Chapter 264. A Masterclass in redirection

"Since they plan on sending us into the trap, how about we bring the trap to them?" Aiden thought.

"You mean you want to bring the beginner Rank 4 chaotic beasts blocking the direction to the island here?" Chromium asked.

"Yes," Aiden nodded.

"If you can pull something like that off, then that means we can’t be around when they arrive," Cosmo said.

"Exactly. We will separate ourselves from them and temporarily branch north of here. The chaotic beasts there are all legendary Rank 3 chaotic beasts. If we wear invisibility bracelets for now, they won’t discover us," Aiden said. "But we won’t travel too far. I will use my scouting abilities to observe the direction to the island. The moment the chaotic beasts are lured over here, we will rush there immediately."

"Sounds good."

"Alright."

Everyone nodded.

The plan wasn’t bad.

The phoenix-looking crimson construct branched north of their current location.

The warriors looked at them.

Why were Aiden Vhorn and his team headed away from the current location?

Could it be that they knew something everyone didn’t know?

Murmurs soon started spreading among the Rank 3 warriors.

"What is going on?"

"Are we headed in the right direction?"

"Aiden Vhorn always has a reason for anything he does. I don’t think they just left for no reason."

"That’s true. If you studied things carefully, he left right after asking Triga how far along we were."

"Should we follow them?"

People started doubting and questioning Triga’s direction.

Soon, the murmurs spread to the front of the expedition team.

"We need to do something about this," Triga gnashed his teeth.

"The Crimson Reaper has left," someone said. "He must have figured out something is off. He’s a very sharp person, so it’s possible he has pieced one or two things together."

"That sounds impossible even for him. We have been very covert. But we can’t exclude this possibility. Anyway, even if he has figured something out, he has already left. So, we don’t have to worry about him," another person added.

"That’s true. It’s just that because of his track record, his leaving is sparking insecurities among the rest of the warriors. If we don’t quell these thoughts, they will start leaving too, and it will sabotage our plans," Triga said.

"I will address them," a legendary Rank 3 warrior with her hair tied in a ribbon said.

The warriors from the Serma Empire Warriors Association nodded.

"Alright, go ahead."

"Sure."

She turned to the thousands of Rank 3 warriors.

"Everyone," she said, "Aiden Vhorn left because he just has some personal matters to deal with. We are all embarking on this expedition together. If we lead you all in the wrong direction, won’t we be implicated too?"

Nods and murmurs of agreement spread across the ocean top.

"Yes, that’s true."

"Indeed. If they were leading us in the wrong direction, they would be implicated too."

"That’s true. They have everything to lose for leading us into some sort of trap."

"I guess we were overthinking things."

"Indeed we were."

"Mmm."

The woman turned.

Her colleagues gave her nods of respect.

She really handled the situation well.

****

Somewhere on the ocean.

A group of thirteen people were seated on a large crimson phoenix construct.

The construct glided across the ocean top.

Several legendary Rank 3 sea creatures dived in and out of the water. However, they couldn’t see the group and the affinity construct.

Aiden and company were wearing legendary Rank 3 invisibility bracelets.

"We can pause here," Aiden said.

After that, several blobs of blood appeared before him and morphed into several crimson shark-like constructs.

The crimson shark-like constructs were extremely large.

Several human corpses, numbering in the thousands, appeared out of Aiden’s storage bracelet.

Aiden put them in the hollow mouths of the shark-shaped constructs.

The mouths of the crimson shark-like constructs closed.

The crimson shark-like constructs, which looked extremely lifelike, dived into the ocean depths.

"When the beginner Rank 4 chaotic beasts in the direction which leads to the island smell the odor of the human corpses which are in the mouths of the shark constructs, they will hunt down the shark constructs—which they will think are chaotic beasts—for the human corpses. Then, I will control the shark constructs to lure the beginner Rank 4 chaotic beasts to where the Rank 3 warriors are. The moment the beginner Rank 4 chaotic beasts leave the place leading to the island, we will rush over there and head to the island while they are busy killing the warriors," Aiden said with clinical calmness.

Everyone nodded. But they looked at him with sighs.

This guy was really dangerous if you were not in his circle.

Not that they were any different. Endra was a brutal world where wimpy morals could get one killed. It was just that Aiden was on another level when it came to going to extreme extents to get what he wanted.

"You are really dangerous."

"No wonder some of your enemies self-detonated themselves."

Aiden shook his head at their comments.

"If you guys didn’t have a similar mindset, we wouldn’t be friends in the first place," Aiden said.

The group couldn’t refute that.

"We never said we are saints."

"Fuck off."

"Hehe."

*****

Somewhere on the ocean.

Several beginner Rank 4 chaotic beasts were gallivanting in and out of the ocean.

They were very large. One looked like a giant squid. It had lots of black goo spewing out of its body.

Another looked like a giant catfish. Wherever it passed, several weaker chaotic beasts would melt into ashes because of the green liquid that came out of its mouth.

Another looked like a giant sea turtle. Ice danced across its scales.

Several beginner Rank 4 chaotic beasts were also here. Each of them was sentient and terrifying.

Each of them was as large as a mountain on land.

Each of them was going about its business.

Suddenly, glints of intelligence flashed through the eyes of the chaotic beasts.

They saw several red sharks gallivanting past their location.

But the sharks were not their focus.

It was what they smelled from the bodies of the sharks.

Why was the aroma so sweet?

The sea turtle made some animalistic sounds to the others, drawing their attention to the fact that the smell was similar to that of those humans from the sect which fell several hundreds of years ago on the island ahead.

Did that mean the sharks had captured human meat?

How long had it been since they tasted human meat?

Human meat was the dream delicacy of chaotic beasts, especially that of the ones who were warriors. Eating their meat could make them grow stronger.

Glints of greed and euphoria flashed through the eyes of the beginner Rank 4 chaotic beasts.

The colossal creatures caused waves to rise and fall as they chased after the sharks. They had to kill these sharks and take the human meat the sharks were carrying for themselves.

Little did they know that the sharks were leading them to the meal of a lifetime.