Chapter 155: Dead bodies everywhere

"Kanan, blood!" Nyalok knelt and touched the blood. "It’s still wet and hasn’t dried yet. It couldn’t have been more than a few hours."

Since swamps were extremely humid, it took longer for blood to dry. So while this could be a good thing when tracking someone, it also wouldn’t guarantee that the person is alive.

"That’s a lot of blood, too. There definitely was a fight here. Look, the blood is on that tree, as well as those plants over there. Must have been some fight." Kanan tried analyzing the blood pattern to see if this could be from a monster attack, but everything was too organized, especially the footprints.

"Over here, there’s a trail of blood leading deeper into the swamp. Let’s follow it."

Nyalok wasted no time following the blood trail, with Kanan right behind her. The further they traveled, the harder it was to follow, since the land got all muddy and watery, but the blood trail persisted, even when they found solid ground again.

"This is too much blood for a person to lose and not be somewhere around here. If there was a dead body here, it must have been moved." Kanan concluded

"You may be right. Or the injured person kept moving on their own."

"I won’t doubt that possibility. Let’s keep going. We may find the answer soon."

And so they continued following the blood trail, their expectations of meeting a living person getting slimmer and slimmer every time they saw the amount of blood the person had lost.

Finally, further in the distance, Nyalok had spotted something on the ground that looked to be a person.

"Kanan, up ahead! I think it’s a person."

Kanan grabbed Nyalok by the waist and rocketed toward the body.

"This is definitely a scout," Nyalok concluded. "As for who it is..." She flipped the body over to see who it was, then took a few steps back afterward.

"I-It can’t be." Her words were soft but laced with sorrow, and her hands began to tremble while a tear flowed down her face.

"Your friend?" Kanan asked, putting a hand on Nyalok’s back.

Only nodding, she knelt to examine the way her friend had died. "Oh, Seejuk, who could do this to you?"

"Hold on, Nyalok. Look at the marks on her body. Those injuries weren’t made by a claw or sword."

"A harpoon!" Her spirit energy began to rise, but once she felt Kanan’s hand on her shoulder, her spirit energy died down, and she calmed herself.

"Carl, that bastard! He uses a harpoon!"

"So does Eshem." Kanan pointed out. "And a lot of warriors in your tribe, including the other scouts."

"Are you seriously trying to say that Carl didn’t do this?"

"No, I’m not. I’m trying to say that there are situations where one might look guilty, but clearly isn’t. Though I do believe that Carl is behind this." Even if the system hadn’t warned him, Kanan felt as if something were off with the guy.

It went beyond mere wariness of the unknown people as well. It was as if his whole person was fake. He had never felt this way about anyone from the Typhon Tribe, so to feel this way about a person he had barely known and was barely around said something to Kanan’s instincts.

Sighing, Nyalok stood up. "I get it. I know what you’re trying to make me understand. But let’s just focus on figuring out what happened here before pointing fingers. But I still believe it’s Carl."

"Heh, alright."

The two scoped the area, their senses on high alert in case anything hostile was attempting to ambush them.

Blood was once again found, which made sense, but what didn’t make sense was the drag marks Kanan had noticed off to the side.

"This is weird. Why are there drag marks here when Seejuk is over there?"

"A second victim, perhaps?"

Kanan nodded. "That’s what I believe. Come, let’s follow this trail."

The trail didn’t lead them on a long chase, only taking around five minutes before reaching the place where it stopped. At first, they wondered what could have been over here, but Nyalok had noticed something weird in the dirt.

"What’s wrong?" Kanan asked

"That spot, the dirt is loose. When digging in the swamp, water tends to seep into the ground more, which leads to the dirt turning into mud. When this happens, anything that’s buried tends to float back to the top or is uncovered by the water if it’s heavy."

"So you’re saying that something is underneath that spot of dirt?"

"That’s right."

"Well, let’s check it out." Kanan wrapped spirit energy around the dirt and lifted it. Water gushed into the newly made hole, but it revealed something else entirely: dead bodies.

"Whoa!"

Nyalok couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Her people, dead in some hole without getting a proper sending-off ceremony. "The scouts!" She muttered while gritting her teeth.

"Are these every scout, or is there someone missing?"

"No, these are evrey scout."

Then Kanan was confident of who the killer was. The only question he wanted to know was why Carl was doing such a thing. Did he realize that killing his people could lead to the tribe’s destruction?

"Wait a minute." Kanan levitated a body into the air and examined its face. "Green vein-like markings. That’s a clear sign of the Verminus Plant plague. This man was infected."

Checking the other bodies, Kanan corrected himself. "Scratch that, all of them were infected."

"What? How is that possible? The scouts aren’t to venture to the old village. Carl only did so because he said that he had heard commotion and wanted to check it out."

Now things were becoming confusing. Kanan could see spirits now, so he knew that the place wasn’t infested with the verminous plant. If so, they would have been scarce. However, these scouts were infected regardless.

The logical answer would be that they had encountered the Helsik Corpse warriors before they had attacked the village, but if that were the case, Carl should have reported this instead of keeping it to himself.

’I can’t believe I had never thought of this, but could the Plant be controlled by someone?’ Kanan had always assumed that the Verminus Plant was simply a monster, but what if the monster had a master? That would explain its high intelligence and rapid growth and evolution.’

"Nyalok, what are Carl’s spirit abilities?"

"He can control plants like me. Why?"

"Hmm. Could it be that Carl is a perfect host for the plant?"

But before Kanan could think of another scenario, he was suddenly attacked from behind.