Born In Ashes: The Enigma

"How are you feeling? Should we rest for a few more hours, or leave now?" Azrael asked Luo Bingqing, who was already mostly healed.

"I am fine. We can leave now," Luo Bingqing replied, giving Elyara a grateful nod of thanks.

It had been three hours since Azrael and the others had killed the undead knights.

Normally, someone as seriously injured as Luo Bingqing would not have been able to recover in such a short amount of time.

However, because of the second passive effect of Elyara's newly acquired class-level artifact, the Solaris Pendant, he recovered far sooner than expected.

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2. Generates a faint aura of radiant warmth that accelerates wound recovery and restores stamina for allies within ten meters.

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"It's already been about ten hours since we entered the ruins. We have just a little more than half a day left before the effect of your prop ends and we can no longer level up by killing monsters, right?" Elyara asked Azrael.

"Yes," Azrael replied with a nod as all three of them started making their way toward the exit.

The crimson barrier that had blocked their retreat path was still present, but compared to before, its radiance had grown faint.

Bang!

Azrael simply punched the barrier, and it shattered like fragile glass.

The ease with which it broke indicated that it had weakened after the undead knights were slain and the wish casket was destroyed.

"There's a barrier formation here," Elyara observed, her eyes glowing faintly with golden light as she examined the entrance of the cave. "It seems it was drawing energy from the wish casket. Once that was destroyed, the formation weakened as well."

Azrael did not pay much attention to the formation since such matters were not his expertise. Without a word, he exited the chamber and stepped out of the cave.

Because there were no longer any skeletons blocking their path, they reached the end of the cave in just a few minutes and emerged outside.

"Let's continue moving toward the core area," Azrael said once they had exited and without delay, all three of them quickly left the place.

****

Five hours later…

"Keep quiet and don't make a sound," Elyara whispered in a low voice as the three of them crouched behind a large boulder, cold sweat trickling down their foreheads.

Faint wind currents swirled around them, isolating their voices and even preventing their scent from drifting away.

Azrael's eyes were closed as he focused and through the flow of the wind, he could clearly hear the heavy footsteps approaching their position.

"It's coming. Conceal your aura as best you can," Azrael reminded them in a hushed voice and though his face remained calm, tension tightened every muscle in his body.

Just a hundred meters away from where they hid, a tall, bulky humanoid figure with two grotesque heads strode across the barren land.

The monster stood nearly five meters tall, its deep red skin glistening like fresh blood.

What made it truly terrifying was the overwhelming aura it exuded—the unmistakable presence of a level-50 monster, only a step away from reaching Legend rank.

"To think we would encounter a two-headed blood ogre here…" Luo Bingqing muttered in a strained, depressed tone, his palms slick with sweat.

Azrael and Elyara remained silent, but both of them felt equally unsettled.

Their plan had been simple: head toward the core area, kill manageable monsters along the way, and avoid dangerous ones.

But during their journey, they had stumbled upon an orc village.

The village held around fifty orcs.

Five of them were at the epic level, while the rest were either class-level warriors or apprentice warriors.

The strongest orc was level 40, slightly stronger than the undead knights they had defeated earlier.

Their strength had increased considerably after killing the undead knights and other monsters on their journey, so they believed they could wipe out the orc village and further increase their power.

For the first five minutes, everything went according to plan.

They fought fiercely against the orcs and even succeeded in killing one of the epic-level ones.

However, at that very moment, the ice birds that Luo Bingqing had sent into the sky to scout the surroundings suddenly detected a two-headed blood ogre approaching the orc village.

Just by sensing the ogre's aura through his scout birds, Luo Bingqing immediately knew they were no match for it and urged Azrael and Elyara to retreat.

Azrael and Elyara didn't question why he had suddenly asked to retreat as they knew he wouldn't make such a decision without a serious reason and they fled at once.

But because they were still in the midst of their battle and surrounded by orcs, it took them precious time to break out of the village.

By the time they finally escaped, the ogre had already arrived.

What truly unnerved them was that the two-headed ogre didn't attack the orcs at all.

Instead, it immediately began chasing after them.

Even more absurd was the fact that the orcs they had just attacked weren't afraid of the ogre in the slightest.

Instead, they followed after it, pursuing Azrael's group.

It was only then that they realized the orcs were under the command of the two-headed blood ogre and served as its subordinates.

As Azrael was recalling what had happened, the sound of footsteps stopped not far away from their hiding spot.

The monstrous ogre scanned the desolate land with both of its heads, sniffing the air as it searched.

Yet, despite its incredibly keen sense of smell, it couldn't detect the three two-legged intruders who had dared to stir trouble in its territory.

ROAR!

A violent, enraged roar erupted from the ogre's mouths, and the shockwaves alone caused the ground within tens of meters to collapse.

Azrael and the others, still hiding just a hundred meters away felt their minds buzz from the sheer force of the roar and their control over their cosmic energy nearly faltered, almost giving away their location.

When the ogre still found no trace of the three despicable intruders, it finally turned around, seemingly deciding to return.

Only when Azrael heard the sound of its heavy footsteps fading into the distance did he finally exhale in relief.

But his relief didn't last long because—

Rumble!

The earth beneath them suddenly began to tremble and the next second—

BOOOOOOM!

A thunderous explosion shook the ground as if the very land had collapsed.

Not even a heartbeat later—

ROAR!

The furious bellow of the blood ogre split the air, followed by the unmistakable sounds of a fierce and violent battle.

Azrael raised his head to peer from behind the boulder and, in the distance, he saw the two-headed Blood Ogre battling a Hollow Earth Worm, which, like the ogre was at Level 50.