Yarra’s Adventure Notes
Chapter 1075 - 190: Breaking Out of the Cocoon

Chapter 1075: Chapter 190: Breaking Out of the Cocoon

Looking at the girls preparing for battle with calm expressions and practiced movements, Catherine lightly touched the faint scar on her cheek. The wound had been too deep, and even with Lina’s immediate treatment, it had left an unsightly mark across her face, stretching from behind her ear down to her jawbone. Though faint, the scar stood out starkly against her otherwise radiant complexion. Lina had no solution for such scars; with luck, it might slowly fade away over time. Otherwise, it could be with her for life. However, the knight girl thought it might be for the best. The presence of the scar served as a clear warning, constantly reminding her never to let her guard down during adventures. The relaxed vigilance’s cost was unpredictable death.

In the five days, many such incidents had occurred. Though none were as dangerous as the one Catherine faced, the continual emergencies kept the girls in a constant state of high alert. Although the demigods they were escorting seemed to take care of the girls, both intentionally and unintentionally, the girls’ pride as strong individuals made it impossible for them to bear always being protected by others. They also understood that this journey through the Forest of Death was an opportunity most professionals would not encounter in their lifetime—it was invaluable for accumulating experience. Moreover, the danger was much lower than that in a typical adventure into the Forest. If they could seize this chance to hone their skills, the future benefits could be unimaginable.

Of course, there was a prerequisite: they had to survive and make it back alive. Striving to stay alive became the girls’ only hope with every step they took. They felt like the magical beasts in the forest, struggling on the edge of life and death every day. Whether predator or prey, from sunrise to sunset, they fought every minute to survive, facing unknown dangers every moment.

Flowers growing on the ground? Untouchable, they were the bait growing on the head of a Rock Eater; any creature that touched the flowers would be devoured by a gaping maw that suddenly burst from the ground, leaving no trace.

Vines dangling from the trees? Untouchable, they were actually the long tails of tree snakes; the cunning tree snakes liked to camouflage their four or five-meter-long bodies as a vine among others, hanging from the branches. This pose could even be maintained for sixty-six hours. The monkeys swinging through the trees were their preferred prey, and any monkey that mistook a snake for a vine and grabbed it had no chance of escape and would inevitably become the snake’s meal.

Solid, hard rocks? Untouchable, they were actually entities known as land corals, formed from the calcified bodies of countless poisonous land coral worms over many years. The living land coral worms resided in the hard-to-spot holes within the land corals. Any creature resting against land corals would be gnawed to white bones in seconds by the swarming toxic worms. No, not even the white bones would remain; the worms’ teeth were as voracious as their appetite, finding even bone delectable.

The fragrant aroma in the air was actually the poisonous gas emitted from the sides of the neck of a Dream Beast. Hidden in the fresh scent was an anesthetic gas that could cause one’s mind to wander and become dizzy. Those who longed for the scent would fall asleep in it and eventually sleep forever. The rustling of leaves when the wind blew was actually the sound of dry leaf caterpillars crawling, small worms that could freely transform between caterpillar and Butterfly. Even when cut into ten pieces, a caterpillar could recover in a few days, and the deadly toxic scales of the Butterfly form were their most formidable weapon. The creatures that died due to the scales often ended up covered in dry leaf butterflies, appearing as though covered by fallen leaves. However, when the dry leaf butterflies departed, they left behind only a shriveled corpse.

There were no safe places. If one saw many ordinary wild animals roaming and playing and let down their guard, they would often fall prey to predators that appeared out of nowhere. Those wild animals lived here year-round and naturally knew how to avoid predator traps. There were also no harmless magical beasts—unless they were ordinary animals with no mana fluctuation, any magical beast, no matter how cute or harmless they seemed, could reveal their ferocious side at any moment. Truly harmless magical beasts had long been eliminated by nature over the centuries.

This was the Forest of Death, this was the graveyard of demigods, this was what the foremost of the three forbidden zones in the Yarran World should be like. To traverse such an environment, the first challenge was to overcome oneself. If one couldn’t overcome oneself, then even if they survived the forest, the world would just have one more madman who went insane at any sound, any shift in light and shadow. There had been numerous precedents in history: adventurers who had spent time in the Forest of Death, only to leave and, being too sensitive, accidentally killed their own partners more than once.

Yet the girls had overcome themselves. Despite feeling like they could fall at any moment every single day, in reality, no one truly fell. With unwavering will, the girls stood shoulder to shoulder with their demigod partners through more than sixty battles in five days, with not a single absence.

For the young girls of the adventure team, the Demigods initially had nothing but admiration for their courage and sense of responsibility, hoping to contribute to their safe entry into the forest. However, this admiration was more of a top-down appreciation. But now, after five days of travel, the Demigods’ perspective had changed completely. If it could be said before that it was the appreciation of the strong for the weak, of the mentor for their apprentice, now the girls had earned the Demigods’ respect. The girls’ strong will and relentless attitude had transformed the Demigods’ gaze from looking down to looking squarely at them. In the eyes of the Demigods, the young girls had gone from being those in need of care to battle partners who could fight alongside them. Although their physical strength was still far weaker than that of the Demigods, strength could be improved, and these valuable traits and respectable natures were very difficult to change.

The Demigods’ change in attitude went unnoticed by the girls, who were completely absorbed each day in combating the environment and the magical beasts. But Pannis saw everything – not just the change in the Demigods’ attitudes, but also in the girls themselves.

The girls’ strength was formidable, their will unyielding, something Pannis had known for some time. However, in Pannis’ eyes, the girls of the past resembled a newly-emerged Butterfly, struggling within its cocoon. In order to help them complete their ultimate transformation and for them to survive the upcoming crises, as soon as Pannis had confirmed that he could not change their decision to follow him into the Forest of Death, his attitude changed considerably.

Over the past few years, Pannis had always stood behind the girls, giving them a push when crucial, like a crutch, supporting them as they moved forward, silently resolving problems beyond their reach.

But now, Pannis had stopped doing so. Before entering the forest, the uncertainty of the future filled the girls’ minds with tension and unease. Pannis simply kept his distance, watching over them, saying nothing. After entering the forest, faced with all that was unfamiliar and with Partners of unknown strength, the girls were understandably nervous. This imposed huge pressure on them. Yet Pannis did nothing, at most using jokes to bring people closer. During the five days of hellish journey, without the high pressure from before, the girls’ subconscious attitude toward the Forest of Death went from initial awe to increasingly lax, even occasionally thinking that it was nothing special; although this thought was fleeting, it was sufficiently dangerous. If this had been before, Pannis certainly would have employed some strange methods to sound the warning bell for the girls with real actions and examples. But this time, Pannis did not do so, letting the girls maintain this dangerous mindset as they passed through the forest.

No one knew what went through Pannis’ mind three days ago, when Catherine faced danger and he was unable to rescue her in time, when she narrowly escaped death. Was it fear? Regret? Pain? Nobody could explain. And when Catherine managed to save herself, what was Pannis thinking then? Nobody knew that either.

But Flare knew, that night, Pannis did not sleep at all. He sat at the edge of the campsite all night, looking up at the sky’s three moons through gaps in the leaves. All night, Pannis, seated alone, made no sound. It was only when the Three Ladies of Moonlight vanished that Pannis let out a soft sigh, faint and nearly imperceptible, noticed only by Flare with her keen senses.

However, even after that night, Pannis remained unchanged. Though he was a little closer to the girls than before, he still let them rely on themselves to face the pressure, to adjust their own mindset, to understand everything around them as they always had.

It might have seemed like there were no changes, but the Demigods, who were acutely aware of the girls’ high mental tension, noticed something: for three days, Pannis had not shown a true smile, and his demeanor grew more and more weary.

It wasn’t until today, after the instructions for battle preparation were issued, that Pannis smiled for the first time in days. It was a genuine smile from deep within, as the tightly wound strings of his heart finally eased. In his eyes, he saw beautiful Butterflies, emerging from their cocoons, fully displaying their beauty and radiance.