The Rise Of A Tribal Deadbeat - Chapter 73

It didn’t take long for Zus to suffer a gruesome death after being dragged behind Cero for hours. It was safe to say, it wasn’t a death anyone would have wanted. But it was a death fitting of someone who betrayed Zok.

As soon as the system confirmed that Zus was indeed dead, Zok finally let go of the vine that had been binding Zus. Soon the creatures that had been chasing behind him, stomped the dead Occunian to a paste.

As a result, Zok’s Depravity shot back up to 20%, and as it did Zok realised something. Whenever he killed people he received some depravity, even if he simply killed them without torturing them, he still gained some of it.

However, he did not always receive it after killing the beast. It was as if the system and the depraved one were trying to tell him something. If it had been the Zok who had entered the dungeon, and such a thought would have risen inside his head, he would have pushed it out without hesitation.

But the thought of killing Occunians now excited him. Or in a way gave him a weird sense of justice. He could feel his mind had become twisted. It could have happened as a result of Zus’ betrayal or a side effect of consuming those herbs raw and unprocessed.

But Zok didn’t care about such things anymore. In fact, his mind had not ever been clearer before. To him, it almost felt as if he had finally found his purpose in the vast wilderness. Something he was clearly very happy about.

All of a sudden, the ones he wanted to kill were not limited to the shamans anymore. Now he wanted to kill everyone who ever wronged him or mistreated him in any way… which necessarily meant he wanted to kill his entire tribe.

All that only went to show the limit his mind had been affected after leaving the dungeon. He had changed a lot and the change did not seem for the better. Either way, there was one thing he was still adamant about… that was helping the guardians of Occuna.

Of course, it wasn’t for some righteous and grand reason. He just wanted to do that because it was the easiest way for him to obtain strength. Enough strength to exact his revenge on the Shamanka and his bastard father. That was and had been his ultimate goal for as long as he could remember.

‘Maybe killing the guardians would also give me strength…’ Zok thought as Cero and he made their way back to the cave, ‘It would be easier to kill than trying to help them with their absurd tasks. No, they are called guardians for a reason. I won’t be any match for them… for now.’

His mindset might have changed but he had not turned into a fool. Going against a higher existence just for the sake of gaining power wasn’t wise. It was a quick way, but not wise. Especially when he didn’t even know how many guardians were there on the planet.

Moreover, going against one of them might trigger the rest of them to seek him out and Zok knew he wasn’t strong enough to take them down. Hell, he wasn’t even able to take one of them down, so he could forget about taking multiple guardians at once.

‘I should try to inquire about the rest of the guardians from Sofina. At least that way I’ll know about how many of them are there.’

With that in mind, Zok urged Cero to run faster. There were a lot of things he wanted to check on.

***

“Where have you been?” Shira yelled at him through Hivemind before knocking Zok over along with Kaira.

“Was I gone for long?” Zok asked Shira while petting Kaira who appeared to have grown yet again.

Shira nodded before finally letting go of Zok, however, it seemed Kaira had missed him more than he would have expected. Either way, Zok wasn’t complaining. Kaira was his first tamed beast, thus she always had a special place in his heart.

As for Shira, Zok was happy to see her slowly becoming more and more cheerful. After all, before he had to be the one to initiate any conversations, but now it seemed she was regaining her lost confidence.

‘Well, it should be fine as long as she can take care of herself and not need Kaira’s constant support.’ Zok gave her a not so genuine smile before asking her yet another question, “How long was I gone for again?”

“About a month.”

“What? A month!? How is that even possible?”

To say that Zok had been shocked would be an understatement. As far as he could recall, he had only spent a few days inside the dungeon. A week at most. But Shira was telling him that it had been a month since he left them in the cave? How was something like that even possible?

After Zok somewhat recovered from the shock, he thought maybe Shira did not know how to inter[ret time and that’s why she was telling him that he had been absent for a month.

‘I can always ask Sofina the same thing.’ Zok thought to himself before turning towards his pets, “Kaira, Cero let’s go- the hell are you two doing?”

It would seem that Kaira had recognised that Cero was much stronger than her. Even in terms of agility. But more than that, she had realised that Cero had evolved… while she had not.

Kaira was looking at Cero with eyes filled with admiration and competitiveness at the same time. While Cero was keeping his head held up t

“What are you keeping your head up for?” Zok barked at poor Cero, “You only levelled up that much because you didn’t have to share the exp earned with either me nor Kaira. but now that we are back and I can gain exp once again, all the Exp would be divided between us.”

Zok’s words hurt Cero like even Adrion’s claws had not. It was true that while they were inside the dungeon, all the exp that should have been divided into three parts, all went to Cero. Thus making him stronger than Kaira and even his master.

Zok gestured for them to follow him inside Sofina’s cave. All three of them followed him without question. But as they were entering the path between the caves, Zok realised he had not asked Kaira and Shira one important thing.

“So I was gone for a month, then how did you manage to survive on your own?”

As Zok asked that question, he could see a smug look pop up on the faces of Kaira and Shira.

“Huhuhu, we hunted beasts on our own. The food you left us with ran out pretty quick.” Shira explained to him, “It only lasted a little over a week. 8-9 days to be precise, and since there was no sign of you coming back, we decided to step out of the cave and hunt on our own…”

Suddenly the look on her face changed as she realised that she had broken a promise she had made to Zok. Which was to not step out of the cave while he was gone.  Zok too realised why Shira had gotten quiet.

“It’s alright. You don’t have to worry about that.” Zok said with a straight face, “I am the one at fault here, not you, as I took a lot of time to get back here.”

He continued, “In fact, I’m happy that you broke the promise. As if you would have abode by it and something would have happened to you or Kaira because of it then I would have never been able to forgive myself. So thank you for keeping yourself safe. Also other thanks for taking care of Kaira in my absence.”

By then they finally arrived in the second cave and found Sofina waiting for them. There was a smile on her face as always, but Zok could sense there was something hidden behind that smile of hers. Maybe it was nothing, maybe it was. Zok paid no heed to it as they walked in further.

“I assume you have met with someone.” Sofina said before Zok could even open his mouth to get a word in, “And defeated him as well… a pretty big feat, even in my eyes. After all, Adrion was stronger than me. Not by much, but by enough to make me not cross his path if I could afford it.”

“Since you know that, I assume you also know what my next question is going to be,” Zok replied as Sofina nodded.

“Including me and Adrion, there are twenty guardians on this planet. Or should I say there were that many of us when I was a free spirit.” Sofina replied with a low voice, “But I assume some of them were either not lucky or foolish enough to be sealed by that witch. This means, that some of them-”

“Might have already been killed.” Zok completed her sentence for her.

“The guardians can never be ‘killed’ as we are immortal.” Sofina corrected Zok, “However, we can be destroyed and it would take us some time to regenerate back to our former selves. However, that duration can range from a few years to a few centuries, depending on the strength of the guardian.”

She continued, “For example, Adrion’s egg, which I assume you have in your inventory, should take a couple of years to hatch on its own. But there can be some anomalies and they could resurrect sooner than expected.”

“I see….”