Chapter 38 - The Netherworld [1]
"When you are done take me to see the doctor, and I will give you a painless death…"
Then Dara who had been searching for the second sword finally saw it lodged into the Obun Leader from the back…
Sharp! Shrap! Chrap!
Dara vengefully stomped his way towards the weak Obun Leader, planted his foot on his back, and shoved out the sword;
Shraa!
"Argh!"
The Obun Leader yelped in pain as he began to bleed from his back at a spot where his hands couldn't reach…
Then it was the Obun leader's time to start choking as he looked up to see Dara's crazed expression, and began to get flustered;
"Don't even think about killing me, I bear the mark of Lord Ru…"
The Obun Leader growled as he stretched his left hand towards Dara and opened his palm to reveal some ancient rune which seems to have be burnt into his palm…
But Dara simply ignored all the rubbish the man was muttering and drove the sword right through his heart;
"Ahk!"
The Obun Leader choked in pain, as Dara looked straight into his eyes and watched as life gradually ebbed away from the human-monster…
After the Obun Leader died, Dara buried his sister right there at the cliff as he became lost in thoughts;
Why was his sister the only person that came to his rescue even when they clearly understood that there was no way she could have managed to achieve that alone?
Where are the rest?
Why haven't they showed up yet?
Or could this actually be what the group had planned? But why?
They had not offended anyone and neither have they ever done anything bad that would warrant this?
Dara's thought became really chaotic as he tried to wrap his head around the situation, but no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn't bring himself to understand…
"Sister… We have been faithful to the village for so long, and this is what they repay us with…"
Dara muttered as he stabbed his sister's glaive into her grave as a signpost, and then turned around to leave… But just as he walked past the Obun Leader's corpse;
"Listen to your sister Little Kid…"
A voice echoed into the area, as Dara stopped in fright, then he looked around, but no matter how much he looked and check, he was only surrounded by corpse, and after stopping for about a minute and seeing nothing out of the ordinary, Dara continued his journey, but then, it happened again;
"~Hu~" The voice sighed;
"Let's see how far you can go within these Dark Lands without cultivation…"
Dara froze once again, but this time, he turned his head as slowly as he could and suddenly looked back, looking to catch the owner of the voice, but despite all that, he could only see corpse everywhere that some Raven-like birds were already feeding on…
He looked towards the Obun Leader as the voice seem to be coming from that direction, and he took two steps forwards, took a small rock and threw it at the Obun Leader's corpse, but he got no reaction of any sort…
Then just as he picked a bigger rock to smash the man's head into a pulp;
"Oi! Ha-ha ha-ha ha!"
The voice scared the living hell out of Dara who fell backwards and saw the massive stone he wanted to use to smash the Obun Leader's head fall on his instead, and that spelt Dara's end;
"Eh? Did I kill him?"
The voice echoed out once again;
"No, I would need to feed on his soul if I am to recover!"
The voice grew agitated and; Boom! An explosion ensued as a massive dark colored formation appear on the chest of the Dead Obun leader…
The formation twisted and turned as it began to spin and gather momentum, instantly a strong wind kicked up in the area as everything around began to surge towards the ancient runic formation, and after about five minutes;
Kacha!
The sound of something unlocking echoed in the area, as a massive dark colored soul of a figure broke out of the seal, and the moment that happened, the always dark sky in this lands went even darker as a white colored lightning bolt as thick as a bucket, fell from the sky;
"Have I been discovered?"
"They are so quick unh?"
"But it seems I still have some time…"
The soul muttered to itself as it looked towards the descending bolt of lightning and jumped out of the Obun Leader's body and towards Dara's corpse, as the lightning descended and blasted the Obun Leader's corpse into smithereens;
"Damn you, Luo!"
The soul cursed at the sky with a loud bellow as it lunged towards Dara's corpse, but just as he was about to enter, he saw a mysterious rune appear on Dara's forehead, and the man blanched in fear, as his level of anxiety rose to new heights;
"Damn it, reincarnation!"
The soul cursed his luck as he soul flashed across the distance between him and Dara's corpse as he left several afterimages behind;
"Fuck you, King Yama!"
The soul cursed as he jumped into Dara's body at the same exact moment another soul popped out of the formation and entered Dara's body, just minutes before him;
"What the fuck!"
"Who the fuck are you!?"
An all too familiar voice bellowed out of the first soul which was white in color as the black colored soul which saw another lightning descend from the sky attacked the white soul…
The black soul made some mysterious hand seals as he opened his palm at the reincarnating soul…
Massive amounts of energy gathered into his palm as a massive cyclone whipped out of nowhere;
"Unh?"
The reincarnating soul was stunned as he whipped out a black cup with blood red runes etched all over its body, some sort of yellow colored liquid was within it as the reincarnating soul poured it at the black soul which had already reached his position;
"Grandma Meng's milk!?"
The dark soul blanched in fear as he quickly maneuvered his attack towards the incoming liquid; Boom!
The two collided and the liquid within the cup flowed right through the black soul's hand and slammed into his body as the dark soul gave a miserable shriek...
But about half of the liquid and the cup was sent flying into the white soul who instantly got knocked out as the cup merged into the reincarnating soul whilst the liquid poured into the white soul and transformed into some sort of ancient formation that spun to a lock with a 'Ka-Ching!' sound…
Rewinding the timeline…
The moment Sam shut his eyes finally and his consciousness went dark, he was jolted awake a few moments after when he heard a loud whipping sound and the miserable shriek of another person;
"On your feet, maggot!"
A loud voice bellowed at Sam who felt the force of that bellow slam into him, dealing some damage as his eyes snapped open;
"Argh!" Sam jumped and crawled backwards as he got the fright of his life...
What he was looking at, right now, was something straight out of horror movies…
Here standing in front of him and looking at him with purple flaming sinister eyes, was a demon soul which had a six inch curled horn jutting out of its forehead…
Then he looked around and noticed that there were other's around, but there seemed to be something wrong about all the figures here; they were all having matching colors and were also transparent to some extent…
Some of them were white, some were black, some were red and so on, but they were all floating and human size;
'Are these souls?'
Sam thought to himself as he felt a sudden gust of heat approach him, and from the corner of his eyes, he saw a flaming whip magnify in his eyes;
Whap-Pa!
One lash…
Just one lash, and Sam could have sworn that the brightness of his soul dimmed by half;
"Argh!"
Sam screamed in agony as he looked into the demon's eyes and understood that if he didn't stand up immediately, this massive demon which was about thirty feet tall was going to give him another stroke, one he was definitely sure was going to kill him, despite the fact that he was still yet to understand why he was still alive, and more importantly, where this place was…
Scampering to his feet, Sam saw a long queue of souls that this demon was putting in order as they marched as long as his eyes could see…
Just like sheep being led by its shepherd, Sam joined in line and began to follow the long queue of souls into wherever they might be going…
Sam walked in thought trying to understand what had happened to him…
He would hear occasional whiplashes and some miserable cries, and on other occasions, some didn't make any sounds which meant only one thing; they were dead!
But Sam, simply adhered to instructions and followed in a straight file;
'Is this hell?'
'Of course this is hell…'
'Where else would there be demons, uncountable number of souls being tortured left and right, with immense heat from raging flames burning in every direction I look?'
Sam began to understand what had happened to him; he had indeed died but his soul was transmitted into hell, as he began to shake his head at the miserable fate that awaited him…
Just like that, Sam walked as he got lost in thought, as days overlapped days, and weeks passed over weeks…
Months repeated their cycle and before long it had been years since Sam had been in hell…
He didn't know how long had passed, but there was a part of him that was saying years had passed, and there was also another newborn instinct that was telling him he had barely been here for an hour; it was this time lag that Sam was still thinking about when he heard a deep voice boom across this massive place that was so large that he couldn't even fathom its ends in every direction;
"Sam?"