Zectas Volume III: Malediction of Veneficatl Valley (9 page)

Although it was his first time seeing the message, he pushed it aside as Rudel walked in the house and called him to follow.
As they waited inside, an elderly brown Volataur came out from one of the rooms. He walked with a long staff to support his weight. His entire horse half including his feathered wings had a brown color. Yet, Deropa's hair and his beard turned white with old age.
Smoke watched Deropa walking slowly with his cane towards him. The elderly Volataur then said. "So, this is the DarkElf that has caught my grandson's attention."
"Nice to meet you, Elder Deropa. I've come to your village as a friend and hope to leave as your blood brother."
"Bold words for such a young man. Very well. Kindly step into the casting circle of truth."
Deropa asked Smoke with only one question.
"Will you sacrifice a friend if it means that you get to kill your enemy?"
Smoke stood in a daze when he heard the elderly Volataur's question. Inside the casting circle of truth, he knew that he couldn't lie.
When Smoke heard Deropa's question, he reflexively thought of Tristan as the enemy. However, he knew that if he told the truth, the Centaurs would want nothing to do with him.
Troubled, Smoke thought of Seth and Donny as the friends that he would need to sacrifice. After he finalized his mental image, Smoke answered. "No!"
To his relief, the casting circle of truth lit up with a green light. Rudel walked over to Smoke and congratulated him. Deropa then called for the DarkElf.
"Smoke, your answer has impressed me. I think you truly are the person I've been looking for."
Smoke bowed down. With his face concealed, he made a victorious grin. He faced Deropa and said.
"If it's within my power, then I'd be glad to help. What seems to be troubling you?"
The old Volataur spread his brown feathered wings, but it couldn't reach its maximum wingspan.
"My body doesn't respond to me anymore. It was only when my health declined that I noticed how unhealthy Pferde has become."
With his staff as support, Deropa slowly walked over to his table which held stacks of books, pieces of precious gems and unidentifiable animal bones.
"I know that you must think we're stupid. Letting all of this garbage surround us." Deropa said as he went through his stacks of books.
He picked out a brown leather book entitled 'Ancient History of the Pferde Centaurs by Ineptus' and gave it to Smoke.
"Here, read this. It was written by a Simiavulg. I detested its contents, but over the years I finally accepted them as truth."
A blue progress bar went up as Smoke acquired the book's knowledge.

"It's tactless, but it's the truth. We grew up with such filth around us that we didn't know any better." Deropa said. "I'm a failure as a leader. I don't know what to do to save this village."
Rudel interjected. "But you did send out our troops to search for a remedy."
"Ha! What good did that do? I should have followed the signs and waited."
Smoke watched as Deropa took the precious gems and animal bones and them all into a bowl and breathed into it.
"Just like before. I had asked the oracle of Verlassene for guidance, and it told me that a stranger would come and help Pferde of its afflictions. Will you be Pferde's savior?"

The inner Smoke jumped up and down. 'Yes! This is what I was hoping for.' He smiled and replied. "Yes."
Smoke wondered about the quest's C level. He thought it should have been higher, but he pushed the idea to the back of his mind when another notification message popped up.

After he read the notification message. He knew that he could safely call Ichaival and Espion to join him inside Pferde. He needed the two of them to help out with his Pferde rehabilitation plan.
As he walked out of Deropa's hut, Smoke thought of three steps for his Pferde Rehabilitation plan.
Step one involved creating closed canals, proper roads and putting some nature back into the village. Step two involved clearing out the waste and garbage littered all over Pferde. Finally, step three involved creating a proper disposal system for the village.
While waiting for his allies, he thought he could start step one on his own. He used his Earth Manipulation ability to try and harden the muddy roads.
However, the ground did not respond to Smoke's will.

'Not again! The land around Margome must be really old.'
"If you're trying to use Earth Manipulation here, then forget about it." Rudel said. "Even Deropa can't control the lands around Pferde."
"Uh huh, I see." said Smoke and nodded.
Smoke remembered that Laernea and Gandiva trained their Beast Tamer ability to Advance Level 1 just recently. So, he used his Knowledge Bank's ability and searched for a specific monster to help him with step two.
'I need a monster that has enormous strength, susceptible to taming, and has the Coprohagus ability, the ability to eat waste.'

Smoke smirked. It took him months to acquire all the knowledge of the book series entitled 'Known Monsters on Wysteria'. It comprised a total of 126 volumes.
With his choices, he couldn't decide between the Durcules Beetle and the Madus Bull. The Horsei Fly was out of the question, given its small size and strength.
Smoke and Rudel headed outside of the village to greet Ichaival and Espion. An idea came to his mind as they waited besides the rustic wooden poles of the village entrance.
"You must need to practice Earth Manipulation, right? Where do you practice that exactly?" Smoke asked.
"Well, it's near the foot of Mount Yunggo. The mountain that divides Pferde and the Simiavulg village of Saruras."
Smoke opened his map window and showed it to Rudel.
"Can you update my map for me? I'd like to visit that place."
"Sure, no problem."
Minutes later, Ichaival and Espion arrived. Smoke noticed their apprehensive faces as they watched Rudel.
"Guys, it's okay. We're all friends here." Smoke said convincingly.
"Okay, if you say so." Ichaival replied with a hesitant voice.
Their pleasant reunion took a strange turn when Smoke got caught off guard by Espion's question.
"And I'm guessing you told them about your hidden Job as well?" Espion asked.
Smoke realized that Espion wanted to test his integrity. A process to check if he was under a spell or an ability. He told them to follow this procedure if one of them gets taken in by the enemy, but he never thought Espion would use it on him.
He hurriedly rushed towards the young Spy and held his hands over Espion's mouth.
"Espion, buddy. No, need to go there. That topic didn't come up and I don't think Rudel would be interested in it."
"I am interested, but I don't want to force you if you don't want to tell me." Rudel replied.
"Alright, now about that quest. Ichaival, Espion, we've got a long walk ahead of us. So, we better get going now. Thanks again, Rudel."
Smoke hurriedly pulled Ichaival and Espion towards Mount Yunggo. Igniz orbited around Rudel and bade him goodbye. The two of them bonded since their flight to Pferde.
 

* * * * * * 

They walked for an hour from Pferde and waited for Laernea to arrive with Smoke's requested supplies. It would have taken them a week if they walked the entire way to Mount Yunggo.
As soon as Laernea arrived, she jumped off her carriage and threw her arms around Smoke. However, she grabbed nothing but air.
Using his high Agility and Dodge Rate, Smoke easily evaded Laernea's hug attack.
"Omf. Hey, why didn't you stand still?" The Lioumerean grumbled.
Smoke helped her up.
"Stop joking around, Laernea. We've got to hurry..." Smoke stopped mid sentence when he noticed Adder sitting behind Laernea's carriage.
"Hey, how are you? You look good. How's the new arm?"
He watched as Adder raised his left arm. It looked completely normal.
"I've been training hard for the last three days, and I've got no complaints so far." Replied the Condortlian.
A large green and black tower shield caught Smoke's attention. Its thick, blunt edges and a protruded, rounded, black sphere as its center made it look heavy.
"Hmm, is this new?" Smoked picked up the tower shield but couldn't lift it.

After Smoke read the notification message, he settled with merely examining its attributes instead.

"Whew!" Smoke whistled in disbelief. "This thing is heavy, and you can really use this in an actual battle?"
Without a word, Adder easily carried the emerald tower shield with his newly regained arm. The Condortlian looked at Smoke and said. "So, where to?"
 

* * * * * * 

With Smoke and his men riding on the back of Laernea's carriage and Rudel flying in the sky, they arrived at their destination in six hours. Laernea's stag moose, Bilis, ran at its new top speed of 280 kph.
Smoke wondered if his gliding ability could someday match Rudel's flight speed, but his thoughts of flying vanished after the tall mountain came into view.
Mount Yunggo's towering height of 5,200 meters casted a dark shadow over Smoke and his men as it blocked the afternoon sun. Dark green Eucalyptus Regnan trees stood at a height from ten to twenty-six meters, spread sparsely all throughout the mountain.
Yet, despite the trees, a noxious smell brought tears to their eyes as they caught its stench. From where they stood, they could see the piles of monster bones and carcasses stacked on top of each other.
These monsters' Coprohagus ability gave them an edge over the other monsters in the area. Whereas some monsters restricted themselves to only eat the fresh meat of a recently killed creature, these monsters preferred their food to be decayed and pungent.
The Coprohagus ability had one more unique feature. During day time it decreased their life and defense by half, but at night, it doubled the monster's attack.
Due to this fact, monsters with the Coprohagus ability mainly became scavengers during the day, and only transformed into predators at night.