Something's off, Deacon thought as he reappeared within Floor Three and took a single step forward. The platform beneath his feet wasn't the same one that he landed on when he'd first arrived on Floor Three.
The reasoning? The Altar of Offering was absent from being in the center of the platform.
However, the tables that displayed the Identification Relays were present, albeit they're were much less of them now than before which made sense, news should have already been out that this Floor was a Treasure Hunt one and everyone who was prepping or took a break after clearing Floor Two must have quickly reached Floor Three in order to get a slice of the loot being offered here.
"I am still on the Floor Three that I was on last time," Deacon said aloud as he checked his Status Page and saw in the Party Tab that Jass's and Esmerelda's compass needles were pointing in the same direction and weren't spinning around wildly.
And considering that the number of Identification Relays still on the tables numbered less than fifteen on this platform, Floor Three wasn't like Floor Two where there was a limit to who was on a Floor and it would be split into mirror versions of the other, Floor Three was like Floor One in the sense that there was no mirror version, everyone stayed on the same Floor and had to fight for the resources within it.
***
Ugh, it's a pain in the ass to move in the dark, Deacon thought to himself as he hopped from branch to branch. Due to the massive leaves that made up the jungle canopy, most of the light that came from the moon was shielded from those beneath them within the island. And it was for this exact reason that he wasn't sure if he even landed on the central island within the Isle of the Damned.
Deacon kept his movements light as he used the natural springiness of the branches to boost his speed as he moved from branch to branch. Much to his disappointment, he wasn't able to use his mana to boost his physical abilities, this was because of the risk of standing out to everyone in the jungle.
He would effectively become a beacon where anyone with decent mana sensory abilities would be able to find him if he entered their mana sensory field.
Snap!
Deacon crouched low against the thick limb beneath him, his hand unconsciously moving to Echoform Reliquary strapped across his lower back as a snap of a branch was heard below him, his eyes immediately snapping onto it.
There, on the bottom left side of his vision, was a person who had fallen off a lower branch and landed on the ground. They were also panting very heavily, like they'd gone through a hundred laps around the island nonstop.
Deacon narrowed his eyes and leaned forward in his crouch, just enough to make out the appearance of the figure that had fallen over, and with the assistance of a fortuitous beam of moonlight that emerged from the wind shaking the canopy above him, he was able to see who this figure was.
The figure was male, smaller in frame, and dressed in light leather armor, he wasn't sure what type of weapons he held due to the darkness of the jungle.
However, what truly set this man apart from the others he'd seen so far while traversing the jungle were the bags strapped to the man's sides, and the fact that they were bulging in every direction, to the point where even he, in total darkness, could see that.
Loot.
Deacon's pupils dilated slightly in the dark as his eyes zeroed in on the bags on the man's sides as he picked himself up and continued to run toward the outskirts of the island.
It's a Treasure Hunt Floor. Deacon's mind quickly processed. Which meant that guy was either bringing loot back from a find, or collecting stashes hidden across the jungle. Either way, with the way he was moving, he had a base to return to… and I would love to see where that was.
The loot runner looked around in panic, worried that someone could have heard him snap the branch and fall to the ground. But after a couple of tense seconds of nothing jumping out and latching onto him, he began to resume his run.
Deacon waited until the man put a few more meters between them before silently dropping from the tree branch he was crouched atop of onto one just a few meters above the jungle floor, but still above the runner, before he then adjusted his pace to match the runner's.
The guy was moving fast, but his breathing was already ragged.
He's not gonna last long at that pace, Deacon mused to himself. I wonder what's making him act like this? Because there's no way this guy doesn't know what he's doing when he's making this much noise in the night.
I mean, with Val as my witness, I'm not the best or particularly gifted in stealth, but I was able to find him before he found me, so that means this guy either doesn't know jack about stealth or is purposely doing this.
The bark covering the branches cracked lightly beneath Deacon's steps, but thankfully, they were not enough to be heard over the runner's own clumsy movements through the underbrush.
This man has to either be the dumbest runner I've ever seen, or this is some elaborate ass plan to try and get people to follow him, Deacon thought to himself as he kept himself just close enough that he wouldn't lose him. However, he also kept himself far enough so that his mana wouldn't be sensed by the runner, and low enough to the ground that his outline wouldn't be spotted if the runner got suspicious and glanced over his shoulder.
After following the runner for twenty more minutes, the runner suddenly ducked under a thick curtain of moss and rolled into a narrow animal trail Deacon hadn't noticed before.
His eyes narrowed as he dropped silently to the jungle floor, crouching low as he pushed aside the thick curtain of moss and caught sight of the runner running atop the animal trail.
His boots made next to no noise thanks to the soft dampness of the grass atop the soil as he dropped from where the curtain of moss was and into the animal trail with his hand still hovering inches above the right hilt of Echoform Reliquary in its dual short sword form on his back just in case that something went sideways and he was being led into a trap.
His eyes glanced from side to side as he followed after the runner.
The runner cut through a narrow pass between two thick-rooted trees that formed an arch, while Deacon stayed close behind, keeping low. He was careful not to let the tip of his boot so much as graze a stone that the runner didn't.
And then, as the canopy opened slightly above the treetops ahead, Deacon spotted warm flickers of fire spilling over high ledges of red clay that peaked through the gaps within the jungle tree trunks.
The runner passed through a semi-destroyed clay archway and disappeared into what looked like a long-abandoned and ruined town made of clay.
The buildings that made up the town were square and squat, all the same red sunbaked color. Each one was clustered so close together that there was barely room to slip between the alleys.
It was a town, or at least it used to be one until that happened, Deacon thought to himself as his gaze lingered on the massive circular craters on the side of some of the buildings and the large and deep gouge marks that cut through the streets and building tops.
Deacon eased closer, pausing just short of stepping through the same arch. His brows furrowed. The mana is still here…
It didn't move. It didn't breathe.
Deacon took a couple of steps back, away from the arch, before pressing a hand into the dirt and stretching out his mana into the ground all around him.
A barrier.
Inching towards the archway but keeping himself from passing through the still mana that covered both it and the area in front of him, Deacon's eyes carefully scanned the clay bricks that made up the archway.
Narrowing his eyes at the sight of recently removed clay brick on the semi-collapsed clay archway, he then scanned the barrier in front of him, made a slow arc around the edge of the archway instead of going through it, eyes on the trees that circled the ruined clay town.
"Someone, maybe the runner, had removed that brick recently, which means they did something with it," Deacon mumbled to himself. "They probably drew a ward focus on it and hid it there… which means that if I go along the arc of the barrier, I should be able to find another one."
Near the base of one of the thicker trees, where its roots overlapped and climbed over a mound of stones, he spotted a faint shimmer of camo green etched into the bark and dirt, almost entirely hidden beneath layers of dried leaves and moss. A ward focus.
Deacon crouched and inspected it, careful not to disturb the perimeter of the ward. His eyes scanned the symmetry, the runes around the outer ring, the tiny flare of mana being drawn in from the surrounding earth to sustain it.
"A sensory ward," he whispered.
Which meant…
"This is his base," Deacon muttered, lips tugging into a grin that didn't quite reach his eyes.
Deacon exhaled slowly, then with a barely audible grunt, he leapt onto a low, nearby branch before leaping a couple more times to leap onto a branch that was thirty meters above the jungle floor. From there, he began hopping from branch to branch.
He kept just outside the arc of the ward that clung low over the ruined clay town.
The trees he used to hide behind as he hopped about were dense, but not enough to block his view entirely. As he leaped around the edge of the ward's perimeter, he caught some movement on the far side of the clay town out of the corner of his left eye.
Deacon halted, crouched on a thick limb, and shifted just enough to get a clearer angle.
The runner.
The guy was climbing and hopping between crumbled ledges, fingers scrambling for traction on loose clay walls, scaling them with the clumsy desperation of someone used to being chased. Deacon followed him with his eyes, tracking the guy as he made his way up a surprisingly intact three-story structure that jutted out above the rest like the crown of the old clay settlement.
The runner reached the roof and stood there panting for half a second too long, staring at something.
Deacon squinted as he followed the runner's gaze.
He was staring at a long, rectangular hole in the building that provided a pathway for a staircase that led inside the building.
After a few more minutes of waiting, one by one, five figures walked up the stairs and arrived on the roof of the clay building. The only one that wasn't marred by the gouges or massive holes, Deacon noticed.
They were calm.
The runner began yelling at them, but his words were muffled by the ward, and potentially other wards that covered the ruined clay town. However, as he tossed both bags to them on the floor and took a step forward, three of the five shot towards him.
One locked an arm around his throat from behind, another took his legs out from under him, and the third jammed a hand into his solar plexus to pin him flat against the clay with enough force that Deacon could feel it in his gut, even from where he was watching.
Then the fourth figure stepped forward.
Deacon's eyes narrowed as the figure took out a feather that glinted lavender.