As Captain Don and the first team turned to look at the tall blood-drenched amazon pulling, tugging a large monstrous severed head along whilst smiling like a spoiled little princess that was just gifted her umpteenth sweet candy, they were shocked beyond belief.

Even Sara was left speechless at the weird sight. Unable to come up with any word for the scene, she could only sigh and shake her head, deciding to not be bothered with it instead. Whatever the reason was, it would only serve to exhaust her even further. Spending the day and dealing with one devil was enough, attending to another was too much.

"W-what in the.." Captain Don stammered, raising his arm and shakily pointing to the oversized insectoid monster's trophy. Albeit several hours have passed, the tugged grotesque object was still drawing a now-thinner trail of gore behind. The serpentine route their small team took was clearly shown in the golden-brown sand behind them.

Whilst the twins weren't bothered by their newest friend's strange actions, even looking somewhat cheerful and like them, Jai was like a love-struck teenager, Crone, and the angelic sister duo, Lily and Galina could only sigh and try their best to ignore everything.

With a stoic, emotionless face, showing even no signs of the wearing of the day's events, they walked towards the bonfire and after giving their greetings, joined and sat down around the campfire.

Naybeah grinning happily, whistled nonchalantly, as she pulled the humungous monster head all the way to the back, placing it at the small empty field that was previously used as the training ground for the morning's exercise by everyone. Well, not anymore!

The strange, uncanny scene left Captain Don and the others speechless. They could only watch with a shocked, stunned silence as the blonde warrioress carried her 'treasure', dragging it through the camp as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

"What the hell happened to you?" Unable to contain himself any longer, Captain Don turned to look at the seemingly only sane duo of the returning group, Lily and Galina. He was hoping that they could at least give some sort of satisfactory reasoning for their friend's strange actions..

Lily flashed a wry, slightly embarrassed crooked smile. Turning her gaze to match that of Sara's she heaved some air as she responded in a powerless, whispering volume.

"Well.. A lot happened." Galina nodding at her words, Lily continued. "We have gone as far as we could towards the northeast, mapping a large portion of the ground that is just ahead of us. Eventually, we have reached what is probably the edges, as the dry hot air was gradually turned more and more humid. The scorched desert began to show some sparsely spread out vegetation.. Not sure what they actually were, from what we saw they seemed to be some sort of mutated weed.."

"We wanted to take some samples of the different flower buds we found along the way, but then.." Galina joined in, adding her bits to their recount.

They then together began to tell the events of the day. They explained how they wanted to gather some samples from the first flora they found in this so-far dead-barren realm, only to find themselves ambushed suddenly.

Strange creatures, giant, oversized, and mutated insects emerged from the ground, borrowing themselves from the cover of the sandy dunes. Large, giant pincers, strong chitin armor plates covering most of their bodies, the team suddenly found themselves in a rather precarious situation. historical

They could still somewhat hold their ground at first, even as they were facing the savage, fierce, seemingly feral predatory monstrous insectoids. Eventually, just as their stamina was slowly, but steadily being ground away, an even bigger bug appeared, showing something that shocked the party!

The seemingly feral, mindless beasts seemed to notice their leader's presence, and reacted to its high-pitched war cry, giving way to it allowing safe passage to face their team.

They then explained how Naybeah decided to face the beast, going more and more crazed as their battle evolved, all the way to the end when the fierce amazon defeated the beast with one swell swoop of her giant war ax and directly severed the head from the monster's torso.

"I see.." Captain Don hummed, now matching the same wry look that the girls also shared when they returned. He could now somewhat understand their plight, deciding to join them in ignoring the situation with the head and not ask about the reason for its presence in the camp and the strange, unhealthy attachment that the amazon shared with her trophy. It wouldn't serve him any good after all..

Recalling what the girls said at the beginning of their report, the captain asked with an inquiring tone.

"And, did you manage to get some in the end?" He asked. Noticing the growing confusion in both girls' faces, he quickly realized the ambiguity of his words, he rephrased himself before they even had a chance to respond. "I-I meant, did you manage to get some samples.. the flowers in the end? Or did you have no chance after surviving the attack and the destruction of the land around you?"

"Y-yes.. We did.." Galina nodded, an honest smile slowly settling on her face as she reached for her side pocket. From her leather pouch she pulled out a handful of flowers and weeds that resembled that of simple, everyday grass, presenting it to the elderly captain, she explained. "..We couldn't get much, only these few.."

"Though we aren't experts, I have some experience in this field, thanks to my Granny!" Finding the opportunity, Lilly joined back to the conversation. "I think this reddish bud looks vastly similar to the Devil Clove from back home. Look, its shape is just like that!" Lilly exclaimed, pointing to a dark red rose-like bud of a flower, surrounded by a few blades of grass. "It should be good for some Health Potions, or some medicinal stew!" She explained with a passionate gaze. Whiffing a smell, she added through a barely audible whisper. "As an added bonus, it has a much sweeter smell than the ones back home.."

"Lilly!" Galina, standing beside her sister, could obviously hear her, warned her. "Don't be hasty! It is because of this unfamiliar smell, that we should tread carefully! It's obviously not the same Devil Clove you remember!" She berated, then turned to look back at the Captain. "Whilst there are quite a few similarities, we can't be certain if it will really be something we could use in the future, or if we should stay away. Neither of us has any experience in this field after all.."

"I see.." The Captain hummed in response. "In that case.."

---

>>>Check out my latest novel: The Strongest Demon Lord in the Modern World<<

It's an urban modern-day styled story, with a reverse transmigrated ('Banished') immortal entity from the fantastical world of Nova!

Planned Tags and Genre: # CULTIVATION # R18 # BETRAYAL # TRANSMIGRATION # URBAN # ACTION # ANTIHERO # OVERPOWERED (romance maybe at some later point)

---

Just a friendly reminder, that from wherever you are reading , you can reach out to me using any of the below methods!

Links:

/shaele