Azure Scepter

Page 48

Trier glanced at the little girl through Noe's gaze—for her age, her speech and behavior were far too organized, and given her childlike nature, it was impossible for her to have successfully escaped the blood plague as she was now.

In short, the judge's judgment was spot on; this seemingly weak and pitiful girl was definitely suspicious.

But Trier didn't say much more.

“You have been spotted by Saint Seir. Just touch the little girl and she will become invisible.”

"Saint Seil!? Gaze!? Radiance..."

Noi reached out with trembling hands and gently stroked the little girl's messy, yellow hair, which was covered with frost like a spider web.

"Priest, what are you doing here?" The judge's bald head peeked out from around the corner. "Joler, put down your axe."

The goblin obediently lowered his weapon: "Yes, sir."

The half-elf priest instinctively turned around, but to his astonishment, he found that the little girl had disappeared. He blinked in disbelief, and then discovered that another little girl had suddenly appeared in the cell.

Moreover, the cell door that would make noise if moved was also closed!

"May Saint Seir bless you!" he blurted out instinctively.

“Praise be to Saint Seir,” the female barbarian added casually, dragging a mangled body covered in blood and scorch marks like a vegetable. “You need to eat more. You’re so thin, you’ll probably die if you get the blood plague.”

Suddenly, the person being tortured abruptly raised his head. His eyelidless eyes stared straight to his side, and his mouth slowly parted, revealing a tongue sticking out from behind his withered and broken teeth.

His gaze was fixed on the direction of the little girl who had already disappeared.

Trier, using Noe's sense of smell, sniffed and immediately detected a barely perceptible sulfurous odor. The sulfur concentration was very high; this smell could only come from pure demons.

"This judge is quite something, managing to gather so many strange things in such a small dungeon," Trier thought to himself. "He even has devils."

"What are you looking at!" The female barbarian slapped the tortured man across the face in a fit of rage. "You scum deserve to be in this mess."

"Stop hitting him—Joler, go and gather our men, we have something to do," the judge ordered.

Suddenly, he slowly raised his cold, pale blue eyes and looked at the cell where the little girl was being held. He stared for a moment, then twitched his nose, and then nodded thoughtfully.

The half-elf priest had just breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the judge's reaction, and he immediately began to tremble as if he had been electrocuted, cold sweat dripping onto the floor.

"Tick."

“This is Radiance’s arrangement.” The judge glanced at the key in the priest’s hand and said meaningfully, “This little guy was ordered to be arrested by Bishop Vercingetorius, and I personally have no objection.”

Having said that, the tall and fierce-looking judge left without looking back. In the firelight, his silhouette appeared exceptionally broad, and his gleaming bald head seemed to radiate a sacred light.

The half-elf priest slumped against the wall, clutching his holy symbol, and began to pray earnestly.

Noi breathed a sigh of relief, lowering the heavy, cold spirit flail from her hands. She paused for a few seconds, then sighed with satisfaction. A feeling of lightness and pleasure, like drinking a cold beverage on a hot summer day, washed over Noi after doing a good deed.

A moment later, Noi slowly floated toward the entrance to the laboratory inside the cell.

"boom!"

The ritual that had been operating in secret was instantly activated. A dazzling golden flash streaked across the sky, and Noi's pale, translucent body was instantly illuminated by the lightning like the blazing sun, with faint golden outlines vaguely clinging to the edges of her clothes.

—The entrance to the laboratory has been imbued with a highly lethal anti-spirit ritual!

His vision abruptly cut off, and the next moment, he found himself back in the shadows at the foot of Church Hill.

“Thank goodness Noi can be resurrected…” Trier thought to himself, “but the plan to enter the laboratory directly from the entrance should be considered a failure; we’ll have to rely on digging.”

[XP-1000]

He felt a wave of weakness wash over him, and in the next instant, the winds of death gathered slowly like a vortex, and Noy reappeared before Trier—her face still frozen with the shock of being suddenly attacked.

"It hurts so much." After a long pause, Noi said, feeling extremely aggrieved.

"throat!"

The sudden clanging of metal below interrupted Trier's mechanical digging and his recollection.

Trier pulled out his shovel and peered into the dark cave by the moonlight.

— Sure enough, they dug up a coffin in the mass grave. According to the basic principles of underground construction, as long as they dug through the coffin, they could reach the vertical entrance to the laboratory.

Chapter 88 Sinking

The coffins in the mass grave were naturally very dilapidated, with various colors of wood and metal scraps roughly sewn together like patches sewn onto old clothes.

Trier intended to put down the shovel, remove the coffin first, and then continue digging, but the next moment, Neu's ethereal voice interrupted his actions.

"I'm sorry—may you rest in peace," Noi prayed to the coffin. She lowered her head slightly, her silver hair falling down her temples, her compassionate expression and ethereal voice fleeting in an instant.

After saying that, she picked up the shovel without hesitation and shoveled it hard into the coffin lid.

"Crack!" The shovel blade cleaved the coffin lid like an axe. Covered in putrid mud, the blade continued its momentum. With a dull thud as metal cut through flesh, the corpse inside the coffin and the bottom of the coffin were split in two.

Without even looking, Noi used muscle memory to shovel out the remains of the coffin and the corpse.

This is too brutal... Trier thought to himself.

Out of compassion, Trier glanced at the corpse.

Under the crimson moonlight, the faceless corpse stared at Trier with empty eye sockets. Its scarlet muscle tissue had begun to rot, and the white, clump-like fascia, like tattoos, pieced together into a series of distorted, frenzied characters, as if from a madman.

Just staring at and trying to understand the characters made Trier feel a slight unease.

He frowned involuntarily—it was the language of the Abyss.

"He is a victim of the skinning ritual, which is used to please the demon lord. Judging from the serial number on the character, he should be the third victim—Eraf City is really in chaos. In addition to the Silent Whisperers, there are also members of the demon cult deliberately committing serial murders."

"Given the chaotic nature of demons, this could be a pure coincidence, but it's more likely that it's aimed at Losevie."

"If we take into account the bizarre prisoners in the church's underground prison, then it is reasonable to infer that Rosevie's actions have attracted the attention of many beings in the world, including at least demons and devils."

"This is perfectly reasonable, because before becoming a lich, Lorthevi had extremely serious conflicts and grudges with many extremely powerful evils, and because she betrayed her faith, her enemies are spread across almost all outer planes, including but not limited to Purgatory, the Abyss, the Dream Realm, and the Upper Planes..."

Trier's mind raced, integrating information and analyzing pros and cons—a near-instinctive thought process for him. For him, rational thinking was perfectly natural.

"Their plans for Lorseville are currently in a wait-and-see phase. These entities can all be considered potential allies in a broad sense. Given the right opportunity, they will never give up the chance to eliminate Lorseville."

"If the plan to blockade Earl Harlan's territory, completely embargo grain, and then mobilize the entire Kingdom of Orco fails, then the situation may very well escalate to the point where we have to have a direct and head-on conflict with Losevie. At that time, Losevie's enemies can be used."

"But all of this is predicated on me having basic strength. Just as only a sufficiently heavy weight can shift the balance of a scale, information advantage is merely a lever to amplify strength. The strength I currently possess is far too weak to qualify for the table. I need at least legendary-level combat power and a military force capable of influencing the balance at this stage."

Trier took a deep breath, dispelling the subconscious analysis in his mind. He turned his head away from the corpse and began the final excavation work.

If the speculation and the map are correct, then the area they are standing on should be the storage room of the laboratory, which is relatively safe.

five minutes later--

"Bang!" As the shovel shattered the red-rusted metal ceiling of the underground laboratory, a crack instantly appeared.

Noi struck the crack in the metal with another shovel, and the crack immediately expanded rapidly like a shattered eggshell, with metal mixed with dark dirt spilling down the crack.

After a while, the sound of metal particles colliding with metal could be heard sporadically from inside the crack.

"Success!" Noi thought to herself with joy. She couldn't wait to put down the shovel, take out the Holy Symbol, and cast a Flash spell on the crack.

Dazzling white lights, like fireflies in summer, emerged from her fingertips, suddenly illuminating the path.

Trier stood on the gentle slope of the excavation pit, peering down.

Beneath the ceiling covered in scarlet rust was a vast, deep space. By observing the shadows refracted by the light spell, one could vaguely see some distinct metal platforms, with rust appearing and disappearing along the metal edges like veins.

Bottomless.

"Thud." A piece of ceiling fell to the floor, the sound hollow and distant.

A faint rustling sound could be heard coming from the areas where the light spell couldn't reach.

Five seconds passed before the fragment fell.

“At least 122.5 meters.” Trier calculated the height of the laboratory almost instinctively. “There was no smell of malt or decay in the air, only a very faint metallic smell, which proved that the laboratory was well ventilated and there should be no toxic gases inside—but it’s still better to be prepared.”

With this thought in mind, Trier first had Noy cast a "delay poisoning" spell on him, then without hesitation ordered Noy to go down and scout ahead...

Noy sighed deeply, gave Trier a rather resentful look, then floated back to the top of the excavation pit, took out a climbing rope from her backpack, and after attaching the rope, jumped down into the crack.

A few minutes later--

“It’s safe here. This seems to be some kind of storage room. Wait, I found a record with square characters that I don’t recognize…” Trier heard Noy’s voice in his mind.

Upon hearing Noy's report, he did not rush down. Instead, he activated his senses sharing first. After confirming that there were no problems, he drew his dagger, which was suitable for fighting in confined spaces, and climbed down the rope.

The metal walls exuded a cold chill, and as Trier climbed downwards, the ground receded into the distance, while the crimson moonlight slowly faded away.

“The walls are curved; this is definitely a storage room,” he thought.

As he continued to sink, Trier keenly sensed an eerie feeling, a chilling sensation spreading across his back, the coldness like sharp black fingernails tightly gripping his heart. He even felt a chill run down his spine.

"Master? Are you alright?" Noi asked.

Trier did not answer. He took a deep breath, quietly feeling the changes in his body, and then suppressed the instinctive physiological reactions of these creatures when faced with a faint threat.

He knew very well that this unease was normal—when a high concentration of death winds lingered in a narrow space for a long time, that space would be permanently tainted by the death winds, and any living being would have an instinctive physiological reaction when faced with such a space that had been thoroughly eroded and corrupted by the death winds.

In gaming terms, if a creature doesn't pass a difficult will exemption, it will immediately enter a state of terror.

He continued climbing downwards. Noy's light spell propelled him down quickly, and he had already landed on the ground, plunging the surroundings into darkness. Trier squinted, only then noticing that certain sections of the metal wall were perforated, the gaps in front of him filled with thick spiderwebs.

Some kind of rotten and grotesque eight-legged worms were crawling in the spider web like severed fingers—the rustling sound just now came from them.

"The spider corrupted by the winds of death, the fact that it wasn't killed, proves that the laboratory is relatively safe, and there are no undead guards inside that have been given the order to purge all intruders." Trier gazed thoughtfully at these strange creatures.

From a certain perspective, these things can be considered magical beasts, and they are of great value for dissection and research.

After climbing down for about five minutes, Trier saw Noy again and the white flashes of light on the ground. The silver metal floor was covered with a thick layer of dust, indicating that no one had set foot here for a long time.

Trier landed quietly on the ground, immediately drew his longsword, and warily scanned his surroundings.

This is a deathly silent storage room, where towering storage shelves stand quietly in the darkness like pilgrimage-bound giant monks.

—This place is relatively safe for now.

Trier breathed a sigh of relief.

"There's quite a lot of stuff," he thought to himself.

“Master, this is the record with Chinese characters written on it.” Noi took out an old piece of paper and handed it over.

Trier took the paper; it was severely aged, its yellowish surface covered with fine creases. The paper's worn texture even made him suspect that it would crumble to dust with the slightest pressure.

He used the light from the flash spell to look at the notebook.

The notebook had a sentence written plainly in Chinese: "It's safe here. I've installed a lighting system here. I've placed the switch for the lighting system on the left side of the table. The activation command is 'Sesame, sesame, turn on the light quickly.'"

P.S.: Guys, even though I've already lost all credibility, I still want to say that I have one last paper this semester. Once I finish it, I can start updating properly again, probably around the beginning of July. /facepalm

Chapter 89 Fate Box

Looking at the yellowed, tattered paper in his hand, Trier couldn't help but think to himself, "This instruction to turn on the lighting system is too strange."

He looked up and handed the paper back to Noe.

"Is this some kind of lost and powerful magic recorded on it?" Noi carefully took the paper and asked with great curiosity.

Trier remained silent, slowly walking towards the table beside the other man, longsword in hand. He took a deep breath, then spoke in Chinese at top speed: "Sesame, sesame, turn on the light!"

Echoes reverberated through the vast underground space, surrounded by towering, silent, curved metal walls.

It seems nothing happened.

Trier looked up, squinting slightly, at the entrance he had come from. The entrance wasn't small, but the vast vertical distance made it appear almost like a dot radiating a red glow. At that moment, he suddenly felt as if he were in a trench ten thousand meters deep, the oppressive and claustrophobic feeling emanating from the towering, dark walls being the omnipresent water pressure.

The echo gradually faded into nothingness, and just as he was about to grit his teeth and recite "Sesame, sesame, turn on the light quickly" in Common Language, a beam of starlight-like, silvery-white light suddenly fell from the dome.

During his climb, one of the distinct metal platforms that Trier saw suddenly lit up.

Bright light spilled from the edge of the platform, its dim glow enveloped by a faint halo, making it resemble a star in the night sky against the backdrop of the curved black metal wall.

The first platform to be lit seemed to be a signal; the next instant, another silver-gray light appeared, followed by another, and in the blink of an eye, countless lights were illuminated. They shimmered, their light like dazzling starlight adorning the dark, curved wall like a night sky.

The dazzling silver-gray light illuminated everything, and the dreamy starlight sprinkled on the ground, instantly dispelling the oppressive feeling of the storage room.

“This is…a summer star map?” Noi stared blankly up at the sky, her red eyes sparkling with curiosity like the brightest crystals. “Glow, it’s so beautiful.”

As Noe spoke, millions of silver-gray dots began to rotate precisely and orderly. Trier then realized that the curved walls on both sides were covered with tracks and gears; these walls were movable. Under this dazzling artificial canopy, he and Noe appeared exceptionally small.

Suddenly, a cobalt blue message flashed across Trier's eye.

[Unknown magical device successfully activated]

[XP+500]

[You have been affected by the magical device "The Starry Sky Above".]