~ 💎 WEEKLY POWER GOALS 💎🔥 60→1ch | 100→2ch | 200→5ch ⏰ Resets Monday!
Thanks!
“Hmph, these outsiders sure ran fast!” About half a minute later, at the center of the forest, the very spot where Wayne had been sitting, over ten High Hollows stood around a pile of splintered wood, cursing without end.
Several were missing pieces of themselves: limbs, horns.
One had even lost a wing.
All of it, clearly, was Wayne’s handiwork.
“Don’t let them escape — find them immediately!” one of the Aberrant Hollows bellowed.
“No need.” A canine-type Beast Hollow sniffed at the broken wood.
“They fled north.
His Reiatsu scent is still on this.” “Hmph.
They really underestimate us.
After them!” The Hollow Beasts shrieked in unison and gave chase.
Less than half an hour later, they caught up with Wayne and the others.
A small clearing in the dense northern woodland, Wayne stood alone at its center, perfectly still.
The reason the enemy had closed the gap so quickly was simple: ten minutes ago, Wayne had already stopped moving.
He’d planted his feet and waited.
“Ha — ah…” He stretched lazily in front of the assembled Hollows and said, without any particular hurry, “You really are slow.” “Cowardly ambusher!” A Humanoid Hollow missing his right arm ground out through clenched teeth.
“Today is the day you die!” “You’re already crippled and you still have this much to say.” Wayne’s expression went cold.
“Do you really think I won’t kill you?” “Arrogance!” The lead Hollow Beast snarled.
“We’ve hunted you for so long and a stray dog still dares act this brazen.
You’ve slaughtered so many of ours — don’t even dream of begging for mercy today!” “Begging for mercy?” Wayne smiled.
“I think you’ve misunderstood something.” “I didn’t retreat here to run.
I brought every last one of you worthless creatures to this forest to make it your burial ground.” As he spoke, his Reiatsu surged.
The wave of pressure rolled outward, and even the Elite-ranked Hollow Beasts began to quietly falter.
“Nonsense!
There’s only one of you.
Even if your subordinates are hiding nearby, they can’t pull you out from in front of this many of us.
Get him!
Kill this outsider and victory is ours!” Among the High Hollows, one with slightly weaker Reiatsu broke first.
He couldn’t hold against the pressure bearing down on him.
He let out a shout and ordered his Elite Hollows forward, anything to relieve that crushing weight.
His order set off a chain reaction.
In an instant, every cluster of Elite Hollows rushed toward Wayne at once, their momentum making it clear they meant to tear him apart.
“Useless roaring.” The corner of Wayne’s mouth curved cold beneath his Hollow Mask.
He raised his right claw, Reiatsu surging, and slashed hard at the ground by his feet.
An instant later, the trees ringing the clearing erupted with a tearing, whistling chorus.
Thousands of sharp stone spikes came screaming in from every direction.
Phase three of the trap: Flying Spikes.
Wayne had ordered his subordinates to spend enormous stretches of time on these preparations.
For the better part of this past week, nearly all of their effort had gone into laying close to ten thousand spikes.
He’d chosen this clearing long in advance.
The surrounding trees were exceptionally tall, perfect for hiding needle and spike traps, and the open center left no cover for anything charging across it.
In an instant, the quiet clearing became a slaughterhouse.
Phase one had wiped out the bulk of the lesser fodder.
Phase two had filtered out the Hollow Beasts with thick, heavy shells.
What remained were mostly those capable of flight, those with quick movement, or those that were genuinely dangerous.
The final stage, the last sweep, was the answer to that remainder.
Only those who survived the dense stone barrage were enemies Wayne’s group actually needed to face.
The spikes numbered in the thousands.
They slaughtered the ordinary and Elite-ranked cannon fodder nearly to the last.
The High Hollows came through with lighter losses, but they were filled with dread now.
Hundreds of Hollows had swarmed eight, and hadn’t landed a scratch, while their own side had been gutted close to annihilation.
Of the dozen or so High Hollows still standing, a large portion had already taken hits from Wayne’s earlier ambush.
Was there any point in continuing?
That question, riding a current of fear, began flooding every surviving mind.
“Leave none of them.” Four words.
That was all.
Wayne’s brief sentence became the final judgment on the allied Hollow Beasts.
His seven subordinates dropped from the trees at the same moment, closing a ring around what remained of the enemy.
Wayne released his full Reiatsu, pressure that matched a Gillian’s.
Despair bled into the surrounded Hollows’ eyes.
Only now did they understand: this had never been a fight between equals.
It was a slaughter, plain and simple.
The battle didn’t last long.
Wayne’s seven took only minor injuries.
The allied Hollow Beasts were massacred to the last.
After this battle, Wayne had firmly established his place in this forest.
The other Hollow Beasts that lived here silently acknowledged the new apex predator in their midst.
Those Hollows with some Sentience chose to leave, or went quiet and kept their distance.
Those with little Sentience drifted through their dim, unthinking world, waiting to hunt or to be hunted.
The iron law of Hueco Mundo would never change.
The cycle of predator and prey among Hollows would never stop.
“My King, this battle yielded twenty High Hollow corpses and one hundred and eighty-four Elite-ranked corpses.
Remains of weaker existences have been set aside.
Corpses that couldn’t be retrieved have been cleared on-site.
In total, we eliminated approximately thirty percent of the Hollow Beasts in this entire forest.” After the fighting was over, Inola led the cleanup, tallied the rough numbers, and reported to Wayne before the bodies dissolved into Reishi and vanished.
“Stop standing around.
While they haven’t turned to Reishi yet, start devouring.” Wayne waved a hand.
“Follow the order I laid out last time.
Fales, you have first priority on the High Hollow corpses.
But one thing, if you feel like you’re close to advancing, stop eating immediately and get yourself to the pit we dug, the one more than ten meters deep.” “Yes, My King.” Fales answered with a respectful bow.
The deep pit Wayne had ordered Chloe to dig hadn’t been made for a trap.
It had been prepared specifically for his subordinates to use when advancing.
The purpose was straightforward: each Hollow needed to be able to leave the forest safely when the time came to evolve.
Even if they lost consciousness upon becoming a Gillian, the tunnel Wayne had laid out would guide them out of the forest on their own, making sure Wayne and the others wouldn’t be caught in the path of a newly-evolved Gillian’s mindless Cero.
With the order given, the Hollows dispersed, each heading to their assigned zone to feed.
Fales set aside five High Hollow Hollow Masks for Wayne, then distributed the agreed shares to the others.
Everything that remained went into his own stomach.
After assimilating them, he found it still wasn’t enough to push him over the threshold.
Wayne gave a nod, and Fales moved on to the Elite Hollow corpses.
At the eighty-second, something shifted.
A powerful surge of Reiatsu began gathering inside his body.
Wayne saw it immediately, the unmistakable sign that Fales was on the edge of advancing.
“My King…” Fales seemed to be asking permission.
“Go.” Wayne nodded.
“The rest of you, come watch.” He led the group to where Chloe had first broken ground on the pit.
Wayne scanned the surrounding area, then ordered Fales into the pit.
He tossed two of his five reserved Hollow Masks down after him, telling him to devour them and wait for the advancement to take hold.
The others spread into the surrounding trees and waited in silence.
With two Hollow Masks consumed, Fales’s Reiatsu surged to its peak.
Spiraling currents of spiritual energy began revolving around his massive frame, dense with Reishi.
The currents wrapped tighter, spinning faster and faster.
His body swelled as the Reiatsu kept building, until it sealed him inside a Light Cocoon that constantly shifted and pulsed.
The wait was neither short nor long.
A full half-day passed before howls broke from within that enormous cocoon, unmistakable to anyone who knew.
A Gillian’s voice.
Wayne knew: the moment the Light Cocoon cracked open would be the moment Fales crossed over.
That moment didn’t make him wait much longer.
Within a few breaths, the cocoon split apart.
A massive black figure stepped out.
Fales.
Successfully advanced.
But atop that enormous body sat a jester-like Hollow Mask with a pointed nose.
“Tsk.
Lost consciousness.” Wayne clicked his tongue from outside the pit and exhaled quietly.
It couldn’t be helped.
Gillians who retained their minds were vanishingly rare, not even one in dozens could be counted on.
There was nothing to do but accept it.
“Fall back — before Fales goes berserk.” Wayne beckoned to his subordinates.
Fales was still inside the pit.
From where he stood, he couldn’t see Wayne or the others, and that bought them the window they needed to withdraw.
Watching the first of their companions make the crossing left the Hollows’ respect for Wayne noticeably deeper.
Fales had lost himself, yes.
But as long as luck held and he could devour enough Reiatsu before reaching the Forest of Menos, there was still a path forward, still a chance to survive, and to become an Adjuchas.
As long as advancement was possible, the hope of living remained.
Because the weak have no right to choose.
Hreeee…
hreeee…
Long after Wayne and the others had withdrawn, the piercing cries slowly faded beyond the edge of the forest.
Fales had left.
The forest still held plenty of prey.
And the Hollows pressing in from outside would never stop coming.
“Alright.
Fales is gone.
Everyone divide up the remaining spoils, then start on the next batch of traps and wait for the prey to come.” Wayne’s voice was steady.
“Time doesn’t wait for us.
We need to move faster.” “Yes!” ➤ Next: The Path to Advancement [FULL STORY ACCESS] Unlock (100+ Chapters) ahead of the public release!