Chapter 24

Walking through the deepest part of the dense forest, just around a corner, the path suddenly opened up into a vast expanse—a massive plaza that could not have been seen from any corner outside the woods.

At the edge of this plaza, which resembled a barren wasteland, stood twelve towering pillars. These pillars were decorated with rough, enigmatic carvings, and perched atop each one was a beast of profound and imposing aura.

At this moment, the twelve fierce beasts atop the pillars fixed their gazes simultaneously upon the arrivals at the entrance: the gray wolf Volberry, the golden lion Belliman, the half-orc Salvador, and the young cub, Su You.

As for Darcy, the gray rabbit that little Su You had picked up—the timid creature had been so terrified by the twelve beasts staring them down that it had fainted on the spot.

It was not just the timid Darcy; even the gray wolf warrior Volberry and the golden lion Belliman felt their fur stand on end as they were subjected to the collective scrutiny of these twelve beasts.

Volberry’s front claws scraped the ground incessantly, his wolf head bowed low with his shoulder blades hunched high in a clear defensive stance. Beside him, the golden lion Belliman was equally tense, his mane flared out completely, paws digging into the earth as he kept his body low and taut while watching the beasts atop the twelve pillars of the Bandasia Plaza.

Or perhaps, they should not be called mere "fierce beasts." Standing upon these twelve pillars were the twelve S-class superior beast kin who guarded the Bandasia Shrine. In the hearts of the Bandasia beast kin, they were the supreme protectors of the shrine, the Twelve Holy Beasts of Bandasia.

Yet, never before had Volberry or Belliman seen even a shadow of these Holy Beasts when they had traversed the Path of Trials to reach the Bandasia Shrine Plaza in the past.

These Holy Beasts were adept at hibernating and concealing their presence; as long as they did not wish to be found, they could remain completely invisible to the eyes of other beast kin.

Now, with all twelve Holy Beasts appearing at once in the plaza, Volberry and Belliman, as natives of Bandasia, felt the true chasm between S-class and these S-plus-class Holy Beasts.

The powerful gray wolf warrior let out low growls from his throat, as if threatening a warning or trying to bolster his own courage. The golden lion beside him displayed the same behavior. They appeared nervous and anxious, and even the half-orc Salvador, who had reached this point safely, felt his mind erupt with frantic, instinctive warnings of danger.

Of all the "people" present, the only one who remained unthreatened... was perhaps the humanoid cub, who looked even more frail than the gray rabbit, Darcy.

The tiny cub was currently looking around in curiosity—the massive plaza was something he had never seen before; the towering pillars were also new to him; and the fluffy creatures and birds on the pillars were things he had never laid eyes on either...

There were so many things Youyou hadn't seen yet!

The little one was looking around with pure anticipation. Even though the Holy Beasts on the twelve pillars glared at him with ferocious temperaments and sharp gazes, he seemed completely unaffected.

"Tongtong, this place is so amazing! It’s so much bigger than Youyou’s home!"

The little cub didn't know which "praise system" he had loaded, but no matter what scene or animal he saw, he could find a unique angle to compliment it—he had even managed to make the group of strangely shaped audience spirits who were watching via the sub-universal channel feel so delighted that they were completely captivated.

Such a "president of the praise fan club" baby was, of course, fearless. Just a tiny bean, he actually dared to walk curiously to the very front, even as the powerful gray wolf and golden lion warriors growled in vigilance, and tilted his head up to look at the Holy Beasts on the circular pillars.

"Wow, everyone is standing so high..."

The tiny cub had to strain his neck to see the shadows of these Holy Beasts at the very top of the pillars.

Just as everyone wondered what the cub would say next, the little one lowered his head with a melancholic expression: "Tongtong, they are all standing so high! Youyou can't touch them."

As he spoke, the little one let out a long sigh: "If only Youyou knew how to climb trees—then Youyou could climb up and touch the fluffies!"

System 001: [...]

Ever since the beast roars of Bandasia had erupted and the gray wolf Volberry and golden lion Belliman had carried Su You toward the Bandasia Shrine, System 001 had remained silent.

As a system, even with the power of a Main God, its information storage was not infinite—everything it knew was derived from the vast, ocean-like database of the Dark Universe Group.

As a Main God-level system, one of its advantages was that its system permissions were far higher than those of primary or ordinary systems.

However, if it encountered a domain that even the Dark Universe Group's database had no record of, then even Hilbert, the omniscient brain of the Dark Universe Group, could not obtain an absolutely accurate answer.

Because at this moment, they could only rely on their own system's deductive capabilities to calculate—and no one could guarantee that the direction of such deduction and calculation would lead to a correct result.

Just like now—the Bandasia Shrine was an existence that did not exist in the database of the Dark Universe Group’s plane number 12768.

When the Dark Universe Group's exploration team had come to investigate plane number 12768, they concluded that it was a high-level beast kin plane lacking traces of higher civilization, maintaining a relatively primitive ecological cycle of the strong preying on the weak. However, the strength of the beast kin in this plane far exceeded that of ordinary planes, reaching the S-class rating of the main universe—and thus, this plane was designated as an S-class danger zone.

Even those experienced exploration team members had failed to discover the hidden, intact ruins of a faith-based civilization—no, perhaps it shouldn't be called ruins; this was a "shrine" still in use.

Therefore, an intact faith-based civilization did exist here, and it had not been interrupted, but rather passed down to this day.

System 001 watched the scene before it in silence. Facing its host's innocent and ignorant questions, the silent system did not know how to respond for a moment.

Meanwhile, the audience watching the variety show in the main universe was constantly issuing strong protests to the show's production team—

[Where is the baby!!]

[Clattering bowls, where is my Youyou baby!!]

[Is the cosmic light-net signal down again? Is the Dark Universe Group going bankrupt? Why is the signal transmission for such a good B-class show so poor?!]

[Youyou baby, my Youyou baby... qaq]

...

On the main stage, the host of "Super Soldier Battle Royale Season 2," Maka Maka, was tidying his bowtie with a smile, while one of his humanoid upper limbs was secretly rubbing the micro-earpiece on his ear.

Hurry up!

Technicians, you better fix the signal problem quickly!

Oh... the situation now might not be a signal issue, but a special shielding...

Poor green-skinned Maka Maka felt like he was going to be completely haggard because of this live broadcast—since 0.1 standard cosmic hours ago, the live broadcast rooms 001 and 098 had turned into snow-screen screens with no signal again. Those audience spirits who were originally enjoying the baby's presence peacefully and happily in sub-space 001 had completely rioted!

These audience spirits, who had already been completely captivated by the cub, should have been the easiest group to manage; as long as the broadcast remained open, these fanatics would be held captive by the cub in the feed.

But the trouble was, everything that happened in this elimination round had exceeded Maka Maka's expectations.

Maka Maka had originally thought that the first of the 100 broadcast rooms to suffer signal shielding would be room 002, Silva Lando's—he had even thought of how to appease the fans of this mixed-blood warrior: "The powerful mixed-blood Winged Clan warrior Silva Lando has entered the secret phase of the elimination round! Once he successfully passes this secret challenge, he will have the chance to surpass the cub in room 001 and claim the top spot in the elimination round!"

Look, what a perfect, deceptive answer.

Maka Maka had almost wanted to pop a bottle of champagne in advance to celebrate!

As it turned out... what he hadn't anticipated at all was that Silva Lando was blocked outside the dense forest and didn't have much of an advantage compared to the other contestants. Instead, the cub candidate in room 001 and that half-orc idiot warrior who regarded the cub as the son of the Beast God had merged into the surging beast tide without any obstacles, easily entering the dense forest that none of the other soldier-king candidates could penetrate.

And once they entered the forest, all the audience members on the main stage were captivated by the live stream of the cub and his half-orc sidekick—the huge, dense, ancient forest where sunlight only occasionally scattered onto the ground through the gaps in the sparse leaves.

The massive S-class beast herd gathered toward their destination bit by bit with a solemn and reverent attitude of pilgrimage.

Even by the aesthetic standards of the current Great Universe entertainment era, such a mysterious and solemn scene possessed an ultimate beauty.

The audience spirits in the main stage viewing area were extremely satisfied with this—and the fanatics in sub-space 001 were constantly praising their baby Su You in loud voices.

See!

In such a mysterious scene, there was a cute and soft cub looking around curiously above the massive beast herd, and he even saved a fainted gray rabbit!

This was simply a scene from a fairy tale!

Their Youyou baby must be the cutest little sprite in the fairy tale world!

As the gray wolf warrior Volberry and the golden lion Belliman continued to advance, the audience in sub-space 001 and sub-space 098 followed their perspective to see the dark, magnificent, and profound dense forest, and then... just as they were about to see the key scene!