In the dark caverns there was a path of light. This path of light was actually multicolored mushrooms guiding the worthy to the mushroom's god's keep.

Yet, not many tread this path, Only the few chosen by Var Agus had the privilege. This chief of the impromptu tribe was currently managing chiefly affairs when there was a knock on his door.

Var's home was nothing fancy and there wasn't much clutter. He didn't need to tidy anything up, so he simply got up from where he sat and opened the door.

"Var.." A lizardman greeted him, they boasted a troubled expression.

"What troubles you, Yoashk?" Var asked the messenger. They tried to speak, but simply didn't know how to phrase things.

"There.. There is a delegate from the Mensch tribe.." The very reason they had been forced into the mushroom caverns as Ed dubbed them was the Mensch tribe. What troubled the lizardman wasn't just this, however.

"They.. They are giving us one last chance to join them.." Yoashk was troubled by this offer. This final chance might be quite tempting to these refugees.

While these were all people that believed in the Hydra god or that simply were not cool with the Mensch tribe.. things were different now that they had experienced the hard life.historical

The biggest test of a person's faith happened when suffering hardships, and unfortunately, that meant this was a test with a high failing mark. Var Agus was not confident that this ragtag group of refugees would stick with him.

"Should we keep this hidden?" The lizardmen scouts had fortunately encountered the delegates quite far off from their base. As long as the scouts cooperated, the matter could be kept under wraps.

"Hmm.. Keep it hidden for now. Let me talk to them" Just as Var Agus finished saying these words, a commotion could be heard not too far off.

"Hahaha haha!" The laughter of someone's unfamiliar voice reached Var Agus' ears.

"Listen up all of you! Kurgher is benevolent and has decided that all of you can be allowed into the tribe!" The unfamiliar voice then shouted, causing Var to rush out of his home.

"Hey! Who do you think you are?!" Someone shouted from the forming lizardmen crowd.

"Tsk, who do you think you are huh!?! A lowly believer of that foul beast!" The delegate answered back.

The lizardman was taken aback and wanted to give a less than amicable answer in response, but..

"Where'd your faith get you? A damp cave living in.. rocks!!" The delegate spat out truthful words that caused the lizardman to falter.

It was at this moment that Var Agus finally intervened.

"With all due respect- No, forget that, you can screw off!" Var Agus was going to act dignified and respectful, but there was a key problem with such a plan. The lizardman in front of him acted with neither of these qualities!

To the easily impressionable, acting with reservation in this situation could be seen as a sign of weakness! There was no concept of a bigger lizardman!

The delegate did not immediately jump into fury, they instead addressed the crowd.

"Screw off? Why should I? Do you own this cave? Do you control everyone in this.. pla- place!" The lizardman delegate could not even bear to call the place a tribe, it was shameful.

The words of the delegate once more sowed discord in the minds of the lizardmen. They agreed that the delegate should screw off, but if they spoke out against him.. wouldn't that be admitting that Var Agus was in charge of their lives?

Var Agus was a smart lizardman, he instantly noticed this. He was just like that, quickly losing whatever control he did have over the lizardmen. The problem was that his intelligence in noticing this was not helping him counter it.

At least until a group of warriors returned from a trip down the divine path.

"Who are you?! What are you trying to do?!?" One of the more well-built men in the group, Kouzzo, shouted in questioning. They had heard some heresy being spouted from echoes in the divine path's tunnel.

The delegate didn't spare the man a glance.

"I'll leave for now, I'll be back with some of my other friends soon" The Mesch tribe delegate said turning.

"Was that a threat!?" The lizardwoman who took the phantom snake blob, Crini, asked enraged. The blatant disdain from before was already too much, to threaten them.. That lizardman didn't want to live!

"No, it wasn't, my friends are nearby is all" The delegate answered back. That was all Crini needed to hear, she acted on impulse and charged over. The audacity of denying her question and proceeding to threaten them again was a sin!

"Are you insane? The difference between you and me is that of sun and moon!" The lizardman delegate asked seeing her approach.

It was a sin that coupled with that of looking down on her had to be paid in blood!

"You wish it was!" Crini did not bring any weapons, she made her way past the crowd of fellow members and punched out.

Her fist was brutally dug into by a spear causing her to wince, but she lunged forward with her other hand. This hand was aiming towards her opponents neck to strangle him!

A light suddenly flashed, Crini was blinded instantly. The spear then punctured her body while exuding a faint white glow.

"Our skill and equipment is too diff-" The delegate stopped speaking, he was shocked to find that although he had punctured Crini, the latter was still alive and well.

"Huh!?!" He even felt a pushing force trying to dislodge his spear from Crini's body. It was inexplicable.

The delegate was then tail whipped in the face, causing him to tumble backwards. He was so stunned by this move that he couldn't react when Crini had taken his spear.

"Why.. why are you so strong?!?" It made no sense for him to be overpowered so easily by a lizardwoman.

Var Agus smiled, the delegate finally made a mistake. The lizardmen in the tribe all knew the answer was the mushroom deity. Even if their faith for the hydra dwindled, it would not be replaced with Eon's figure, but with a mushroom.

This mushroom was currently observing the situation at the lizardmen tribe through a very much delayed stream.

In this stream, the lizardmen had yet to reach the source of the commotion. Nonetheless, Ed was able to witness the erupting conflict. A foreign lizardmen came and riled the lizardmen up.

Thanks to W, or more specifically to Eon, Ed knew what was going on. The mastermind explained many things to Brennan rather briefly. The religion he created was included in those tid bits of information.

'Looks like the Mensch tribe might be planning something' Eon didn't spill out all the details and even if he had, there was no guarantee that W heard them.

Ed continued to watch silently and got to bear witness to Crini knocking down the opponent. He frowned as the exchange continued and Crini continued to beat down on the delegate.

There was something wrong.

'Why was she so aggressive today?' Ed thought of a couple of reasons as to why, and the most obvious one was the blood clot.

'Who could have guessed that having blood clots in them would cause mood swings?'Ed was shocked by the revelation. Most of all, he was troubled.

If there were too many side effects, the other lizardmen would be reluctant to obtain this "divine blood" he made from random monsters.

'This is still manageable' The blood clots themselves might not have been the culprit, it might just have been the mobs he used to make them.

Bloody who possessed Brennan had a lot of time to develop and grow. Bloody was its own unique entity by now, and the orc blood in it was likely small.

These new clots however were hardly processed and were already stuffed into the bodies of lizardmen. It would be surprising if there were no consequences. Thinking along these lines, it was a very good thing that Ed only tried it on 6 lizardmen.

The other 4 lizardmen were missing out, but at least when new blood clots were made, Ed would have learned more about using them. This reminded Ed to check in with W, who had yet to respond to his inquiries.

'W, please respond back' It appeared that he was underestimating the distance between the dungeon and the outside.

'Maybe there is some interference when getting the signals out of the dungeon' If there was interference, the most likely culprit was the dungeon itself. There was a chance it was intercepting his messages and maybe even reading them.

The thought was scary, but fortunately neither he nor W were sending important messages.

'Eh no wait I don't actually know that..' He wasn't receiving any transmissions!

But panic did not settle in Ed's heart. It did not even become a passing feeling. Ed was calm as he thought up of all of these issues and tried to resolve them internally.

In the end, Ed could not help but feel the need to grind some of his mental skills. Transmission was already so close to advancing! Maybe that would give it the necessary push in strength to send messages to W.

It was a mere possibility, but Ed was expectant and began transmitting with any monsters that his mushrooms came across, or rather that came upon his mushrooms.