Yarra's Adventure Notes-Chapter 98 - 22 Earth Walker_1

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"Ah? Who is this?" Pannis closed the lid of the cellar and backed away with Lina to lean against the wall of the house. Turning back, he noticed an old man following Lydia into the backyard and asked.

"Sir, this is the village chief," Lydia answered loudly. "We met him at the entrance. He came from the priest."

The old man ran up a few steps, grabbing Pannis’s arm and asked anxiously, "Sir, have you found the ones yet? What’s the situation here? The priest only told me that there is a monster here, please, you must save them."

"Please don’t worry." Lina secretly cast a calming spell to soothe the anxious village chief. "We haven’t found the people yet, but the beast’s lair should be right here. We’re going to go down to look for them soon. You can rest assured."

"Monster lair?" The village chief was startled and looked around nervously. "Is the monster still here? Could it be hiding somewhere else?"

"Generally, no," Lina explained. "By nature, animals hide in their lairs. And this monster can attack humans, dragging them away without giving them a chance to resist, so obviously it’s not small. Something of its size wouldn’t be able to hide anywhere else in the village except for its lair, so it’s very likely right here. You should leave for now, it could become dangerous any time. Don’t worry, we’ll take care of it."

"Then I will have to leave everything to you." The village chief took a few steps, then suddenly stopped and said, "I’ll just wait at the entrance. I’ll know right away if there’s any problem. Maybe I can even help somehow."

"Absolutely not," Lina said, looking at the village chief’s trembling steps with a wry smile. "We don’t know how long this will take, so it’s best for you to go back to the temple and wait with the priest. Also, please tell Priest Milak that if we end up taking longer than expected, he shouldn’t be worried. We’ll be fine. But, until we get back, unless it’s a Legendary Rank adventurer, no matter who it is, they absolutely must not enter."

Pannis paid no more attention to the village chief who was looking back with each step he took, instead he questioned Lydia, "Have you really thought it through? I have a rough idea of what might be down there. It’s a very annoying creature. Are you sure you want to come down with us?"

"Yes, sir." Lydia raised her head and answered determinedly. fɾeeweɓnѳveɭ.com

"What do you think it is?" Lina, taking the five ropes from Lydia, handed three to Pannis while coiling the remaining two around her waist. As she worked, she asked Pannis.

"An Earth Walker." Pannis took out a small tool from his bag, wrapped it a few rounds tightly on his left forearm, then took the crystal energy lamp from Lydia. Fastening it to his left forearm, the lamp stuck firmly, showing no signs of loosening even after Pannis forcefully swung his arm a few times.

"Just our luck." Lina sighed, giving up on her last glimmer of hope. While demonstrating to Lydia how to create a makeshift climbing gear with rope, she said, "Such a headache. We just left the underground not long ago and here we are going back. It’s so annoying."

"Sir." Lydia hesitated a little, but eventually mustered the courage to ask, "What is an Earth Walker?"

"A kind of lizard," Pannis replied, giving his gear a final once-over. "Usually, they aren’t large, living in underground crevices and caves, feasting on insects and small creatures. Their tongues can shoot in and out at an extremely high speed. The base of their tongue is hollow and barbed, quickly injecting paralysis toxin to immobilize prey once they strike, and the tongue then retreats, dragging the prey back to its mouth. Also, their front claws are very strong. You’ve switched to a steel shield; good, a steel shield can fend off their claws, leather or wooden shields won’t do. Finally, their skin is tough with strong defense. Regular attacks can hardly break through it. Usually, these magical beasts are small. I’ve only ever heard of two instances where large Earth Walkers appeared. Alright, I’m going to head down first, you two wait for my signal."

Lydia was about to say something but was promptly shut down by Lina’s stern warning, "He’s an explorer, so he has to go down first. If you want to join us in battle, from now on, you have obediently follow orders. If you can’t, you should leave right now."

"Yes, ma’am."

Pannis disregarded the slight kerfuffle above and, using a short stick, pushed open the lid of the cellar from a distance. He gracefully slipped into the entrance of the cellar. Not long after, they heard him call out, "Come down."

The Rein family’s cellar was rather large, about six or seven square meters and over a person high. When Lydia entered, Pannis had already lit the lamps in the cellar. By the light, they could see an uneven, round hole at one corner of the cellar. The hole was over a meter in diameter and extended downwards at a steep angle.

"It’s here," Pannis squatting at the round hole said, "These are claw marks. There are ones that lead inward, and ones that lead outward. Hmm, and not just one creature, looking at the marks, there’s one large and two small. Surprisingly, there are three. A large Earth Walker of this size with its own territory would have to be at least a Middle Silver Rank, and it wouldn’t be surprising if it had Upper Silver Rank or even Gold Rank power. Be ready."

Pannis pulled out a thick, long steel nail and threw it to Lina. Lina huffed disdainfully but still secured the nail into the cellar floor with her treasured hammer. Pannis smirked a little, tied the rope securely to the nail, lit the crystal energy lamp, turned upside down, and started climbing down the rope slowly into the hole.

After descending a few meters, Pannis noticed that the soil had become very hard. A few more meters in and suddenly there was nothing in front of him. The downward-sloping tunnel was replaced by a more spacious, vertical shaft.

"Tsk, a soil layer crevice. I thought there might be something like this," Pannis muttered to himself mirthlessly. "Normally, burrowing creatures won’t trouble themselves to dig tens of meters up to the surface for no reason. Damn it, I guess I have to keep going." He continued to grumble as he slid further down, quickly reaching the end of his twenty-meter rope. Pannis sighed, hung upside down to attach another rope and continued his descent.

"Earth Walkers, Earth Walkers, where are you?" Pannis hummed a tune as he slid down, "Come out and let me see you. I can smell you all, la la la la la." Apparently, the lizards had no intention of heeding Pannis’s command, remaining completely silent.

As the second rope was about to reach its end, Pannis, who had been adjusting the Crystal Energy lamp on his arm incessantly, finally saw the ground below. Taken aback, he whistled as he smoothly landed on his side, and once assured there were no dangers, he vibrated the rope lightly with a twist of his wrist. It sent a wave traveling up the sagging rope, reaching as far as the end tethered to the steel peg, nearly forty meters above. He repeated this three times, rested a bit, and then repeated again until he felt light pulls from above, indicating he should stop sending the signals.

It didn’t take long before a clanging sound echoed from above, and Lydia clumsily slid down the rope, landing heavily beside Pannis. Had it not been for Pannis’ timely assistance, she might have fallen over.

"Are you alright?" Pannis asked with a wry smile, "Don’t they train you to do this in the city guard?"

"I apologize, sir." Lydia’s echo of her response startled her, so she quickly lowered her voice, "We’ve never practiced it."

"It’ll be more troublesome when we have to climb back up," Pannis shrugged in the dark, "It isn’t simple like coming down."

"No problem, we can use the rope to pull her up when it’s time," Lina’s voice came from above, but what descended next was not Lina, but another rope that came down directly, coiling around several circles on the ground before stopping mid-air.

"Where did you fix your rope?" Pannis asked looking up, "at the end of a soil crevice?"

"Yes, right there, just in case." The light from above swung, and Lina, one hand holding a lamp and the other the rope, slid down to the ground with ease. After shining the lamp around, she asked, "What’s the situation?"

"As you can see," Pannis pointed ahead, "there’s a soil crevice which leads to a rock crevice. It seems the hunters climbed out from here."

"Rocks? That’s strange. Can Earth Walkers dig through rocks?" Lina puzzled, "A rock crevice should be natural. It looks like, um, this has been here for a long time. It’s odd, why are they just now attacking humans on the surface? Since these two crevices have been here for some time, they should have surfaced earlier."

"Who knows," Pannis peeked into the crevice, "Let’s just go in and see. We’ll never figure it out just by guessing here. Wait, I smell something. The scent of hunters."

"Have you found the Earth Walkers?" Lina tried to pick up the smell, but found nothing.

"I have. They are hunting. The prey is." Pannis suddenly darted to the side as a white shadow struck where he originally stood, then finished his sentence, "...us."

Highly alert with her sword in hand, Lydia saw the white shadow, and although she couldn’t react in time, her body instinctively followed her training striking at the white shadow. A twang echoed, and Lydia was thrown back a few steps, her sword almost knocked from her hand, but the white shadow retreated unscathed.

"I forgot to mention," Pannis casually remarked from the side, "their tongues are even tougher than their skin, the most protected part of their bodies. There’s no use trying to cut their tongues. Instead, aim for the eyes, the inside of the mouth, the center of the belly, and the anus, those are their weak spots."

Lina cocked her head to listen, "That sound is ... it ran away? Could they set traps too?"

"Of course." Pannis nodded, "A hunter that can’t set a trap is not a good hunter. They are born to be hunters, setting up traps to catch their prey. Now we have two options. First, we could chase them into their traps and withstand their attacks until we’ve eliminated them all. Alternatively, we could lay an ambush here and wait for them. Either way, the goal is to kill all of them. What do you think?"

"Didn’t you forget? I said before, you make the decisions." Lina responded noncommittally.

"Oh, right. Then let’s... take a rest here," Pannis said after a little thought, "I’m sleepy."

"What the hell, you were just complaining about hunger, and now you’re sleepy?" Lina complained, both amused and annoyed.

"Can’t help it, sleepiness is worse than hunger," Pannis said. Meanwhile, under the glow of the oil lamp, he cast a subtle glance at Lydia.

Remembering Lydia’s level of expertise, Lina gave a knowing nod, "Alright, time to sleep then. But, there’s not much space, how do you plan on hiding to ambush them?"

Pannis winked mysteriously, pulling several silver circular plates from his pocket, "Sweetheart, carrying ready-to-use Concealment Array and Defense Array is a basic quality of a top adventurer."

Lina was lost for words, she could only manage a thumbs-up.