Chapter 521: Ancient Ruins Expedition 1

Garen took a deep breath, Phiroth's death in the fight was beyond his expectations. According to the original timeline, the battle between Hellgate and Phiroth should have lasted a little while longer. He didn't expect it to end this quick.

Phiroth was a king stronger Cthulhu King, and was a king that was closer to exceeding his limits. One could say that aside from Hellgate, he was the strongest in the world. At least that was what shown in the original timeline.

It's not that Garen had never thought about working with him, unfortunately, the plan was to be executed after he found the Living Secret Technique, but he didn't expect Hellgate to push his actions forward by this much.

"Now everything can no longer be referenced off the original timeline, the changes are getting more drastic..." Garen made new estimates in his heart.

Coming back, there was still a dark archaeological site in front of him, after separating with the other two people, he then wandered to his right alone.

There was a faint blue light in the air within the site.

Garen stood in the middle of a narrow, cuboid tunnel. Darkness enveloped him and the front and back of the class; all around him were black walls that had a slightly rough texture.

After touching the wall on his right, an ice cold, coarse sensation travelled from his fingers.

Garen frowned slightly. His faint red iris turned black suddenly, and the fusion power in his body started circulating. He tried to accumulate some water to be spread around for reconnaissance, but once the large fusion power hit the outside word, it immediately dispersed, as though it never happened.

"Indeed, fusion power is limited here. Then, Nine-Headed Hydra ability is obviously suppressed too, not having nine lives is indeed troublesome. What about this?"

He started circulating his vital energy quickly. His skin turned blood red and diminished in an instant.

"My aura is also suppressed, looks like we can only use my normal physical power."

Garen knew his advantages. He had possessed special abilities, and his body had already reached its limits. He is much stronger and quicker than a newly advanced Form 5.

However,, Divine God Palace Master and Cthulhu King have always been slowly strengthening themselves through fusion through the years, they had also have reached their body's limits. Compared to them, this wasn't an advantage, but something to level the playing fields.

Whereas Divine God Palace Master, who was not human, would very likely to have even stronger physique. Even though he looked like someone who focused on agility, he needed to remain prepared.

In an instant, Garen had prepared for the subsequent scenarios, and he continued advancing.

He did not intend to mask his footsteps.

His crisp footfalls kept revertabrating throughout the faint blue tunnel, echoing back and forth.

It was just as foggy ahead of him. Garen couldn't see anything, but he didn't have the need to. Just by the sound, he could clearly judge the rough topography ahead of him.

As he walked straight ahead, Garen detected the slight downward inclination of the tunnel. As he continued walking down, he would most likely reach underground.

***********

A few days went by.

In the dark corridor, Garen rested by leaning against the wall, a white hand extended beneath the black robe, eating the wheat biscuits with meat bit by bit.

He ate quickly, it only took ten-odd seconds for him to gobble down a palm-sized biscuit. After three of them, Garen took out a black metal bottle, and gulped a large gulp of water, then took out a tissue to clean his mouth and sweep away the crumbs to the ground.

"It's been eight days..." Garen mumbled, he took out a red button, the dark red on top of it now had green patterns. He then carefully kept it again. He then tidied his garments and then continued walking.

His footsteps continued bouncing off the hallway, and this sound had been his only company for days.

A left cornering appeared in front of him. Garen walked along it, and the path widened after the curve.

An arched round hall appeared before him.

The hall was empty, and the walls on both sides were covered with coarse, blurred paintings. Its contents could not be determined; all that was left was a blueish-black smudge.

Directly opposite the tunnel was a giant black arched wall, on top of it was an image of a man, alongside many crescent moons, surrounded by a blood-colored frame.

The entire hall seemed simple, but Garen's face showed a hint of relaxation.

"I'm finally here."

He walked into the hall and headed for the wall ahead of him and gently touched it.

Bzzz.....

A strong vibration was transmitted from his hand onto the crescent moon on the wall, Garen's eyes turned black, and the fusion power of his Form 5 surged into the moon like tidal waves.

Time seemed to pass by slowly. After half an hour, Garen released his hands.

With a crisp tap, a small stone drawer bounced out from beneath the crescent moon, and there was a hexagonal button inside it.

Garen slapped the drawer with force.

Pap!

The drawer went into the wall again.

Garen's eyes had also quickly returned its original red hue. He took out the button and tapped it a few times, a third green pattern appeared on it.

"Then, I should take the original route." he turned around and began walking as he followed the plan.

Upon leaving the hall and reentering the tunnel, Garen suddenly realized that at the original corner, there appeared an additional junction.

It was originally a cornering, but now it became a T-junction. Leading into the right tunnel was nothing but darkness, not even the faint blue light.

Garen stopped, then walked directly into it.

That tunnel was even flatter, except the environment was much dustier, making it slightly hard to breathe.

Garen touched his way down this tunnel, hence his speed was severely impacted. As he just entered, a strong feeling of purity could be felt in the atmosphere.

This feeling was very odd, it was as though the air he usually breathed in was impeccably polluted.

Comparatively; the air here was much cleaner, even though it was full of dust particles.

After walking in the dark for an unknown amount of time, and even though he couldn't see anything, the echoes off the wall allowed him to regained some speed.

Pap!

Suddenly, Garen stopped moving.

Roar... Suddenly, a deep roar similar to a canine's preemptive attack can be heard.

Fuu!

Suddenly, a strong gust was blown.

In the dark, a large shadow pounced towards Garen, this shadow nearly filled the entirety of the tunnel, standing at almost 3 meters tall and about 4 meters wide, and it had a clear roar.

Garen did not move. With his palm flexed into a knife-hand, he met the attack directly. His knife clashed with the shadow violently, and both of them fell back one step.

Bam!

A deep voice reverberated across the tunnel, then came back with an echo.

Garen was shocked and took two steps back, only regaining his balance with his hind leg stepping on a protrusion on the ground.

He looked serious, and were warily sensing the environment around him.

"Such strong force..."

The shadow disappeared, only the echo of the clash remained.

Garen only felt that as he chopped the opponent, it felt like hitting a piece of sturdy wood. It should have injured part of the opponent's body severely.

He stood in the middle of the tunnel and waited for a while, only relaxing when he felt no movement, and that the opponent seemed to have retreated.

As he squatted to check the floor, there were no signs of the beast at all. The floor still had a thick layer of dust, and it was impossible that any large sized entity had pounced forward.

There were no marks on the floor, nor were there any sigs on the walls surrounding it.

Garen remained unfazed, he stood up and continued walking forward.

He believed that so long as he kept moving, the opponent will surely reappear.

As time passed, he could no longer distinguish the night and day as the tunnel was completely pitch black at all times.

Garen did not light his torch, as this environment did not cause any difficulty to his senses. Instead, the light from the torch would have caused the dark areas to brighten.

Even if the opponent had been living in darkness for an extended period, it is very possible that it's a special sensing ability, he also didn't plan to occupy one arm to bear the torch.

As he walked forward step by step, the second layer was different from the first layer, this place was not explored by Cthulhu King and Divine God Palace Master, hence there was a high danger risk.

A place which stored the Living Secret Technique was definitely not easy to explore

As he advanced warily, Garen did not notice two slim black needles ahead of him at all, they were dangling mid-air, aimed straight at his eyes, if he kept moving, they would no doubt pierce his pupils.

The black needles got closer and closer to Garen's eyes.

Pap!

Garen suddenly stopped moving forward, and remained at his position. The black needles were no more than ten centimeters away from his eyes, but he hadn't noticed at all, as though he were blind.

Suddenly, a large hand slapped the needles away, and carried a force equivalent from before before it was hammered into Garen's face.

Bam!

Garen got hammered and hit back several meters. He was knocked onto an angled wall and hugged his head while his right hand firmly grabbed onto the two needles. The tip of the needle was moments away from stabbing him blind.

Roar!

A deafening howl similar to a wolf's can be heard, a large black silhouette pounced towards Garen once again, this time with a gust even more violent, as though a rolling boulder came crashing towards Garen.

The entire tunnel quaked alongside the howl, the floor rattled lightly, the dust in the tunnel got thicker as well. The dust gathered into a thick dust fog due to the quake.

The giant shadow was extremely agile, just as the sound came to him, it almost got within a half metre from Garen, seemingly able to pounced on Garen instantaneously.

At this time, Garen lifted his right leg and sidestepped, his other leg spun and drew out a curve, and

Accurately sailed towards the top of the shadow.

Both his legs connected.

The entire shadow was clamped by Garen's legs, and with that Garen pulled them back with force, through his waist, hips, palm, and then his palms, it then hit onto the rock walls on the tunnel.

Bam!

The rock walls then got imprinted with two palms.

Garen used both hands as a leverage, both his legs clamped the shadow that felt like an ice cold wire gauze. He scoffed, and then unleashed his full power, the limit on the body's power then exploded, and smashed the shadow down violently.

Bam! Bam! Bam Bam!

With four continuous smashing, the shadow let out a painful moan. It then disappeared, turning into a cold breeze of air and dispersed.