Chapter 82: Catching Up
The statement ’What now’ kept reverberating in both their ears while Lisa didn’t hear anything. The three of them stared at each other with a confused face before one person finally spoke.
"I think we need to keep moving first, though they are still caught up with that battle and probably haven’t noticed our absence; it won’t be long."
"We can also do some catching up while we move," Morden said.
The other two didn’t say anything; they just nodded in approval and began preparing to move. Lisa was the First move, her body still showing the signs of worry Morden had seen previously.
Not too far behind them, a man could be seen leaning on a tree, though his face was barely visible; the little part that showed was enough to make almost anyone take a step back.
Beneath his feet a Shadow was present, but unlike normal shadows, this one was swaying from side to side irrespective of its owner’s movement.
The motion continued until the owner made a slight of one of his fingers and the Shadow separated from its owner.
"He should be far enough by now," he muttered while he stared off into the distant forest.
"You will follow them and try as much as possible to remain unseen. Is that clear?" the man said to the shadowy figure.
With a flick of his wrist he produced a red stone; if Morden was here, he would immediately recognize it as the same Kind of stone he had found.
With the stone in hand, the Man stretched that same hand into the shadows’ body; he slipped through without any disturbance, but when he was retracting his hand, the stone was nowhere to be found.
In response to that action, the previous dark eyes of the shadowy figure were now replaced by two bright red spots.
"Go now and make sure you stay connected. If there’s a need for you to step in, you will get my orders," the man said.
With that, the red-eyed Shadowy figure suddenly turned around and vanished; the next moment it would be seen again, and it was already a few meters away.
Morden’s Location
"So Lisa, do you mind explaining more on what is going on?" Darlus asked.
But strangely, unlike usual, Lisa wasn’t keeping an eye on any of their mouths to see if they were moving; instead, she was completely distracted and constantly looking back.
Morden heard Darlus’s question and immediately perked up his ears in wait for Lisa’s response, but a few breaths went by without him hearing a single word, so he obviously had to turn to check.
He was quite shocked to see Lisa walking with her head completely fixated behind her, so he decided to give her a tap on the shoulder so he could get her attention.
A decision he would soon come to reject.
The instant his hand made contact with her, she flinched a little but not for long; instead, she went on the offensive. without looking she grabbed the arm and gave it a really bizarre twist.
"Whaattt!!!!!!" Morden almost screamed.
If it weren’t for the overall upgrade he had gotten, that twist would have almost certainly broken his harm multiple places.
Lisa had done her instinctive maneuver and now actually managed to get a good view of who touched her, and upon realizing that, she quickly let go to apologize.
"Sorry about that," she said with an apologetic smile.
"But why did you even think it was a good idea to touch me suddenly?"
While still massaging his sore arms, Morden shot her a slightly annoyed glance before opening his mouth to respond.
"You weren’t responding when Darlus asked a question, so I turned to check up on you and noticed you were distracted."
"Next time do not do that," Lisa said.
’No one needs to tell me that again.’
Without any time to waste after that short drama, the group continued to move through the Forest hoping to get as far as possible from that showdown spot.
With Lisa now attentive again, Darlus asked his question again, and Lisa didn’t hesitate to give a full detail of her experience.
She described how she found herself alone after the fog receded, her search, her Encounter with Marcus’s group much earlier, her decision to return, and everything that had happened with a mostly neutral face.
Though she was also in a lot of tense situations, it was still different from what they themselves had experienced, Morden especially.
After Lisa’s recount, the two boys managed to get a better scope of what had happened to them. Almost as if he had been waiting for his own turn to speak, Darlus immediately began his own recount when Lisa was done.
The beginning of his recount was almost the same as what Morden had to go through, waking up in that tunnel and walking to both sides to see what was there.
But from there, the two stories veered so far apart.
Instead of sliding down the mountain like Morden had done, he remained on the protruding cliff edge all through before they were brought back. Though at one point in his narration, Darlus seemed like he was about to say something, but he forced himself to stop.
’I don’t think they should know about that for now,’ Darlus thought.
His two teammates picked that up too, but they were just too caught up with their own thoughts.
’What the hell is the Old world and how is the great fog connected to it?’ Lisa wondered.
’Why didn’t I also think of staying up there, what exactly made me want to leave there so much? How didn’t I meet Darlus too? damn, I really hate not understanding all this.’
Since the other two had recounted their experience, it was obviously Morden’s turn to do the same. He took a few moments to decide what to share and what not to before he actually started speaking.
The Shadow that had been following them since so long ago finally moved with a murderous intent.
"Oh no, Lord Tales, I can’t have you spilling that information," their stalker muttered.