At that moment, Locke sensed within the forest that a mortal cavalry unit was rapidly approaching. The hoofbeats of the warhorses fell on the ground, and even in the forest soil a hundred meters away there was some trembling.
At that moment, the young man and the middle-aged man also reacted immediately. They looked back and saw in the distance, on the hillside, the cavalry of the city-state they had originally belonged to.
The middle-aged man immediately wanted to take the young man and flee, but they had few options. Two legs could not outrun four, and there was no other cover nearby.
So the lush forest became the only choice.
The two rushed into the forest and found the largest tree within it, hiding behind it.
The cavalry quickly arrived at the riverside, warhorses searching in all directions.
"There are footprints by the river. These are the prints left by the footwear that only Terrila's noble persons would wear. Those two criminals must be nearby. The head priest said they must be killed to appease the War God's fury."
"They are here. They could not have gone far."
One mounted soldier with an iron sword said, "Their hiding places are limited. I estimate they are in that forest ahead. We dismount and enter the forest to search. They are surely hiding behind that largest tree."
There were six mounted soldiers in total, and another in heavy armor said, "These sinners who have angered the War God are truly pathetic. Do they think there is still a place in all of heaven and earth for them to hide? I heard their entire family has been put to death. Everyone connected to them has already died."
"Terrila will welcome new governance. The governance of the one chosen by the War God."
All those soldiers dismounted and entered the forest to search.
The middle-aged man hiding behind the tree thrust his dagger into the soil, then bit his lip, his eyes wavering, falling into doubts about whether he had already been counted among the sinners.
He knelt on the ground and prayed.
"Unconquered one who drives the flame chariot, divine being who governs the charge and the clash of shields, please forgive our sins and give us another chance. We are willing to offer you the finest sacrifices..."
"Please forgive my young master, Olian, of all his sins, just as you have blessed his family with all the victories in battle they once received. We have never harbored any disrespect toward you. Please do not let your vision be obscured by treacherous people..."
"Please bestow your favor upon us once more..."
"My young master Olian will become your finest hunter, capturing all those who betray and defy you..."
The middle-aged man heard the soldiers' footsteps growing ever closer and a shadow of despair crossed his face. The heavy armored knights of Terrila were divine guardians, clad in heavy armor, representing the will of the War God.
Was he to stand against these divine guardians?
Even if he could overcome this psychological hurdle, could he, one against six, defeat these warriors who had begun military training at the age of ten and could each face a hundred opponents in both naval and land battles?
How could he possibly be a match for such people?
At that moment, in his heart, the only thing that could turn the situation around was the will of the War God, Terrila's patron deity.
A great god who could direct the wars of the world. Wherever his gaze fell, war would follow.
The middle-aged man turned to look at Olian and said in a low voice, "Young master, what are you doing? Pray to the War God quickly!"
Olian picked up the dagger. "Right now we only have one dagger between us, but there are two of us. I am going to cut off a branch from this tree and whittle it into a weapon."
"That way both of us will have weapons."
The middle-aged man found this absurd.
"Young master, those are Terrila's heavy armored knights, the finest warriors. Even if both of us had weapons, what difference would it make? Only prayer is the only useful thing right now."
Olian's eyes hardened with resolve.
"The War God has already abandoned us, Serenos. Now we can only rely on ourselves."
"We need weapons right now."
Olian brought the dagger down on the tree branch before him. In an instant, the dagger scraped against the branch and produced sparks.
Olian stared at the tiger's mouth of his right hand in shock.
His hand had gone numb.
The dagger fell from his hand onto the ground.
From a young age he had aspired to become Terrila's finest warrior, to don the heavy armor that represented honor. So from childhood he had honed his skills and physique.
His father had once said that he was also Terrila's finest hunter. He possessed a special talent: he could rely on his own instincts to never lose his way in complex terrain, and he could easily tame fierce beasts that others could not subdue.
Whether warhorses or the dangerous creatures of the forest, he had even once made a wolf-bear submit to him. That was the offspring of the legendary underground world's demon wolves and ordinary surface wolves.
He had believed he was capable of hacking off a branch with one stroke of the dagger. Yet the reality was that his hand had gone numb and the dagger had fallen.
A leaf drifted down. It was lush and green, like a piece of jade, an oak leaf.
Its edges were golden, giving off a sense of the sacred.
Olian could not help looking down at that leaf.
The next moment, the furious shouts of the six heavy armored knights rang in his ears.
"There he is! I can see him! The sinner is right here."
"His blood must be offered to the War God. Seize him quickly."
Serenos's face went pale. "Young master, you run. I will hold them off. Remember, you must escape. The War God and the priests have simply been deceived. As long as you are alive, there will be a day when we can clear our names."
Olian's eyes filled with despair. He had not imagined he would ever find himself in such hopeless and helpless a situation.
Trusted friends had betrayed him.
Subjects who had once served him had become the executioners who sought to kill him.
Even the deity he had worshipped had judged him a sinner.
And to this day, he did not even know what wrong he had committed.
The next moment, a tree standing before them suddenly rose up. Using its branches as hands and its roots as feet, it walked across the ground. This tree raised its palm and struck three of Terrila's finest heavy armored knights, sending them flying. Then roots rolled across the ground, and two heavy armored knights were bound by roots that burst up from the earth.
Then, Locke controlled the treant avatar, extended his palm, and seized the last remaining heavy armored soldier.
That heavy armored soldier discovered in alarm that he had been lifted by Locke, and cried out, "A tree... a tree that actually moves?"
"Gods of the crater rims, are my eyes playing tricks? A tree that actually moves? War God above."
Locke scanned him briefly. The heavy armored soldier immediately felt an inexplicable sensation, as if being stared at by some enormous entity.
Not the treant staring at him.
But Locke staring at him.
And Locke's current magic pressure was 18,500. Locke's magic pressure alone was approximately one percent of this entire world's.
This was world-level magic pressure.
So this heavy armored soldier felt the strange sense of being fixed upon by some enormous entity while being unable to accurately judge the other party's scale.
Locke scanned briefly and judged: "This soldier is human. His soul structure is not much different from the souls of mortals in the wizard world. The only difference is the planar force within his body."
"But there is one point where he differs from the wizard world. And this difference is also a characteristic of this world."
Locke became aware of one thing: the Three-Hole World's time flow rate issue.
The difference in time flow rate between the crater rims and the wizard world was approximately 2:1.
But the time flow rate on this world's great land seemed different from that on the crater rims.
It was approximately one day on the crater rims equaling one year on the great land.
The moment he entered this world with the treant avatar, he had immediately noticed this. The information gathered by the void cube was only partial and incomplete planar force data of this world. So it was only by entering this world's present world directly that he perceived the characteristics of the Three-Hole Plane.
"This mortal's body has virtually no magical tide whatsoever. The entire great land is a mortal world. Yet the Three-Hole Plane is very close to medium-to-large-scale plane status. How could there possibly be no magical tide?"
"The magical tide has been drawn away to the crater rims by the upper-tier plane there."
That was entirely within the capability range of an upper-tier plane.
The upper-tier plane atop the crater rims was probably the root cause of the great land having no magical tide. Because the upper-tier plane atop the crater rims had absorbed virtually all the magical tide of this present world, this was what had caused the difference in time flow rates between the two.
"That is to say, one year on the great land equals one day on the mountain. The true time flow rate within the Three-Hole World is thus quite complex."
Although being in the Three-Hole World's present world might seem to give a person more time, in reality, since the present world was a nearly magic-free region, being here meant only wasting time and even declining in strength.
So having what appeared to be more time was actually a disadvantage.
Even for wizards this was the case. First, it was difficult to maintain magic pressure here. Second, conducting experiments was problematic, as there were no materials here, and even if experimental materials were brought to this region, their magical tide concentration would continue to decline over time.
This place was not even suitable for conducting thought experiments for wizards, because it was a magic-free zone, and after one's magical rank rose high enough, even thought experiments required a certain level of Heart's Light support.
But at that moment, for Locke, who wanted to evolve his power system and forge his Grand Magic, the difference in time flow rates between the Three-Hole World's present world and the crater rims' sacred domain was actually very advantageous for him.
As it happened, he needed a relatively long period of time to evolve his power system, and he needed somewhere to organize his thoughts on botanical magic.
When he thought about it, doing organizational thinking work at Golden Crown Mountain was indeed somewhat expensive. Golden Crown Mountain was not only expensive in terms of land but also in terms of time.
Golden Crown Mountain was not the place to be using solely for this kind of work.
Locke casually tossed the heavy armored soldier who carried some of the War God's divine power sharing, sending him flying.
At the same time, Locke turned and looked at the middle-aged man and the young man, Olian.
Locke said, "How very rude of you. The first time we met, you hid behind me without my permission. Then you tried to cut off one of my branches."
The middle-aged man raised his dagger, trembling, and pointed it at Locke.
"We... we meant no offense. What are you?"
"You just killed six loyal guards of the War God. You have offended the War God..."
Olian said, "Great Treant, we meant no offense. You are so powerful and mighty. If you wish, we can leave immediately. I apologize for trying to cut off your branch earlier."
Olian was somewhat terrified.
He had just tried to harm such a powerful... being?
Locke let out a snort of laughter, then his expression turned serious. "I am the forest. I am a part of nature. You ask me who I am. I should rather be asking who you are."
"I know very well who I am. But do you know who you are?"
As he spoke, the dagger in the middle-aged man's hand quickly rusted, and with a breath of wind, it crumbled into a pile of dust that vanished in his grip.
Faced with Locke's question, the middle-aged man trembled and responded, "We are Terrilans... no..."
Confusion appeared in his eyes. Because calling himself a Terrilan, yet it was Terrilans who were now hunting and trying to kill them.
The middle-aged man's eyes flashed with puzzlement. "We... who are we? I am the young master's guard, a loyal retainer..."
And Olian said, "We are believers of the War God! We have been harmed by treacherous people. My family was slaughtered. We plan to seek refuge with city-states friendly to our family, then regain our strength, return to Terrila, kill that evil person, have the high priest cleanse our sins, and have the War God forgive us."
Locke let out a sigh. "You see, I knew you could not answer who you are. What you just described are only your external identities. So let me ask you, if you removed all those external identities, could you then say clearly who you are?"
The two looked at each other, then stared open-mouthed, unable to speak. They had originally thought they would have a great deal to say, but once they opened their mouths, they found they could say nothing at all.
Olian's expression shifted. He asked Locke, "Great Treant, you are so powerful and mighty. The War God would certainly favor you greatly. Why not help us reclaim Terrila? As long as I restore my family's honor and position, Terrila will forever be your ally."
"Terrila is the War God's city-state. You would gain the War God's friendship."
Locke let out a loud snort of laughter once more.
He said to Olian, "Interesting little fellow. I will not help you. I am a part of nature, part of the forest. The internal conflicts of your city-states hold no interest for me whatsoever. However, I just heard the person beside you say that you are an excellent hunter? Then you may try to pick up the leaf beside you. That is a Power Leaf. Only a Ranger chosen by the forest can obtain it."
This leaf had in fact not fallen of its own accord. Rather, it had been knocked off by Olian's dagger.
Because the Power Leaf system was already a complete system.
So it would indeed automatically respond to a person of suitable aptitude and drop a Power Leaf to draw in outside talent.
Olian immediately looked at the leaf.
Locke said, "I can train you within this forest, and that should give you the ability to return to your city-state and take revenge on your enemies."
"Only this is a transaction. As the price, you must help me kill one person in this world."
Olian did not notice the precision in Locke's phrasing: in this world, not in any other world.
Of course, in his understanding, this world was the entire world.
He immediately bent down and reached to pick up the leaf on the ground. But the middle-aged man beside him looked in alarm at Locke's treant avatar, then tried to dissuade him. "Do not. This treant may be one of the demon wolf clan's... We are believers of the War God. We cannot accept his power."
But Olian had already picked up the Power Leaf: Path of the Sworn Enemy from the ground, and said quietly to him, "But we need power right now. Only by having sufficient power can we go back and take revenge. Only then can we kill the evil person and make the high priest and the War God understand our devotion."
"The War God will forgive us."
Olian looked at Locke and said, "Great Treant, I accept your transaction. Please train me. In return, I will help you kill one of your enemies."