The Earth Online

49 The Underestimated Race

Anu’s Ziggurat

“This is odd, it seems like the humans are stronger than what we initially assumed.” Nirah started as he was watched the Emerging Group cut down all the whale-sized piranha-looking creatures in the black ocean.

“That is quite interesting. It’s amazing how resilient humans are. It’s been over a month in the second stage and only a tenth of the whole professional human population has died.” Enki remarked while observing the Igigu team doing their best to infiltrate a whole forest filled with the Sakura faeries.

“Ah I’m getting quite tired of this push and pull relationship with these humans. It’s like every single time they get my attention, they suddenly become boring. Ugh.” Irkalla responded in disinterested tone.

The goddess of the underworld mindlessly stared at Thaleos’ face and just took a swig of the golden liquid. She just sighed and rolled her eyes in frustration.

“That’s what you get for being too arrogant. We might have more advanced powers than the humans, but that doesn’t mean that mean we’re better than them.” Innana scolded in a stern voice.

The goddess was tired of how self-absorbed her family was and how they’ve been playing this game for millions of years.

“Oh shut up, you little upper-fixer. Don’t act like you’re any better. If you actually cheered for the humans or any other species, then you would’ve ended the game a long time ago.” Nirah lashed out on the goddess of beauty.

Before the goddess could even respond, Anu clasped his large hand on her shoulder and slowly shook his head. This caused Innana to close her mouth and comply with the silent order.

“Now, now, children. We’re one of the last primordial gods, creations prior to time itself, I implore that we lessen such petty fights.” Anu gently said while staring at each and every single one of them.

Although the god’s baritone voice suggested a certain touch of gentleness, they all knew that it was an order. Cross him and you’ll spend a thousand years in the Abyss alongside with their sleeping mother.

It was hell to be trapped there; that’s why they all did their best to not get on their father’s bad side. They knew how terrible and cruel their father can get when triggered.

Anu pensively looked at the Igigu team and quietly spoke, “It seems like we’ve underestimated their race.”

~ ~ ~

“Hot damn, that’s like the 200th blood soul we’ve gotten for the past three weeks.” Kedrick shouted in excitement as one of the large butterflies he was battling with fell on the ground.

The eagle-sized butterflies were found in the Decaying Fields of Northern Simbat. After almost a whole month of fighting through the terrain, they finally got one of the maps in the Riverbeds of the Centaurs.

“I feel like the second stage is too easy, I think there’s something wrong.” Haya started as he suspiciously looked around the location.

They were currently in the Cornish Sakura Faerie Forest and they just took down one of the largest and most powerful faeries of the population — it was almost like the leader, but they knew that it wasn’t that easy.

Thaleos agreed with the statement and cleaned his sword from left over beast blood. The forests mostly had more than just faeries, it was like a whole habitat.

It was filled with various beasts, such as giant lizards and ants.

“I think we just need to always keep cautious and always be ready for any sudden attacks.” The beast tamer commented as he hid his sword back to its holster.

The past month was filled with everyday challenges and battles, and although they were pretty tired in the beginning, they eventually got used to the grind.

Aside from the everyday quests, they focused a lot on training on the side. Ygritte even did some extra training at night to make sure that her druid powers can still stay connected to underworld creatures.

They’ve noticed that compared to earth, the second stage had less of the underworld creatures, like the undead and moving skeletons.

In the second stage, they mostly went around like nomads and used sleeping bags to go around the terrain. Thaleos was thankful that Ganuru sold them the Akkadian cube or else they’d be dragged down by all the stuff they lugged around.

Thankfully, the second world still had location bases. Although, these locations were mostly inns and farmlands, they still sold basic supplies and gave warm dinner.

There were no buildings nor castles in the vicinity, just the bare minimum to make sure that they don’t run out of supplies.

But then, Thaleos and Haya did discuss that they were still going around the southern part of the location and had barely went around the whole terrain.

The group of four hypothesized that there’s a large chance that the Southern part must be more rural compared to other locations.

“I mean the perk of going to the south first is that we literally had to remove all forms of comfort in our lives, save for the sleeping bags, just to survive. Like, I swear, I feel like my back’s about to break any second now.” Haya explained and then held unto his lower back as he remembered how they slept on the forest floor.

“I think it’s about time we go to the east. How about you, guys?” Ygritte asked as they were walking back to their temporary home base—basically, a cave near the Riverbed of the Centaurs.

“Yeah, I was thinking the same thing, I mean we’ve mostly went through all the locations here in the south. We just need to go to one final location before we continue to the east.” Thaleos responded and laid down some of his weapons on the cave floor.

“Ugh no don’t tell me this is about the alien lizards. Are we really going to attack their nest?” Kedrick asked in an exasperated tone while opening one of the baked beans they had in their cube.

Due to constantly being on the move and limiting their food to protein, healthy fat, and fiber, they all now had shredded physiques. This is the most fit they’ve been ever since the whole apocalypse started.

“Is it because they have the muffling gems?” Haya asked while taking out some of the whole wheat bread and spreading some raspberry jam on them.

Ygritte was currently outside getting some water and making sure it gets filtered out correctly.

Surprisingly, the gods weren’t that cruel and still left some basic sources of nutrition littered around the terrain. They reckoned it was probably because they didn’t want to watch humans die over a “stupid” reason like hunger.

“Yeah, that’s the one. Aliens have incredible hearing, so we need to get those muffling gems.” Thaleos explained while getting out some of the fruits they had. He took out James’ journal from the cube and read out loud,

Nightmare # 156

December 5

3:51 AM

The second world’s incredibly beautiful. I knew that the gods had a penchant for aesthetics, but they seemed to have perfected this world, similar to what they did in the playground.

Going through the desert mindlessly was calming to me. Although the silence did bother me a bit, just floating through the flowing waves made me feel at peace.

After what felt like hours of just drifting through the sand waves, I spotted one extremely large ancient tree. It was just in the middle of nowhere, but it was almost as big as a whole village.

It had levels and levels of branches, that it was hard to keep track how high the whole tree was.

It was so fascinating to stare at they I didn’t notice how below its roots, there were large holes that look like hollow caves.

After hearing some chirping and clicking, I finally noticed the hundreds of large alien-looking lizards crawling around the ancient tree.

It was hard to notice them because they were like chameleons. Their colors changed every single time they moved, and the only thing that made them noticeable were their golden eyes.

They had sharp jagged teeth and had beautiful translucent scales. One could literally see where their mana centers were.

When I got a bit closer to where they were, I noticed that a large number of them were just staying in the roots and guarding something.

Since they couldn’t see me, I went to where they hollow caves were and noticed that they were heavily guarding the little square crystals that seemed to be shifting colors as well.

When I felt something jumping through my ghost-like body, I immediately froze in shock. I could remember the weird sensation of seeing myself separating like smoke and then forcing itself to form my astral figure again.

Looking at the alien-looking lizard that jumped through me, I saw that it was eating one of the gems. Upon swallowing the square crystal, its body became even more translucent and its movements lighter.

When it left the cave, I could barely hear its movements at all. It seems like these gems muffled someone’s presence.

As soon as another lizard jumped through my body, it was as if my body couldn’t form back its former structure—pushing me to wake up from the dream altogether.

I appreciated dreams like this; not scary nor threatening, just informational. I just want to stop seeing the killings and the gods’ cruel quests.