Lord Evolution: Starting With SS-rank Skills
Chapter 285 - 285: Calamity.(5)

WINTERSEED

It was the early hours of a solemn but bright afternoon, and the people of the village could be seen going on about their daily tasks pretty sluggishly, as they had long since lost the will to work.

At the farm, the farmers could be seen working very sluggishly compared to their usual hardworking selves. At the livestock area, Elara could be seen feeding the birds that had grown bigger overtime.

She and her assistance distributed the feed into the wooden feedthroughs. Their faces were etched with sadness, their minds were heavy with conflicting thoughts—Were their beloved Lord still alive? What was he going through?

Those questions had slowly become the daily recitation of everyone in Winterseed.

They were concerned.

Some had lost hope.

Some were losing hope.

Only a few believed he would return.

In Rowan's absence, the village was managed and protected by the captains with the assistance of the divine beasts who patrolled the village severally.

Thankfully, there had been no attacks. Not even from monsters or humans.

However, there have been a few visitors from neighbouring territories with intention to build a business relationship with Winterseed having heard of the unique merchandise they were in possession of.

Unfortunately, those people had to be sent back as Rowan wasn't around. But they were asked to return after a few weeks.

While the village did not face any physical battle, for the past two days, there had been frequent prevailing signs of a powerful storm.

It first started two days ago.

It was afternoon and everywhere suddenly became dark, revealing that it was about to rain heavily.

But it lasted for only a few hours and disappeared without a single rain drop, which was pretty unnatural. It was as though a powerful force was holding back the rain.

A few hours after that happened, in the evening, lightning flashed across the sky repeatedly and loud thunder blasted across the village.

The sky had a different shade of dimness, showing signs of a heavy rain.

But it also ended up returning back to normal after a few hours.

This greatly confused the people and became a great cause of worry for the captains who were managing the village.

But that wasn't all—at night, the lightning and thunder continued, accompanied by an unusual cold temperature.

The cold was so strong that many of the villagers woke up with cold the next morning, some were feverish, while others were sneezing and coughing non-stop.

It instantly became a matter of concern—None of them had ever experienced such scenarios. Even the oldest amongst the villages, a man in his late eighties, found the situation odd.

The cold prevailed until morning and more villagers got sick.

The tailors had to act up—they began distributing the cold resistance robe that Riela had made to the villagers.

But the robe was only able to prevent cold from entering their bodies, it could simply not force out the ones that had already evaded their systems.

In the morning, the captains had a meeting about the situation. They were concerned, but what could they do about the weather and the sick villagers? They could only pray that the weather goes back to normal.

And it did.

The afternoon sun rose up early, it bathed the village in scorching heat and drove away the cold that lingered throughout the night.

The people were relieved but in the evening, they faced the same situation as last night and it prevailed till early morning before disappearing once again.

"What is happening?"

"Is this a sign that Lord Rowan is not okay?"

"My son is sick, what should I do?"

"Oh heavens, please bring back Lord Rowan and Lady Riela."

Prayers and questions continued across the village.

At the village square, some villagers had already gathered to sort out comfort in the companies of one another.

The captains were present, they even tried their best to calm the crowd but it was fruitless—The only person that could calm down now was Lord Rowan.

At a corner of the village square, Blaze could be seen resting quietly while Black Drifter could be seen flying in circles around the village square.

Both divine beasts were just as concerned as the villagers about Rowan.

Minutes passed, and the gloomy silence prevailed.

But then it was quickly shattered as Black Drifter let out a sharp sound that alerted everyone. And then it rocketed away towards an unknown destination.

The alert of the divine beast caused all the villagers to stare at the direction it flew at—They saw nothing of importance, except for five tiny figures.

Blaze, who was previously resting, suddenly woke up and dashed out of the village square toward the same direction as Black Drifter.

"What is happening?"

"Why are the divine beasts reacting this way? Are we under attack or... Is Lord Rowan returning?"

The villagers wondered.

But then one of them noticed something and pointed at the tiny figures which were beginning to get bigger and clearer as they drew closer.

Their eyes widened right away.

---***---

A few hours ago—Rowan and the others could be seen flying above the vast dark forest.

The divine beasts Rowan, Dragun and Eliman flew on were the fastest, so both of them were at the front of the ladies.

Rowan enjoyed the view above the dark forest, he was pretty surprised at just how big the dark forest was even from the sky.

It appears to stretch out without end.

Rivers, hills, giant beasts, barren lands—all these could be seen within the dark forest from above.

Rowan even spotted several strange structures: some were in the form of caves but were bigger and at the entrance there were glowing portals, other structures were pretty tall, they stood in twos and in between them were the same portals.

Rowan easily recognized them as dungeons, they are special territories for demons and unique monsters.

They are pretty popular in the game world, players usually book dungeons to slay the monsters within them to gain experience and also unlock mysteries which include new powers or even treasures.

Rowan spotted many of them within the dark forest, he counted more than one hundred before he got tired and stopped counting.

The party continued getting closer to Winterseed.

Only a few minutes away from the village, their gaze fell upon a shocking scene below them.

"What the fuck!"

Rowan cussed out loud as his gaze fell on the tens of thousands of monsters of varying races and ranks approaching his village.

The Calamity Trials are beginning!

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