Chapter Ninety-Five: Crisis of the Mission

Another bright, sunlit day. The fresh dew among the trees had made the forest air unusually sweet, yet Odasia seemed extraordinarily excited. Her figure slipped through the woodland with liquid agility; from afar she looked like a streak of green, a fairy dancing on the wind.

On the seventh day of the mission, when Guo Lang had nearly convinced himself she would return empty-handed, she at last sensed a difference in the air. The sweetness now carried a strange, heavy undertone—an overripe, almost fishy sweetness. It was a rich scent that felt wrong, no longer pure and clear like forest fragrance, but clinging and faintly choking. It was not the perfume of flowers at all, but unmistakably close to the smell of the Void-kin’s sacrificial fire-bloom she had mentioned.

Tracing that pollen-like scent, Odasia broke into a run. Her steps were light, elegant, and impossibly crisp, cleaner than many Golden-rank assassins Guo Lang had seen in a former life. That release of force did credit to her as a true pure-blood descendant of the Windstrider line.

Guo Lang, however, felt his heart tighten. The mission was about to end—he was about to get his breakthrough—when this sudden turn threw him into a deep unease.

He could find no fault in Odasia’s movement. She moved like a veteran ranger, every path, every rise and fall of her body, every instinctive avoidance of blind spots in her field of view executed with seamless precision. The strange serpent at her side flew around her too, weaving like a living radar. As Guo Lang’s shadow, he could feel its function clearly. Its body released minute electric currents, and controlled them with near-perfect precision. Though they held no real killing force, those waves spread across several kilometers, constantly draping Odasia in an unseen net. Any nearby creature triggered a return signal, and the information reached both the serpent and her at once.

Such a tool for reconnaissance was extraordinary. Even someone of equal rank, even one rank above, would find a sudden attack or ambush nearly impossible. Guo Lang could only sigh inwardly at how excellent this contract beast was—already so useful at such a young age. Its potential was frightening.

Suddenly, the rhythm of those currents was broken. In an instant, the serpent wrapped itself around a nearby tree and, with the same motion, caught the shape of Odasia as she leapt through the air. Through years of shared instinct, she understood at once that something was wrong ahead. She stabilized herself in midair with the serpent’s help, then snatched her heavy bow from her back and drew it into a perfect crescent.

As Guo Lang watched, he felt the draw weight through her shadow. It could no longer be called just “strong”—it was ton-level force. To draw it fully in a moment like that would require at least the strength of a mid-tier Silver-class warrior vocation. He assessed silently: this host was not only shockingly agile, her strength was no small thing either. Was this what true Windstrider blood looked like?

A forcefully muffled impact sounded from the thicket. The thing in ambush, seeing it had been noticed, fled from its place with a rush. It moved so fast that even Guo Lang, from his place as her shadow, could not track it. Yet the movement bore a distinctly Darkmoon cadence.

It was a tracker, Guo Lang decided. Void nature is extreme. A high-spirit Void body is actually frail, even weaker than an ordinary adult. The agile Void type has slightly better physical advantage, but the bias is severe. Within the same level, even so-called Dark Night types are not guaranteed to be more agile than them, while ranger vocations are usually balanced in stats, and so lag when agility is everything.

That kind of one-sided build can doom most races—too many obvious weaknesses. But the Void does not care. Its powerful regeneration lets it make mistakes without paying for them.

“An elemental counter,” Guo Lang thought, brows drawing tight. A ranger’s strongest weapon is the bow; against such speed, hit rate can plummet. Class counters are not just in games. In real life they exist too, and a ranger typically hates to face an assassin type.

Still, Odasia stayed cold and clear. She met the absurd velocity without a flicker of panic, closing her crystal-like violet eyes. Guo Lang, startled, followed her and shut his own eyes too—and in that instant, understanding cracked through him.

She had planned to use those thousands of electric pulses to lock the target’s position. But the plan had a flaw. She was not the first recipient of their feedback. The currents detected the target and relayed it to the serpent; the serpent relayed it to her. That delay was all the enemy needed. No one would stand still and wait.

In Guo Lang’s mind, prediction always meant luck, his least favorite way to fight.

But what could he do? He was no one else’s decision-maker.

At that exact moment Odasia’s face lifted in a faint smile. Her finger released.

“Twang—”

The bowstring gave a clear, bright note of its own strange beauty, though only Odasia and Guo Lang could hear it. That bow’s pull had sent the arrows far beyond the speed of sound; the target would likely hear them only after the hit.

Odasia loosed what seemed three arrows. Their flight traced a formed, elegant curve, arcing over branch and trunk alike, sweeping through the forest and aiming directly for the point where the enemy would land.

Both Odasia and Guo Lang narrowed their pupils. She had truly predicted him.

More than that, her timing was perfect—at that exact heartbeat when he rose and touched down. To change direction, he had to use the ground to push off.

The enemy was no fool either. Though boxed in, he landed with slick agility and barely grazed past the first two arrows. When the third came at him and there was no way past it, he lifted his right hand and flashed out a black dagger, trying to deflect.

Odasia’s bow had immense force. She had not flooded it with wind enchantments as a magical bowman would; she relied on raw strength. Any silver-grade shield warrior brave enough to meet that arrow head-on would likely lose that entire hand.

The foe, black-eyed and controlled, was not panicked. He knew better than to take the blow directly. If he could angle his body and block from the side, he could shift the arrow’s line and slip by with his frame.

“Thud.”
The knife met the shaft at an unnervingly perfect angle. Its striking force was tremendous, but the rebound made him flinch; he could almost hear his own finger bones crack. The power was terrifying.

No matter. He wore a cold smile. For a Void, breaking a few fingers counted for almost nothing.

Then a jolt. At the instant he smiled, his body seemed to freeze. He had blocked one arrow, only to realize there had been two. What he first took for three arrows was not three at all: Odasia had released four. The last two were so perfectly synchronized that the eye believed it was one.

The impact burst through his right hand, already spent from holding the knife, and drove straight toward his left chest. The momentum alone carried him nearly ten meters, and only at last did it pin him into a distant stone oak.

In the highest planes, durability far exceeds that of lesser planes. An arrow that could punch through a heavy armored vehicle there could only rip a thin strip of bark here, not even boring through the trunk.

Guo Lang held his breath as he took it all in. Damn. This little girl, one he had once dismissed as expendable, was that formidable? A pure Windstrider, all right.

“Mm.”

Odasia flashed both of her tiger-like half-fangs, excitement lighting her eyes. After so many days, this was finally a true catch. She had not only detected the Void-kin movement—she had taken a prisoner. Surely this would earn enough merit for promotion to lieutenant.

Still in midair, she glanced at the serpent that had held her. It released its grip. Odasia spun with elegant precision and landed lightly, ready to claim her prize.

Then a hoarse, hungry voice came from behind her:

“Very good indeed.”

Both Odasia and Guo Lang started at once.