Way of the Knights

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"Ah shit, here we go again..." Vendrick mumbled as he prepared for the incoming wave. "How many times would it take for you to stop? Ugh."

Aa he turned his back and ran towards his temporary camp, he kept paying attention to the things happening behind him. Even though he had no eyes on the back of his head, could see what's going on. 

A trail of black smoke was coming from the deeper parts of the wilderness. The smoke behave strangely, it was as if it was looking for someone or something which shouldn't be possible but it is indeed doing just that. 

Vendrick had encountered this black smoke before and its bad news. He couldn't allow it to catch or else he have no short of troubles on the remaining of his journey. 

Vendrick was swift at his retreat but the black smoke was just as fast if not, faster than him. Thankfully, it doesn't seem to catch any of his trails so it was taking a different route. 

After a brief period of retreating, Vendrick reached his temporary camp and stabbed his spear at the dead center of the camp. A small blue dome erupted from the impact which covered him, going about fifteen meters in radius around the camp. The moment the blue dome appeared, Vendrick sighed in relief and inspected his surroundings. 

He saw the black smoke arriving near his camp shortly after his arrival. It hit the blue dome but instead of clashing against it, the black smoke phased through the other side of its entry and continued on its way without noticing anything different. 

This was the effect of the formation of course. He was really thankful for himself being alert and prepared for numerous situation, if not he'd found himself in a lot of trouble right now. 

It's been approximately a year and a few months since he left the tribe. After leaving it sealed within the formation he left for them, Vendrick didn't waste time and began his journey to wipe out the Hags one by one. 

It has been a hectic and action filled year for him. He stayed at the wilderness, hardly taking anytime to rest since he didn't allow himself to stay at one place for too long. One by one, he hunted and slain the Hags, much to the ire of the others and maybe the Forest Witch herself. 

He had seen the variations amongst their ranks. Every single one of them has a unique specialty. Some gave Vendrick troubles but others, not so much.

Vendrick knew that he's being hunted. The evidence was that Black Smoke trail just now. That black smoke might look unimpressive but it's incredibly dangerous. 

That Black Smoke Trail is a chain of hex and curses. Touching even the smallest wisp of the smoke will reduce the victim into a decaying corpse in no time. Even though Vendrick is strong, he very much prefer to keep his body intact. 

This thing is not something that the other Hags can produce. It takes enormous time, effort and rituals for them to condense something like this and those hags just don't have the necessary skill to pull it off. More importantly, all but one Hag remains right now and it shouldn't be hard to figure out who amongst them could produce something like this...

That's right. It's that Eldest Sister. She's the only left amongst the Hag Daughters of the Forest Witch. 

It's hard to imagine just what the Eldest Sister felt about him. As far as he knows, she shouldn't have known his identity just yet since if that's the case, he'd be dead by now. He was careful enough to not leave any traces of him whenever he hunted her sisters but again, he can never be too sure. 

As for confronting that Eldest Sister, Vendrick still falls a little too short unfortunately, however it won't take long before he's able to do it. He has the resources and foundation needed to proceed, he's just lacking the necessary accumulation to approach his next breakthrough but he will in due time. 

For now, he have to avoid her and her tricks at all cost. He also had to gain some distance away from her or else she might sense him using one of her tricks. It would be most unfortunate if she disturbs him during his breakthrough. 

Vendrick's temporary hideout is near a stream. There is a crater in there that's uninhabited by a demonic beast. Coincidentally though, it is surrounded with all sorts of Tier 8 to Tier 9 Demonic Beast. He's using them as a shield to prevent any of the lesser Demonic Beasts to invade his camp but of course, he can't stay here for long. 

"Whew! Glad that's over." Vendrick murmured after noticing that the Black Smoke trail disappeared completely. It's most likely not coming back for now and so long as he stayed put at his camp and not go out for at least a few days, that should be enough for him to hide from the Hag's radar. 

Letting out a sigh, Vendrick entered his tent and laid down to rest for a bit. He's feeling a bit of pressure but it's fine. The situation isn't so terrible right now to the point of him being in a grave danger. 

As he laid down there, he's thinking about many things. 

The Eldest Sister was certainly troublesome. During his trips in search of where she is, his journey brought him close to the very depths of the wilderness. He's certain that the moment he entered core of the Wilderness, the Forest Witch will sense his presence and all hell will break loose. What made him stresses him out is the probability that the Hag is there as well. 

If she's there, then good for her, terrible for Vendrick. Going there right now is suicide. The Forest Witch won't let him be, in fact he doesn't even have enough knowledge about forest witch just yet so it would ne extremely risky to go to her territory now. 

What makes this even more complicated is the fact that the Eldest Sister is a Swamp Hag. And as if that's not enough, the core of the forest is a whole damn swamp as well. 

Who knows just how many abominations hiding underneath that swamp? Considering the memories he absorbed from the Hags he killed, the Eldest Sister is already a Hag before the Forest Witch rose to power. Additionally, swamp was already the territory of the Hag long before the two met. It is unknown, even to the Hags he killed, if the Eldest Sister is as strong, or stronger than the Forest Witch since they never seen him fight. What they know is that the Eldest Sister pledged her alliance towards the Forest Witch and became her Eldest Daughter. The other Hags were created one after another by then. 

Knowing all of that given Vendrick conniptions though. First of all, although the information he read from the memories of his Hag victims were uniform, he for some reason felt something was amiss, therefore he didn't trust it. 

Second, is the Eldest Sister truly loyal towards the Forest Witch? If what he knew was true, then all logic in him tells him that the Hag would rather die than to share territories with someone else or surrender completely. Hags are notoriously evil, territorial, ill-tempered and so on. The Eldest Sister is Hag so there should be no way that things would end up this way, but it did. 

And finally, how can he be sure that the Forest Witch would just sit down and watch as all of her precious daughters die? Its very likely that she had already created some measures to ensure that she won't lose them. He had already experienced it in fact...

It happened during one of his battles against a Hag. Before dying, the Hag tried to activate a bone charm as a last act before dying. The moment Vendrick sensed the presence of the Bone Charm, all hairs on his body stood up so he swiftly snatched it away and sealed it for good. Had he been late even for a millisecond, he'd be dead by now. No doubts about that. 

Thanks to that, Vendrick treaded more carefully. He fought his battles as quickly as he arrived. He didn't give them any chance to call for reinforcements, which in this case, the Forest Witch herself. 

But see, things are getting more hectic. He doesn't have much time. He can't stay still, he could feel his instincts telling him to get rid of them as soon as possible. Why? He didn't know. What he do know is that his instincts never betrayed him before and he certainly wouldn't start doubting it now. 

Vendrick released another sigh. He sat up from his bed and stepped out of the tent to eat. 

His thoughts remained working as he did so, additionally he would inspect his surroundings every now and then to see if there's anything approaching his camp. Better be safe than sorry. 

After eating his fill. He went back inside his tent but he didn't sleep.. He sat cross legged and cultivated with the Crystalized Bloodstone on his hands.