. They navigated through tree trunks with effortless coordination and reflexes.

Little did they know, Aiden was watching them from his base of operations.

This forest was not a safe haven. It was the most dangerous zone in the entire region. The towering green trees surrounding the squad were not plants at all. They were terrifying expert, and legendary rank 3 chaotic beasts that possessed flawless camouflage abilities.

They stood completely still, blending so perfectly into the environment as green predators that anyone looking at them would think they were just looking at normal trees.

The squad marched further into the center of the woods.

"My comms are completely dead," an operative said, tapping his earpiece. "All of a sudden."

"Mine too," the scout said. He stopped near a large, thick tree trunk to inspect his radar. "The signal is completely blocked by these thick trees."

As the scout reached out his hand to brace himself against the tree trunk, the bark suddenly twitched.

Gulp!

The "tree trunk" opened a massive, hidden vertical maw. The maw was full of razor sharp translucent teeth.

Before the scout could even scream, the predatory beast snapped its jaws shut around his entire body.

Crunch!

Blood squirted across the green moss as the beast swallowed the scout whole. It pulled his legs into its bark-like body before returning to a completely motionless, tree-like state.

"Scout!" the team leader yelled in shock. "What happened?!"

"The tree! The tree ate him!" an intermediate rank 3 warrior screamed as he scrambled backwards.

Suddenly, the silence of the green forest ceased.

All around them, the towering green "trees" began to move. Dozens of terrifying expert, and legendary rank 3 chaotic beasts uncoiled their camouflaged bodies. Their leaves transformed into razor-sharp green tendrils.

Their trunks split open. The trunks revealed hungry eyes and massive maws.

"It’s an ambush! They aren’t trees!" the team leader shouted in pure horror. "Form a circle! Activate all affinities. Shit! I knew there was something off about this place."

The operatives frantically tried to channel their worldly energy, unleashing flames, lightning, water, ice, earth affinity attacks to defend themselves.

However, the rank and power of these green predators were far too high. A legendary rank 3 chaotic beast launched a thick, vine-like limb through the air with terrifying speed.

Thwack!

The strike smashed through one intermediate rank 3 warrior at once. The strike smashed through her battlesuit, tore through her flesh and broke through her spine instantly.

A dull thud resounded as her dead body fell on the ground.

"Argh!"

"Help me!"

Chaos broke out as the expert and legendary rank 3 beasts launched attacks from all directions. Green tendrils wrapped around the operatives’ necks and limbs, snapping bones and dragging them toward waiting maws.

The forest floor quickly turned into a gruesome slaughterhouse as human limbs and torn battlesuits were scattered across the bloody grass.

"Retreat! Break through!" the team leader screamed with an expression of fear on his face.

The wooden arrows floating across him shot towards the chaotic beasts. However, it was futile. He was an advanced rank 3 warrior and the creatures were expert and legendary rank 3 chaotic beasts. What could his attack do to them?

The chaotic beasts snorted. These humans were really naive. Did they think they could just come here, breeze their way through and leave the area? Not when they had not tasted human meat in a long while. Especially that of those humans who called themselves warriors. Their meat could help beasts grow stronger. Their meat was also very tasty.

Beside the team leader, the last remaining rank 3 operative tried to use aerial maneuvering to escape as he formed a beam of flames beneath his feet to propel himself upwards.

However, a massive, legendary rank 3 green predator above opened its giant maw and bit down directly from above.

Snap!

The operative was bitten clean in half mid-air.

His lower half fell onto the ground with a wet thud.

The team leader stood alone in the center of the bloody forest, surrounded by dozens of towering, green monstrous beasts. His worldly energy was completely drained. He was completely spent.

Cold sweat mixed with blood dripped down his face as the terrifying realization finally hit him.

Team one hadn’t failed by mistake. Team two hadn’t failed by mistake. The natural hazards and apex beasts of zone zero had completely wiped out their operation.

"This place, zone zero is... is a complete death trap," the team leader whispered in pure despair, looking up into the canopy.

A legendary rank 3 green predator slammed its massive, wood-like claw down directly onto the team leader, crushing him into a mixture of half flesh half bloody paste.

Within just a few minutes, all operatives of group three were dead.

3 kilometers away in his base of operations, Aiden observed the bloody forest through his setup with calm, indifferent eyes. He absorbed the blood essence of the corpses of the dead operatives spread across the forest floor before the chaotic beasts gobbled the corpses up and returned into camouflaged trees.

After that he formed crimson hands with his blood and brought all the corpses of the groups of the team and the chaotic beasts spread across the place whose blood essence he had not absorbed, into a three kilometer radius. The chaotic beasts were numerous, all rank 3 chaotic beasts, ranging from beginner to advanced rank 3 chaotic beasts.

He absorbed the blood essence of all the creatures. After that, he sent the corpses of the warriors into swamps, burying them completely.

The crimson hands turned into blobs of blood and returned into him.

"I don’t think this plan will keep working as I intended. The next team will adapt after two elite teams died. Most likely Cyrenthia Empire military Command will run a live surveillance com to observe the situation here directly and give them active commands on how to navigate this place," Aiden thought. "The higher ups must be more experienced. They will figure out that someone is manipulating the terrain to kill their operatives. Since that’s the case, I can’t keep hiding any longer. I need to leave this place and actively fight chaotic beasts, kill them and absorb their blood essence, break into beginner rank 3 before the next team arrives and leave the southern continent. By the time they realise I am the one behind the deaths of their operatives and place a kill target on me, I will be completely gone."

Aiden decided.