Chapter 13 - Life Elixir

Being labeled as a Red Zone, Black Mud Marsh was not a place for a picnic. The land was muddy and stinky. If one was not careful enough, he'd be eaten by a beast or the soil where he/she set camp.

The most comfortable lodging one could ever hope was the holes on trees made by some beasts. If you see an empty tree hole, you can occupy it freely. Just be careful of some uninvited visitors.

Last time, after Reid left the band of hunters that take on the Wrathful Thunder Lion, one of the lords within the marsh, he headed towards the inner region of the marsh. The region where Diamond-level beasts stay as some lands within the inner region was not muddy, but normal soil where plants strive.

Along the way, Reid rested in a tree hole of an ancient tree. Even though day and night within the Underground World cannot be distinguished, he would still get tired and needed rest.

While resting, probably got attracted by the scent of his sumptuous meal, he was visited by a swarm of insect beast. Though only at Silver-level, their number was overwhelming that he needed to leave and look for another tree hole.

But the second time, he did not neglect to do some precautionary measures. He shrouded the entire interior of the tree hole with his Isolation Field, disguising it as if it did not exist. After that, he was no longer visited by anything.

And on the way to the inner region after his rest, he encountered a group of hunters battling against another group. The battle was anticlimatic that it ended instantly.

When they clashed, a behemoth appeared, swallowing them whole, leaving no bones. It was a Giant Earth Worm that was so huge that it seemed like a hill. Such a phenomenon happened often, but those who got eaten could only be said to be unlucky.

Knowing that Giant Earth Worm liked to prey on a flock of beasts, they still gathered together even after knowing that gathering together was a taboo on Black Mud Marsh as it unknowingly invited a presence of a Giant Earth Worm.

It was the first time Reid saw a living Giant Earth Worm and he was shocked, thinking about how it grew to such size.

After that brief encounter, he arrived at the inner region, and now on his way to his target. Black Mud Marsh has many commander beasts as the land was vast and their list could be freely acquired at the Hunter Forum. His target was no longer Diamond-level or so-called lords, but Adamantium-level beasts known as Commander Beasts, for the former was no longer enough for him.

Black Mud Marsh alone has 3000 commander beasts on Adamantium-level, tens of thousand Diamond-level, and millions Gold-level. All commander beasts have their territories, but the territories sometime changed ownership after being challenged by some beasts that have broken through to the higher level, but those which succeed were few.

His Destruction Force could now increase his attack power by 200 times. Imagine a leisure punch that could flatten a hill. Therefore, even with an overwhelming difference in physique, he was not afraid as he was now basically invincible below Obsidian-level. As long as he takes the initiative to attack, no one would be able to take on his fist unscathed.

Moreover, he changed his target to also raise his Hunter Ranking as he found a rare mission on the Hunter Site. A special mission that could be taken by anyone. As long as the mission was completed, their hunter ranking could be raised directly to Adamantium Rank without any assessment.

The mission objective was to collect a complete specimen of Pristine White Rose, a thorny flower with white petals and extremely poisonous, that could be found on Black Mud Marsh. Each main stem could only allocate the nutrition it could siphon underground to 12 buds and only three bud could bloom every three years. Thus, each bud was extremely precious. More specifically, at the small island at the center of Pristine White Lake also known as Lake of White Gorgon.

The White Mother Gorgon was one of the top 100 Commander Beast on the list. A hill sized beast with a humanoid torso and lower body of a snake covered in white scales. It has six pairs of eyes, normal nose and mouth, ear fins, and hair made of thousands of black snake that could spit corrosive venom. It has three pairs of arms, wielding large blades coated in deadly venom.

Not only that, but the Pristine White Lake was also a home for a variety of snake beasts with strength ranging from Gold-level to Silver-level, venomous, and not. Thus, increasing the difficulty of obtaining the Pristine White Rose.

Pristine White Rose was a very important ingredient for making a Life Elixir that could increase the activity of the cell to a hundred thousand times.

Hence, greatly increasing lifespan and healing factor to almost immortal level. Thus, it was also famously known as Immortality Elixir. As long as the brain was not destroyed completely, a person that took the Life Elixir could regenerate any deadly injuries, from a destroyed heart to severed limbs, and live for thousands of years. It also made the consumer immune to almost all kinds of poisons.

While the information about the Life Elixir was made public, including the ingredients, not many could make it. Because the ingredients needed could only be found in the most dangerous places.

So basically, thousands of life were needed as a sacrifice before a Life Elixir could be made. But many were still obsessed about it. Who would not want to become immortal? Such an irresistible thing. A lifespan of thousands of years. No one would refuse it.

While Ried could buy a Life Elixir at the Dimensional Store or some items that were much more powerful than Life Elixir, but he did not need it at the moment. For him, immortality would come sooner or later. And he valued personal strength more.

From the information that Reid obtained through Hunter Site, Pristine White Lake was one of the places where the water of the entire Black Mud Marsh converged. It was the smallest body of water on the Black Mud Marsh. The others were Deep Green Lagoon and Misty Black Lake.

From another point of view, the three water bodies formed a triangle, with their rivers spreading like tree roots across the Black Mud Marsh.

After traveling on foot for hours, he arrived at Pristine White Lake. Surrounded by grasses rich in nutritions forming a vast plain, a place where herds of beasts such as cow, goats, rhino inhabited. And hidden within the grasses were snake holes, home of snake beasts that prey on the herds.

The herds that grew very fast ate plants and reproduced very fast, while they were eaten by snake beasts that grew very slow and reproduced very slow. The three have formed a balanced ecosystem that maintained the prosperity of the land.

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