BXBX NOVEL Chapter 6 [Lost Forest]
After 50 days of continuous travelling, Lucy and i arrived at the [Lost forest]. It was a massive dark forest with huge trees around 50 meters.
"[Lost Forest] ranked [B] because some idiots disappeared without a trace. Though there are few [B] rank beasts, this forest mostly consists [D] rank beasts. Do you have questions related to things i explained?" i started to explain this forest\'s prominent characteristics to Lucy.
"Are there any [C] rank beasts in the forest, if yes wouldn\'t they be a big trouble to us?" Lucy asked.
"There are [C] rank beasts in the forest but they are mostly pack leaders. So we wouldn\'t get ambushed more than 1 [C] rank beast and even if an [C] rank beast with its pack ambushes us, i am sure we can take them with little injuries."
I waited for Lucy to digest the information, and after that, i started to speak again.
"In the [Lost Forest] there are many strange things. If you see something strange, show me first and don\'t interact with it. Understood?"
Lucy nodded slowly.
I cast illusion magic to hide our scent and made us look like a blur.
"Hold my hand. We shouldn\'t be separated in this forest."
Lucy held my hand and we entered the forest.
I didn\'t have a particular destination in my mind. I will just trust my intuition to find treasures.
My bet was in my innate power. [Situational intuition]\'s rank was high enough to find some valuable treasures, so i will rely on it for a while.
Forest was dark and strange. I said too many times the strange but it\'s because it\'s too much strange.
There are trees fully black that look like 2D if don\'t look around them, you would think that it was just a flat paper like illusion.
There are trees their parts are missing and floating in the air as if a game bug appeared.
Rainbow mushrooms, transparent berries, singing squirrels, everything is strange.
If i didn\'t know this forest\'s strangeness, i would think that i got drugged or something like that.
While we were walking, i picked mushrooms, berries and herbs. Even though i didn\'t know what is their use, i picked them anyway. No one comes to this forest anymore because of the fear of disappearing in a second.
While we were looking around, something came closer to us.
It was a skeleton. Though it is a skeleton, i could tell with a single glance that, this skeleton isn\'t mindless undead.
"Good day mister, do you need something from us?" I greeted skeleton politely, which made Lucy look at me like as if i had gone crazy.
Why i greeted a skeleton you ask? It is simple actually. [Lost Forest] is somehow connected to the [Dark Realm] and every [Dark Realm] denizen, which is called Darkling are bizarre but intelligent spirit like creature.
In this world, there are 5 realms.
[Mortal realm] where humans and other races lives.
[God realm] where gods, goddesses and their servants live.
[Devil realm] where devils and their servants live.
[Spirit realm] where spirits live.
[Dark Realm] where Darklings live.
[Dark Realm] is a realm full of madness. It\'s every denizen that contains madness that they fought back against every day to keep the madness from slipping their minds. Though they can form a contract with someone compatible and give them power for a price and usually the price is to share Darkling\'s portion of their madness.
So it is recommended that be polite to every Darkling or else they could lose their minds to madness because of some small stupid mistake.
"Hello there human child, what are you doing in this scary forest?" Skeleton spoke with an elderly tone.
"I am here for treasure hunting mister, what about you ?" I spoke and smiled innocently.
"Call me grandpa child, i am at least 700 years old. I was just strolling around and i saw 2 human children in this forest. There aren\'t any humans or elves that visit me or this forest any more. So i got curious and came here."
"Grandpa humans don\'t come here anymore because of the disappearances. But i don\'t know about elves."
"Because of the disappearances huh? What cowards. You are brave one by human standards huh."
"Nope. I just read a book about this forest, so i knew that me and my sister wouldn\'t disappear. I am not an idiot, if i didn\'t read that book, i wouldn\'t come here."
Skeleton made some cackling noises and chattered its teeth.
\'I don\'t know how i understand this but i think it laughed.\'
"I like you kid. I will give you 4 choices and you will select one of them.
"First one is a dagger as empty as you.
Second one is a mask with countless faces.
Third one is a potion that will change you.
Fourth one is a rune that distorts space."
This skeleton is too strange to understand, so i gave up the idea of understanding this skeleton.
Every one of them intrigued my interest in one way or another.
Dagger that is empty as me is interested me because the skeleton knows my emptiness and there is a dagger that like me who is nearly incapable to feel anything.
\'Is dagger have a soul? Or dagger is really empty or something like that.\'
Mask is a disguise artifact, but i didn\'t understand the potion.
\'Is this potion can change personality, soul or physical body? Even if it\'s physical change it would be too valuable.\'
A rune that distorts space is a gamble. It can be a simple blink spell or long range teleportation.
Normally i wouldn\'t even glance at this rune because of its huge gamble, but my intuition is going crazy over this option.
So i selected fourth option.
In the skeleton\'s hand, a map appeared and said:
"This is the map of the forest. I marked the rune\'s location on the map. If you can take the treasure, it\'s yours."
This skeleton only gave the location of the rune. Well, i didn\'t think that it would be that easy i guess.
I thanked the skeleton and started to walk in the direction of the rune.
Lucy asked what was that skeleton and i explained darklings and their circumstances.
After some time of walking, we saw a colossal tree with a hollow, so we decided to rest for the night in it.
At some time in the night, i woke up because of some bell voice. I listened carefully and tried to feel its aura.
What i heard was only bell voices but its aura was different. It was majestic but peaceful and silent.
\'It is majestic but not too strong, maybe [B] rank and its aura peaceful.\' i concluded that our new guest too is darkling.
I quickly woke up the still sleeping Lucy and told her about our new possible guest.
After that, i unblocked the hollow\'s entrance and looked around.
I saw a cute shadowy cat with ruby red eyes and cat with have bell hung its neck.
"Hello." I greeted the cat.
"Meow" the cat greeted me back with its pawn and the bell that hung its neck disappeared.
"Do you want something from us?"
Cat nodded its head for affirmation.
Every darkling can communicate with humans in one way or another. So i know this cat can communicate too, but i didn\'t know the reason why it\'s not answering properly.
"Can you tell us what you need properly? I know that every darkling can communicate."
After i said this, i heard a feminine voice come from the cat.
"Cheeky one aren\'t you? Anyway, what i want is simple, i just want to form a contract with the girl."
"Why? You are not even compatible with her and even if you were compatible with her, it\'s still no." I said and pulled Lucy behind my back.
"You know a thing or two huh? Why? Because i want to get out of this place, i am bored. I am not compatible with her but i can make her compatible. Why her? Not you because you are packed with affinities and that would be harder for me." She said it loud.
After that, i heard the cat\'s voice in my head.
"If you are worried about madness, you don\'t need to worry about it. I formed countless contracts, so my madness diminished considerably. Her personality may shift a little but not drastically. For example, if she was an honorable person, she would be less honorable but still honorable nonetheless."
Cat\'s offer was extremely good that i thought there was some sort of trap. But my intuition told me that it was a great deal. So i accepted and told Lucy the cat\'s offer but didn\'t tell her about her personality would change.
Lucy was enthusiastic about the contract because forming a contract with spirit is big deal. Though this is darkling, not spirit. But this particular darkling is a shadowy cat with little madness, so it looks like a dark or shadow spirit rather than a darkling.
I told to cat the conditions. Which are don\'t attack me and Lucy, protect Lucy, listen to her orders if it\'s not uncomfortable to do and befriends her. The cat agreed pretty quickly, it was suspicious, to be honest but i let it be, well because i didn\'t care too much.
Afterwards we started the contract ritual.
I wrote the contract\'s conditions and started to chant.
After some chanting praises to the [Goddes Esnera], The Goddes of wealth and contracts.
Lucy dropped her blood onto the paper, paper shined briefly. After that the cat, whose name is [Yarin] dropped her blood which was shadowy and transparent, paper shined briefly for a while after that paper disappeared.
Lucy lost consciousness immediately and i hold her before she fell to the ground and i looked to Yarin for an explanation.
"She is just sleeping to adapt to her sudden change."
I nodded, it was a valid possibility. After that, i put Lucy into her bed in the hollow.
I looked over her status.
======
Name: Lucy Ceurie
Race: Human
Rank: D–
Talent: S+
Potential: ???
Strength: F–
Agility: E
Dexterity: E–
Constitution: E–
Stamina: E+
Charm: A–
Mana quality: D
Mana quantity: D+
Mana control: D+
===Innate powers and Curses===
???(passive): A+
Shadow manipulation: A–
===Compatibilities===
77% Information
73% Wind
57% Earth
45% Shadow
38% Water
9% ???
======
I didn\'t look at the status of Lucy last months because i didn\'t cared about it.
She improved her stamina and agility a lot. It is good.
After the contract she gained [Shadow manipulation] and shadow affinity.
Spirits and darklings use their respective element itself not mana. They can crate them manipulate them. Though they can\'t infinitely do that, or else they would die.
[Shadow manipulation] is a skill/power of shadow spirits or darklings. With this power they can manipulate existing shadows with thought. It is like chantless magic but more cheaper. Though it is not efficient as chant magic.
I looked over Yarin. I didn\'t used status lenses on her first glance because i thought that she could sense it. Well i can use it now.
After that i used status lenses on Yarin. Although i was sure that it will show too much error, because i was sure that artifact maker wasn\'t knowledgeable about darklings and their power levels.
======
Name: Yarin
Race: spirit???
Rank: @#§¶°
Talent: @#§¶°
Potential: @#§¶°
Strength: D
Agility: A+
Dexterity: A
Constitution:???
Stamina: @#§¶°
Charm: S+
@#§¶° quality: @#§¶°
@#§¶° quantity: A–
@#§¶° control: @#§¶°
===Innate powers and Curses===
Shadow creation: ???
Shadow manipulation: ???
Shadow storage: ???
Transformation: ???
Madness(weakened): F+
===Compatibilities===
96% Shadow
======
It worked as i thought. Full of error but it worked.
Yarin will be useful in the future when apocalypse come.
I called over Yarin to my side. When she came to my side, i take her to my lap and started to rub her head. She could very well resisted me with her strength or abilities if she didn\'t want it. But everyone, even darklings likes beautiful things and my beauty exceeds that of a [S+]. And even if she is darkling, she is cat nonetheless, so she couldn\'t resist my head rubbings.
So i seduced her with my looks and head pats for knowledge and easy cooperation in the future.
"I don\'t know too much about darklings, so can you tell me about it?" I asked with relaxed tone.
Yarin purred and spoke telepathically.
"We darklings are like that of a spirits. Just more bizarre and mad. We don\'t know why we are mad from the beginning, even strongest and long lived darklings couldn\'t find the reason. But they thought that everything have their exact opposite form.
For example Gods and Devils are divine beings. But they are exact opposite of theirs.
Therefore we thought that we were the exact opposite of the spirits because our structure like that of a spirits." Yarin explained with sadness apparent in her voice.
"That is interesting theory don\'t you think?
Gods always do things what they believe is good and Devils always do things what they believe is evil.
While spirits graceful and wise, darklings bizarre and mad.
Probably mortals are the most free of their mind. We can do good things and bad things, we can be gracefull, wise, bizarre and mad." I said with relaxed tone.
This world\'s balance ideals are fucked up too. I noticed this fact when Yarin told the theory of darklings.
"You are not usual 12 year old are you?"
"Hahaha no. I am the most beautiful 12 year old, don\'t you think?" I said and lifted Larin to my face.
Larin stared for a while and said:
"Indeed you are right, but you aren\'t my taste right now. Wait for some years and try me one more time."
"Well i don\'t think you can resist my beauty, but we will see about it later." I said and placed Yarin back to my lap and continued to rub her head.