Lowly Ascent

Alex maintained her smile as a new spear emerged from the ground and broke off for her use. She had acquired many new abilities from the golden sap, and controlling trees was one of them.

As a defense mechanism, Alex had planted numerous trees throughout the island and built a wide array of roots for her personal use.

She threw the new spear, and this time it hit the ground a meter from the figure using a longsword. They panicked and moved away from the spear, but it was too late. Roots sprouted from the ground, five meters from the spear in all directions, creating a cage.

The figure tried to break the roots, but they always grew back. The cage slowly shrank and crushed the figure to death, causing a fountain of blood to seep out from a compact cluster of roots.

The last two figures looked defeated. The figure holding the sickle nodded to the other. This prompted the other figure to drop his two knives and draw two wicked short swords from behind his waist.

Alex was stunned, seeing such uncommon weapons. Her thoughts immediately led her to a question she wanted to ask.

Wielding a sickle, one of the figures charged at Alex while taking out a vial and drinking it in a single gulp.

The figure's body began to become bloated and increased in size as they began to fight her in close quarters. It was not a second later when they exploded.

The serum had been developed by the research division of the obsidian syndicate. It caused the body to combust and explode.

The last figure looked at the explosion with relief but a shield made of tree roots came into vision as the smoke let up. Their mask strangely changed and turned to a sad face, they then charged at Alex.

Approaching the shield, they disappeared into its shadow and looked for their opponent. Astonishingly, she wasn't there.

The figure suddenly became nervous.

"Do you know a person called Cain?"

The figure turned to see a kick heading for their face. They were sent flying. Their mask cracked, and the figure was disoriented.

They looked around to see that the battle had ended and to find that they were surrounded by only enemies.

Cracking even more, the mask broke, revealing the figure's face. They were a man—a man with green hair and dark skin. The defenders gasped upon seeing him; it was obvious he was a contaminant.

The dark-skinned man didn't care about this and instead fixated on Alex in anger.

"How dare you say his name! You dare, a mortal, say the name of God!"

"What's this now?" Alex was stupefied by such an outburst. Tears almost ran down her eyes at the sight of such a joke.

"I am his sacred warrior. I have been given his gift, his boon, and you dare say his name in front of me! I will kill you!"

Alex's face warped in confusion, "Are you sure we're talking about the same guy? Black hair, red eyes?"

"Shut up! Shut up! How dare you make a mockery of him!"

The man got up and took out a crimson-red vial. He drank it and his body began to regenerate; his wounds healed, and he appeared to grow younger. The creases in his skin disappeared and had a faint glow.

Getting up, he looked at Alex with wrath and drew blood from his hands onto his Yurombi. The twin blades then glowed.

Finally, he then charged Alex with zeal and clashed against her spear.

He was stronger than before, far stronger. His weapons grew brighter as Alex was pushed back. She studied his eyes becoming bloodshot.

Alex stomped on the ground and roots came out and chased to kill him, but he dodged and disappeared again into the shadows.

Reappearing behind her, the man aimed for her neck. Alex blocked with her spear but the man succeeded in drawing blood.

Her mouth turned agape with disbelief. Alex turned serious.

Alex had become much stronger after she drank the golden sap yet this mere pawn could harm her.

Angry, roots came out of the ground rapidly attacking the man, each strike attempting to kill him in one blow to no avail. He dodged attack after attack, attempting to get closer to Alex.

Shorting the distance, he threw one of his Yurombi. Glowing even brighter, it came into contact with her spear and exploded, fragments of the blade blew in all directions and pierced her skin yet again.

The man collapsed to the ground, exhausted beyond measure, "Hahaha! I won. You will die soon, I succeeded! Hahaha!"

Alex recovered from the explosion and walked over to the man with metal fragments still in her skin. Many defenders ran to her to help.

Ignoring them, she walked to the man curious "What do you mean?"

The man looked zealous and happy as he responded, "That blade had poison created by one of the lord's apostles! You are to die no matter what, hahaha."

Alex grinned, "Sorry to break it to you, but I'm immune to stuff like that. Sorry to ruin you're last moments."

After she took the golden sap, poison and disease immunity were some benefits. In Netherane such benefits were unheard of.

Unfortunately, even for Alex, her immunity was nothing to the more powerful and rare viruses. Luckily, this poison was not on this list.

"What? No, you lie! I have to kill you! I must kill you!" The man became deranged, repeating himself over and over.

Alex sighed as a spear emerged from the ground. She picked it up and plunged it through his chest and out his back.

The man soon turned motionless.

Before he closed his eyes for the last time, a few whispers left his mouth like a prayer.

"Lord Pestilence, I have failed you. Forgive this servant for this transgression."

The abrupt battle was over. It had happened so suddenly and ended in less than an hour. The victors began to celebrate this victory, and it would become a renowned battle throughout Netherane—the time when a thousand villagers invaded the city of Cardin.

However, Alex was not happy; she was confused.

This attack had come from a group of unknown figures who manipulated the outlying villages to attack that much seemed obvious from the abrupt entrance.

All she knew was that their leader was a man named Cain, and he was a god to them.

The image of a man with black hair and red eyes entered Alex's mind. He had an air of intelligence and eloquence, but he also gave off a sense of instinctual fear and dread to whoever saw him.

'Cain, where are you? What are you doing?'

........

In a laboratory inside Carc, Cain was in the middle of an experiment. He stopped when he felt something connected to him disappear.

'Oh, someone died in the south? I'll have to check it out or send someone when I finish this experiment.'

Before Cain sent off the syndicate members to shadow the caravans, he made a breakthrough in his 'gift'. Just like what he did for Zimo when he changed it to be a disease that originated from him, allowing him some control over it on a superficial level.

He tried previously to do something similar but couldn't figure it out so he tried once more before the caravans left in a last-ditch effort.

It was not the most desired effect, but it was useful. Whoever was infected by this virus was connected to Cain in the sense that he could tell where they were and if they were alive. This would prove useful when he sent out his elites on missions like now.

The elite who died was one of Austin's men, one of the first he had recruited. Only someone on a similar level could kill him, but with an extra vial of blood that Cain had given each of the elite members, which had a boosted healing factor as well as additional high-grade weapons that every elite soldier gets. Killing one would require someone much stronger than them.

'The dead are dead. Best not let them worry the living.'

Cain simply noted this event in his head and continued with his experiment.