"Everyone, prepare for battle!"

Olsen immediately shouted out a warning to his group as a sudden realization dawned upon him.

The mercenaries hurriedly huddled closer, leaning back-to-back against each other and clenching their weapons tightly as they looked around vigilantly.

"Captain, did you find something?" A mercenary next to him asked anxiously.

Frowning, Olsen didn't answer his question directly. "Do you think that this forest is too quiet?"

"Quiet?"

The mercenary was slightly taken aback when he heard Olsen's question and suddenly realized that, just like the team leader said, except for the rustling leaves above, no other sound could be heard. Even the insects and birds seemed reluctant to make any noise.

"Um… I guess? But… do that really matter in our current situation?" He didn't understand what Olsen implied. Wasn't it quite nice if there wasn't any buzzing in your ears?

"Idiot!" Olsen cussed in a low voice, "Is your head only an accessory?! How have you managed to survive as a mercenary until now?" He grumbled as he scanned the surrounding area as if searching for something. "How could there be no bird chirping in such a large forest? Not even a trace of insects! Do you think this is normal, you doofus?!"

Listening to Olsen's words, he finally sensed the danger, and the mercenary's body tensed. Their current situation was indeed abnormal.

A mercenary suddenly raised his fingers. "Captain! Look over there!"

Everyone's eyes trailed in the direction the man pointed.

A black-robed man was sitting on a branch not far away, his eyes watching them intently.

Olsen raised his giant ax at the man in a black robe. "Bastard, who are you?!"

The rangers also raised their bows and crossbows, aiming at him altogether.

"Me? Everyone who knows my name is dead..."

Facing the crossbows aimed at him, the suspicious man still looked composed and indifferent, as if whatever they did wouldn't pose any threat to him.

He tilted his head slightly, a creepy smile plastered on his face, cackling eerily, "No... It doesn't matter whether you know or not because you all have to die here… Khukhukhu."

"Bullshit!" Olsen dropped his hand.

With that gesture as a cue, the rangers behind him immediately released a volley of arrows at the man in black while the other mercenaries laughed mockingly.

'That man is a dead meat!' was what everyone thought.

They witnessed the man in the black robe being pierced by a barrage of arrows from all sides into a hedgehog and stopped wasting everybody's oxygen as he fell in the ground lifelessly.

"Hmph! What a bluff!"

Olsen gave a wink, cueing the mercenary next to him to check the man's corpse.

The mercenary nodded and carefully approached the man in black, poking it with his sword and pushing the man's robe to the side.

As he lifted the man's robe in expectation of seeing his dead body, what greeted him was something entirely different. There was no corpse under the black robe, but dozens of black snakes were entangled with each other.

The man's face turned pale, and his feet stepped back subconsciously, frightened by the bizarre turn of events.

However, just as he was about to inform his companion behind him, the swarm of snakes sprung forward without giving him a chance to react, biting his neck, cheeks, and arms ferociously.

"Ah! Leader, save... save me!"

The mercenary turned around and ran stumblingly towards Olsen and the mercenaries while struggling to shake off all the snakes that hung on his body, but to no avail.

The mercenaries took a few steps back in horror at his terrifying appearance, covered in black snakes from head to toe.

The next thing they saw scared them witless.

The man's skin that was bitten by snakes turned black in a blink of an eye, spreading to her entire body as fast as wildfire in the forest. Then his feet started breaking down, turning into a mass of limp flesh.

The man died with his eyes wide open and black mucus gurgling from his mouth, nose, ears, and eyes.

"Hiss~!"

When the mercenary was completely dead, the black snake biting him began to find another target, quickly flooding toward them. Too frightened it seemed; their bodies couldn't move as if they were petrified.

"It just a few black snakes! Useless!"

The muscles on Olsen's sole arm tightened as he raised the axe in his hand and swung it madly at the incoming snakes.

The black snakes were cut and crushed on the spot when they entered the attack range of the giant axe.

"Oh? It seems that you're quite capable. It won't be too boring then."

When he finished cleaning up the black snakes, an eerie voice suddenly echoed across the empty forest.

Olsen raised his axe and growled tauntingly, "You scum just know how to hide! Come here if you dare, you son of a bitch!"

"Khukhukhu… you want me to fight you head on? Amusing… truly amusing… khukhukhu… Well, I'll fulfil your wish then…"

The voice faded away, but not too long after that, the sound of trees breaking and collapsing came from the dense forest in front of him and gradually became louder and louder.

On the horizon, a figure gradually became clearer and clearer. His face suddenly turned ugly.

Olsen narrowed his eyes, full of vigilance.

Around him, the mercenaries had already scrambled and screamed in fear.

What appeared in front of them at this moment was a giant black snake towering over them like a big tree. The gigantic snake stuck out its forked tongue, hissing as it stared intently at the group of people in front of it with its terrifying slit eyes, as if looking for prey.

Just with a single glance from it, Olsen and the other shivered; a chill crawled down their spines, and all the hair behind their necks jerked up involuntarily.

"Khukhukhu… what do you think of my little baby? Isn't he cute? Khukhukhu…" The black-robed man laughed eerily from the top of the gigantic snake head, looking at the people below condescendingly.

"Get ready!" Olsen issued a command in a thunderous voice to forcibly suppress the fear in their hearts. "Fire!!!"

The ranger's bow and arrow shot at the black snake one after another.

Clank! Clank! Clank!

The arrows' heads and the huge black snake's scales clashed, producing a sharp clanking metal sound, as if hitting on full plate armor. No matter how many arrows came in its direction, they couldn't even leave a scratch on its skin.

"Aim at its stomach! Rangers, keep shooting! The others come with me!"

Olsen swung his huge ax and charged towards the black snake first, and the other mercenaries looked at each other and rushed forward with a roar.

"Go."

Seeing that Olsen and his group were rushing towards him, the man smiled mockingly. He reached out and patted the black snake on the forehead, and with tacit understanding, the latter swung its huge tail, sweeping at them sideways.

Olsen's pupil shrank as he saw the incoming attack, stomping his feet hard to the side and barely being able to dodge it.

A mercenary saw Olsen suddenly jump up in front of him and was still puzzled when a thick black snake tail slammed into his chest and knocked him flying in the next second, falling to the ground in the next second.

The mercenary in charge of treatment rushed over to rescue him. Seeing that his chest had caved in deeply inside his body, he couldn't help but shake his head. With such a serious injury, there was no way he could survive.

Olsen didn't have the time to care about the dead man and immediately issued another command to his subordinates.

Unbeknownst to them, while they fought fiercely with the black-robed man and huge black snakes, two pairs of eyes watched them with relish from a small slope in the distance.