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Chapter 779: The Street is Really Quiet, Huh?
After traveling for a full afternoon, until the sun had completely sunk below the horizon and disappeared, and the sky was filled with brilliant starlight, Hayato's party finally reached the vicinity of Thief Village Kul Elna.
On a small hill, Isis said to Hayato beside her, "Hayato, ahead is the ruins of Kul Elna."
From afar, Hayato on the hill could see a scorched ground. Although in Hayato's memory, Kul Elna did indeed disappear in a sea of fire, that was already fifteen years ago. For Kul Elna, located in the desert, to still not have had the traces of that time erased by the sandstorm after fifteen years was truly somewhat strange.
Behind Hayato, Malik, who had had enough of the rapid journey, got off his camel and rubbed his butt without caring about his image at all. Even though the camel's back had a layer of fat for cushioning, sitting on a camel for nearly ten hours was truly unbearable for Malik, and he complained, "I say, since we're already so close, it wouldn't be a bother to rest for a night before going, right?"
"This Malik is really lame, huh?"
Looking at Kaiba, who had ridden cars and dragons but never a camel, with a calm expression that was quite adapted to riding, and then looking at Malik, who was from the desert but performing so poorly, Hayato expressed his contempt and said, "Although we are indeed very close, it looks like we'll arrive in about ten minutes. The request to rest for a night doesn't seem excessive."
"However, I refuse. Because what I, Hayato Kobayashi, like to do most is say 'no' to people who think they know it all."
"Since we've come this close, then Malik, just bear with it a little longer. It'll be easy once we reach Kul Elna."
Hayato's words, a twist on the classic parent line about university being easy, successfully appeased Malik and stopped him from complaining further. Muttering something like, "You meet ghosts easily when traveling at night," the party crossed the hill and continued towards Kul Elna.
But as they walked, Karim, who was at the front of the group, noticed something slightly off. Being good at observation, he inadvertently glanced at the ground and noticed that there were many footprints left on the sandy ground ahead of them.
In the desert, footprints are buried by the wind and destroyed by quicksand; they certainly don't last long. The large area of clear footprints before them could not possibly have been left long ago. This meant that someone had already been to Kul Elna not long before they arrived, and judging by the quantity of footprints, there were quite a few people!
"Mr. Hayato..."
"Yes, I noticed too." Hayato nodded, his brow furrowed. "So many footprints, I have a bad feeling. Everyone, stay vigilant as we move forward."
Continuing into the village, the scorched ground was covered with scattered footprints. It seemed that the people who had arrived before had conducted a large-scale search, looking for something. But despite so many footprints, the village was eerily silent at this moment, as if these many footprints were just a phantom, and actually no one had ever been to this village.
The wind passed through the gaps in the wreckage, making sharp "whooshing" sounds. The camels' breathing, the people's breathing, and the sound of the camels' hooves stepping on the sandy ground were all that the group could hear in this silent place.
However, after walking into the village for a while, suddenly, a "crack" sound came from somewhere, as if someone had stepped on something and broken it.
"The street is really quiet, huh? We didn't see the people who came here before us either. Maybe they left after finding nothing?" Malik said nonchalantly, speaking lightly. But Hayato suddenly reached out and grabbed the collar of his clothes, pulling him back from continuing forward. "Careful!"
As the camel Malik was riding stepped on a slightly sunken stone brick, the decayed stone brick suddenly crushed, and the camel also suddenly fell down because it had no support point. And at the same instant, several human skeleton arms suddenly protruded from the ground buried by sand. Although there was no muscle tissue to exert power, the bone hands easily pierced the body of the fallen camel, killing it in an instant!
Malik had a look of lingering fear. If Hayato hadn't pulled him back in time just now, he would probably have been sneak attacked and killed like his ride, the camel, losing his life!
"Crack!" "Crack!" "Crack!"
The death of Malik's camel at the front was not an isolated incident. Almost at the same time, the ground around the other people also cracked open, and one terrifying skeleton after another crawled out, brandishing sharp bone claws and attacking the group.
However, Hayato wasn't the only one who reacted. Besides Malik, Karim, Isis, and Kaiba all raised their Duel Arenas and called their respective monsters.
"Thunder Dragon!"
"Agido!"
"Blue-Eyes White Dragon!"
Amidst Karim and Isis's honest summoning and Kaiba's passionate calling, only two monsters appeared before the three people who raised their Duel Arenas to summon.
Isis and Karim looked at Kaiba strangely, thinking, why are you shouting so loudly, you didn't summon anything. And Kaiba also put down his Duel Arena, annoyed: "Tsk, even using this Duel Arena doesn't work? Is it that the bond between me and you is still not enough for you to respond to me, Blue-Eyes?"
Although the spirited Kaiba didn't summon anything in the end and made a fool of himself, the two monsters summoned by Karim and Isis were more than enough to deal with the skeleton monsters in front of them.
Although seeing a bare skeleton suddenly was a bit scary, if you put a piece of cloth on these skeletons, aren't they the famous "Small Fry Monster" Skull Servant?
As priests, Karim and Isis's performance was much better than the embarrassing Malik. They showed no mercy to the Skull Servant that had just now launched an attack intending to kill them. The two commanded their respective monsters to easily destroy the batch of Skull Servant closest to them.
"Heh heh, even Priest Isis is working hard, huh? Then I, Karim, must also put in some effort. After all, I can't let all these years of effort go to waste." Glancing at Isis next to him, Karim said with great motivation, "Then come out, the rest of the Thunder Dragons!"
Not saving the zones on the Duel Arena at all, Karim summoned all three Thunder Dragons in one go and sent them all out to kill.
Isis was not as competitive as Karim. Instead, she used the power of the Millennium Necklace to the best of her ability to begin future sight. The Millennium Necklace's ability to future sight has two modes: one is actively glimpsing fragments of the future, and the other is a passive mode where the Millennium Necklace automatically warns of the appearance of a crisis.
Compared to the latter, using the former puts a considerable burden on Isis, and Isis cannot be in a state of actively predicting the future at all times. Therefore, most of the time, Isis uses the latter mode, and only uses the former in a few necessary situations. The passively used mode is also sufficient to warn of most crises.
After Bakura's death, Isis had actively used the Millennium Necklace once. At that time, she clearly saw that the future had recovered its light and could be clearly predicted by her. And on the way to the Thief Village, she had also confirmed it once in advance; the Millennium Necklace could still be used normally.
However, just now when the group of Skull Servant emerged from the underground and attacked everyone, the Millennium Necklace did not give any warning. This was very strange. After all, the decaying bad smell unique to undead on the group of Skull Servant that emerged from the ground could not be hidden at all. The Millennium Necklace, which is very sensitive to dark power, should have issued a warning in advance.
But when she used the power of the Millennium Necklace for the first time after entering the Thief Village, Isis was stunned, because she found that the phenomenon of the future being obscured by darkness that had occurred since Bakura's appearance had actually reappeared, and this dark power was even greater than the darkness brought by Bakura.
Using the power of the Millennium Necklace with all her might, Isis only barely managed to intercept a single image of the future: the image of their camels being killed by the Skull Servant.
Isis suddenly remembered that although it was normal for the Skull Servant to be defeated by her and Priest Karim's Stone Tablet Monsters, the resistance they offered was too weak, and these monsters should be classified as undead-type monsters. How could they be crushed so easily?
An idea suddenly popped into Isis's mind. She quickly reminded Karim, whose Thunder Dragons had gone too far out: "No, Priest Karim, it's a trap! Quickly call your Stone Tablet Monsters back!"
Isis's reminder was as timely as possible, but it was still a step late. Almost as if taking Isis's words as a starting order, the wreckage of the Skull Servant on the ground that had been easily crushed by the Thunder Dragons' attacks actually reassembled themselves and, while the Thunder Dragons couldn't return in time to defend, charged towards Karim!
Immediately, Isis summoned two more Stone Tablet Monsters—Keldo and Kelbek—to protect everyone. However, the expected attack targeting the people on the camels did not come at all. The party left the camels completely unharmed, but all the camels they had ridden were killed without exception.
Even the most slow-witted person felt something was wrong. Even Malik said somewhat strangely, "Feeling like the goal of these monsters isn't us, but our camels? Were they kicked to death by the camels? Do they have such great hatred towards camels?"
"No, I'm afraid the controller behind these Skull Servant intended to kill our rides first so that we couldn't leave this ruins," Karim stated his conjecture, controlling the Thunder Dragons to kill their way back and protect him.
And this time, since they had already been exposed, they didn't pretend anymore. The Skull Servant actually displayed a combat power completely different from just now. It was nothing like the beginning where any attack, regardless of strength, could easily kill them. Even Karim's Thunder Dragons were slightly injured in the process of killing their way back.
And after the Thunder Dragons returned to Karim's side, the Skull Servant that had fallen due to the Thunder Dragons' attacks showed a powerful revive ability. In just an instant, the disassembled skeletons were automatically pieced back together, and even broken bones quickly healed themselves.
"What is their goal in keeping us here?" Kaiba frowned, looking at the group of Skull Servant surrounding them. After fighting for a long time, the quantity of Skull Servant had not decreased at all. Instead, as time passed, more and more Skull Servant gathered from all parts of the village. "This is endless. If only my Blue-Eyes were here..."
"Stop thinking about your Blue-Eyes all the time. We must find the source of these Skull Servant," Hayato said, his Millennium Ring on his chest glowing slightly. The golden cones on the disk all pointed in one direction. "The Millennium Ring can lead the way. The work of clearing the path is up to you, Karim!"
"Don't worry, Mr. Hayato!" Karim knew that Hayato wanted to save his power for the last to deal with the source of the Skull Servant. The Winged Dragon of Ra had proven its strength many times, and Karim was very convinced by it. He had no complaints about being responsible for clearing the path. "Then, I'll begin. The power of the Millennium Scale is manifested here!"
"Come forth, my strongest Stone Tablet Monster, Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon! And then, the widest range diffusion thunder attack!"
Although its appearance was underwhelming, its power was real. Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon manifested before the party. Towards the direction pointed by Hayato's Millennium Ring, Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon suddenly spat out a light beam of lightning, clearing away all the Skull Servant blocking the path.
However, even Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon's attack still couldn't completely destroy the Skull Servant. The Skull Servant that were defeated quickly recovered as soon as they fell to the ground and regrouped.
But Karim had Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon spread its attack range as much as possible not intending to kill them; being able to clear a path forward was enough.
Malik, who was terrible at battle but number one at escape, ran at the very front, leading the way. Then came Hayato and Isis, while Kaiba and Karim followed at the rear. The party of five rushed forward with their heads down. After Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon cleared the path twice more, the Millennium Ring led the group to a well-preserved house in the Thief Village, which was full of ruins and very rare.
Malik, who was skilled at kicking down doors, kicked open the locked door with practiced ease and rushed in. The other people also rushed in one after another. After Karim, who was at the back of the group, also entered the door, Malik didn't hesitate to slam the door shut, even clipping off a Skull Servant's arm that was about to grab Karim, causing it to writhe on the ground.
Although the house was not a sturdy barrier, the Skull Servant were, after all, just Small Fry with no great power other than being troublesome and numerous. The people who entered the house were temporarily safe. At this point, they also noticed that in this room, a wall had been smashed open, revealing a set of stairs leading to the underground.
After traveling for a full afternoon, until the sun had completely sunk below the horizon and disappeared, and the sky was filled with brilliant starlight, Hayato's party finally reached the vicinity of Thief Village Kul Elna.
On a small hill, Isis said to Hayato beside her, "Hayato, ahead is the ruins of Kul Elna."
From afar, Hayato on the hill could see a scorched ground. Although in Hayato's memory, Kul Elna did indeed disappear in a sea of fire, that was already fifteen years ago. For Kul Elna, located in the desert, to still not have had the traces of that time erased by the sandstorm after fifteen years was truly somewhat strange.
Behind Hayato, Malik, who had had enough of the rapid journey, got off his camel and rubbed his butt without caring about his image at all. Even though the camel's back had a layer of fat for cushioning, sitting on a camel for nearly ten hours was truly unbearable for Malik, and he complained, "I say, since we're already so close, it wouldn't be a bother to rest for a night before going, right?"
"This Malik is really lame, huh?"
Looking at Kaiba, who had ridden cars and dragons but never a camel, with a calm expression that was quite adapted to riding, and then looking at Malik, who was from the desert but performing so poorly, Hayato expressed his contempt and said, "Although we are indeed very close, it looks like we'll arrive in about ten minutes. The request to rest for a night doesn't seem excessive."
"However, I refuse. Because what I, Hayato Kobayashi, like to do most is say 'no' to people who think they know it all."
"Since we've come this close, then Malik, just bear with it a little longer. It'll be easy once we reach Kul Elna."
Hayato's words, a twist on the classic parent line about university being easy, successfully appeased Malik and stopped him from complaining further. Muttering something like, "You meet ghosts easily when traveling at night," the party crossed the hill and continued towards Kul Elna.
But as they walked, Karim, who was at the front of the group, noticed something slightly off. Being good at observation, he inadvertently glanced at the ground and noticed that there were many footprints left on the sandy ground ahead of them.
In the desert, footprints are buried by the wind and destroyed by quicksand; they certainly don't last long. The large area of clear footprints before them could not possibly have been left long ago. This meant that someone had already been to Kul Elna not long before they arrived, and judging by the quantity of footprints, there were quite a few people!
"Mr. Hayato..."
"Yes, I noticed too." Hayato nodded, his brow furrowed. "So many footprints, I have a bad feeling. Everyone, stay vigilant as we move forward."
Continuing into the village, the scorched ground was covered with scattered footprints. It seemed that the people who had arrived before had conducted a large-scale search, looking for something. But despite so many footprints, the village was eerily silent at this moment, as if these many footprints were just a phantom, and actually no one had ever been to this village.
The wind passed through the gaps in the wreckage, making sharp "whooshing" sounds. The camels' breathing, the people's breathing, and the sound of the camels' hooves stepping on the sandy ground were all that the group could hear in this silent place.
However, after walking into the village for a while, suddenly, a "crack" sound came from somewhere, as if someone had stepped on something and broken it.
"The street is really quiet, huh? We didn't see the people who came here before us either. Maybe they left after finding nothing?" Malik said nonchalantly, speaking lightly. But Hayato suddenly reached out and grabbed the collar of his clothes, pulling him back from continuing forward. "Careful!"
As the camel Malik was riding stepped on a slightly sunken stone brick, the decayed stone brick suddenly crushed, and the camel also suddenly fell down because it had no support point. And at the same instant, several human skeleton arms suddenly protruded from the ground buried by sand. Although there was no muscle tissue to exert power, the bone hands easily pierced the body of the fallen camel, killing it in an instant!
Malik had a look of lingering fear. If Hayato hadn't pulled him back in time just now, he would probably have been sneak attacked and killed like his ride, the camel, losing his life!
"Crack!" "Crack!" "Crack!"
The death of Malik's camel at the front was not an isolated incident. Almost at the same time, the ground around the other people also cracked open, and one terrifying skeleton after another crawled out, brandishing sharp bone claws and attacking the group.
However, Hayato wasn't the only one who reacted. Besides Malik, Karim, Isis, and Kaiba all raised their Duel Arenas and called their respective monsters.
"Thunder Dragon!"
"Agido!"
"Blue-Eyes White Dragon!"
Amidst Karim and Isis's honest summoning and Kaiba's passionate calling, only two monsters appeared before the three people who raised their Duel Arenas to summon.
Isis and Karim looked at Kaiba strangely, thinking, why are you shouting so loudly, you didn't summon anything. And Kaiba also put down his Duel Arena, annoyed: "Tsk, even using this Duel Arena doesn't work? Is it that the bond between me and you is still not enough for you to respond to me, Blue-Eyes?"
Although the spirited Kaiba didn't summon anything in the end and made a fool of himself, the two monsters summoned by Karim and Isis were more than enough to deal with the skeleton monsters in front of them.
Although seeing a bare skeleton suddenly was a bit scary, if you put a piece of cloth on these skeletons, aren't they the famous "Small Fry Monster" Skull Servant?
As priests, Karim and Isis's performance was much better than the embarrassing Malik. They showed no mercy to the Skull Servant that had just now launched an attack intending to kill them. The two commanded their respective monsters to easily destroy the batch of Skull Servant closest to them.
"Heh heh, even Priest Isis is working hard, huh? Then I, Karim, must also put in some effort. After all, I can't let all these years of effort go to waste." Glancing at Isis next to him, Karim said with great motivation, "Then come out, the rest of the Thunder Dragons!"
Not saving the zones on the Duel Arena at all, Karim summoned all three Thunder Dragons in one go and sent them all out to kill.
Isis was not as competitive as Karim. Instead, she used the power of the Millennium Necklace to the best of her ability to begin future sight. The Millennium Necklace's ability to future sight has two modes: one is actively glimpsing fragments of the future, and the other is a passive mode where the Millennium Necklace automatically warns of the appearance of a crisis.
Compared to the latter, using the former puts a considerable burden on Isis, and Isis cannot be in a state of actively predicting the future at all times. Therefore, most of the time, Isis uses the latter mode, and only uses the former in a few necessary situations. The passively used mode is also sufficient to warn of most crises.
After Bakura's death, Isis had actively used the Millennium Necklace once. At that time, she clearly saw that the future had recovered its light and could be clearly predicted by her. And on the way to the Thief Village, she had also confirmed it once in advance; the Millennium Necklace could still be used normally.
However, just now when the group of Skull Servant emerged from the underground and attacked everyone, the Millennium Necklace did not give any warning. This was very strange. After all, the decaying bad smell unique to undead on the group of Skull Servant that emerged from the ground could not be hidden at all. The Millennium Necklace, which is very sensitive to dark power, should have issued a warning in advance.
But when she used the power of the Millennium Necklace for the first time after entering the Thief Village, Isis was stunned, because she found that the phenomenon of the future being obscured by darkness that had occurred since Bakura's appearance had actually reappeared, and this dark power was even greater than the darkness brought by Bakura.
Using the power of the Millennium Necklace with all her might, Isis only barely managed to intercept a single image of the future: the image of their camels being killed by the Skull Servant.
Isis suddenly remembered that although it was normal for the Skull Servant to be defeated by her and Priest Karim's Stone Tablet Monsters, the resistance they offered was too weak, and these monsters should be classified as undead-type monsters. How could they be crushed so easily?
An idea suddenly popped into Isis's mind. She quickly reminded Karim, whose Thunder Dragons had gone too far out: "No, Priest Karim, it's a trap! Quickly call your Stone Tablet Monsters back!"
Isis's reminder was as timely as possible, but it was still a step late. Almost as if taking Isis's words as a starting order, the wreckage of the Skull Servant on the ground that had been easily crushed by the Thunder Dragons' attacks actually reassembled themselves and, while the Thunder Dragons couldn't return in time to defend, charged towards Karim!
Immediately, Isis summoned two more Stone Tablet Monsters—Keldo and Kelbek—to protect everyone. However, the expected attack targeting the people on the camels did not come at all. The party left the camels completely unharmed, but all the camels they had ridden were killed without exception.
Even the most slow-witted person felt something was wrong. Even Malik said somewhat strangely, "Feeling like the goal of these monsters isn't us, but our camels? Were they kicked to death by the camels? Do they have such great hatred towards camels?"
"No, I'm afraid the controller behind these Skull Servant intended to kill our rides first so that we couldn't leave this ruins," Karim stated his conjecture, controlling the Thunder Dragons to kill their way back and protect him.
And this time, since they had already been exposed, they didn't pretend anymore. The Skull Servant actually displayed a combat power completely different from just now. It was nothing like the beginning where any attack, regardless of strength, could easily kill them. Even Karim's Thunder Dragons were slightly injured in the process of killing their way back.
And after the Thunder Dragons returned to Karim's side, the Skull Servant that had fallen due to the Thunder Dragons' attacks showed a powerful revive ability. In just an instant, the disassembled skeletons were automatically pieced back together, and even broken bones quickly healed themselves.
"What is their goal in keeping us here?" Kaiba frowned, looking at the group of Skull Servant surrounding them. After fighting for a long time, the quantity of Skull Servant had not decreased at all. Instead, as time passed, more and more Skull Servant gathered from all parts of the village. "This is endless. If only my Blue-Eyes were here..."
"Stop thinking about your Blue-Eyes all the time. We must find the source of these Skull Servant," Hayato said, his Millennium Ring on his chest glowing slightly. The golden cones on the disk all pointed in one direction. "The Millennium Ring can lead the way. The work of clearing the path is up to you, Karim!"
"Don't worry, Mr. Hayato!" Karim knew that Hayato wanted to save his power for the last to deal with the source of the Skull Servant. The Winged Dragon of Ra had proven its strength many times, and Karim was very convinced by it. He had no complaints about being responsible for clearing the path. "Then, I'll begin. The power of the Millennium Scale is manifested here!"
"Come forth, my strongest Stone Tablet Monster, Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon! And then, the widest range diffusion thunder attack!"
Although its appearance was underwhelming, its power was real. Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon manifested before the party. Towards the direction pointed by Hayato's Millennium Ring, Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon suddenly spat out a light beam of lightning, clearing away all the Skull Servant blocking the path.
However, even Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon's attack still couldn't completely destroy the Skull Servant. The Skull Servant that were defeated quickly recovered as soon as they fell to the ground and regrouped.
But Karim had Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon spread its attack range as much as possible not intending to kill them; being able to clear a path forward was enough.
Malik, who was terrible at battle but number one at escape, ran at the very front, leading the way. Then came Hayato and Isis, while Kaiba and Karim followed at the rear. The party of five rushed forward with their heads down. After Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon cleared the path twice more, the Millennium Ring led the group to a well-preserved house in the Thief Village, which was full of ruins and very rare.
Malik, who was skilled at kicking down doors, kicked open the locked door with practiced ease and rushed in. The other people also rushed in one after another. After Karim, who was at the back of the group, also entered the door, Malik didn't hesitate to slam the door shut, even clipping off a Skull Servant's arm that was about to grab Karim, causing it to writhe on the ground.
Although the house was not a sturdy barrier, the Skull Servant were, after all, just Small Fry with no great power other than being troublesome and numerous. The people who entered the house were temporarily safe. At this point, they also noticed that in this room, a wall had been smashed open, revealing a set of stairs leading to the underground.
