…….
Time swiftly flowed. The sun had long set and the mountain was shrouded in the dark cover of night. Such a setting/environment was usually accompanied by an eerie silence however, someone had forgotten to tell Zilan and his disciples that.
Near the peak, Zilan’s seven trouble makers could be seen recuperating from what looked like a day of hard labour. Their expressions though were one of extreme bliss to the point that foolish smiles and smirks were plastered on their faces. Zilan looked at them sprawled on the ground and a light chuckle escaped his from his lips. He was confused as to why the group looked so tired when he was the one who did all the heavy lifting in getting them their scriptures.
Misty got a Water scripture of some sort as did Hendrek. The Harnah sisters were fortunate enough to attain Scriptures of the Fire field, Grouch had his Poison scripture and Misty got an interesting Wind field-ed Scripture. The luckiest of the bunch though was undoubtedly Lorn as he had actually managed to get in his hands a Scripture of the field of Killing. It was also expectedly the one that took the most effort to subdue.
‘Everything’s gone smoothly….to this point.’ Thought Zilan.
He then turned to address his disciples. “Your scriptures contain more detailed information on their respective fields as it pertains to this world. Learn about the strongest poisons, killing alchemy recipes, water alchemy etcetera…of this world and use the Scripture I gave you to fill in the blanks. The information it contains cannot be rivalled by these things. Nevertheless, it will help each of you grow.”
Zilan took a deep breath, “From here onwards, I’ll be going alone. Sine you guys have met the requirements, you should leave. You can watch from the spectator’s area.”
The bunch of tired-eyed, exhausted disciples were suddenly alert when Zilan was speaking, each one more energetic than the last. From their Master’s tone, they could deduce that he was being serious thus they could only comply obediently with his wishes.
“Master will definitely get the Supreme Scripture.” Cried Andrete as he balled up a fist.
The rest of his disciples following the lead of none other than Lorn respectfully bowed, none daring to raise their heads.
Zilan waited for a while however, they still had not risen. ‘These idiots…do they want me to leave first? What kind of tradition is this?’ Confused, Zilan opted to just walk away. Only when his figure had disappeared far into the darkness did the disciples raise their heads. With his senses, he could obviously feel their movements and he was left feeling conflicted on whether or not to feel touched or disappointed that they would actually willingly stay in that position until he chose to depart.
‘Never mind, I guess it’s a good thing.’
The audience that was watching Zilan’s group was at this point completely numb to his actions. The Half Breed could not be understood, his methods were strange yet efficient, the way he carried himself was infuriating to them but the end of the day they were beginning to respecting him. How could they not? He had captured SEVEN ‘Legendary Scriptures’ in one bloody day when it was normal for some past Concealed Scriptures Display’s to end with no one even obtaining one. The envy they felt at this point could not be described in words. Some members of the audience actually wanted to head up the Mountain to tell Zilan that those Scriptures were not things that ought to be given away. Some idiots amongst even desired to head up and accept him as their Master in hopes of receiving a scripture.
The Elders were also feeling out of sorts, thinking to themselves, ‘Having this new format with this monster running about is like welcoming a pack of wolves into the hen house.’ It was unfortunately too late to regret though as the damage had already been done. One group had practically monopolised the Legendary Scriptures! What they could not figure out though was how in the f*ck Zilan was able to locate so many of them.
The First Elder himself in his current form would be unable of such a feat on the Chairman’s Mountain.
………………….
As Zilan approached the peak of the mountain, Little Red’s words rang clear in his mind.
“Let’s see what’s waiting for me.”
The peak of the mountain ran past the clouds in the sky. Seeing the misty white cover, Zilan didn’t get surprised, he calmly rushed through it and in a matter of seconds was on the other side. What greeted him was an entirely different atmosphere very much different from the metallic ‘everything’ down below.
The sky was a peculiar all-white with only a single dark cloud up above. This dark blemish on the otherwise pure sky was precisely that dark cloud that caused Zilan to feel apprehension. Ignoring it, he moved around a little bit taking in everything this seemingly new realm had to offer. The ground was littered with interesting, orange flowers that throbbed with light at a particular rhythm. Grey trees were scattered across the environment in groups of three, placed in a style that Zilan was fairly familiar with. “It’s a formation.” He exclaimed.
As soon as that thought went through his mind, the dark cloud up in the sky abruptly began descending. For caution’s sake, Zilan immediately backed away until he was no longer underneath the huge cloud. Whilst in the sky its size seemed small but looking at it up-close as it was about to land on the ground, he could only suck in a breath of cold air as he marvelled at its size.
The audience watching through the screen were having a similar reaction, marvelling at the wonder of the dark cloud that was making its first ever appearance in the Concealed Scripture display. Their eyes shone with wonder as they dazedly observed not just the cloud but the wonderland of an environment that was the Mountain’s peak. It was really beautiful.
Zilan was not concerned about beauty though. The wariness he felt towards the dark cloud had yet to fade but for some reason the thing inside him that was directing him towards his destination all this while was now pointing him towards the dark cloud. He was most certainly confused by this but instead of making any rash movements he simply stayed put and patiently awaited a trigger that could make things move along.
Like a monster from the abyss, the dark cloud periodically bobbed and lightly swayed about. Black tentacle-like wisps of cloud creepily flailed around causing Zilan to feel even more discomfort. The thing even looked scary so what reason did he have to not believe that it was dangerous.
“Boom.”
The Mountain started rumbling, everything was shaking. Even the spectators area that was a distance away was suffering from the wake although mildly.
The source of all this commotion to Zilan could only be the dark cloud before him.
“Let’s see it then.”
