Shang continued traveling towards the north for another two hours, killing tons of Pest Cats on his way.
Sadly, he hadn't met another Vanishing Snake in these two hours. Now, he was ready for them, and they decided not to show up.
After these two hours, Shang turned around and traveled towards the southwest.
About half the night had already passed, and Shang was rather certain that he would need the remainder of the night to exit the Wild Forest, especially with the added weight of his beast sack.
For the next couple of hours, Shang killed Pest Cats while going towards the southwest, and finally, he also found another Vanishing Snake.
This encounter wasn't nearly as dangerous as the previous one. When Shang had noticed it, he slowed down a bit but kept running. After the Vanishing Snake appeared in Shang's darkness vision, he immediately dropped his beast sack and charged toward it, killing it rather quickly.
Shang killed a couple more Pest Cats before he noticed that he found fewer and fewer of them.
And then, he saw none of them anymore.
Shortly after, Shang came out of the Wild Forest.
As Shang exited the Wild Forest, he saw that the sky in the east was slowly beginning to light up, which meant that dawn would soon arrive.
In front of Shang were lots of fields growing wheat.
'The Farm Line, huh? Seems like I went quite far into the north.'
Shang searched for a way through the fields and continued walking towards the west. For once, he decided to stroll instead of run. He had run nearly the entire night, and he wanted to relax for a bit. Additionally, it had been a while since Shang had walked through such fields.
These fields of wheat reminded Shang of home. He hadn't always lived in the city, and these fields of wheat reminded him of his childhood.
Suddenly, a large shadow appeared beside Shang.
BANG!
Shang jumped to the side with all his power, shaking the ground beneath him.
At the same time, Shang heard the startled yelp of a dog from the shadow as it also jumped back.
Only now did Shang notice that this was just one of the guarding dogs in the Farm Line. The huge shadow and the weight of Mana inside the shadow had startled Shang.
Of course, the dog hadn't anticipated for Shang to jump away, resulting in it also getting startled.
Another two dogs, a couple of houses down, lifted their ears as they looked towards the dog beside Shang.
When they saw that nothing of note was happening, they only put their heads down to sleep again.
The startled dog looked at Shang with eyes that he interpreted as accusing.
It was like the dog was blaming Shang for startling it.
"Don't sneak up on me like that," Shang said after a sigh.
Who wouldn't get startled by a two-meter-high beast shadow suddenly appearing beside them?
'It probably smelled the General Stage Vanishing Snake in my beast sack and became curious. The dogs are probably specially trained to kill these kinds of snakes since they are the biggest danger to the Farm Line.'
After sniffing the beast sack from a distance for a little bit, the dog turned around and left.
'Well, there goes the relaxing atmosphere,' Shang thought as he started jogging. While strolling through the fields, Shang had felt quite calm. He had just come from a dangerous location with several dangerous encounters while carrying a lot of wealth on his shoulders. That had made the stroll rather enjoyable.
But now, all the joy was gone.
Shang had lost the mood and sped up as he jogged towards Warrior's Paradise.
It took him quite a while with the added weight, and before he knew it, he saw other people running beside him towards Warrior's Paradise.
Shang saw a lot of students who looked at his beast sack with interest.
However, they were used to such sights, which made them interested but not interested enough to strike up a conversation.
Shang also passed by a lot of other students and teachers without saying a word. He didn't want to waste any time since the streets would only become busier, and he definitely wasn't interested in entering a traffic jam during rush hour.
"Wait!"
Shang suddenly heard the voice of a woman, and he somehow felt like it was directed at him.
Shang stopped and turned around.
He hadn't paid any attention, but Shang had passed by a woman with long black hair and a silver uniform. She looked like she was in her late twenties, and there was an interested but distant look in her eyes as she looked at Shang.
"Yes, teacher?" Shang asked.
In comparison to many of the other teachers, this woman wasn't accompanied by any students.
Obviously, she wasn't a very sociable person.
That was also why many other students became interested in why she had stopped Shang.
"Come over here for a second," she said, gesturing for Shang to come over.
Shang's brows furrowed, but he complied. After all, she was far stronger than him, and she was also his teacher.
She extended her hand to the beast sack on Shang's shoulder and moved her finger over it. Then, she put the finger to her nose and smelled it.
After that, her brows furrowed.
"I want to see the corpse," she said.
"Of what?" Shang asked.
"You know what I mean," she said with annoyance.
This piqued the interest of the other students.
A corpse that their teacher was interested in? That had to be a special corpse!
Shang's brows furrowed even more. "Why?" he asked.
"Because we have to note down every appearance of them," she explained. "They are an important indicator for the status of the northeastern Wild Forest."
This alleviated Shang's trepidation.
It made sense. The General Stage Vanishing Snakes laid their eggs in the Wild Forest to avoid the predators in the Empress Cobra Zone. That meant that there was always a certain distance between the Empress Cobra Zone and the location of the eggs.
If the General Stage Vanishing Snakes went further into the Wild Forest, it might mean that the Swamp Millipedes had claimed a bigger part of the Wild Forest than before.
Shang looked at the interested eyes of the other students.
"Fine, but I don't want to show it to the public," he said.
The teacher gestured to the western Wild Forest. They hadn't yet arrived at the slope to Warrior's Paradise, which meant that they could just run a couple of kilometers to the west to enter the Wild Forest.
Shang and the teacher ran towards the west and entered the Wild Forest while the students on the path were annoyed that they wouldn't be able to witness the corpse.
Why had Shang decided to hide the corpse?
Because he wanted to keep his strength a secret.
The less attention there was on him, the easier his life would be.
After entering the Wild Forest, the teacher stopped. "No one will spy on you here," she said.
Shang put the beast sack down, put his hand into the sack, and pulled out the corpse of the General Stage Vanishing Snake.
When she saw the corpse, her eyes narrowed.
Then, her eyes went towards Shang, his sword, and back to the corpse.
For a second, her brows furrowed in confusion, but then she noticed the lower part of the snake's neck.
Three large gashes were there.
At that point, a light of recognition lit up in her eyes.
"Seems like you had some help."
