Another abnormally large, one story sized wooden house that stood out from the surrounding buildings. This was in part because it looked to be designed with more thought behind it, clearly belonging to someone with status, and also because of it's isolation.
As opposed to the other houses protected by the village's walls, this one, much like his own, was not bunched up next to several other homes, but had some space to itself instead.
Even if it was only 20 meters away from the nearest house, it still stood out to those that were attentive and looking for something that stuck out.
Walking up to the target building whilst making sure he wasn't seen by anyone, a small smile broke out on Gaston's face before he even reached the door.
One of the main things that separated Qi Cultivators from "Knights" was the newly obtained spiritual consciousness, that enabled one to observe the situation around them without having to rely on their eyesight.
At least, as far as the spiritual consciousness could reach. Which, for Qi Refining cultivators at the 1st level, was only a measly 10 meters.
This proved to be enough for Gaston in this situation however, as he spotted what he had rightly guessed were his crew members that he wasn't sure were still alive.
Nicolaus looked to be getting ready to get out of the house, which was why the two of them had both found each other so quickly despite the short range of their spiritual consciousness.
Unlike Gaston though, who limited his reaction to a little smile, Nicolaus looked like he had seen a ghost after he saw Gaston, who he had thought was dead and even mourned already.
After he regained his wits about him, he quickly went to open the door for him whilst shouting to the others who were deeper inside the house. "Hey, get up and come to the door, Gaston's still alive! Hahaha!"
Gaston exhaled through his nose, smiling at the reaction.
After Nicolaus opened the door and they finally saw each other face to face however, a massive headache suddenly struck Gaston like a freight train.
'Umph...' Wincing mentally at the sudden unexpected pain, a rush of steady but fragmented memories suddenly returned to him all at once.
He had been hoping to remember what had happened to him after he split off from the rest of his crew, but the memories simply refused to return to him no matter how hard he tried to remember.
Apparently however, all that needed to happen was for him to see a familiar face again, and almost as if it was a mental trigger, everything came flooding back all at once.
Unlike his previous experiences however, this time he didn't go through this while he was asleep, but rather whilst he was still awake, and about to enter into a conversation.
A part of him was fascinated by what had happened to his body whilst he was stuck recalling his memories. How would he explain his situation to the others if he had passed out in front of them right after reuniting?
It wasn't like he was still a civilian who could easily explain it away. Cultivators weren't so fragile that they could lose consciousness out of exhaustion or other benign reasons.
He didn't have to ponder for long however, as he wasn't sucked completely into his memories, but was rather in a unique state, where he felt like his body was functioning on auto-pilot in the real world, whilst he was recalling his memories.
'Good, I won't have to worry about explaining a sudden collapse to the others. I do hope that I don't reveal anything I shouldn't to them while I'm not fully present however.'
With that final thought, the headache that had been growing stronger and stronger as he ignored his returning memories and made sure that his body was fine instead, grew too strong for him to continue ignoring.
...
Back in the godforsaken forest, he witnessed himself run as fast as he could away from the oncoming Blue Ape reinforcements.
He appeared to have gotten unlucky however, as even after a day had passed, he found himself waking up to the sound of a broken tree branch being stepped upon, only to discover that a pair of Blue Apes were slowly closing in on his location.
Not aware of if they were the only ones nearby, he saw himself spare no expense in order to deal with them as quickly as he could and get out of there immediately.
As luck would have it however, they were indeed not alone out there. Despite his success in dealing with them, he had lost his punch dagger in the process, forced to leave it behind because of the new sound of rushing footsteps he had heard at the time.
Relentlessly hunted through the forest for four days without pause, Gaston found himself at his wits end, completely exhausted both physically and mentally after dealing with yet another pair of Blue Apes.
With no more strength to run, he forced himself to drag his feet away from the scene of the crime, which was the only thing he could do.
He looked beyond haggard at this point, with various injuries all over his body as well as an empty stomach, he was close to his breaking point.
After dealing with the latest pair of Blue Apes however, he didn't hear the sound of immediately approaching footsteps of another round of reinforcements that he would have to run away from. Rather, there was complete silence instead.
Before he could breathe a sigh of relief, he suddenly felt himself completely immobilized, his torso grasped by a barely visible hand made out of spiritual consciousness that was twice the size of his entire body, the likes of which he doubted anyone in the Qi Refining stage could make.
No matter how hard he tried to move, his body couldn't break out of the hand. He was completely suppressed when it came to strength, which was the final nail in the coffin as far as he was concerned.
Helpless to defend himself, he tried to turn his head and locate the creature that would soon be responsible for his death, only to see a singular Blue Ape, approaching 16 feet in size, standing right behind him, observing him with a smile on its face.
The ugly smile of that Blue Ape was the last thing he thought he'd ever see, before he lost consciousness.
...
Once again however, he had been wrong on that point.
Seeing himself wake up again, he felt a strong sense of déjà vu, recalling that he had found himself in a similar situation just a few days ago, where he thought he was falling to his death.
Just like then however, he had beaten the odds and survived to tell the tale.
Upon further thought however, this was actually his first would-be certain death experience that he had survived, with his fall being the second. It was just that he had remembered them in the opposite order, leading to this strange feeling.
Upon seeing himself open his eyes, he was certain that he hadn't been unconscious for a short period of time, as the familiar-looking trees were nowhere to be found. Instead, he found himself in a dimly lit room with dark, stone walls. Judging by the lack of ventilation, he guessed that he was underground as well.
He wasn't free to move around and explore however, his circumstances were far from being that good.
Looking down, he found himself strapped to a large stone table. He tried to move around and break through his restraints, but got nothing in response. The strange-looking red cloth straps that bound him made no sound, nor did they budge even the slightest amount.
It was as if he was a baby and not a Qi Refining cultivator, completely helpless. On top of that, trying to move around had proven to be a very costly mistake, as a sudden wave of pain assaulted his senses, the kind that he had never experienced before.
For some reason, there had been delayed reaction, and only after trying to escape did his body remember the pain it was in. His upper body looked fine, but it was when he looked further down, that he discovered the source of his pain.
Gaston's eyes slightly widened when he saw that his legs, which were fine before he lost consciousness, were now anything but fine. It wasn't some flesh wound or muscle injury that was responsible for his pain however, the sight that graced his eyes was far more terrifying than that. His perfectly healthy and muscular legs, had been very precisely skinned!
Slightly to the right of his disgusting looking legs, there was a small container in which he saw the skin of his legs, which brought as much shock to him as the pain did.
Trying to process what he had just discovered was not easy, and it was made no easier by the pain he felt, which threatened to make him scream at any moment. He grit his teeth and refused to give whoever had done this to him the satisfaction however, resisting the pain with everything he had.
On Earth, more than 40 years ago and before officially making it out of Green Team and into the teams, one of the last programs that he underwent was the SERE exercise.
Standing for Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape, it was the final barrier that prevented one from joining DEVGRU. But it was exactly this training that he found himself having to rely on now.
He had been trained to survive capture and resist torture, and whilst this was not Earth and his captor was not human, the concepts still applied.
"Let's try this one more time Gaston. Why were you sent here?" Suddenly, a voice came from behind him and asked him a simple question in a relaxed manner, as if they were having a conversation over some tea.
The voice however, did not come from the giant Blue Ape that captured him like he would a chicken. It was far too high-pitched of a voice for it to belong to a figure like that, instead, it sounded like it came from someone young, and feminine.
He had never heard his captor talk, but he severely doubted that this was what he sounded like.
While he was thinking over these things however, his new female captor was not too pleased by his delayed response, and immediately went to work. Holding... a very familiar looking knife, with several unknown magic runes engraved on the blade itself, she moved from behind him to right in front of him.
If before, he had held suspicions however, now he had gotten his confirmation.
He had a new, female captor, not too much bigger in size compared to the other Blue Apes he had killed over the past few months. Standing at about 9 feet tall, she was only at the 3rd level of Qi Refining.
Only these strips of abnormally tough cloth were preventing him from getting up and taking her life. This was the confidence that was engraved in him after killing dozens of her kind.
Aside from her size however, there was something else that separated her from the typical Blue Ape he had encountered, something he couldn't quite put his finger on just yet.
She didn't intend to let him keep thinking in peace however, bringing the knife to the left side of his face, she began skinning him alive without so much as a word!
"MMMPH!"
...
Then, the scene abruptly cut off.
The next memory, was of himself still in the same place and in the same set of circumstances, but after what looked like quite some time after the events he had last seen.
Now, his legs had been completely healed and looked as good as new. Gaston had no recollection of how she had managed to accomplish this, but the facts were in front of him.
Not all was well however, as he experienced the same sudden burst of pain, instead this time it came from his right arm, which once again had all of it's skin removed.
Looking at his past self's reaction however, his response to the pain wasn't nearly as severe as what it was last time.
This wasn't good news, since to develop such pain tolerance in a span of a few days at most was no simple feat, leading him to question himself. 'Just how many times has this been done to me for me to get so used to it? I'm not even gritting my teeth now.'
In spite of the pain however, he saw his past self speak in a calm but monotonous tone, trying to get all his words out with as little amount of pauses in between words as possible, which he had to make in order not to react to the pain.
"Your highness... I speak the truth. My name... is Gaston von Rainerhorn... I grew up in a little village... not too far from here... My talent and ambition led... led me out of my home..."
Before he could finish however, perhaps because he was taking too long to get the words out, or perhaps his captor had grown tired of listening to the same old story repeat itself over and over again, so she took the initiative to help him finish.
"Led you out of your home, and to the nearby city. Unfortunately, during your travels, you encountered several of my kin, and that eventually led you on a wild journey that made you end up here."
Bringing her face close to his, she looked into his cold-looking, lifeless brown eyes, "Is that still the story you're sticking with, Gaston? Why don't you just tell the truth, It'll make things a lot easier on the both of us."