Chat Group For Magicians 112 Discovering The Chasm

Catmod shakes his arm a bit before he approached me.

"Since the chief is dead, let's find the source of the darkness that caused the Chief to turn into an Abyssal Demon. Destroying the source is the most effective way of doing it."

"Won't we get corrupted like how the chief did?"

"No, unless we succ.u.mb to it, we will be safe from it. There is nothing to worry about it. I have closed a few sources of darkness which acts as a gateway to the abyss. It's not really a big problem to get closer to the source as long as you don't get too much attached to the area because even the purest person would get corrupted slowly."

So there is a risk. It's something that needs some extra care or you will also undergo changes as the chief does. Should I go with Catmod?

"You should go, kid."

The seed's voice resurfaced after a few hours of not speaking at me. But why call me to go to a dangerous area.

"And why would I risk my life on something dangerous task such as this?" I asked the seed.

"Trust me, you can use something in that area. And besides, you can't just go back to the ruins, you don't even know which way is the path back there. Just follow them. I extracted a few parts of the memories of the guy killer earlier. And I just got valuable info that would be helping you unlocking your mana circuits faster."

Hearing this, I frowned. Something that can help me unlock my mana circuits? Is there a hidden treasure that would be helpful for me? I don't know but the seed has not betrayed any of my expectations at all so why not? I looked at Catmod again and said my intentions.

"Alright, I am coming with you. I am also quite curious about the source of the dark energy."

Miya approached us as she sheathed back her daggers back go her sheath. Now I am nervous with Miya around because that daggers of hers are just sharp enough without being sharpened. What would happen if it was sharpened enough? Gah, that was horrifying.

"I will be coming too. I will have to end everything, once and for all to avoid anyone else being corrupted by this source. I will see it until the very end."

Catmod smiled and nodded. "Well, in that case, we should probably get going. We can't keep staying here, we have to find that place before sunrise."

...

This is the very first time I did not sleep at all. With all the actions going on, it's hard to get a wink of sleep. Every second and every minute is the same. Hard to deal with a single sleep. Who can I blame, there are too many enemies to beat last time and if you keep on fighting, it wouldn't be the same anymore. Instead of collapsing from the wounds, you will be collapsing in fatigue and might start dozing in the middle of the battle.

The light coming from the moon adds the eerie atmosphere to the place. The whole area is also incredibly quiet. It was like all of the lifeforms are under a deep slumber that even a single sound is muted.

"Why is it so quiet? There should be at least chirping from night owls and night birds. Even cricket sounds that should be present is also oddly silent today," I said as I glance around the place.

"I have noticed that too. Living in the forest for almost all my life, it was like a different place all of a sudden. I can't even feel the essence of most organisms here. It was like they disappeared out in thin air," Miya said.

"Is that even possible?" 

"No, that was actually impossible to do so. Even cemeteries would emit sounds from the crickets. Why is this place more silent than other parts of the forest?"

"It's because of the darkness lingering this place. With such a heavy darkness revolving the whole place, it would become inhabitable by any kind of lifeforms that are not good or sensitive enough to darkness," Catmod said and pointed on a tree that seems to undergo mutation.

"Is that tree corrupted?" Miya asked and reached out to touch the violet spot.

"Don't touch it!" Catmod grab Miya's hand before the tips of her fingers can even land to the infected area.

"Why?"

"Patches of infections from trees are a bit more dangerous than the darkness in the air. It's because they easily infect others once a certain spot from an infected lifeform, the infection also infects the one who touched. So unless you don't want to get corrupted, don't touch any of the trees."

I sighed in relief because I was about to touch one myself. Good thing Catmod is knowledgeable on it. We continue walking on the path for quite a while and Catmod and Miya would occasionally cut some trees with infection out of the way once in a while. I, on the other hand, use my mana scan. Since it is always used a lot of times already, I have been too reliant on it now in detecting lifeforms.

Still, I did not detect any kind of lifeforms aside from the trees, Catmod and Miya and it started to make me feel confused. Does not a single animal or monster can last the power of darkness here? Soon, we saw a clearing and on the other side of the clearing is the mountain. What made me stunned is the heaviness of darkness in the area. I quickly deactivated my ability to scan the mana because I knew the consequences of scanning the darkness. It was something I don't want to feel because the pain is almost unbearable.

Still, I managed to scan a bit of the darkness. A slight pang of pain occurred on my head but since I closed the mana scan, it didn't really become as painful as before. But I still have to hold my head in pain, d.a.m.n it.

"Are you okay Kazuma?" Catmod asked as he took a glance at me.

"Yeah, I am fine. I just realized that the cave in front of us is covered of darkness. I am guessing that is the place," I said.

"Looks like we found our target this time. Let's get inside and find the portal to the abyss. We can't let the darkness cover this whole place."

We cautiously approached the place. We still need vigilance in case we are going to fight otherworldly enemies.

The cave is quite dark which made Catmod cast light orb. However, his light orb started to glow in a violet shade.

"Take a look at that. The Light Orb is also corrupted by the darkness. That means this place is really full of dark energy."

"Are we at risk?" I asked.

"Not really, we have just to be fast in locating the place and exit this place. We could only have at least 30 minutes to stay in this area."

Thirty minutes... that was a short amount of time considering this place might be bigger and the dark portal leading to the abyss is not that near. I bet it was in the very deepest part of the cave.

"Kid, why don't you use the memory of that Chief to find what you are looking for?" the seed suggested.

Use the memory? Of course! Since I managed to scan the memory of Onizuka last time, I can scan the memory of the chief too! I entered my consciousness as fast as I can and find the memory that involves this cave. It didn't take me too long because the most recent memory involves the memory of this cave.

"Lil' Blue, can you please extract the pathway of this memory for me?"

"No problem," the seed said before it swirled around.

The memory quickly gets temporarily imprinted in my mind. I returned to reality and glance at the two.

"I think I can find the way here, follow me! And I quickly traversed the cave as fast as I can. Miya and Catmod glanced at each other before following me.

With the temporary memory, I managed to cut the time we have to use for traversing the cave. At the very end of the cave, we finally arrived at the deepest part of the cave. What is waiting for us is the deep crack emitting a very dark energy that from my guess is the dark portal to the abyss. The whole place is reeking with the smell of blood. But what made me frown is the altar that is just adjacent on the very chasm of darkness.