'FARREL, SAVE ME!!!'
Hearing the boy's scream filled with nothing but panic and dread, Farrel wasted not a single second to dash towards Joy's direction.
Following the connection the two of them had, Farrel put the power he got from the cursed sword onto his body, enhancing his overall physical prowess, including his speed.
Farrel's speed rivaled Earth's 100m sprint athlete as he crossed that distance in under 10 seconds. Even with the wild and uneven terrains of the forest.
He soon found Joy floating in place, petrified as his eyes locked onto a certain direction,
"Joy! Come here!" Farrel shouted as hard as he could, waking Joy up from his stupor.
"Farrel!" Hearing Farrel's voice loud and clear, Joy quickly flew in Farrel's direction before going into Farrel's body, hiding there as Farrel faced the danger that made the little ghost boy freeze in fear.
He didn't take notice of it first when he just arrived as Joy was his first priority, but after knowing that Joy was safe inside him, Farrel finally looked at the creature that had made his little ghost friend panic.
Farrel expected to see a 20 meters tall ghost that towered over the trees and all he could see would be its feet.
Just like his old ghost friend whose body was taller than his house, he expected to see something similar but on a larger scale due to the overwhelming amount of pressure that he felt.
Or it could be an army of ghosts that wandered around together in a single group.
However, when his eyes finally landed on the entity that made Joy terrified, Farrel was surprised that none of his guesses turned out to be true.
What stood in his line of sight was in fact not a ghost at all.
Standing with its four feet and black fur with deep purple stripes covering its whole body, a black tiger twice the size of an adult human stood in front of him.
It was a genuine tiger, a life, breathing, mortal tiger. One that wasn't a ghost or any kind of spirit.
Farrel had seen powerful spirits that looked like animals and were worshiped by the people as a local deity.
Some of them had a genuine symbiotic relationship with the people living there, protecting the people from evil entities that would bring harm to the village.
While the others were basically parasites that took 'tax' from the people with the threat of death if their wishes were not heard.
However, the black-purple tiger standing in front of him was a real tiger. One that was definitely mutated somehow with the color of its fur being nothing like the tigers that Farrel knew.
'Or it might be a local species of this unknown world… I don't know…'
The tiger currently stood still, looking down at Farrel with its glowing purple eyes.
Just like how the tiger observed Farrel, he also did the same and scanned the tiger from top to bottom.
And right after a quick scan, Farrel found out what had made Joy, a ghost that was supposedly unaffected by worldly creatures incapable of harming him, frightened.
A quick look was all that it took for Farrel to notice the tiger's overwhelming aura.
The tiger emitted negative energy that was on the same level- even higher than the dozens of ghosts living in his cursed sword.
He focused even more, scrutinizing the aura that the tiger emitted.
'Although it was definitely a strong one, all of this negative energy didn't come from this tiger…'
Farrel then closed his eyes, something that was very dangerous to do considering his current circumstances, but he did nonetheless as he needed to be very sure of one thing before deciding on his next action.
After tuning out his other senses and focusing solely on his sixth sense, Farrel noticed something and opened his eyes.
His eyes were looking in the black tiger's direction, but they didn't look at the tiger.
His sight went past the tiger, focusing on the area behind the large tiger that took up almost a quarter of his vision even from tens of meters away.
Farrel took note of the thing that he had just realized and regained his focus on the tiger that was somehow constantly releasing an unusual amount of negative energy for a living being.
Well, it wasn't the first living being that Farrel knew emitted that kind of energy from its body.
He himself, back when he was still the strongest shaman on Earth also had that kind of aura surrounding him.
The existence of Bahuwirya and his army of powerful ghosts inside him not only made him bulletproof and essentially have inhuman strength, but they also caused anyone who had their sixth sense opened to feel tremendous pressure just from looking at him.
But he got that aura from having dozens of ghosts and an ancient one making a deal with him.
He wouldn't believe that an animal could make a contract with ghosts even though it could see them.
'There must be a reason why that tiger had that much aura…'
And Farrel might have found out about the reason why.
"ROAR!!!"
However, he didn't have time to validate his guess as the tiger decided that it had finished observing Farrel.
Let alone a tiger, even a toddler could figure out that Farrel was definitely weaker than the two-adults-sized tiger in front of him.
And of course, Farrel also knew that fact.
He still had a plethora of spells he hasn't used yet.
But with the absence of powerful ghosts and the lack of conditioning his current malnourished body had, Farrel couldn't utilize those powerful spells that he used to fight powerful opponents.
If it was an ordinary huge tiger, then Farrel would have second thoughts about swinging his sword onto the creature.
But a giant tiger that was covered in negative energy as strong as the one he had in his prime? No, Farrel was confident, not brainless.
The second he heard the tiger's roar, Farrel started running as fast as he could without looking back at the tiger.
'Hell no. I'm not dying for the second time,' his head thought as he put all his strength onto his feet.