Monster Hunter: I can hear the monsters' thoughts

Chapter 482 The Crew of the Plane Disaster

That son of a bitch!

Lin Lin gripped Da Kong's back armor tightly, cursing under his breath.

This is a Bone Dragon Poet? Even a Minotaur flying hundreds of meters in the air can be targeted? And he comes in with a Genesis attack right off the bat? Does he think energy is free?! What's the difference between this and using a cannon to kill a mosquito?!

Despite being nearly driven to despair, Lin Lin hadn't lost his basic rationality. He knew that even a monster of the Skeleton Dragon's caliber couldn't just unleash a powerful attack like Genesis at will. Taking advantage of the fact that the opponent had just missed its target, there would be a window of opportunity when they couldn't unleash another attack. This period was their best chance to escape.

'Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!'

Lin Lin clenched his left hand, and the azure bond stone on his wrist shone brightly. Through the bond, Lin Lin's power was added to Da Kong's body, making his already impressive flight speed even faster.

At the same time, he didn't forget to look back with Ye Ziniya and the others at the islands embedded in the sea below, searching for the exact location from which the laser breath had just been emitted.

However, the sky was flying at an extremely fast speed, and in just a few breaths, it had already left that sea area far behind.

"That oppressive feeling has dissipated, meow!"

Nia took a deep breath before speaking: "I can't feel that guy's malicious gaze anymore, meow!"

It seems they've given up on pursuing them?
Sophia and the two hunters all breathed a sigh of relief, only to find that their backs were soaked with cold sweat.

"What kind of monster is that..."

Sofia was still shaken, frequently glancing back at the archipelago that had shrunk considerably in her field of vision, her tone filled with unspeakable horror.

"Whatever kind of monster it is, it obviously doesn't have the ability to fly."

Lin Lin took a deep breath to calm his turbulent emotions. He did not withdraw the blessing he gave to Da Kong through the Bond Stone just because he was temporarily out of danger, and continued to fly at supersonic speed.

"After returning to Yuukoku, we need to remind the guild that there is an extremely dangerous monster lurking in the vicinity of the Ancient Forest. Ordinary airships are far less agile than the Great Airship. We were lucky enough to dodge its attacks, but if the airship were to unsuspectingly step into that creature's attack range..."

Ye Zi stopped speaking at this point, but everyone knew what she meant by what she didn't say.

Given the airship's maneuverability, there is virtually no other possibility besides being destroyed.

The only uncertain outcome is whether the entire ship was vaporized by a single shot, or whether Genesis merely destroyed the airship's larger gasbag, preserving the ship's structure and allowing for a few more survivors on board.

"That's right, we need to inform the guild about this as soon as possible. Hopefully, no airships will fly over that area..."

So, after escaping danger, Ozora did not slow down; instead, it increased the frequency of its wing flapping and flew straight toward Yukumo Village.

This time, thanks to the Bond Stone, although he carried a lot more burdens than before, it took Ooku much less time on the road. In less than a day and a night, he could already see the red leaves fluttering on the mountain peaks of Yukumo Village in the distance.

In the past, to avoid causing panic among the villagers, the Sky would never openly approach the village from the sky. But this time, it had no scruples and landed directly on the hot spring bath on the mountaintop.

Amidst panicked shouts, Lin Lin and his group tumbled off Da Kong's back. Da Kong, after releasing Bao Bao with its claws, let out a soft roar and spread its wings again, soaring into the clouds.

—Continuous flight is quite physically demanding. Now that Lin Lin and the others have important matters to attend to, it can take this opportunity to wander around and see if it can find any wild raw meat so it can roast it over a fire and eat it.

The great dragon arrived without any warning, and its departure was even more unexpected for the villagers who had seen the male fire dragon land from afar. The chaotic shouts from just moments before fell silent.

what's the situation?
Could it be that it landed right near the meeting place and was repelled by the hunters?
There were indeed a few hunters soaking in the hot springs at the meeting place, but...

The most dominant creature in the Yukumo region right now is the overlord, the Blue Bear Beast, which lives right next to the village and lives peacefully with the villagers. The Zinogre will avoid the stream area, and the Rathalos just now did not harm the villagers at all. The highest-level requests that can appear on weekdays are only from the water beasts that occasionally come ashore.

Therefore, apart from hunters who occasionally come to the village for a temporary stay or vacation, the highest star rating among the active hunters here is only three.

This was their first time seeing the king of the sky up close. It was already quite remarkable that they weren't so frightened that they fell into the hot spring pool, but instead rushed to retrieve their weapons and armor. Expecting them to "repel" the Great Sky was really asking too much of them.

Lin Lin ignored the hunters who were watching his worldview crumble and begin to question his existence. He quickly ran into the gathering hall, rushed to the mission counter, and slammed his hands heavily on the counter.

At this moment, only one signboard girl in blue was working on documents at the counter, while another signboard girl in red was sleeping soundly, leaning on the counter like the old dragon man sitting cross-legged next to her.

Startled by the noise Lin Lin made, Cihua abruptly woke up from her sleep. Before even opening her eyes, she straightened up and exclaimed:
"I wasn't slacking off!"

However, she soon realized that the figure in front of her was too tall and obviously not the guild leader. While she breathed a sigh of relief, a surge of anger rose in her heart.

Who came this brat to cause such a commotion at the assembly hall! He's completely ignorant and doesn't take me seriously at all!
"Hey? Lin Lin? When did you get back?"

Sasayuki was initially startled by the sound, thinking that some low-class hunter was trying to cause trouble. But when she saw the Gundam-like figure take off its helmet, the slight anger in her heart instantly turned into surprise.

Upon hearing this, Cihua was taken aback, her anger quickly dissipating. She hurriedly rubbed her face, wanting to exchange pleasantries, but Lin Lin didn't give her the chance, speaking directly to Sasayuki in a deep voice:
"We can catch up later. I have some very urgent and important intelligence to report now."

Sasayuki was slightly taken aback, but her excellent professional skills allowed her to quickly adjust her mindset, switch into work mode, and immediately pull out a piece of parchment to start taking notes.

"We flew directly back to Jieyun from Jiangbo Village, passing through the Ancient Forest, the Submerged Forest, and the Isolated Island. On the edge of the Ancient Forest, we were attacked by an unknown monster."

Just then, Yoko and Sophia came over. Lin Lin gestured to Sophia, took a map from her, and pushed it to Sasayuki.

Sasayuki deftly unfolded it and found a slightly curved line drawn on it, one end connecting to Yuyun Village and the other end connecting to Jiangbo Village. Above this curve, there was a circle drawn in red pen.

This was clearly the location where they were attacked. "At the time, we were sitting on the back of the giant bird, flying hundreds of meters in the sky. The attacker couldn't fly, but its breath could easily break through the clouds thousands of meters above the ground."

"If we hadn't noticed something was wrong, and if Ooku hadn't been agile enough, we would have been reduced to ashes."

"Based on my years of hunting experience traveling all over the country, that is definitely an ancient dragon, and one whose strength is not much inferior to that of a Storm Dragon!"

The flower still had its big, bewildered eyes open, not yet realizing what had happened, while Sasayuki had already scribbled down all the information Lin Lin had provided:

"Did you fly back by air?"

“Yes, if it were an ordinary airship, even if it sensed that thing was about to attack, given the airship’s reaction speed, it would be absolutely impossible to avoid it—that thing would even calculate the lead time. If we hadn’t turned, we would have charged straight into that breath attack!”

Since Lin Lin had said that, Sasayuki quickly realized that the entity that attacked Lin Lin and his group posed a huge threat to all airships that had to pass through that area!
We must report the intelligence immediately! We need to quickly investigate the true identity of the monster that attacked Lin Lin and his group, and decide whether to launch a campaign to subdue it.

Moreover, the message must also be sent to major cities across the continent, so that their airports can relay the information and make sure the airships change their routes to avoid this area of ​​the Ancient Forest!

"Hmm? What happened?"

The old dragon man, still hungover, was slightly awakened from his sleep by the noise, but judging from his dazed look, he was clearly only a little bit more awake.

"This is none of your business, go back to sleep!"

Sasayuki understood that since it concerned Gu Long and the matter was urgent, the faster the information could be transmitted, the fewer potential sacrifices there would be. There was absolutely no need to explain to the drunkard guild leader again and waste more time.

"This flower, help me transcribe this secret message!"

Sasayuki stacked the map Lin Lin had given her and the intelligence she had just recorded together and handed it to Konohana. Then she took out several maps from under the counter and marked each one in the same way. After that, she began to write her own intelligence report.

"This one is for the guild headquarters in Dongdoruma, this one is for the Lokrak Guild, this one is for the Minagard Guild, this one is for Tangia Port, this one is for Barbare... Oh right, there are quite a few airships at the Dragon Academy, this one needs to be sent to Berna Village."

Sasayuki, as expected of a highly experienced guild leader responsible for entertaining high-ranking hunters, acted decisively. Facing Lin Lin, the hunter who had once saved Jieyun from dire straits, she trusted him without the slightest hesitation. In just a few minutes, she completed the transcription of several secret letters and casually took the guild seal from the drunkard guild leader, leaving a mark on the sealing wax.

After a flurry of activity, Konohana and Sasayuki released almost all the peregrine falcons kept at the Yuukumi Gathering Hall before returning to the counter with mixed feelings.

Lin Lin let out a long breath, as if a huge burden had been lifted from his shoulders:

"Thank you."

Sasayuki shook her head: "We should thank you for delivering such important information to the guild so quickly."

This flower then pulled out another map, carefully examined the location of the ancient forest for a while, and suddenly turned around to open another cabinet specifically for storing files, rummaging through it for something.

"Hey, what are you doing?"

Yoko found it strange.

The flower's head was tucked inside the cabinet, and its voice sounded somewhat muffled.

"The location you marked looks somewhat familiar. I remember when I was curious about airships before, I looked up a lot of information, and I recall that many airships disappeared in the airspace near the Ancient Forest in the past."

"Phew—found it!"

She finally pulled her head out of the cabinet, placed a thick stack of documents on the counter, and began flipping through them page by page:

"let me see……"

"The Silver Star airship disappeared on April 15, 337 AD, en route to the Kingdom of Steller, its route passing through the Ancient Forest region."

"The Albatross cargo airship disappeared on September 3, 315 AD, en route from Tangia Port to the Kingdom of Sici. Its route passed through the Ancient Forest region."

"The Eagle, the royal steed of the Kingdom of Westfall, disappeared on June 21, 324 AD, while returning from the Kingdom of Stroefort. Its route passed through the Ancient Forest region."

……

This flower flips through the list of crashed airships. Almost from the time airships were invented until today, there have been continuous airship crashes over the past ten years. And if you overlap the routes of those crashed airships, almost the vast majority of them will pass through the area that Sophia circled on the map.

Each and every one of these incidents is truly shocking.

"Although the guild has not been able to pinpoint the cause of these airship crashes, some people have identified several high-risk areas based on the commonalities among these airships, including the area near the Ancient Forest. Nowadays, most airships will avoid these areas on their flight paths."

Lin Lin listened and couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief:

"So you're saying that even without my intelligence, airships wouldn't normally pass through that area?"

Although this would make the intelligence I provide seem less valuable, it would be great if no one got hurt as a result.

Meanwhile, in Jieyun Village, as Lin Lin finally felt relieved, a guild-emblazoned airship was sailing straight towards Jieyun Village above the archipelago surrounding the ancient forest they were discussing.

The navigator, holding binoculars, surveyed the surroundings, a vague unease creeping into his heart. He turned to look at the cat in the coat behind him:
"According to the records, this area seems to be classified as a high-risk zone. Should we avoid it?"

(End of this chapter)