In the middle of the forest of the dead, inside the bandits' hideout where there used to be dozens of bandits living and hiding themselves from the outside world, was now nowhere to be found.
There were still tents filled with their food, the well they dug up for their water, and even their belongings were all still in there.
However, despite all that, there was not a single bandit that could be found there. One that was alive that is.
All the bandits, every single one of them had lost their lives in the hands of their own possessed comrades.
The vengeful ghosts that had followed the band of bandits everywhere they went were finally able to get their lifelong wish to make the bandits pay for what they did to them.
Those ghosts were powerless before. Not being able to affect a single bandit even with their overwhelming hatred towards them and how they cursed those bandits to die.
Fortunately for them, someone had given them a chance, an opportunity to make their wish come true.
The man first taught them how to make the bandits' hearts shrouded in fear, then he taught them how to feed on those fears and make themselves stronger.
And lastly, he taught them how to use their newfound strength and the fear-induced bandits to achieve their goal.
The second they got into the bandits' bodies and possessed them, the vengeful ghosts could finally become true to their name as they realized their vengeance, swinging their weapons and killing every bandit their eyes laid upon.
Their strong emotion and their lifelong wish become the fuel to repel any hesitation in the possessed bandits' bodies.
No matter what their comrades tried to do, such as calling out the possessed bandits' names or begging for mercy, none of those worked as the vengeful ghosts' aura filled the possessed bandits' hearts with only one thing.
And that was vengeance. An irresistible thirst for revenge.
And almost all the bandits had paid for what they did as all the vengeful ghosts did their job splendidly.
However, there was still one more bandit remaining. One person that ran away the second he heard the pained screams of the possessed bandits, leaving his underlings to die without a shred of thought about them passing in his mind.
And that was none other than the leader of the bandits.
Running in the almost pitch-black forest was not an easy task even for him, but remembering what was happening back in the hideout, the boss didn't have a single thought about coming back to the hideout.
All he knew was that he needed to get away from the hideout as far away as possible, away from all the ghosts that had decided to descend chaos and madness onto the hideout.
'Shit, shit, shit, shit!'
'I know this forest is haunted, but what the hell was that?!'
As the one who chose the location of the hideout, of course, the leader knew about the forest which was famous for being a haunted one.
The forest which was eerie and silent, seemingly empty of any inhabitants was not because of the bandits' existence.
Just a single group of bandits were easy to deal with if the kingdom they dwelled in sent a group of guards to take care of them.
It was more than enough to take care of the bandit group which was formed from a ragtag bunch of people.
The reason the forest was empty and the kingdom not caring about them living there was because of the reputation of the forest being the Forest of Death.
The majority of people might not know the origin of the forest's name and thought that the forest was called that simply because of how empty, silent, and eerie it was.
However, for someone who had traveled a bit of the world, the bandit leader knew why the kingdom gave the forest such an ominous name and encouraged everyone to stay away from it.
It was said that a powerful person, one that was powerful enough even to threaten the kingdom had fought the kingdom's forces there and died inside the forest once.
The fight was brutal and caused a terrible loss for the kingdom as thousands of the kingdom's elite soldiers died inside the forest.
But in the end, they succeeded in killing the person.
However, it was said that the person now still roamed the forest as a ghost, killing and taking anyone's life if he knew they were from the same kingdom that had killed him.
And that was the reason why the leader of the bandits now held a pendant in his hand, clutching it hard and making sure it didn't fall from his hand when he was running in the dark forest.
Looking at the pendant in his hand, the boss stared at it for a second before clutching it harder.
'Good thing I ransacked this from that priest…'
Truth be told, he also heard the crying woman's voice that night when almost half of his subordinates heard it.
However, the boss was prepared as he knew that he was living in a haunted forest said to be inhabited by a powerful ghost.
Ever since stepping his feet inside the forest, he always kept the pendant that he got from the priest somewhere inside his pocket.
It was a blessed pendant that was always worn by the priests everywhere they went.
He knew that he would be using the haunted forest as his hideout, and the thought of having a blessed item to protect himself was a must for him.
So when he heard the crying woman's voice, the boss took out the pendant from his pocket and held it in his hand.
The pendant worked and it protected him from the crying woman's voice and also the sleep paralysis that the vengeful ghosts caused later in the night.
The ghosts that Farrel had sent to the bandits' hideout were young ghosts that didn't have any rich spiritual energy at all.
Back in his old body, those kinds of ghosts were the type of ghosts that he could easily swat away by just simply exuding his aura.
Under normal circumstances, Farrel wouldn't make a deal with these kinds of ghosts and let them go inside him.
However, due to his current goal and his lacking strength when he suddenly found himself in a stranger's body, Farrel had to make do with them.
If he was still with his powerful ghosts from his old body, then a simple blessed pendant wouldn't be able to stop his ghosts.
Heck, he could even corrupt the blessed pendant after some time if he still had his old ghosts with him.
But he had to work with what he got. And he planned to do his job properly.
Unbeknownst to the bandit leader, following behind him was a young man that could traverse in the dark easily, running towards the bandit leader with a stick in hand, and a platoon of ghosts on his back.