Chapter 2901: Chapter 2901: Black Pool

A white cocoon of light floated in the darkness of the tomb.

This cocoon wrapped around Elvinia.

Every a few seconds, the cocoon could be seen beating with the naked eye.

Dong! Dong!

The movement of the cocoon caused tremors to pass through the dark cave.

The blood vessels and the flesh on the wall and the ground bulged as if they were sentient living beings, and gathered around the cocoon.

Dong! Dong!

The cocoon had beaten over a hundred times before some of the blood vessels attached themselves to it, the flesh following close behind. The entire process was long and slow, but they continued to gradually gather together into a shape.

Zen didn't know that such a strange change was taking place in the dark cave.

He waited for a few hours before he began to feel that the light was dimming. The pig-faced monsters that had been near him had gradually fallen into the darkness. The effect of the Darkness Fruit was about to disappear.

“Are you going to use me as bait?” Zen asked the pig-faced monster that was guarding him.

“Right,” the pig-faced monster snickered.

“I'm afraid I'm going to disappear from the Dark Region before that because the Darkness Fruit is about to lose effect,” Zen said.

The pig-faced monster looked surprised.

They had forgotten that Zen was not from the Dark Region. When the effect of the Darkness Fruit wore off, the Dark Region would erase his body.

The pig-faced monster reported this to its superiors. Soon, several pig-faced monsters had left the valley.

Zen felt it getting darker and darker, the voices of the pig-faced monsters becoming fainter by the minute. He felt pain as the Dark Region continued to corrode him.

Fortunately, there were a number of Darkness Fruits in the Dark Region. About an hour later, the pig-faced monsters returned and shoved a Darkness Fruit into Zen's mouth.

As the power of the Darkness Fruit spread out across Zen's body, the darkness faded away and things returned to normal.

“I wouldn't eat the Darkness Fruit if I were you,” Zen's guard said meaningfully.

“Why?” Zen asked curiously.

“It's better to be corroded by the darkness than to be bait,” the guard said with a grin.

Zen wanted to shrug but the bronze iron plates were pressing down on his shoulders, restricting his movements.

Zen hadn't given up despite the numerous changes that had come about. He wasn't about to take the guard's words to heart and he had no other choice but to stay strong. ɌΑΝ𝐨𝐛ƐⱾ

Eight hours later, the guard gave Zen another Darkness Fruit.

It was then that the tentacles in the triangle caves began to emerge in succession.

Zen could now see the tentacles completely and what they were. A wrinkled round head sat at the top of the tentacles. The creature looked like an octopus, but it had many more tentacles.

'The pig-faced monsters aren't strong or as big as the black monkeys. The octopuses are obviously more powerful. So why do these two creatures live together? Why do the octopuses obey the pig-faced monsters?' Zen thought.

It was common for creatures to live together, but usually, only those creatures that complemented each other did so.

What made the pig-faced monsters special?

They weren't of great wisdom and strength. How was it that they were now commanding the octopuses?

What happened next helped Zen understand this.

One of the octopuses stretched out its tentacles and grabbed the ropes attached to the bronze iron plates. It then pulled Zen along with the iron plates and began to climb up the valley.

Halfway through, it stretched out its tentacles yet again and got entangled with the octopus below it.

Each tentacle was over a thousand feet long. The octopuses connected with each other using their tentacles. Only one of them remained in its cave.

The octopuses couldn't really leave the caves. If they really wanted to, it was a long-drawn-out process that was troublesome. Moreover, the range of their activities was limited.

'No wonder there are so few living creatures in this area. They must have been wiped out by the octopuses. But the octopuses can only move around a certain distance. So it must have been the pig-faced monsters that do the rest.'

Zen was still deep in thought when the long rope made of tentacles scaled the peak of the mountain, and a strange smell reached Zen's nose.

Zen looked down to see the black pool that the pig-faced monsters had mentioned.

There was no water in the pool. Instead, it was filled with sticky black mud that was so dense. No wave could ever be created on its surface no matter how hard the wind was blowing.

Whoosh!

The octopuses, which were part of the rope, lowered Zen onto the surface of the black pool.

Moments before Zen was about to hit the surface, the octopuses tossed him into the pool.

The black mud was so viscous that people could even stand on it with no fear of sinking.

But because of the heavy bronze iron plates on his back, Zen began to sink slowly into the mud.

In no time, Zen's whole body had sunk into the depths of the pool.

He could see nothing in the black quagmire, and could do nothing but let himself sink.

Minutes later, Zen felt something tug at his back. The rope had tightened and was stopping Zen from sinking even further. He was alone in the black pool, hanging onto the rope and his luck.

Plop! Plop!

Bubbles began to float. Zen frowned, sensing that something was coming his way.

As more bubbles began to appear, he felt a stabbing pain in his feet, as if something was stuck to them. He struggled to escape it but his body was being held down by the bronze iron plates. Thanks to the absence of enough space, he couldn't get rid of it.

The more he struggled, the more things he attracted to himself. It was not long before these things spread out all over his body.

“What the heck?”

Zen couldn't see anything. All he could do was grit his teeth and endure the pain. He finally understood what the pig-faced monster had meant.

The monster had been right when it had said that being put in the black pool and sucked at by these unknown objects was worse than dying.

Dorothy and the others were witnessing something horrifying happen to Zen. Countless tiny holes appeared on Zen's body, ringed with black traces of erosion.