Female NovelChapter 548: The Deadly Forest of Onistead
Upon receiving his orders, Chris swiftly went to work. As he left, he casually closed the door behind him, restoring the quietness in the office. Kelvin, sitting alone in his chair, gazed out the window with sharp, deep-set eyes, a cold smile curling his lips.
It seemed that he had been too kind last time, failing to make the Parry family's stocks plummet, allowing Teagan to cause trouble once more. This time, he would not be merciful. Anyone who dared to stab him in the back, without exception, would meet a grim fate.
In Onistead, during the dry September heat, the autumn breeze carried a scorching heat and northern sand dust that stung the faces of passersby. The weather felt like walking into a furnace, with a faint smell of burning rubber lingering in the air.
In a corner of the city, lush woods and spring water created a tranquil oasis, a great spot for tourists. Despite its proximity to the city center, it maintained a primitive charm, with refreshing coolness and sparse human presence.
Yet, for some unknown reason, this beautiful place, located in a good loaction, remained uninhabited and desolate within a ten-mile radius. It was renowned for its ominous reputation and was rumored to be the entrance to an imperial tomb, marked with intricate formations.
Local elders had recounted the discovery of a massive tomb in the 1980s, where archaeologists unearthed the remains of thousands, their bodies transformed into eerie white bones, with only fragmented armor revealing their identities.
Judging by the layout of the mass grave, it seemed as though they were guarding something. Speculation arose that since there were tens of thousands of soldiers, there must have been a commanding general buried nearby.
In an attempt to locate this general, archaeologists launched a mountain search operation with a team of twenty-three. None returned alive. A decade later, in the early 1990s, a plane crash survivor happened to land near the mountain range.
Media efforts eventually located the survivor. Clad in lavish attire and deliriously rambling, he claimed to have encountered a "supreme lord" and boasted about his antique treasures, recounting witnessing ancient tombs and legions of spirits numbering in the thousands.
Many dismissed him as mentally unstable and advised psychiatric care. However, a strange incident occurred. Before the public eye, the survivor bled from his seven orifices and died, with his once-gleaming jewelry instantaneously oxidizing into blackened carbon, a spectacle captured on video.
Amid widespread disbelief, a group of esteemed archaeologists and medical experts conducted a scientific investigation, attributing the death to the accumulation of corpses and toxic gases in the forest, positing that the survivor had unknowingly succumbed to the poisonous environment during his three-month stay.
Suddenly, when he stepped outside, the air pressure changed, and he died from a toxin outbreak.
As for the batch of antique objects oxidizing, this is a common phenomenon in archaeological history.
This phenomenon is particularly pronounced in silk fabrics and bronze artifacts.Contents belong to NovelDrama.Org
However, some people were puzzled because the person also wore a large gold bracelet. Although bronze artifacts and silk are prone to oxidation, gold is a stable solid metal that shouldn't instantly oxidize to carbon.
This question has not been answered yet, but this forest has already been designated as a forbidden zone.
People have named it the "Deadly Forest".
A big sign has been erected at the entrance, painted in striking red, with the words "No Entry" written on it.
It was worth mentioning that Cheyenne's grandfather, Layne, was one of the experts involved in the archaeological and discussion meetings back then.
At this moment, from the depths of the forest, came a series of horrifying screams.
The sound was sharp and loud, causing the crows on the branches to flap their wings and quickly fly away.
Unfortunately, it didn't even get a few steps further before someone shot it down.
After the gunshot, a black feather, stained with blood, spun in mid-air and slowly floated down, swaying with the help of a chilling wind until it finally landed on the pure white tombstone. In the next moment, it was picked up by a big hand.
The man was ragged, with a disheveled appearance, and his big feet stepped on the dry leaves. The crisscrossing wounds on his feet were horrifying to behold.
He was extremely hungry and picked up the crow without plucking its feathers, biting into it directly.
The crow, not completely dead, twitched in his mouth. As he sucked the blood, it gradually lost all signs of life.
The man enjoyed his meal, completely unconcerned that the crow had grown up eating nearby corpses.
As he tore the crow's belly with his teeth, he unexpectedly bit into a hard piece, maybe a human fingernail.
"Thui."
He spat out the fingernail, then continued feasting on the meat, displaying a savage scene of consuming bloody flesh as if he were a primitive human yet to be civilized. This scene was truly nauseating.
Not far behind the man, two elderly people were tied to trees. They both felt a surge of nausea in their stomachs.
Among them, the shorter and plumper old man spoke up first, kindly reminding the man, "Young man, you can't eat crows. If you do, you'll die even faster."
The man didn't listen and walked away briskly, searching for the next crow that could fill his stomach.
Seeing that he ignored his well-intentioned advice, Jonathan, his beard bristling with anger, sighed in frustration.
But his beard couldn't stand up anymore since he hadn't washed it for two or three months, and his once beautiful goatee had become one long dirty strand.
"Alright, you old man, save your
breath. He's been injected with
some biochemical agent. He's
practically half-dead now. There's no
difference whether he lives
dies,"
Layne said.
Unconvinced, Jonathan retorted, "Isn't it half? As long as he's not fully dead, I have the obligation to remind him. It's amazing that you're from a lineage of divine physicians and healers."
Layne was already too tired to argue and didn't pay attention to Jonathan.
Not happy with being ignored, Jonathan lightly kicked the old man with his foot.
"Hey, say something. It's no fun having a monologue with just me speaking!"
Layne coldly snorted, raised his eyelids slightly, and pointed his chin towards the mass grave not far away.
"You think you're having a
monologue? Look over there. So many people are waiting to chat with you. Since you love talking so much, why not go down there and chat with them?"
As soon as his voice fell, a gust of eerie wind swept by them, whistling as it passed, and picking up a considerable number of dry leaves from the ground. The tree shadows shook, producing a creepy rustling sound.