[Even in a vampire's ancient castle, I rarely used the word "deathly still" to describe a place—
At the very least, there were genuinely ancient skeletons, crimson dancing skirts wandering the depths of the castle, and lonely souls playing the piano in the banquet hall.
But Ebony Forest—or at least the Ebony Forest before my eyes—held nothing but a deathly stillness lurking beneath the shadows.]
The trees' branches were shriveled and curled. Standing beyond the dense forest, they looked like gaunt, stooped old men leaning on canes, Their backs bent, struggling to support their decaying bodies, ready to shatter onto the ground with the slightest sway.
Sunlight filtered through the branches and fell upon the barren ground, revealing wet soil. This meant the trees did not seem to lack water.
"How did they wither into this state?"
Tang Qi put away the Guide and was about to step into the wetland.
[Alertness] suddenly sounded, forcing him to pull back the foot he had just stepped out with.
The whistle of arrows tearing through the air rang through the woods immediately afterward. Several arrows suddenly shot out from the shadows of the barren trees, their feathers as vivid as peacock tails.
While still airborne, the arrows burst apart with a bang, spreading like a torrential downpour over the orcs and blotting out the last wisps of sunlight beneath the leaf-covered sky.
No one wanted to be turned into a sieve beneath a rain of arrows. The orcs behind Tang Qi cried out in alarm and hurriedly tried to scatter.
Yet, unexpectedly, at the instant the arrow rain should have pierced their skin, it passed straight through their bodies one after another.
"Phantoms?"
Tang Qi was outside the range of the arrow rain, allowing him to see the situation more clearly. He