Lucius stared down at the water for a few more moments, checking to see if he could find the apparition that had ben smiling at him. But apparently it had all been a trick of the mind. Or at least he hoped so.
"I wish you strength in your hunting," Shavak said, as he passed another dangling rope towards Lucius.
"Yeah…" Lucius whispered, looking at the water for another moment, before climbing up the rope.
For him, it was an easy task, what with his strength stat being maxed out. However, climbing this wasn't merely an issue of strength.
Harsh ghost-winds howled at them, as if sucking, rather than blowing them towards the Nightmare Forest. Ghost-winds because they seemed to be coming from the cliff walls themselves.
With Avankor's cowl, Lucius doubted that he could feel just how unnatural the wind's temperature was. It was almost as if they were the hot breaths of some massive beast… a beast with a case of rancid breath as the smell alone was enough to have Lucius holding his breath for minutes at a time.
After 20 minutes of non-stop climbing they could finally see the top, though the moment Lucius attempted to touch the ground there, a cold-stinging pain travelled up his fingers. It felt like touching dry ice bare-handed.
~Solar cleanse~ he chanted almost instinctively, before taking a better look at the soil.
"Decay…" he whispered, right as Avankor caught up to him.
"How… how are you so fast?" Avankor strained in between deep breaths, unable to understand how he was outperformed even with his mystic mantle on.
"Are you really only a third tie—" Avankor was abut to ask as he climbed onto the top.
"Wait-" Lucius shouted, however Avankor was already standing on top of the decayed ground, apparently unaffected by the decay. "—the entire ground is decayed…" Lucius added in whisper right after.
"Your cowl allows you to stand on this…" he realised almost instantly, before looking around.
"Here," Avankor said, before making a gesture. With that, a small section of the shadows covering is face moved towards the ground making a small shadow puddle around him.
Lucius poked at it with his tail, and once ensuring that nothing happened, he stepped onto it.
"This'll make things more difficult," Lucius whispered to himself as he looked out at the landscape.
Sure, the dark forest had always been a desolate place, with little to no vegetation, and a grim look to it. But this, this looked exactly like the images he had solen from Aziel's mind.
The necromancer was terraforming this place to look exactly like Necropolis, or alteast he was in the process of doing it.
Far in he distance Lucius could see a multitude of towers, as if a whole city had been erected in the forest. Massive creatures were at work, building even more towers, each of them moving in a coordinated manner.
"What are those?" Lucius asked as he pointed at one of the 'Leviathans' that were currently unrooting a massive tree in the distance. The creatures were at least 80 maters tall, and with Lucius's hyper vision,he could just make out what they seemed to be composed of.
They were walking amalgamations of corpses.
"Those came in after the Genera from the Behemoth clans tried fighting against the necromancer. He must've created them to fight against them," Avankor replied thoughtfully.
~The Behemoth clans, Cregnog… I missed the tournament,~ Lucius remembered, though that probably didn't matter at all right now anyway.
"Let's look round for any spots we can use as camps later. Perhaps there are sections of the forest where the decay has not infected," Lucius said, before the two of them began walking around.
Lucius tried using his earth sense to scan the area for enemies, but found that it wasn't working. It was almost as if his link to the forest had been severed. He had grown so accustomed to having earth sense, that it felt like he was walking around both deaf and blind.
After walking around for 30 more minutes they hadn't encountered a single undead….or uninflected section of the forest for that matter.
If Lucius had to guess, most of the undead were probably in those 'cities' helping with construction.
"Your shadows are thinning, perhaps we should head back," Lucius said, noticing that his feet were beginning to burn, and even the armour covering Avankor's body had become more faint.
"The spirits haven't been the same ever since the necromancer spread this muck everywhere" Avankor complained before calling on even more shadows to cover him. "But you're right, time is running out," he continued, failing to combine the shadows he had summoned into his armour.
~I wonder if…~ Lucius thought before casting solar cleanse.
"Try again."
Avankor tried once more, but just like before, he failed to converge the shadows to his armour.
~It's probably like photosynthesis. Solar cleanse can't reset th-~ Lucius was thinking, right before he noticed Avankor staring at the ground in awe.
"What are you looking a—"
Right then Lucius noticed it as well, the ground all around them had been completely purged of the necromancer's decay. Tufts of purple grass poked through, tickling Lucius's feet.
"This… this'll work," Lucius whispered to himself before casting solar cleanse once more, this time at the maximum radius he could manage.
With that, a whole patch of purple dark grass appeared, and the necromancer's decay shot back, as if it were being repelled.
"I think we can work with this. Turn off your cowl, we might need it later," Lucius ordered, before inspecting the grass beneath them.
In all the times he had been in the dark forest, he hadn't once seen grass growing here, in fact he had never seen grass with this colour for that matter.
"Have you ever seen anything like this?" he asked. Avankor seemed semi-ancient, so if there had been a time when grass like this existed in the far past, there was a chance he knew.
"No, vegetation this vibrant should not be growing in this section of the forest…" Avankor replied hesitantly, as if something were bothering him.
"Well, it doesn't burn my feet, so I'd say its safe enough," Lucius commented before walking forward.
"No, I mean this is unnatural… grass like this belongs in the Immaculate Forest, not here," Avankor added, now caressing the grass with his hand, almost as if it were a long lost child
"I'm sure grass can grow anywhere," Lucius replied half-mindely, before casting solar cleanse again, creating even more purple grass.
"The curse… you've lifted it," Avankor whispered to himself before lying down in the grass, his eyes faraway.
