"Warriors, Line up!"
"Yes, Captain!"
Early in the morning, the village warriors lined up to prepare for an expedition to the mysterious and dangerous Forest of Echoes.
The plan is to go deeper in the forest and look for rare resources that the village can sell or use.
At the same time, they are expected to mark the potential hazardous zones and beast dens.
The warriors are currently lined up horizontally with Helena in front.
"Warriors, the mission today is filled with danger. I would like to extend my gratitude to the eleven of you who are willing to do this important mission for the development of the village."
Blanc walked in front of them and bowed in gratitude then he continued.
"I have prepared these for all of you."
He said as he handed brand new steel buckler shields and bandages to each of them.
"Although this will only increase your survival rate by a fair bit, just know that the village will spare nothing to keep all of you safe. Unfortunately, this is all we have for now."
"I promise all of you that I will provide better equipment and items for you all to use in the future."
"So please, everyone stay safe. The priority will always be to stay alive."
"If you think that it is too early to enter a certain area yet, don't force it and only explore what you can. I wish all of you the best of luck."
After his speech, Helena, along with the warriors proceeded to enter the Forest of Echoes.
Half an hour later.
"Everyone! We are now past the safe borders and will be entering unknown land. Stay vigilant!"
The warriors focused and stayed on alert after hearing Helena's warning.
Some of them started to get creeped out as the soil they were walking on changed color from the normal dark brown color to blue.
It seems they have entered a new zone.
A few minutes later, a weird sound can be heard which seems to be metal hitting another metal in repeated small motions.
"What's that sound? Are there other intelligent creatures here?"
Helena was puzzled and curious as she tried to look for the source of the sound.
After hearing Helena's words, the warriors seemed to be even more tense and nervous than before. They were on max vigilance ready to fight at any time.
"Shit! It seems to come from behind u…!"
Helena turned around and her words were cut short.
"You fucker! Eden! Why are you shaking so hard! so the sound was the result of you shivering like an idiot?!?! What a fucking amazing mysterious sound huh?!?! Where did all your training go?!?!"
Helena cursed in anger.
Turns out the mysterious sound was from Eden who was so nervous at his first expedition towards the forest.
His armor was clanging continuously due to his shaking.
As a child, he heard many stories regarding the forest and he couldn't help but remember those stories now resulting in him being so scared and nervous.
Helena was shaking with anger since she also got a bit nervous after hearing the mysterious sound.
"Pff..Pffftttt…Hahahahahahahahahah"
"Hahahahahaha"
All the warriors were laughing except for Eden who was about to die from embarrassment, and Helena who was shaking from anger.
She was so mad that she got startled by something so insignificant. Turns out she was also on edge even though she was hiding it.
After the laughs, embarrassment, and anger.
Helena and her warriors felt their bodies lighten up by quite a bit.
Earlier, they were all on edge but thanks to Eden's short episode, they all started to loosen up and their march started to get a lot less stressful.
They were still vigilant but they weren't scared anymore.
After laughing, they remembered the reason why they're here, and that they have comrades who got their backs.
In addition, when everything goes wrong, they have their almighty captain Helena.
The group continued marching on, after a while, they encountered their first enemy.
A mutated tiger started roaring and circled the squad.
"You pretentious little shit, you think I'm scared of you?! Circling me like I'm a weak prey.. Circle your mom!"
Helena was then locked in a fierce battle with the mutated tiger, although it took a few minutes, she was able to defeat the tiger easily.
The warriors were in awe of Helena's strength. They secretly swore to work even harder and be as strong as their captain.
Once the tiger was dead, the group continued travelling and finally reached the entrance of a cave that seems to go deeper towards the ground.
"Halt! Guard the entrance, let me go in first."
The warriors got in formation and guarded the entrance of the cave while Helena went inside.
"Hmm..seems like there's nothing special here though..Oh? What's that?"
Helena muttered while walking in the direction of a glowing red mushroom.
"Ohhh what's this? It looks cute..can I eat it?"
She was wondering if she could eat it but she directly put the glowing red mushroom in her mouth after wondering.
If Blanc saw this scene, he would probably pull his hair out in frustration.
After all, which person in their right mind will eat some unknown glowing red mushroom?
Heck, it even looked poisonous!
"Ooh?? Ooooooh!! I feel energized."
Contrary to its appearance though, the mushroom actually rejuvenated Helena.
"Better bring back some of th…?"
Helena's words were cut short again after turning to look deeper into the cave.
"Th..this many?!"
A lot of such mushrooms are growing deeper in the cave and they come in different colors.
There were four colors in total which were green, blue, yellow, and red.
The Goddess of Enlightenment seemed to bless Helena's intellect this time though as she didn't taste test each of the mushrooms and instead just picked one of each kind for Blanc to examine.
After getting a sample of each mushroom, Helena proceeded to go out of the cave.
"Looks like there's some glowing mushrooms inside that cave. I ate a red one and it rejuvenated me, this might be a good thing for the village."
She quickly relayed the important information to her squad and then proceeded to walk further inside the forest.
The warriors were stupefied on the spot again but their shock seems to not be directly related to the mushrooms.
"Y..you ate it?"
As expected, their captain was crazy.
After a momentary shock, they followed their captain and walked deeper into the forest.