The black shadow thrown out by the red dragon had limbs and appearance similar to those of a human child, with chestnut hair and a headband made of vines on its forehead.

From a distance, it really looks like a wild child that ran away from some family.

Considering the public security in Weiren, such homeless children are more common.

But when Roche looked closely, he found that the child's skin was as smooth and shiny as leather soaked in tung oil, and even had a faint dark blue color; when he showed his face with his teeth bared, one could clearly see wrinkles deeper than those of an adult, and a pair of the most inhuman eyes - strange amber eyes.

——Describing Amber Eyes like this seems a bit disrespectful to the Witcher.

"Little earth spirit?" Roche muttered to himself, "I only heard of it in fairy tales when I was a child."

Keira chuckled. "Did you also have a childhood of listening to fairy tales? I thought you've been touching knives and singing dirty jokes since you were old enough to understand."

…

Little earth spirits are also classified as [residual creatures], but unlike leprechauns and high-level vampires, little earth spirits are more inclined to the kind camp of the lake fairies and are frequent visitors to various fairy tales.

In fairy tales, the little elves are very smart and hardworking, and are willing to help the objects they protect with small things; the reward they ask for is just respect and a little food or unwanted tools.

However, they are shy by nature and will always try their best not to be seen by the ones they are protecting.

But if rudely, ungratefully scolded or treated unreasonably, the little goblin will be easily offended and retaliate with mischief.

Keira's science on Roche is more theoretical: "The little earth spirits have a very close relationship with their habitat and will take care of and protect the people and animals who live near their caves."

"Young earth spirits are also attracted to joy and innocence, so this group enjoys being with children, and usually only allows themselves to be seen by young humans."

"But they value peace and tranquility. When the population of the village they protect becomes too large, or the residents forget the old traditions, they will leave the caves they live in forever and head for an unknown destination." Keira shrugged. "I guess Velen Province is the only province in the whole of Temeria where little earth spirits can live."

Roche's curiosity was aroused: "Where is the 'unknown destination' you said they would go to?"

Keira ruthlessly shattered Roche's illusion: "The 'unknown destination' is mostly used by adults to deceive children. Most of the little earth spirits that 'left' are dead, and some may have been killed by adults."

The always cold-blooded commander of the Blue Guards felt like he was struck by lightning.

Lann patted Roche with a smile and consoled him, "As far as I know, there is also a little earth spirit living in Novigrad - although I haven't found her. But this shows that these little guys still have their own tricks of life."

"But compared to the past, their lives are indeed more difficult." Lann shook his head, "But this is the inevitable price of our human development - the fairy tale is gone, and reality is coming."

Lan En didn't know whether Roche was comforted or not, but the little earth spirit in front of him became even more excited and started jumping up and down after hearing Lan En's words.

"Can't the little earth spirit speak?" Roche hesitated for a moment, but still asked Kira.

The sorceress frowned, "It should be possible... Wait, it's magic, the wizard sealed his mouth with magic!"

Roche was extremely angry after hearing what Kayla said: "Who is it! Who took away the little earth spirit's voice!"

Lann held Roche down and tilted his head towards Kertulis who was stretching his wings.

"What happened? I asked you to hide in the clouds and follow the Baron to find the witch in the woods. Why did you bring this little earth spirit back?"

Roche also shouted angrily: "How did he lose his voice?!"

The red dragon curled his lips in a very human way, then widened his eyes.

After she suppressed Roche's anger, she slowly began to answer Lan.

A dull sound like the vibration of an ancient bell echoed around:

"I followed the baron to a church in a swamp, which didn't look like a good place."

"Lan, you told me not to act rashly, so I didn't touch the church. I just kept wandering around to familiarize myself with the terrain."

At this point, the red dragon pointed with its wings at the little earth spirit that was jumping on the ground.

"Then this little guy suddenly came out of a tunnel, followed by a bunch of flies and crows. I heard him shouting something like 'Help' and 'The witch is going to massacre the forest', so I became interested and caught him and wanted to take him away."

"As a result, the crows and flies that were chasing him actually came towards me." The red dragon showed a mocking look, "I blew a spit of fire and burned most of them, but the remaining flies flew into the mouth of this little guy, and he became like this."

…

The mute little earth spirit put his hands on his hips and showed an angry expression as he followed the red dragon's explanation.

He was not afraid of Kertulus at all, nor did he have any fear of Lan and the others. He was really like a wild boy who was fearless.

Through Kertulis's narration, Lann basically understood what happened - it seemed that the red dragon found the hiding place of the three witches, but the three witches were underground and the red dragon was helpless.

It seemed that this little earth spirit often went to cause trouble for the three sisters. Today, he happened to hear about some dangerous conspiracy and was being hunted. Kertulis happened to pass by and saved him.

After the three witches sensed from the crows and flies that the red dragon was invincible, in order to prevent the little earth spirit from leaking information, they finally used magic to take away his voice.

…

Lann felt nauseous at the thought of this weird way of casting spells.

Roche also moved away from Kayla.

Kayla was furious: "That's not how a warlock casts spells! That's a witch... No, that's a monster!"

"Do you have a way to break this spell?" Lan asked, turning back.

Keira looked troubled. "This is not a system of magic. I can't remove the curse directly, but maybe I can find another way to break it."

“Is it difficult?”

"There might be some damage." Kayla made a small gesture.

The little earth spirit suddenly jumped up, ran left and right, and actually hid under the red dragon's wings.

Lan smiled and shook his head. With a wave of his hand, Kelturis obediently raised his wings to reveal the little earth spirit behind him.

"Don't worry, I have a less brutal way." Lan En comforted him and strode forward to the little earth spirit.

He squatted down and stretched out his left palm: "I have an ability that can heal any injury and remove any curse. It can only be used once on anyone."

"If you believe me, just don't resist for a while, okay?"

No one would believe such words spoken in such an environment. Even if they finally obeyed, they were forced to do so unwillingly.

But the little earth spirits are different. They are natural creatures that can be attracted by the kindness and innocence of children, and they are born with the ability to perceive kindness.

Little Di Ling wrinkled his nose. This blond-haired man seemed more comfortable than the man with a blue turban behind him.

It’s believable!

The little left hand hesitated for a moment, then reached into Lan's palm.

…

There were a great number of magic stones and magic items that could be absorbed looted from the Island of Thanedd. Apart from those needed for Mossack's experiments and those for regular storage, all the rest were absorbed by Lann.

Converted into skill points.

However, Lann did not rashly use them all to level up system skills. After acquiring the two important skills of [Magic Guidance] and [Addiction], the remaining skills would no longer bring him any subversive power growth.

He would rather store these skill points to build the Griffin Cavalry Regiment in the future, or contract a new batch of trained demon hunters and then scatter them around to collect the experience feedback from the [Follower System] in the Cintra Palace.

However, Lann also planned to use it in this way, which was to contract with various strange non-human races and monsters on the continent to share their unique racial talents.

Without asking for an extremely perverted ability like Regis's [Immortal Seed], or a rare ability like Raymond's [Plague Body], even if he had a talent like the Trolls' [Barrier] that could increase physical fitness by a percentage, it would be a terrifying increase when added to Lann's current body.

It’s worth several skills!

Even if you don't have any talents, you can still use the extra followers to do commissions and earn experience, so you won't lose out anyway.

Now Cintra has begun to collect various rare monsters and non-human races openly or secretly, and Lann also plans to make this request at the Cintra Conference where all the northern countries will gather.

Anyway, Cintra is now a country that advocates "racial equality". Its citizens include humans, dryads, elves, dwarves, halflings, dragons and other races. Being more fraternal is in line with its character.

And today's little earth spirit was one of Lann's original contract targets.

This is quite a coincidence.

Click on the system, consume a skill point, and open a new follower panel.

【Follower】——Contract!

The experience value fluctuates and stops when it reaches double-digit levels.

【Follower: Johnny

Race: Little Earth Spirit

Level: 1

Talent: Seeking benefits and avoiding harm

Experience value: 0/1000

Health: 50/50

Mana: 100/100

Inventory: Hibiscus headband, numb shorts

Skills: Jungle Hand, Mischief, Advanced Social, Intermediate Herbalism, Intermediate Mysticism, Low General Knowledge

Mission: None]

[Shared follower talent]

【Shared Talent: Seek Advantages and Avoid Harms】

[Seeking Advantages and Avoiding Harm: The owner of this talent can keenly perceive the underlying thoughts and emotions of others, and is particularly sensitive to extreme kindness and malice.]

…

There is nothing much to say about the attribute base. This is the weakest follower that Lann has currently contracted.

She was even worse than Milva whom she had just met. At that time, the little girl was a wandering hunter who had no food to eat.

But the little earth spirit's talent is very interesting.

Although this [Seeking Advantages and Avoiding Harms] is not a talent for fighting, in human society, this talent can turn people with low emotional intelligence into social experts. For people like Lann who will exercise rule in the future, it is also a powerful tool for selecting subordinates and partners.

After all, no matter how powerful you are, you can still be bothered by rats and termites secretly causing trouble.

On the other hand, the little earth spirit clearly felt that the kindness emanating from Lann was even stronger, and his trust in this good-looking human was even stronger.

A majestic power surged into his body, destroying the other evil and obscure power entrenched in his body with ease.

The little earth spirit suddenly fell to his knees, coughing and retching violently.

A crow suddenly spurted out of the little earth spirit's mouth, covered with saliva and colorful body fluids, followed by countless flies and flying insects.

This strange scene made everyone step back.

"Disgusting!" The little earth spirit screamed even louder, "Too disgusting... Eh? Can I speak now?"

He immediately stopped stepping on the flying insects and hitting the crows and happily began to express his voice like a running mouth.

"Whiskey! Slugs! Bumblebees! Toads! Trash! Scary! Haha! I can talk again!"

The little earth spirit jumped his tongue and feet, and even started dancing around Lann.

He was happy, but for a moment Lann felt as if a hornet's nest had been smashed on his head.

"Okay, okay, little guy." Lann shook his head. "Are you happy now?"

"Ah~ah~thank you, thank you, kind person whose name I don't know." The little earth spirit didn't stop dancing. "My name is Johnny. Thank you so much. I almost thought I would be unable to speak again!"

Lann waved his hand: "I helped you, so we are friends, right? Then are you willing to do a favor for your friend?"

The little earth spirit Johnny suddenly became lost and stopped dancing: "Oh no... Such a beautiful and selfless act of kindness, why must it become an exchange of interests?"

Lann reached out and began to rub Johnny's hair. The touch was surprisingly good. "You should have heard our purpose just now. We plan to deal with the three sisters in the forest. How much information do you know about them?"

"Ah? Those three ugly witches!" The little goblin jumped up again, "Yes, yes, they want to take over the entire forest!"

"Then you should take us to stop them." Lan said with a smile.

…

In a book called "She Who Knows Everything" that is popular among the people of Weilun, there is such a passage:

[Long, long ago, all of Velen was ruled by the Fairy Mother alone. Her daughters would tell her the people's requests and speak for her. Every spring, on the night of the Lady of the Woods' special feast, villagers would offer sacrifices of grain, animals, and people.]

There are local folklorists in Velen who have attempted to study the myths and legends associated with the Lady of the Woods.

They believe that there once existed a fairy mother on the land of Velen - at least in myths, she has always lived alone in Velen, listening to the pleas of the people of Velen and asking them to sacrifice grain, animals, and living people in exchange for blessings to help them through difficult times.

Later, she created three daughters out of mud and water to resolve her loneliness and help her rule Velen. However, she did not expect that the long-term demands of the Velen people would eventually overwhelm her, causing her to fall into despair and madness, and even began to destroy the lives of Velen.

Eventually, the three sisters were unwilling to see their land being trampled upon by their mother's madness, so they worked together to kill their mother on the Sabbath in spring, buried her deep in the Velen Swamp, and continued to bless the people of Velen in their own way.

The above is the research result of folklorists, and it is also the legend recognized and believed by the followers of Velen.

But when later generations read history, they will basically find that contemporary folklorists, when studying legends, always come to conclusions that are completely different from the facts.

This time is no exception.

A dark cloud of crows and flies descended, covering the ground before their eyes.

The three sisters in the forest looked at the giant tree in front of them. Strange blood flowed out from the cracks in the bark, nourishing a huge tumor that was constantly expanding at the bottom.

The weaver licked her lips and said, "It has been sealed for so long, it should be time to eat it, right?"

The cook loosened her fingers and threw a huge wolf head in front of the giant tumor. The giant tumor suddenly jumped violently, as if something was about to burst out of it.

"Why don't you try it and find out? We need to gather every bit of strength to fight against the Ancient Blood!"