After sending the message, Liam did not look back and continued walking forward. He was fully aware of what he had done, and he did not plan on being anywhere in the vicinity when the shit hits the fan.
As for why he had done it, he simply had no other choice. It was not as if he was fond of backstabbing in this way. He would rather be straightforward and brutal. But he had already considered this from several perspectives, and if he tried to keep his word, the only outcome he was able to see was his death.
This mysterious being was a prisoner, imprisoned by possibly one of the most powerful factions in this world. What would happen if word spread around that he helped the person escape?
Even if the divine temple let this matter rest, would the prisoner let him live? He was the only one alive who knew that she had escaped or was at least close to escaping. Wouldn't she want to erase his existence to remove all evidence?
No matter what, he was the one who would be in danger. This deal was never valid, to begin with. An agreement like this could only hold true if it was made between two true equals. When their strength disparity was so great, he had to look out for himself and his family.
The only thing Liam couldn't figure out was how such a powerful being didn't see his betrayal coming from a mile away. It seemed fairly obvious and logical for him to act this way. So why was she so sure that he wouldn't rat her out? Was it perhaps because of his nether affinity?
Liam mulled this over in puzzlement as he quickly made his way back to the forest. Once he was under the cover of the forest, he did not care about his invisibility any longer and called for Luna.
The man and the fox then set out on their return journey back to the elven lands. The old elf had chased him away in such a hurry that he barely had time to do everything that he planned to do. Moreover, he needed to talk to the elf about the new intel he had gathered.
"Limitbreaker fruit… A celestial grade item…" Liam wondered if it was really possible to get his hands on something like this. His gaze shifted to the soft, luxurious white fur ball he was currently sitting on.
He had already obtained something of the celestial grade, would it really be impossible to get one more item? Just one more? He patted the fox while he mulled over all the places where he could possibly search for this item before the game shut down.
The nether realm was definitely an option. However, there was another place where he was quite confident of getting what he needed, and that was the Milky Way Auction House. If there was really an item like that around, wouldn't that little girl know about it?
There was a chance that she could even pluck out the dang fruit from her backyard tree and gift it to him! He had to start his search from that place!
While Liam was thinking about this, Luna had already crossed half the distance by teleporting in and out, and the duo were almost back at the elven lands.
But all of a sudden, she unexpectedly came to a screeching halt, almost throwing Liam off her back. "Master! Something is wrong!"
Liam snapped out of his thoughts. He lifted his head to look up and saw a bright, glimmering barrier of sorts in the distance. "Isn't that where the elven lands are?" He opened his system interface map again just to check, and that was indeed the place.
"What happened there?" He frowned. "Let's go closer and take a look." He patted Luna, and the fox cautiously took off once again. The duo approached the barrier slowly, and when they got closer, what they saw only confirmed their suspicions.
There was a gigantic barrier in front of them, preventing them from going any further. Luna even tried clashing against this barrier several times, lobbing a few fireballs at it but it was impossible to crack.
Just the magnitude of the thing was simply enormous. It seemed like the barrier was encompassing the whole elven kingdom, or perhaps that entire territory, including all the elven clans and kingdoms.
How was this possible? Liam gulped as he imagined the kind of magic one would need to erect a barrier of this magnitude. The person who was capable of doing something like this… was this the work of that old elf? Was this why he had chased him out in a hurry?
Liam did not understand what was going on. After staring at the magnificent magic for a while, the fox and the human then started circling around the thing. Since they couldn't enter the barrier, their only option was to go around it.
Thankfully, Luna was able to fly, and the nearby territories seemed to be neutral forest zones. So there weren't any factions hanging around in the wilderness, wanting to shoot them down for flying in the enemy zone.
However, when they reached half the distance, suddenly sounds of disturbance echoed ahead of them. There wasn't any magic per se, but loud clanging noises could be heard as if someone was ramming something powerful against something strong.
"Luna, wait here," Liam asked the fox to land and took another invisibility potion as he moved closer to check what was happening. Some of the sounds he heard were familiar, so he already had a wild guess.
And when he arrived there, he knew he was correct.
Barbarians! The barbarians had finally made a move. In front of him, there were hundreds of thousands of barbarians swarming the barrier like flies.
More importantly, each one of them had bloodshot eyes and swelled-up bodies as they repeatedly rammed themselves against the barrier.
