All, One, Everything.

Chapter 10: Pursuit(1)

Preview: The Shadow Hound and the rest immediately gave chase even though they just arrived after a rushed journey. Their bodies and minds were tired but they had no choice. It was their master's order. They could only rise through three floors hurriedly in order to catch up with the murderer. Thankfully, they had access to a safe and stable passage towards the higher floor.

"There are too many of them! And one of the guys.. Looked terrifying. We should run away for now, but I don't know any place besides the Muddy Swamp Region. Where do you think we should go, Pendra?" the sunflower asked in distress as it was the first time having experienced being chased. It knew it should flee but didn't know where to.

The centipede, whose name is now Pendra because the sunflower repeatedly calling it Poison Centipede found it too strenuous, thought long and hard about the question, and a place came to mind. The 2nd Gate!

"Master, there is a place in my memories. I overheard some low-rank demons talk about it when I tried going out of the Muddy Swamp Region back then. They said it's the passage towards the 2nd Level of Hell. But in order to reach it, one has to travel towards the center of the First Level of Hell. It's quite the distance with many unknown dangers ahead." Replied Pendra with an uncertain tone. Even he wasn't sure about where it could be and how it could be reached. It was only the small gossip between little demons about the legends and their great ambitions.

"Oh? That place sounds interesting! Hmm, let's go there! But, how do you know this exactly? It seems to be very high level information..." Questioned the Little Sunflower in doubt while fleeing.

Muddy Swamp Region was located in the northeastern direction and thus, they had to travel southwest to reach the center. But they didn't know their exact location so they could only continue in the original direction.

"I-I am already a dozen decades old this year and due to my long life, I was able to experience a lot of things.." Although a bit nervous at the start, the high-level of intelligence of Pendra helped it calm down soon after and managed to reply smoothly.

"Eeeh? How did you live for that long?" The little sunflower asked in doubt as it was aware that creatures like demon worms could only live for as long as two decades. Although Poison centipedes are stronger than them, they aren't the types of demons that are abundant with vitality and can live past a century.

Pendra felt nervous and shifted its position a bit while thinking about how to reply.

"I once encountered a tiny puddle of red blood on the ground.. There were roughly fifteen drops of blood at that time. And I was still a poison centipede without much intelligence then, so I greedily drank the blood. After that, I felt my strength rising and size increasing. But the most obvious change should be my lifespan.. I gradually realized over the years that it was due to that blood that I can live for this long.." Pendra replied with a bit of nostalgia and longing. He wished to get more of that blood. Especially with its extraordinary benefits.

"Mmm, red blood.." the little sunflower found the story interesting and gradually forgot the danger coming from behind. Despite the tense situation they were in, she had the time to make her mind wander towards Pendra's history.

As the scenery flashed past, a fireball appeared out of nowhere and shot towards them from a blind spot. Danger! The Little Sunflower quickly shrunk its body and pulled its stem towards the ground to avert this disaster. But alas! This crisis did not seem to be over soon as two more fireballs and an ice spike flew towards them.

The Little Sunflower managed to avoid the spike and one of the fireballs but the last fireball slid past its vines, scorching the entire vine aflame.

The Little Sunflower shrieked in pain as one of its vines got reduced to ashes, the flames tried to spread through the vine but it decisively abandoned and cut off that body part like a lizard leaving its tail behind to escape. Fortunately, through this action, they managed to escape temporarily.

The little Sunflower realized its blunder and immediately focused on the situation at hand. It did not try thinking about useless things and picked up the pace.

The Little Sunflower's speed was rapid. With hundreds of roots moving all at once to travel from one location to another.

She and Pendra swiftly disappeared within the two Low-rank demons' sight, Ice hound and Fire hound.

Both hounds felt irritated as they knew they would be scolded and possibly be punished by their leader. Although they had already awakened their magic circuit, it does not exempt them from punishments as only those Mid-Rank demons have the right to decide things.