While others avoided witches like the plague, she now encountered someone who wanted to abduct a witch, which no longer surprised her. In fact, she even wondered if this was a new scheme by the Church, employing a honey trap to deceive more gullible witches and deliver them right to the Church’s doorstep?
The duo had become a trio.
The Forest Witch only agreed to show Zheng Yichen where the Headless Knight was. If Zheng Yichen couldn’t defeat the Headless Knight, she would leave immediately. Before that, Katrina had to use her magic to cast an effective protection spell on them.
As for Zheng Yichen, he didn’t need it; he boasted that he was going to kill the Headless Knight. With the protection on him, the Headless Knight would find it hard to aproach Zheng Yichen.
Finding the Tree of Death was no easy task, the forest’s terrain was complicated, but with the Forest Witch leading the way, they went straight to the location of the Tree of Death, with no need to follow the setting sun.
Upon seeing a particularly robust tree, Zheng Yichen immediately spotted a sword embedded in the ground wrapped around its roots.
The hilt had a serpent’s head, making it resemble a snake’s body. The sword was wrapped in vines, but there weren’t many signs of rust. What it did bear were traces of the passage of time.
"This is it," the Forest Witch said, looking at the tree, her mind seemingly drifting to something else.
"Do you know this place?"
The Forest Witch nodded and then shook her head.
"I know some things about it." She didn’t continue, while Zheng Yichen approached the tree, sensing a faint aura of death from it.
Ever since he arrived in this world, he had always had a somewhat weak elemental detection, which allowed him to sense the ’Elements’ in the environment. As for not being able to detect the presence of witches, that wasn’t his fault; they were the ones with the problem.
Right, they were too weak. Even though they wielded magic akin to witchcraft, they were still at the level of ordinary people. Getting hit would still cause them to cry for a long time, and getting cut could still kill them. Zheng Yichen could lift one with just one hand extended on either side.
The ’low-level’ magic they mastered didn’t bring any changes to their constitution; essentially, they remained ’ordinary people’.
Neither the Forest Witch nor Katrina, upon approaching Zheng Yichen, elicited any sense of a terrifying presence. It was only during magic rituals involving various materials that Zheng Yichen could feel some ’Elemental’ fluctuations in the environment.
But those fluctuations were more due to changes caused by the ritual materials rather than originating from the Forest Witch herself. Their so-called magic was like a type of ritual.
No wonder, when watching movies, she felt the magic released was similar to divine battles.
However, to say that the special powers of this world were weak was one thing, but they did have their special aspects. The Headless Knight had escaped from Hell, and without discussing the nature of Hell in this world, the very emergence of such a being implied that the magic of this world was not entirely... useless.
Zheng Yichen circled the sword twice, touching it and feeling nothing but a slight chill from the blade; he didn’t notice anything particularly special about it.
"What’s going on here?"
"This sword is just an ordinary one for now; it will become the Sword of Hell only when the Headless Knight appears," the Forest Witch explained, eyeing the somewhat reckless Zheng Yichen.
"This place... seems to be the burial ground of the Black Forest Mercenaries," Katrina mentioned, addressing Zheng Yichen. The affairs of the Black Forest Mercenaries were somewhat related to the town where she lived, but that was before she was born. The related records were scarce, and even many people in the town had forgotten about the matter.
Had it not been for her arrival here, she would hardly have thought about it.
"Let’s start digging," Zheng Yichen said as he took out a collapsible shovel and began to busy himself. This tool didn’t take up much space, but it was very useful to have on hand.
A headless skeleton appeared within the grave pit. Zheng Yichen looked at the skeleton and raised his eyebrows slightly, then turned back to the Forest Witch, "Would it make any difference to destroy this skeleton now?"
"No use. The skeleton is just a medium; the Headless Knight will still appear after it’s destroyed, and you will have incurred its wrath," she responded.
Zheng Yichen took out a hand cannon and fired into the grave pit. The small grenade fell into the pit and exploded violently, turning the decrepit headless skeleton into ashes.
"..."
"..."
Two witches, one younger and one older, looked silently at Zheng Yichen who had already taken action. The Forest Witch looked at the ’fire gun’ in Zheng Yichen’s hand with an indescribable expression. She remembered fire guns as being very troublesome to load, requiring the bullet to be stuffed in from the muzzle after each shot.
Not to mention possessing such power. The attack from Zheng Yichen’s fire gun produced an intense explosion, just like an explosive.
"The sun is about to set," the Forest Witch said after the shock.
The Headless Knight would appear after sunset, and sunset wasn’t the same as nightfall. As the sun dipped below the horizon, the scattered skeleton ashes in the grave pit began to coalesce under an invisible force. A large amount of flesh began to form on the reassembled skeleton, and halfway through the process, the flesh-covered skeleton and the sword stuck in the ground were pulled underground.
Beneath the large tree, a horse’s head emerged, and the Headless Knight climbed directly out from beneath the tree.
Instead of leaving immediately, the Headless Knight set its sights directly on Zheng Yichen, its sword bursting with eerie green flames.
Zheng Yichen’s earlier actions had enraged it!
At this moment, the Forest Witch had already pulled Katrina back. They, as women, had no power to oppose the Headless Knight, especially one on horseback, and it was best not to drag others down and instead stay away.
Katrina hesitated for a moment, then picked up a dried tree branch from the ground and drew a magic array formation. It was a protective magic array. As long as they were within its bounds, the Headless Knight would find it difficult to approach them. If Zheng Yichen couldn’t hold up later, they could come over for protection.
Meanwhile, Zheng Yichen, fully prepared, eyed the seemingly furious Headless Knight and took out his fishing rod. A black substance flowed along the fishing rod, covering it and transforming it into a black spear.
In his other hand was a shotgun, which he has already loaded with shotgun slugs.
At close range, the tremendously powerful shotgun slug pierced through the chest plate of the Headless Knight, blowing a huge hole in its torso, but this was still to no avail. The massive wound was quickly covered by new flesh, and even the shattered chest plate was restored to its original state.
Seeing this, Zheng Yichen was unconcerned. He was just testing the power of the shotgun slugs, which proved to be sufficient.