Chapter 115: Cultivating 2 Trillion Evolution Points in two days

"What do we do with Berthold’s body?" One of the men asked.

The Commander stared at the body in silence for a moment. "Clear out the supplies at the back of one of the trucks and put his body there. We’ll bury him at a suitable place if we don’t make it back to the stronghold on time," the Commander decided.

Reiner was the first to jump down and clear the supplies at the back of Truck 2 before dumping the body inside and flashing Kaelen a heated gaze.

Kaelen ignored him and didn’t protest before climbing back into the truck bed with Berthold’s body, and the convoy drove off into the forest.

He didn’t stay idle and immediately began cultivating Evolution Points.

As the truck wasn’t stationary, the amount fluctuated, giving Kaelen higher or lower amounts at intervals. But on average, Kaelen still made a decent 10,000,000 for every second of the trip.

For the next eight hours of non-stop driving, Kaelen accumulated 300 billion Evolution Points. Then, he felt the trucks screech to a halt and opened his eyes to the pitch-black, moonless night.

It was difficult to keep driving, as nocturnal beasts usually became active at this time, and though Kaelen claimed to have a Talent that could keep them safe, the Commander was smart enough not to risk it and knew too well that Talents needed mana to operate.

So he made the call for the team to camp there for the night.

"We couldn’t make it to the Grand Canyon much earlier, so we’ll be camping here tonight, and we’ll be taking turns to keep watch." The Commander addressed his team before shifting his gaze to Kaelen. "Rest well. We’ll need that ability of yours more than ever the further we go."

Kaelen didn’t have any objections. Whether he was sleeping or awake, any beast could choose to engage with them, but on the brighter side, the below-Tier 25 beasts Kaelen had left alive didn’t have the balls to charge into the armoured vehicles. Then again, this was around the area where Kaelen had clashed with the wolves.

This not only meant the wolves could attack at any moment, but from here on out, there were very much Tier 25 and above beasts that could be triggered at any moment to attack.

That night was going to be the calm before the storm because Kaelen anticipated they’d be arriving at the Grand Canyon by the next day, and beyond that would be a whole new world brimming with even greater dangers.

The mercenaries took out their tents and began setting them up around a fireplace. Kaelen didn’t have any, and left to him, he’d choose to disappear into his castle for the night.

He didn’t plan on sleeping a wink while being so exposed in the wild.

He scaled a large tree and sat cross-legged, and just as the mercenaries began retiring for the night, he began cultivating once more.

Time went by in a blink, and the next time Kaelen opened his eyes, the mercenaries were packing up to leave at first light, and Kaelen was up another 400 billion Evolution Points.

In total, Kaelen had made over one trillion Evolution Points from the three times he’d used the Eternal Myriad Scripture.

He leaped down and went to a nearby river to wash his face, but on his way back, he heard a commotion between the mercenaries.

"What the hell happened?" One of the men asked in shock as he stared into the truck bed where Kaelen was stationed.

"What happened?" The Commander asked.

"Berthold... his body is gone." The man said in surprise and disbelief, and the rest immediately closed in to investigate for themselves, even going as far as searching the other trucks and surrounding areas.

They found nothing.

Kaelen was as confused as they were.

But surprisingly, he wasn’t the immediate prime suspect, as the body had been seen in the truck bed before everyone retired, and there had been people keeping watch in rotation.

That could only mean two things.

Either whatever took his body sneaked into the camp and sneaked back out without alerting either the watch guards or sleeping men, or someone amongst them had something to do with the body.

Possibly someone who was supposed to keep watch and used the opportunity to steal the body.

But why would anyone amongst them do that to their own dead comrade?

This increased distrust and suspicion amongst them, further solidifying Kaelen’s fake claims of Berthold being poisoned by one of them.

Except this time around, not even Kaelen had a clue.

This event exposed a fatal flaw in his cultivation technique, and that was that each time he began cultivating, he lost track of both time and everything happening around him and could only be distracted if acted upon by an external force—just like when the truck had screeched to a halt and woken him up the previous night.

The Commander was at a loss for words, and Kaelen happened to lock eyes with Yelena at that moment. They both came to an understanding that neither of them was responsible or had a clue. Meanwhile, Reiner kept shooting suspicious glances at Kaelen but surprisingly didn’t make a fuss about it.

"Let’s keep moving forward." The Commander said grimly.

The team jumped back into their trucks, and for the next twelve hours, with short breaks in between to replenish their energy, the Grand Canyon came into view. But at the same time, the terrain took a sharp turn from the forest and barren lands to a rocky mountain path covered in a mist that Kaelen was strangely familiar with.

The temperature also increased rapidly, making the inside of the trucks no different from relaxing inside a heated microwave.

The vans screeched to a halt just outside the Grand Canyon, whose eerie sounds drowned out everything around it, including the sounds of the trucks’ engines.

The mercenaries jumped down from the trucks, keeping their hands on their weapons as they inspected their surroundings under the dim moonlight.

Kaelen was surprised their journey had been uneventful till that point, aside from Berthold’s missing body, which he still had no clue about. But he was soon distracted by his Evolution Points balance after seeing he was up nearly 2 trillion Evolution Points in two days, bringing his fortune to a little over 170 trillion Evolution Points in total.

"C-Commander, you have to see this." One of the men suddenly called out, and everyone immediately closed in to see what the man was looking at.

It was a crude inscription on a rock wall, which read:

If you wish to live, turn back now.

And just below that was another word inscribed.

P.O.C

The moment Kaelen saw the last line, his eyes widened in surprise.

’Property of the House of Cross...?’