C492 Stain
The tension of the battlefield fell on Khan, but he felt something different in that symphony. Animals and plants experienced emotions differently, and the colors in Khan's eyes reflected that.
The trees conveyed a primordial vibe. Khan found no reason in that symphony. Only lingering aggression and wariness existed in that environment, and he became their main attraction.
Khan could also feel how the many hidden eyes were disregarding the jeep and the pilot. Everything was on him, and only one explanation existed for that instinctive behavior.
'They know I'm the main threat,' Khan understood as the jeep dived deeper into the trees.
Reports couldn't match the magic of Abora's environment. The trees' pale-brown trunks stood tall and straight, even if they gave off flexible vibes. All kinds of plants encircled them, assaulting Khan's eyes with green, purple, and yellow colors.
Flowers with odd and uncommon shapes grew from bushes or directly from the ground. Transparent drops rested on their petals or leaves, showing how the rain could pierce the thick crowns above.
A prevalent wetness that the incoming rains were bound to intensify also filled the area, and the ground reflected that. Dark-green mud splashed in every direction when the jeep's tires ran over it, creating slimy puddles all around that path.
The jeep's tires tried to cover that swampy forest's sounds, but nothing escaped Khan's ears. The environment's hissing, chirping, croaking, and buzzing were constant and overwhelming. Abora was a breathing and living planet, and the outpost's presence couldn't tame its wild aspects.
Khan couldn't help but feel invigorated. He had spent so long inside space stations or environments tamed by the Global Army that he had almost forgotten what authentic wildness was. Besides, that was his first time witnessing it with his new senses, and the scene was blinding.
Mana flowed in every direction. Every plant, animal, and even part of the ground radiated that energy and applied their influence. Khan's senses had to work overtime to capture everything, but his brain could take it. An ordinary human would faint under that assault of information, but he felt born to live among that harmonious mess.
'Istrone should be similar to this,' Khan thought as the jeep advanced.
The path led deeper into the forest, growing narrower and muddier. The forest was slowly erasing that mark left by the Global Army, but the jeep could still advance. Yet, Khan knew his time was approaching.
Drawing Derek's screen could keep Khan updated on the remaining path, but he preferred to continue looking at the forest. The tension remained constant, with nothing attempting to attack the jeep. Everything was waiting for something, and Khan wanted to be ready for that.
Swaying motions appeared in the environment as the jeep advanced, and a foul smell also reached Khan's nostrils. The darkness of the night tried to hide the source of that strange event, but Khan felt unable to miss it. He could see the larger puddles and the wet chunks of the ground around the trees releasing gases full of mana.
Khan instinctively grunted as those gases seeped into his body, and the pilot also brought a wet tissue to his mouth. A bitter taste spread on Khan's tongue and made him lower his gaze. He could feel that foreign mana invading him, but no marks had appeared on his skin yet.
"It will get worse later on, sir," The pilot warned through his wet tissue. "I won't be able to bring you any closer at that point."
"It's fine," Khan grunted again, stretching his neck due to the vague discomfort he experienced. It felt odd to have that invader running inside him, and forcing his mana to flow seemed unable to fix the issue.
'Maybe I should get healing techniques next,' Khan wondered, but the path continued to retain most of his attention.
The swaying motion intensified, but Khan didn't experience any dizziness. The foreign mana also continued to expand, uncaring of the chaos element's hindrance, but Khan soon grew used to that discomfort. That process never stopped, and the car eventually stopped.
"I can't go any further, sir," The pilot coughed while tinkering with the jeep's menus to check his coordinates. "You must proceed East for three hundred meters to reach your target."
Khan checked the map on the jeep's menus' before drawing Derek's screen. The device showed the same directions, so he lifted his gaze to look at his route. He would have to abandon the path and dive into the forest to reach his target.
"You can go back," Khan said while adjusting his backpack, checking his pockets, and jumping out of the jeep. When his feet dug into the mud, a splashing noise resounded, but his balance didn't falter.
"Sir, if the rains arrive," The pilot announced.
"You won't be able to pick me up," Khan interrupted. "Don't worry. Go before you faint on me."
"Thank you, sir," The pilot nodded before another cough forced him to trail the path in reverse gear.
Khan kept his eyes on the trees while the jeep disappeared. His eyes started wandering left and right when he couldn't hear the tires anymore. He almost expected something to happen once solitude arrived, but everything remained still.
'What are they waiting for?' Khan wondered before taking a careful step forward. Nothing happened, so he advanced again, leaving the muddy road and crossing the first line of trees to immerse himself in the forest.
Three hundred meters were nothing for Khan, but he couldn't exactly sprint forward. There were too many trees on the path ahead, and a sudden release of mana might affect that tension. A chain reaction could unfold if he weren't careful.
Nevertheless, the constant tension slowly affected Khan's patience. The symphony felt on the verge of exploding on him, and that vibe intensified with each step that splashed on the mud. He didn't like being the prey of unknown opponents, so he decided to make the first move.
'I can play this game too,' Khan thought before eyeing a rare short tree on his right.
The tree's yellow crown was perfectly still, and no sound came out. Yet, Khan knew that something was waiting among those large leaves, and his left hand went on his knife's handle while he sent some emotions forward.
Altering the mana had become as natural as breathing for Khan, so he easily conveyed aggression to the creature inside the crown. No response arrived, but Khan kept his focus on that spot and waited for a reaction.
The creature inside the crown didn't have Khan's patience. It didn't even have intelligence. The aggression felt simply triggered its instincts, forcing it to pounce at that threat below.
A huge yellow snake pierced the crown to dive toward Khan. Its big mouth was already open, showing the two rows of curved fangs ready to stab its prey. Purple drops fell from those teeth, but they never found any skin.
The snake froze when an unbreakable grip seized the base of its head and prevented it from diving any further. Khan held the creature above him, uncaring that the fanged mouth could probably swallow his head in a single bite. He felt no fear either. He couldn't be afraid in front of a Tainted animal as strong as a first-level warrior.
'You are big,' Khan commented while glancing at the flexible body stretching from the crown. The snake had shown four meters of its figure, but much more seemed to remain inside the branches.
A sudden change in the mana inside the snake forced Khan to draw his knife. The creature's tail came out of the crown, pointing its sharp tip at the center of Khan's forehead. However, a purple-red flash unfolded before the Tainted animal could complete the attack.
Khan let go of his prey and waved his hand to shake off the dense blood that had covered it. Meanwhile, the snake's two edges hung lifelessly from the branches, and blood fell from one of them to reach the severed head on the mud.
The encounter with the snake didn't force the forest's hand. Everything continued to remain still, and the same went for the tension. Khan didn't know how to feel about that, but his mission had priority, and the incoming rains made him decide to avoid wasting any more time.
Truth be told, Derek had given Khan a four hours window. The jeep had barely taken twenty minutes out of that, so even a poor estimate would still grant Khan a lot of time. However, he didn't know how hard it would be to retrieve the Dridie yet, so he played it safe.
Khan crossed one hundred and fifty meters without encountering any danger. Many eyes were still on him, but the general stillness made him advance without worrying about those weak threats.
The environment changed at that point. The ground grew even muddier before transforming into a small, greenish lake that appeared filled with slime.
'It can't be too deep,' Khan considered while looking at the muddy lake.
Khan stopped by the lake's shores and put some strength into his right leg. His foot dug into the ground easily, diving for at least ten centimeters before finding a firmer surface.
'The lake is bound to be worse,' Khan thought. 'Flying should be better, but.'
Khan diverted his gaze, letting his eyes wander on that mostly still surface. Some bubbles popped in a few areas, but nothing truly moved. Yet, he sensed that the lake's population was far from zero.
'Annoying,' Khan cursed. The snake from before and the lake confirmed how Abora's fauna had exceptional cloaking abilities. Khan could still sense those creatures, but identifying the exact number of threats was impossible under that slimy cover.
Khan inspected his right and left while calculations ran through his mind. The lake was relatively small. He could walk around it in a few minutes and avoid risking alerting its inhabitants.
Derek's device fell into Khan's hands while he crouched on the shore. The map on the screen confirmed his idea, but the marker about his target appeared oddly close.
Khan lifted his gaze and tilted his head to gaze at the opposite side of the lake, but the trees there hindered his vision. He straightened his position and walked alongside the shore to find a better spot, and a familiar plant eventually fell into his view.
A thick, spiked branch peeked out of a tree on the lake's opposite side. Khan couldn't gain a complete view of the scene, so he trailed the shore a bit longer until he could see the entire Feicox.
'Is that it?' Khan wondered while tinkering with the screen to activate its camera.
Khan pointed the device at the Feicox and used its zoom function to inspect it. The screen recorded a series of stats and highlighted a faint purple shadow stretching behind the plant's base.
With the map and the camera active, Khan moved a bit more and eventually found what he was looking for. The device captured a clear picture of the Dridie. He only had to cross the lake to reach it.
'What now?' Khan wondered.
Everything would be easier if Khan could use spells, but the Dridie's frailty worked against him. He didn't expect the plant to be so close to the lake either. He risked starting a war between vegetation and Tainted animals if he wasn't careful.
'I can't even see the other Feicox from here,' Khan thought while trying to peek past the trees in front of his target. 'Where are they?'
The device ended up solving the issue. An icon lit up on the screen, attracting Khan's attention. A square moved on a trunk in the distance until a scarlet flower peeked past it, and part of its spiked branch soon became visible too.
'That's the second,' Khan exclaimed before a ripple flowed through the symphony and made a chill run down his spine. His eyes remained on the screen while the tension intensified. He saw the flower pointing in his direction while a hole opened at its center.
Khan instinctively jumped to his side, using as much strength as his body could provide. A bullet reached his previous position, and its impact on the muddy ground created a fuming dark-green puddle that released sizzling noises.
The symphony went crazy after the attack. The forest awakened, and countless cries reached Khan's ears while he was still in mid-air.
Khan prepared himself to retreat, but something flew toward his back. A light tap on the air put him in a spinning motion, and his glowing knife severed the head of a snake-like creature that had come out of a bush in half.
The dangers didn't end there. Something came out of the lake's shore, forcing Khan to turn. A slimy tongue shot forward and crossed many meters to reach Khan, only to have a violent kick interrupting its motion. Khan even shattered that body part with his attack, making it explode into a cloud of blood.
Another dangerous sensation spiked in Khan's senses, making him swing his knife upward. A yellow bird-like creature had dived toward him, but his weapon cut it in half. Yet, something else flew toward him in the meantime, forcing him to leap away from the lake.
Khan landed behind a tree nearby, splashing mud in every direction. He sat on the dirt, uncaring of the stains and wetness spreading on his uniform. He didn't hold back during his previous sprint, but his right arm told a chilling tale.
A hole had appeared on the screen in Khan's hand, and smoke came out of its edges while the dark-green liquid's corrosive properties continued to work. A similar stain had occupied Khan's right forearm, and the sizzling noise it released filled his mind with pain.
To be continued