I Devoured The Primordial Chaos to Become the Strongest

And that was what they did. After healing from their fight that day, they ate some food, then got back into the thick of things. They first traced the remaining stink wolves, and then they wiped them out. But the trail also led to a crypt where they cleared it, and with that move, it was like they somehow declared themselves in the forest because the monsters turned on them.

Every day they fought. The forest boiled with monsters that were constantly after them, even when they were hiding to sleep, because pack after pack just kept coming towards them.

Stallus was angry that the monsters practically left them with no choice but to continue hunting. They climbed tall trees and hid in small caves to recover before another set of monsters found them.

And unlike the year before, where they hunted crypts in the training side of the Crypt, at least they got to choose which crypt and when they hunted, but no such choice was given to them here.

After the first week, they began to adjust. They slept when they could and did their absolute best to make sure their cores were full at all times. They reacted to every sound in the forest and kept their eyes sharp.

But Azaroth’s plan was working as he intended. Already, they’d cleared a big part of the Acolyte side of the forest, wiping out more than three monster dens in a day. Azaroth wanted to do more in a day, but their bodies were always weak and tired by the end of each day, leaving them wrung out.

The week that followed, they wiped out enough of the monsters that they now began to run from them. And the others had now gotten used to the power of their new rank and the upgrade to their new skills.

So when the third week rolled around, they turned their attention to the crypts since almost all the monsters in the forest were dead, which made Stallus and the others annoyed—not because the monsters were dead, but because the forest was now filled with the smell of rotted flesh.

There were so many dead monsters that the forest was now choked with the smell of rotted flesh, and flies buzzed around like bees. The only thing that made everything enjoyable was that they weren’t getting as wounded as before.

The weeks before had been painful because every encounter with monsters left deadly wounds on their bodies, and they had to fight the next den of monsters like that. But now, they were getting less wounded as they got used to it.

On this third week, they’d hunted up to seven crypts, and one thing they’d learned was that Acolyte-rank Crypts were far bigger than others they’d been to so far. And sometimes, there was some kind of condition to be met before they could clear them.

Stallus wiped blood from her face with a grimace. "Well, how are we going to capture the princess?" she asked, her voice wooden.

Catena looked at her and said, "Rescue, not capture."

Stallus’s shrug meant, ’What’s the difference?’

This was a conditional crypt. They had to rescue the princess from her evil father, the king. Immediately they entered the crypt, they all knew what to do, as if something had whispered it in their ears.

’Help the princess. Save her.’

Alex also contributed his own opinion. "We go in and rescue her? No matter what, if we don’t rescue the princess and we kill the boss, then the crypt will still remain standing."

"It matters not if we clear the crypt or not. We are here only for the essence," Azaroth replied.

Clearing a crypt was a complicated thing, at some level. Back in the real world, Crypts could be regulated. If you didn’t kill the boss, then it would surely cultivate its monsters back. So there was something called culling Crypts, when they were intentionally left alone to farm the resources in the crypt by periodically killing all the monsters except the boss.

So Awakeners could farm crypts for their essence and still not clear them, as long as they didn’t kill the boss. The monsters and natural resources would come back in time, depending on the level of the crypt.

Stallus nodded slowly. "We are here for the essence, but also the experience. Azaroth, you told us that we must fight to sharpen our skills. You made the rules that we should clear the crypt."

Azaroth didn’t say anything for a while, and the silence built.

"Very well," he said at last. If it were back at their former training grounds, then Azaroth might want to clear a conditional crypt, but as it was, all they really wanted was essence.

"We clear this one. But any other one we see will just be farmed for their essence."

Nobody disagreed. They turned to where the princess was being held by her father—a big tower castle, the only building within the encircling wall of stone and dirt.

The wall might hold only one building, but it was packed full of monsters. Fortunately, most of them were goblins of the Acolyte rank, but still easy kills for them.

The only issue was their numbers, just like the stink wolves weeks ago. In fact, one thing about the crypts here was that there was sometimes quantity over quality, as the crypt made hundreds of average Awakener-rank monsters and tried to use that to batter them down.

"Get ready, another wave is about to leave the wall!" Stallus said.

But she didn’t need to say much as the gate creaked open and goblins with deep green skin rushed out, their weapons raised. Azaroth raised his hand and connected with the formation in his mind, powering it.

Fire blasted out toward the first wave of goblins, washing over them like sunlight, melting skin and bones. At the same time, Catena made the ground slick like wet glass, and the monsters slammed into each other.

Now it was their turn to raise their weapons.

It was time for green blood.