Chapter 16: The Shadow Man
"It's just a small skill of carving insects!" In the face of the thick mist, Gare's mouth was full of care, but his body was very honest, he held a broad-bladed sword in his hand, and watched his surroundings vigilantly.
Similarly, the cadets on Garay's side lost their sights at the moment when they were engulfed in the thick fog. However, in the second round of testing, there was no longer teamwork, and it was not so important to have a companion by your side. Garay was a swordsman with great self-esteem, and when faced with this situation, he immediately put aside the many doubts that had arisen in his mind, clenched the great sword in his hand, and walked forward with full concentration.
The fog grew thicker, and Gary was left with nothing but gray in front of him, and he had to slow down and test the obstacle ahead with his broadblade.
"Bang!" After a while, while he was still walking slowly, the sound of animals suddenly sounded in the distance.
"It's ...... "Horses should be in the prairie or in the fields, how can there be horses in the woods?" he thought crankily.
After a while, the sound of "clattering" gradually weakened, and even seemed to be wailing, and something seemed to have happened to the horse. After walking for a long time, he finally came across signs of creature, and Garay wanted to find out. After a moment's judgment, he hurried towards the source of the sound.
Just as he was approaching his destination, the fog suddenly dispersed, and he was greeted by a valley, and Garay walked out of the woods beside the valley. When he saw the scene in front of him, he stood there as if he had been struck by a thunderbolt.
I saw a stream not far away, and there was an overturned carriage on the bank, and the horse had been killed by a crossbow arrow, and fell to the side, presumably from here the horse's cry. The carriage was still burning, and there were two bloody people lying on the gravel next to the stream, and it was obvious that the carriage had been attacked.
Gary's eyes were red, his hand holding the sword trembled slightly, and anger burst out of his heart, because of a childhood accident slowly emerging from his mind.
It was a clear morning, and Garay's mother took him in a carriage with him. Their coachmen were so skilled that they also served as escorts.
Just as we passed through a valley, the weather changed abruptly, and the bright sunlight disappeared and was replaced by thick dark clouds. The local climate is like this, and it can rain at any time. The coachman looked at the sky, quickened the carriage, and had to get to the inn before the rain, he thought. At this time, Garay was still immersed in the care of his mother's love, listening to his mother's story, and did not care about the changes in the outside world.
Suddenly, a hot stream of blood spilled down on Garay's face, and the coachman in front of him fell from his seat, and the horse was killed by a bow and arrow, and fell to the side with two wails. The tremendous inertia caused the carriage to tumble, and Garay and his mother had already been thrown out of it.
Luckily, the mother held her baby tightly at the moment of danger, and although she had a long trail of blood on the ground, she avoided injuries when Garay fell to the ground. Unfortunately, the Grim Reaper would not give up so easily, and the heavy carriage rolled towards the two of them, and when the danger came, the great mother burst out with amazing strength and threw Garay out at once, and the carriage was so ruthlessly crushed.
After some time, Garay gradually came to his senses, he felt very hot, and suddenly opened his eyes, and found that the rain had stopped, and the surroundings were on fire for some unknown reason.
"Mother, wake up!" Garay did not run away, but rushed to the side of the carriage, constantly trying to pull her mother out, but she was already dying because of her injuries and being crushed beyond recognition by the carriage.
The fire of "Mama ......" grew bigger and bigger, and Garay could not save his mother with all his strength, so he had to crawl out of the fire crying.
Suddenly, Gary felt a chilling gaze, and when he looked back, there was a man standing beside the corpse of the coachman not far away, who was dressed in black and had a black turban wrapped around his face, so he couldn't see it at all. But what terrified Gare was the blood-red eyes, staring at Gary like a beast.
"You...... Who are you?" said Garet, fearful, but with a hint of anger mixed in his fear, for he knew that it might be the man in black who had caused this.
The man didn't say a word, but slowly walked towards Garay with his lower abdomen in his hands, and it seemed that he was also injured.
Garley glared angrily, but as the man in black slowly approached, his legs involuntarily stepped back, and gradually, changed direction. It was a young child after all, and Garay finally succumbed to that demonic eye, and with tears of discouragement, he began to turn and run away.
After running for some time, a lake appeared in front of him, and with a "plop", he jumped into the lake, and with the good water skills he had trained since childhood, he swam to the other side of the lake without looking back, because he could always feel the terrifying gaze behind him.
Garay swam desperately to the other side, anger and humiliation intertwined.
"I'm going to run out, I'm going to run out......"
Thinking back to the present, the scene in front of me replicates the scene of that year, and the two lying on the ground with bloody flesh and blood are none other than Garay's mother and the coachman at that time. Garay froze in place, his chest heaving from shock, and his broadblade sword trembling with his arm, as if he couldn't hold it.
"This must be an illusion!"
Garay closed his eyes and tried to calm his mind, and slowly, his emotions gradually calmed down. There could be no such bizarre thing in the world, he thought.
At this moment, a vague black shadow appeared not far away, it was the man in black who had been bringing the Garay Dream Demon for many years!
"Hmph! Sure enough, he also appeared, am I still afraid of you now!" Garray regained his innate arrogance, and his eyes became firm again. He picked up the broadblade sword, pointed at the dark shadow man and said, "I know it's the second round of testing, but you dare to test me with this kind of thing, in that case, I want to see what an abomination you have!"
With a "whoosh", Garay rushed towards the shadow man, but he didn't expect the shadow man to still stand there, and he didn't seem to be aware of the impending attack.
"Whether it's true or not, I'm going to catch you!" The moment Garay's broad-bladed sword slashed at the shadow man, he suddenly moved, dodged Garay's attack with a somersault, and then fired two qigong bullets at Garay, landing and fleeing into the distance.
"Martial artist, I don't know how many times Lao Tzu and that scoundrel fighter have fought, and I am still afraid that you will not succeed?" Garley scoffed at this, he easily blocked the qigong bomb, and immediately chased after the black shadow man.
After chasing for a while, Garay suddenly felt very annoyed. Because every time he was about to catch the man, he would always speed up and distance the two sides. Later, the man didn't know what was going on, and he ran faster and faster, and even the posture was a bit like... Escape.
"What's going on?" Gary, who was originally full of anger, was now confused, this dark shadow man seemed to be very different from the original one. However, he didn't slow down, but concentrated Yuan on his legs and closed the distance again.
At this time, a vine flora appeared in front of them, and various coiled vines blocked the way.
"Where to run!" Seeing an obstacle ahead, Gary picked up his broadsword and was about to slash it. But what happened next left him dumbfounded: the shadow man was as blind as a man and completely ignored the plants, and he actually slammed into them with the speed of a cheetah. The rhizomes of the vines were very strong, and after pulling to a certain arc, they violently bounced the black shadow back like a cannonball.
With a "bang", Garay didn't have time to swing his sword, and the two collided together. At this moment, Garay seemed to see the originally demonic blood-red eyes, but at this time, he was as frightened and even innocent as he was when he was a child......
"It's you!"
"It's you!"
As the surrounding scene gradually returned to the appearance of the woods, Bell and Garay sat on the ground with the large bag on their heads, staring at each other with wide eyes.
"What do you see me running?!" Garay yelled angrily at him.
"Do I see a giant slug and have to talk to it happily? How did you become a big slug?!! It's disgusting!" Bell kept flapping his clothes, as if trying to wipe out the disgusting liquid that had been illusory before.
"Slugs, I became slugs, what's going on?"
"And what did you see me becoming?" Bell asked, pausing and thinking for a moment.
"You've become a shadow man, and that person has something to do with an incident that happened in my childhood. Gary replied.
"Hmm...... This...... Is that what the second round of testing is about?" Bell mused.
"Did we pass then?" said Gare, standing up and looking around, finding no other students.
"Over there!" he casually caught a glimpse of a light in the distance on his right.
With a "whew", Bell turned into a gust of wind again, and the speed was even faster than before.
"Stinky boy, I found it first!" said Garay hurriedly and hurriedly chased him out.
As the light grew bigger and bigger, Bell and Garley scurried out of the woods in turn, and the latter was swearing and obviously angry at Bell's escape.
The two of them stopped, and what appeared in front of them was a small old castle, which was exactly where Tori was talking about, but there were already five of them, Takuha, Bono, Galle, and two college assistants.
"You're here too. Seeing this, Takuyu nodded and greeted the two. The three people who arrived at the finish line first seemed to be the same, but if you looked closely, you could still see that their faces were all a little pale to varying degrees, which was very rare in the academy according to their strength. However, in this competition, Bell and Garay passed relatively quickly.
Immediately after, Fred, Dona, Amu and others also rushed out, and after a while, all eighteen students arrived, and it could be seen from everyone's expressions that everyone had faced their own fears before.
At this time, the two assistants made a note of the students who had passed the level, and then turned around and entered the castle. After a while, the two walked out again, along with the two examiners, Keith and Lineker. In the former's hand stood a mouse in armor, and when it saw so many people staring at it curiously, it obediently retracted its head, revealing its two eyes to meet the crowd.
"Hello two examiners!" everyone retracted their gaze and greeted the two.
"Let me introduce you to you," Keith nodded, "The woods you crossed before weren't long at all, only a few hundred meters at most, but it took you so long to get out of it because each of you had encountered a fantasy and circled it to varying degrees. It's all this little thing ......" Keith pointed to the armored mouse, "Magic Armadillo!"