It had been around five days since Ana's arrival at the military camp guarding the Gehenna Border. Besides being on multiple patrols for the past two days and wandering in the vicinity of the military camp. It had been pretty mellow.

Ana spent most of her time practicing martial arts in the house. Isis and Joss came to visit her from time to time but Ana wouldn't indulge.

Today, during the assembly, the sixth squad received a reconnaissance mission as a response to the rumours about the presence of a ferocious spirit manipulated beast in the jurisdiction of the North East military camp that had allegedly attacked the merchants and innocent civilians in the surrounding villages.

So, the sixth squad along with the two others were ordered to investigate the site for this killer beast and fight it off.

One of them was the fifth squad, whose leader was a first grade spirit manipulator of the Earthly stage.

Although there was no spirit manipulator of the Earthly stage in this team, thier strengths were still impregnable with an average level above the six grade of the mortal stage. Generally speaking, the sixth squad was no match for these two.

After getting thier gears ready, Matthew prepped his team and led them out of the military camp along with the other two squads for the area of operation.

Besides Ana, every other spirit manipulators brought thier own spirit manipulated beasts, which were crucial to the mission.

‘ Now, that is what I am talking about!’

‘ You said it! Finally, a chance for us to use our strength ’,

‘ But I heard that the beast was kind of ferocious ’,

‘ What are you afraid of? There are so many of us and there is only one of it’,

‘ That's right. If we repel it successfully, we shall have our reward’,

Last in the line, Ana heard Isis and a couple of spirit manipulators foolishly chatting in excitement soon after thier departure.

They sounded like immature kid scouts, who had never had any combat experience before.

The reason for this amateur behaviour was that the sixth squad was accustomed to thier usual mission involving patrols around the camp. Any missions that came with a certain degree of danger had nothing to do with them on account of them being too weak.

If the other three squads weren't occupied with important recon missions elsewhere, the sixth squad would've been kept out of this one as well .

‘ Zander gave them a Pep talk and took charge of the situation.

Infact, his ulterior motive was to selfishly get the job done himself so that he could apply for transfer to another squad.

After all, all squads besides the sixth squad were always assigned important missions, and that was the only way out.

After crossing a flat wasteland, all three squads entered a flourishing wild forest .

The dense foliage filtered the light reaching the ground, making thier surroundings dark and hazy. The villagers had named this forest the

‘ Mazse Forest ’ because it was almost impossible to tell directions after entering. Those who were not familiar with it would often get lost very easily.

This was the area of operation for the three squads.

There was a trade route at the end of this forest where the attack on merchants took place two days ago.

This led them to believe that the spirit manipulated beast most likely took refuge in this forest.

With thier respective plans of action in place, the other two squads took off in different directions as soon as they entered the forest.

‘ Isis turned to Zander hastily.

‘ Zander rolled his eyes, hoping to sound smart and cunning.

The truth was that he was not familiar with the route of the Maze Forest at all. It would be truly embarassing if they got lost without any sign of the beast under his leadership.

Isis and others exchanged a knowing look.

The crew could see through Zander's tactics now. He was famous in the north east military camp for his cowardice. He got his position as squad leader purely by being the superior 's pet.

Ana, who had been silent all this while walking at the end of line, suddenly sensed something. She immediately turned around to see what was behind her.

‘ seeing the other spirit manipulators led by Zander already followed the fifth squad with thier spirit manipulated beasts, Isis and Joss both shouted at Ana, telling her to pick up her pace.

Hearing her crew, Ana then turned back and caught up with them.

Just at this moment, a cool breeze passed by Ana and a pair of giant red eyes appeared from the amidst haze, glowing in dark.

The sixth squad had been following the fifth squad for a few moments. It didn't take the latter a lot of time to realise that they were being followed.

All of a sudden, all the members of the fifth squad increased thier marching speed drastically to get rid of whoever was following them.

The strength of the spirit manipulators in the fifth squad was not bad. As soon as they traveled at their full speed, they were able to get rid of the sixth squad, whose strength ranked at the bottom of all the squads.

The sixth squad felt as if in a blink of an eye, the fifth squad disappeared into the dense forest. They had missed thier target and were now at a loss.

‘ Damn it! The fifth squad is so shrewd. They must be thinking of finishing the task single handedly so that they could get the merit alone. They are not chivalrous at all!’ Zander swore angrily.

He was ignoring the fact that to fish in troubled water and get the merits, he was deliberately following the fifth squad.

‘ How could he swear against others like that? He was also among those kind of people!’ his subordinates thought.

‘ Captain, what should we do now?’ a spirit manipulator of the sixth squad asked blankly as they looked around the large and dense forest.

Everyone was confused.

‘ You are asking me what we should do now, are you? Ofcourse, we will continue the search on our own. Actually, I wanted to give the fifth squad an opportunity to pave the way in front of us. Who knew that they were so ignorant that they would waive away such a good opportunity! Hmm! Let's wait and see’, Zander said in an irritated tone.

The fact was that he was just bragging. Though he was weak and mindless, he had to pretend to be strong and smart in front of his subordinates. He took his spirit manipulated beast and began to walk in a random direction aimlessly.

Ana, who was at the end of her squad, saw her captain behave like that and frowned slightly.

She had realised that Zander had a terrible sense of direction and he was not smart enough to lead the squad to finish the task at all.

If he continued to lead the way like that, Ana was afraid that the entire squad will be completely lost.

But she didn't stop him or did she said anything to others.

With her current power, which she was deliberately hiding, she was confident that she could protect herself from any harm if she was in danger. She could deal with any emergency. Thus, she kept silent and wanted to see what would happen next.

Despite her confidence, she was still cautious and left an obscure mark on a big tree beside her by touching it's trunk casually when everyone was not paying attention to her.

If Zander lost the direction later, the mark might be helpful. Quietly, under the leadership of Zander, who Ana believed to be a mediocre and incompetent captain, she continued to march forward.

The random direction that Zander picked was towards the center of the maze Forest. As they keep walking deep into the forest, they saw that all the trees were towering and lush.

They felt that within the forest it was getting darker than the outside world. The deeper they walked the dimmer the light became.

They ended with poor visibility. After a little while, they could only see the things within three meters distance. They had to walk more slowly and carefully.

Gradually, the surrounding area around them became completely silent. Occasionally, there was screams of beasts and worms. Those eerie sounds coupled with dark and dim light gave them gruesome feeling.

As they marched forward, they noticed that at the side about two meters away, there was a strange rustling of branches And leaves, as if something was about to jump out of somewhere. few spirit manipulated beasts, which were standing ahead of the squad suddenly roar anxiously with teeth bared.

The abrupt sound after the silence was rather terrifying. Consequently, all the spirit manipulators of the sixth squad, except Ana was taken back. They jumped to thier feet and immediately took all kinds of weird postures.

As the rustling sound grew louder, everyone was so alarmed that they geared themselves to fight against whatever it is.

The next moment, thier attacking action stopped abruptly as a cute white rabbit came out from the thick branches And leafes.

‘ Damn it! It turned out to be a rabbit. How dare you taunt us like that! Be careful! Next time I see you, I'll roast you alive, ’ Zander yelled as the rabbit left. He felt greatly relieved.

The other spirit manipulators also breathed a sigh of relief at that precise moment.

‘ Since you are so afraid of death, I think it's better for us to go back earlier. If you really get hurt in this task, it's really not worth it’, Ana said with a cold sneer.

Instead of wasting time and energy in finishing the so called task with these cowards, she felt that it was better for her to go back and continue her secret cultivation, which she believed would be more meaningful and helpful to improve her strength.

‘ Hey, you brat! What makes you have the nerve to say that? It's said that every corner of the Maze Forest is full of danger. Who knows what will pop up abruptly the next second! Are you not afraid?’ Zander shouted loudly at Ana on hearing her words.

Ana continued to ignore Zander 's words and went straight ahead.

‘ Zander stumbled over words.

Ana's action at the moment showed that she didn't really regard him as a captain. Zander immediately was in great fury and gritted his teeth.

‘ Isis and Joss rushed to solve the trouble caused by Ana.

‘ Zander said, pretending to be a generous leader. He continued to pave the way by his spirit manipulated beast and followed Ana with other spirit manipulators.

A few seconds later, Ana suddenly furrowed her brows and stopped moving forward. Zander, who had caught up with Ana now, almost ran into her due to her sudden stop.

‘ Zander burst out angrily. He was greatly irritated by Ana 's weird behaviour and actions.

At that particular moment, a horrible scream echoed around. A flock of birds in the forest was startled and they began to fly away at full speed as if to save thier lives.

Zander and the other spirit manipulators were instantly horrified.

They hurriedly huddled together and scanned around with terrified looks on thier faces.

They wondered,‘ As thier imagination began getting wild, thier hands and feet started to tremble violently because of fear.

At that point, a spirit manipulated beast from the sixth squad seemed to smell something.

Suddenly it ran fast in one direction.

Ana who was staying still and wondering what had just happened, immediately followed the spirit manipulated beast. She knew that it must have detected something strange. She wanted to find out who had made the horrible sound.

The remaining spirit manipulators of the sixth squad looked at each other with fear. They could do nothing so they decided to follow Ana. They ran after her as fast as they could.

After they had run a little distance, they found Ana in front of then and stopped again.

It was clear Zander was annoyed again. Just when he was going to scold Ana for her actions, he saw Ana move away.

Without Ana blocking thier view, he and the other spirit manipulators saw a scene that was extremely terrible.

At a distance of a few steps far from them, the spirit manipulated beast that had just led them to this place was squatting.

Meanwhile, a spirit manipulator in a military gown, whose face was completely ruined lay on the bloody grass in front of them.

It was gruesome to see that half of thier body was missing, which was exposing thier sternum.

The portion from thier chest to a part of thier stomach was completely cut open by some kind of sharp weapon.

Their internal organs were gone, with only some fragments, and a few pieces of badly multiple intestines left hanging outside thier body .

Adding to this scene, the spirit manipulator 's body was still oozing yellowish liquid, which was stinky.

Never had the spirit manipulators of the sixth squad witnessed such a cruel scene before. One by one, except Ana, all of them began to tremble.

They were frightened by the scene.

Three or four of them had already started vomitting so hard that it looked like they would vomit bile out of thier stomachs due to rancid smell wafting around in the place and the horrible sight in front of them.

While others were distraught by the scene, Ana was numb with shock at the sight. Still, she regained her composer quickly and looked at Zander, who stood beside her and was extremely pale.

‘ Can you find out which squad this person is from?’ Ana asked Zander.

Zander was extremely sick at that time and was filled with horror.

When Ana asked him about the dead person, he suddenly came back to his sense and realised that the members of the sixth squad could also meet a similar fate in the forest.

Holding his horror back, he took a closer look at the military gown of the corpse. Then he said,‘ It could be a person of the third squad ’

‘ No! Wait! You are not the captain, I am the captain... Why should I answer your questions?’ Zander yelled at once. When he finished answering Ana 's question, for a moment he had felt as if Ana was the captain.

Once again, his words were ignored.

In such a crisis, he had to swallow his pride.

‘ Ana immediately put forward her judgement based on her observation of the corpse.

Listening to Ana 's words, the spirit manipulators present there, looked even more pale and sick. Thier bodies all trembled in fear and apprehension .

They had high chances of being trapped in great danger from that moment on..

‘ Ana said as she glanced coldly at Zander.

‘ Zander seemed to assert in a self comforting way. He pressed his quivering hand on his waist, as if to hold down the overwhelming uneasiness.

Suddenly, they heard another rustle from the bushes. All the spirit manipulators from the sixth squad was so scared that thier knees trembled. They looked around in terror and became more alert of thier surroundings.

‘ Ana could not help but shake her head as she saw the team panic and hesitate to proceed.

After taking a deep breath, she decided to return back by following the marks she made when she came.

‘ the spirit manipulators saw that Ana had left after she finished talking to them. They also wished Zander could make the same decision to go back with Ana, despite the tension between the two. After all, no one wanted to risk thier life.

As much as Zander did not want to believe Ana's judgement, he knew it was too risky. The last thing he would do was to risk his life.

‘ Zander wanted to finish his speech to save his face.

But, when he went on his speech, a weird shadow showed up again. It loomed over them, scaring the wits out of the spirit manipulators. As , he had to end his speech abruptly and followed Ana's direction.

Soon, they arrived at a crossroad. Different paths intersected in front of them to different destinations.

They weren't sure which path would lead to the right way back.