บท 41: Chapter 41: Betrayal I
Buried in the rubble was an ornate container in the shape of a tall and rectangular object. The material that was used to make it was something that Herbert did not seem to recognize. The design had a wavy and snake-like motif that resembled the White-Horned Snakes that he and his group had just decimated.
It had the texture of wood and the luster of glazed ceramic, but the same strength and durability as metal, Herbert found out that it was somehow also emitting cold air.
Seeing it pop out from the altar was odd and peculiar that Herbert first tried to probe it by using one of his feathers to take a swing. Surprisingly, it easily broke and chipped off a large chunk before it caused the entire thing to fall apart.
In its place was an ancient totem in the form of the White-Horned Snake. However, there was a key difference between them as instead of horizontal and pointed horns, this totem had antlers that stretched and branched off in various directions. Its appearance reminded him of the image of an eastern dragon that only appeared in legends and myths.
He was curious about its origins and its relation to the statue that was above the altar, but since he did not have anything that he can use to figure things out, he could only limit himself to making a guess.
"This is something that the novel didn't mention. Interesting."
Strangely enough, Herbert could feel something ominous from the figurine. Its eyes seemed to be alive as it looked at him with its frozen gaze, the mere pressure caused him to temporarily stop breathing. Its appearance gave him the urge to suddenly destroy it, but after calming himself down he soon saw something else that attracted his attention.
Beneath the totem were three pieces of crystals that he had instantly discerned as Awakening Crystals. With a smile, he quickly took them and validated them by comparing them with the Awakening Crystal that he had just received from the Transcendent ranked White-Horned Snake.
"Buy one take three, how lucky. Even the protagonist doesn't have this kind of luck."
With a satisfied look on his face, Herbert packed the Awakening Crystals in his pocket while he held the ancient totem with his free hand. Taking with him the treasures that he found, he was already prepared to return with his haul until he suddenly felt the strange sense of having his perception disrupted. The distortions caused his surroundings to become blurry and illusory which made him disoriented and feel a headache.
Taking a step back to prevent himself from falling, Herbert remembered the feeling that he had when he was fighting against the White-Horned Snake. Every time it would use its illusions against him, he would get the slight sense of wobbliness that he could quickly shake off.
However, at that time he still had the help of the Silver Moon Leaf which pretty much reduced the amount of interference that he had received from the mental illusions that the White-Horned Snake had cast on him.
Because he had already used up his three Silver Moon Leaves, he could only face the full brunt of the sudden attack.
As Herbert tried to fight back against being fully engulfed in the illusions, a hidden white snake noiselessly slithered its way closer. Among all the White-Horned Snakes that Herbert had fought, this was one monster he had missed as it had been hiding inside of the mausoleum during the entire commotion outside the cave.
From its point of view, today was supposed to be a happy day as it felt that it would soon break free from the shackles of being at the Awakening rank 9. It was already about to enter the Transcendent rank when all of a sudden, the cries of death disturbed it from concentrating. Its partner who had been standing guard soon went to check out the noise and chase away the intruder.
After a couple of minutes, this White-Horned Snake suddenly heard the sounds of battle from the outside. This gave it the right amount of pressure to hasten its process of breaking through to the next rank. Unfortunately, it was already too late, Herbert and his men had killed every snake that came out of the cave.
Feeling anger, it was already prepared to rush out of the cave when it suddenly felt three humans getting closer to its nesting area. The aura coming out from one of the humans temporarily cooled its anger as it continued to glance at the human with an unfriendly gaze.
The world was so cruel, how dare the human kill its mate and its family? The White-Horned Snake realized that if it repeated the same thing as its partner then it would also be killed by the strong human. So, it decided to bide its time and wait for the right moment when the human is distracted so that it could launch a surprise attack to kill the human who she recognized as the biggest threat while he had his guard down.
Because of his avarice, Herbert had insisted that the guards not follow him in as he did not trust them enough to the point that he would be willing to show them his gains during this trip. After all, he did not know if they were spies sent by his father to keep watch on him.
Fortunately, since Herbert had managed to reach the Transcendent rank, he could still maintain his consciousness and immediately used his power to materialize the feathers on his back. In an instant, two pairs of wings materialized, one was black and the other was white.
Herbert then used the black feathers on his first pair of wings and launched it in all directions. His sudden retaliation temporarily stopped the illusions that he faced. Taking advantage of the moment, Herbert quickly scanned the area and found the hidden White-Horned Snake.
From the very beginning, he understood that there was a discrepancy between the Transcendent ranked White-Horned Snake that he had fought and the one that the protagonist had fought in the novel.
So, he had been very cautious when he entered the cave which heightened his reaction to the sudden surprise attack.
Feeling the pain, the White-Horned Snake shrieked out and revealed its position. Not letting go of this gap, Herbert soon rushed towards it and continued to suppress it to prevent it from trapping him in an illusion. Since he had reached the Transcendent rank, there had been a significant change that happened to his abilities.
Previously, his abilities only had the characteristics of sharpness, speed, and flight. This time, with his two pairs of wings, Herbert discovered two new traits that manifested from their different colors.
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