"Annoying pricks," Williams cursed freeing his right axe of a dead beast. A monkey with stone-like fur.

The 4m tall beast slid off his axe to land on the ground lifeless. Its figure disappeared after Williams waved his hand. Williams spat at that point and noticed that he had actually bled.

The monkey had been a beast at the very peak of the middle-stage closer to crossing into the higher stage than he was. The fight had been grueling especially since he had needed to keep his focus split on two other monkeys only halfway into the middle stage, but were as troublesome as the strongest.

The fight had lasted about two hours, but he had claimed victory. However, his figure featured a series of injuries. Not too deep, but were significant enough to require resting. At least only for an hour or so, even after two bottles of healing potion.

Williams placed his back on a tree before closing his eyes to think thoughts. He had long since unfolded his consciousness to keep himself at alert, so he could comfortably try and recall the events that happened before he suddenly found himself in the forest breaking a tree after smashing into it.

"Nothing," he cursed, realizing that his focus had been on running to witness how he had arrived far from their former position, and how he had been separated from the rest.

His mind went on to Aiden's words, and he couldn't help but believe the young man had in his possession a spell that could allow such, maybe a special item. But such a reality made him ponder on how unfair a man's prowess could be.

"I'll ask him when we meet," Williams grunted rising to his feet. He didn't know exactly where he was, but hopefully, his group wasn't too far. However, he also had to watch out for roaming magical beasts. Higher stage could be anywhere lurking in those woods.

He began his walk at that point, even if it featured occasional sprints, mostly when escaping the multiple packs of magical beasts.

Due to the power his body was capable of mustering, he traveled a few miles in the short span of about half an hour. It would seem running at incredible speeds had ruined Noah's ability to calculate distances.

Williams arrived at a clearing in the forest and he could only describe the scene as a battlefield. A big one at that. The ground was charred in many areas, and even trees looked to have been burnt down. Bloodstained whole portions of the terrain and even a pool of the crimson liquid formed.

However, from the looks of things it seemed over an hour had passed, and he could only trace that level of destruction to his guild-mates, either Liam or Aiden. His guess was Aiden.

More than 400sq-m worth of land had been touched by man's destructiveness. He seemed to have wiped out entire packs of magical beasts on his own. And from his previous display, that normally absurd level of power looked believable.

Williams continued to shake his head as he walked past that area, feeling pity for the beasts that had encountered Aiden. After a few minutes, however, he noticed a trail that led towards the edge of the forest since he could see it on the horizon, Of course, this was after he had climbed the tallest tree in the area.

The bodies of middle-stage cultivators were on their path to performing great wonders, so climbing a huge tree of about 20m in height could be done casually.

Williams followed this trail at full speed after he confirmed that it was one. Whoever had left the trail; most likely Aiden had severed trees in half on one linear path. A path that stretched for whole kilometers.

After spending about twenty minutes sprinting at full speed, Williams found himself exiting the forest to arrive at a cliff that featured a river at its base.

Fortunately, there was the individual he had expected to find; Aiden, casually sitting crossed-legged, staring at a book.

"You finally arrived," Noah's voice rang out as he raised his head to stare at Williams's standing figure.

"You're to first to arrive here with the trail., hopefully, the others are here before sun-down," Noah continued, storing his soul cultivation manual before Williams could get a proper look at it.

He had long since sensed the young man enter the range of his consciousness and had been glad. But he also cursed his inability to properly calculate the distance between the various positions he hurled them at. This unfortunately reminded him of how bad he had been at math.

"Are you sure they'll find the trail," Williams asked walking closer to him and seating next to him.

"I left plenty of trails and intersections of those trails, across a significant distance. Only extreme bad luck would make the two of them miss it," Noah explained already keeping his words away from the topic of how they got there.

"I see," Williams muttered. "Though how did we escape the tier 4 threat?" he asked immediately he had the chance to.

Noah who already expected that question and had cooked up a whole story for it opened his mouth to speak.

"Well, I'm not completely sure. There was an explosion, but I had carried you guys with my movements technique before the explosion knocked me unconscious and sent each of us in different directions," he explained with a thoughtful expression. "Or did you see anything?" He added.historical

"No," Williams replied with furrowed brows. "All I recall is that I was running then suddenly a force as I have never felt pushed me and sent me crashing into a tree. I believe it's the explosion you speak of, even if I never heard a sound... Everything happened so-"

"Fast" Noah completed his sentence and gave a light smile, even if Williams couldn't see it as a result of the mask.

"Hopefully the others saw something that can make sense of our situation," Noah sighed raising his head to gaze at the sky. He did all those acting just to clear Williams of all his doubts. Unfortunately, the young man still had some.

"I wonder what you were expecting when you told us to run." His words threw shade at Noah's plan. He had asked them to run when he gave a go-ahead, and suddenly something happened that both of them had no explanation for.

"You don't believe me," Noah stated going straight to the point, startling Williams who could only remain silent at his accusation.

"All I remember was that I had turned to attack the two higher stage cultivators before dashing to catch up to you guys, that was when everything went south and here we are," Noah explained with an expression that radiated seriousness.

Seeing that Williams still struggled to believe him, he played his last card. "Look. What do I even gain from lying to you? All that matters is that we are alive, somehow. We can go back to the area when the others arrive, maybe the cause of the explosion might still be there," he explained, and Williams could only nod at that point.

The duo could only wait for Liam and Illiana to return, and that had taken a bit more than five hours of waiting. By this point, the sun had gone down and the river below them seemed to come alive, illuminating the area with its blue glow.