547 - 555
Chapter 547: New World (1)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
Two hours later.
A ball of red flames was released from the sandstorm that was in front of the caravan. Angele recreated his body next to a bull.
The door of the carriage was opened right after Angele returned to the caravan, revealing Fir's face.
"Master Green, how's the situation?"
Angele smiled and nodded. "I found the entrance. Inform everyone that we need to start moving. The tunnel won't last for too long and doesn't appear often, so we need to travel through it as soon as possible."
"Sure, I'll let the elders know. They are sitting in different carriages with their relatives so I only need to inform them about the situation." Fir looked relieved.
Angele jumped into the carriage and closed the door. The door of the carriage was protected by a wind-blocking spell. It was quiet inside the carriage but he could still see the furious sandstorm through the window.
He sat down by the window and grabbed the fruit wine from the table. The wine was slightly spicy and warmed his body up quickly.
Fir lowered his left hand and nodded. It seemed like she already sent the message out.
"Let's get moving then." Angle tapped on the table using his finger.
*MOO*
The bull started pulling the carriage forward slowly.
The caravan traveled at full speed for several hours and charged into the tunnel that was opened by Angele.
The place suddenly became silent after the caravan rushed into the tunnel. The wind and the sand were no longer making any noise.
The carriages were connected by a green chain, advancing in the tunnel at full speed.
"That's the secret path you talked about?" Fir looked out of the window, surprised.
"Yeah… I found this path by accident," Angele responded calmly.
He peeked through the closed window and saw that the carriage was surrounded by gray clouds.
The deeper they advanced, the darker the clouds became. It felt like the caravan was traveling through a tunnel made of clouds.
The dark clouds were boiling around the caravan, but none entered the tunnel.
They advanced for around ten hours.
Angele suddenly grabbed a wooden cup from the table and threw it out of the window.
*CHI*
The wooden cup hit the dark clouds and sank into it, but nothing happened.
"Inform the other carriages, we're already inside the tornado. Tell them not to touch the clouds or they'll be devoured by the wind," Angele spoke in a deep tone.
Fir nodded, she was a white robe that had already mastered the communication technique. The energy waves were interrupted by the strong tornado but she could still contact other wizards. She could even do a better job than Angele, which helped a lot as no one needed to leave the carriages to receive messages.
The woman tapped on the table using her fingers and released some white energy waves. It only took her several minutes to finish the job.
"Keep advancing and increase the speed!" Angele ordered.
The speed of the carriages started increasing slowly and the noises made by the wheels were getting louder.
**********************
Vivian was sitting by the window, staring at the dark clouds.
"I can sense the great power around me; if the energy waves explode, they can easily destroy the whole caravan." There was a serious expression on Vivian's face. "I wonder how Green found this secret path."
"I don't know, but I trust him." The First Elder was holding a diamond-shaped badge in his hand.
"Without this tunnel, it's nearly impossible for us to survive the sandstorm. The energy waves from the tornado have the same power level has a spell casted by a rank 2 wizard and they are coming from everywhere. I can probably survive one glass hour in this environment. The three wizard lords didn't find a secret path like this so they failed to explore the tornado," he spoke in a low voice.
"You're right." Vivian nodded. "I wonder how long this tunnel is. Make sure that no one leaves the carriages. The carriages are protected by defensive spells, they'll last for a while even if something unfortunate happens. Also, pay attention to the chains, it'll be a disaster if they break."
A white robe beside her nodded; the wizard was sending messages to other carriages. The energy waves the wizard released looked identical to the ones released by Fir.
"The Second Elder said that the chain has been reinforced. Don't worry."
"Good, then." Vivian nodded. "Keep an eye on the surroundings. Although Green said everything should be fine, we still need to be careful.
The white robe nodded.
**********************
The carriages were connected by a green string, advancing at full speed in the tunnel. The path ahead was dark and the green light around the carriages was the only source of light.
Time passed, no one knew how long they had been advancing for. The color of the clouds ahead finally turned from black to light gray.
The noise made by the wind was not as loud as before.
In the leading carriage.
Fir looked surprised. "Are we on the other side yet?"
"Not yet." Angele shook his head. "We're reaching the end of the tunnel. The area ahead is the sandstorm area of the tornado but we've moved past the dangerous part and the wind won't be too bad."
"That'd be great." Fir quickly informed the carriages behind.
Angele heard people from other carriages cheering after the message was sent out.
"I hope everything goes as planned." Fir sounded relieved.
"Everything will go as planned, don't worry," Angele interrupted. "This secret path helped me survive during the war. If not for it, I would already have been dead."
"You're lucky if that's true," Fir joked.
"I'm always lucky."
The carriages' speed increased as they left the tunnel, charging into the endless sand.
The strong sand started hitting the carriages hard again loudly.
Angele noticed there were evil energy waves behind them as they left the tunnel.
The energy waves had the power level of a rank 6 wizard and were hard to detect. The one who released the energy waves was hiding in the dark and it seemed like he was trying to find the best chance to ambush the caravan.
Angele's expression turned cold as red light flashed around his eyes. He released some black smoke from his right ear and the smoke moved through the window, charging to the source of the evil energy waves.
*ROAR*
The force field was so strong that the monster hiding in the sand was having trouble handling the pressure.
The monster looked like a dog with three eyes and was more than ten meters tall. A scorpion that was formed by some black smoke was roaring above the monster's head.
"I'll devour you if you get closer!" The scorpion released some terrifying energy waves and the monster could barely move under the pressure.
The monster trembled and slowly started stepping away. Its eyes were closed and there was blood running out of them. Finally, the monster left the effective range of Angele's force field, turned around, and disappeared into the sandstorm.
The smoke scorpion collapsed and returned to Angele's ear.
"The elders said that they heard something." Fir suddenly opened her mouth.
Angele smiled and explained, "Don't worry. It's normal here. I also heard strange noises the last time I was here."
"Alright, I'll send a message to the elders." Fir nodded.
**********************
Three days later.
A smile appeared on Angele's face as he noticed that the sandstorm was getting weaker and weaker.
The noise made by the wheels and the wind mixed together but it was no longer loud.
Angele stood up and opened the window.
Some warm golden light appeared in front of the carriage.
"The sunlight!" Fir woke up from the meditation. She looked relieved after seeing the golden light.
"We're finally out!"
"You're right, finally, we're free!" Angele nodded.
*MOO*
The bull shouted. It seemed like the creature noticed that the area in the front was warm and safe. The bull charged forward and its speed was increasing gradually.
*BAM*
It felt like that the carriage went through an energy barrier.
The noise that bothered them for weeks disappeared. There was no noise from the wheels nor the wind. Angele could hear birds twittering and the area looked peaceful.
The golden light in his sight was getting intense.
Angele narrowed his eyes slightly and it took him a while to get used to the light.
There was a land that was covered with green grass in front of the caravan and there were small hills on it. The land looked like a large soft blanket.
The land was endless and there were white flowers mixed in the grass. Several black eagles were soaring through the sky. Angele could smell the fragrance of flowers and grass in the air.
The caravan slowly stopped, he jumped off the carriage and rubbed the ground.
The texture of the mud was wet and warm. Several ants climbed up his finger and moved around his hand. He could also feel the tiny stones in the soft mud.
Angele grabbed some mud and his finger turned brown. He put his finger into his mouth; the mud was bitter and fishy for some reason.
'Comparing the soil… Energy content lower than average… The energy content in the soil of the central continent is 24 times stronger.' Rows of data were displayed in Angele's sight.
'The man didn't lie. The soil here is bad…" Angele stood up and glanced around. He was surprised by what he just saw.
On the far right of the land, there was an enormous gray scale standing quietly on the ground.
The scale was more than 3000 meters tall and looked like a mountain with its top in the clouds; also, there were several white birds rotating around the scale.
"Oh my…"
More and more people got off the carriages. They also saw the gray scale on the far side and they were all surprised. The scene was so strange that no one knew what to say.
"Who would build a scale like that for no reason?" The First Elder wondered. The Second Elder and Vivian were standing beside him. They were speechless after seeing the scale.
Chapter 548: New World (2)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
"It might be the giants from the tales," the Second Elder spoke in a low voice. "They are probably related to the tea pots and vases we saw earlier."
"You might be right but this scale is too large even for the giants…" The First Elder looked surprised as he stared at the scale.
"There's another one there!" one of the wizards shouted.
They looked in the direction that the voice came from and found another humongous gray scale on the far left.
Angele glanced around but the only thing he could see was the green grass. There were no strangers around.
He applied some force to his feet and flew into the air.
Angele flew for a while and started observing the area. He noticed that the grass on the ground was slowly turning yellow.
The color turned from light green to dark green and from dark green to bright yellow. It seemed like the color of the grass was changing under the sunlight.
The color was shifting back and forth between green and bright yellow.
Angele's brow furrowed as he started landing.
"Calm down, everyone. I think something is a bit off," he shouted and tried to calm the crowd down.
The crowd slowly stopped talking and they all looked at Angele. "Master Green, did you find anything?" Mike stepped forward, it seemed like the wizards considered him as the representative.
Angele shook his head. "I didn't find anything, but I think something is missing in the air…"
The First Elder walked to Angele and nodded. "We noticed that too. Vivian and Second Elder checked the situation. They had a similar conclusion. This is probably not our destination. Although the radiation energy is weak here, the energy movements are unpredictable. It means that only a few creatures will be able to live here. This is not an ideal environment for human beings."
Angele nodded. "I agree with what First Elder just said. This is not the destination. Turn your heads around and observe carefully."
They all turned their heads around and started observing.
All they could see was a land that was covered with green grass, there was no trace of the tornado. It was almost like that the tornado was never there.
Mike had a strange expression on the face. "The tornado is gone… Will we be able to go back to the central continent in the future?"
They looked at Angele as they heard Mike's words. Angele was the one that brought them to this area and they assumed that Angele knew the answer.
"I don't know." Angele shook his head. "I think the scales are the answer to the secret. We should check them out."
"I agree." The First Elder nodded.
"The color of the grass is changing," one of the wizards shouted.
"The grass was green but it's golden now…" Vivian crouched and pulled some grass.
*CHI*
The grass turned into gray dust in the wind right after it was pulled off the ground.
"It doesn't matter. Let's head to the scales," Angele spoke in a deep tone. "Get on the carriages, everyone."
They returned to the carriages and the bulls started heading to the scale that the closest to the caravan.
The bulls were extremely high in Stamina, they just needed to be fed once every couple of months. The bulls were perfect for long travels and relatively fast when compared to normal creatures. They could run as fast as a human knight.
*************************
The sky was blue and the golden sunlight shined upon the top of the mountain. The green grass glowed under the sunlight.
On top of the hill, there was an enormous scale that was over 3000 meters tall. The scale was black and it looked like that the scale was made of pieces of rocks. Its surface was covered with tiny cracks and green moss. It seemed like the scale had been standing here for years.
The two dishes hanging on both sides of the scale were balanced, they were not leaning at all.
*GA GA*
A white shadow passed through the blue sky, it was a bird with no head making some strange noises. The bird slowly landed on the left dish and started drinking water from it.
*MOO*
The caravan slowly stopped by the scale; the bulls were still mooing.
The carriages were all painted in black and were barely noticeable by the scale. They looked like tiny black dots when compared to it.
A ball of red light was released from the first carriage and the light ball was flying up.
The light ball had the shape of an egg and was translucent. There were red flames burning inside the ball; it slowly landed on the edge of the left dish and turned into a human being.
It was a man in a black robe who had long red hair. The man's skin was pale and there was a confident expression on his face. It was Angele, who decided to check the situation alone.
Angele stood on the edge of the dish and looked at the water. The dish had a diameter of over 300 meters and it almost looked like a lake. The golden sunlight was reflected in the shimmering water and the wind was blowing gently.
There were several white birds with no head standing on the edge of the dish, drinking water using their necks.
*CHI CHI*
Angele heard the noise coming from the other side and quickly checked the source of the noise. A ball of white fog landed on the other dish, it was the Second Elder.
Angele quickly activated the communication rune; he could hear the Second Elder's voice echoing in his ears.
"Green, did you find anything?"
Angele shook his head and responded, "No, the only thing I can see here is some water. What about you?"
The Second Elder replied in a strange tone, "Well, I found a huge pattern here. I've never seen anything like this. I'll show it to you."
An egg-shaped white light screen appeared in front of Angele's body after the Second Elder finished his words. A strange red pattern was displayed on the light screen.
The pattern looked like a circle with two triangles on its top. Inside the circle, there were countless runes that weren't following any particular order. There were strings, triangles, squares, insects, creatures, and human beings. Some of the runes were simple but most of them were complicated.
Angele narrowed his eyes and observed the pattern carefully. He felt like that he had seen it somewhere.
Vivian's voice came from the light screen. "I have no idea what this pattern is. The runes inside circle don't make any sense…"
The First Elder also joined the conversation. "I think those are just random runes that have no actual meaning. I'll show them to the other wizards. Wait a bit."
Some wizards failed to reach higher ranks but they might know more. The wizards who explored different areas of the world usually knew more about information like this so they just started waiting for the First Elder's response.
Angele could hear other people talking through the light screen.
He started thinking as his brow furrowed. Some blue light flashed in front of his eyes and it seemed like the biochip reminded him of something.
"I've seen a similar pattern in some random books. The pattern has no actual meaning, however, it's used for explaining and sharing certain information."
"Huh?" The First Elder was a bit surprised, he did not expect Angele to know the things that they had never seen.
"What is the pattern trying to explain then? Maybe it's related to the scale?"
"That's possible." Angele nodded.
Vivian agreed, "Yeah, those runes are not releasing any energy waves, that might be the only explanation."
"Who's there?!" someone suddenly shouted below, it seemed like they found something.
Angele and the Second Elder jumped off the dishes immediately. They were dropping at full speed but they landed on the ground without any problem.
Mike and two male black robes surrounded a strange human-shaped creature in the center. They were standing on the empty ground by the carriages.
The wizards already prepared their magic devices, the magic devices were glowing. It seemed like they could be activated at any time.
"What happened?"
The crowd led by the First Elder gathered around them. Angele and the Second Elder also approached them.
They had a clear view of the person that was surrounded by the wizards.
The man was strange. He was wearing a gray linen outfit, and his head was a large magnifier, its glass slightly curved.
The man looked just like a normal male human besides the magnifier head.
"Don't kill me! Please!" The mentality waves the man released were sending the message to the wizards around.
The man shook his head and the wizards' faces reflected on the magnifier.
The First Elder moved closer to the man and asked the wizards not to cast the spells.
"Who're you? Are you a resident of this area?" he questioned using the mentality wave.
Using mentality waves to trade messages was a basic technique, however, only simple messages could be delivered through the mentality wave. The technique was still used by some old races with strong mentality.
The man calmed down after he received the First Elder's message. "I'm a magnifier man… the ritual… is not my fault…"
He pointed at the First Elder and then pointed at the scale behind him.
"A ritual?" Vivian noticed that the man said that word when he was pointing at the scale. "Do you mean that the scale is used for a ritual?"
However, it seemed like the man did not understand the sentence.
Vivian repeated the sentence using mentality waves but the man just pointed at the scale.
"Exchange… Ritual… You…!" he suddenly shouted and the wizards were a bit surprised.
"It disappears…"
"Disappeared?" Vivian and the First Elder exchanged eye contact. "Maybe the scale has the ability to start a certain ritual. The things in the circle refer to the things that can be sacrificed and that's why there are many things in it. I think that the scale can be activated using a sacrificial ritual and it will teleport us somewhere else."
"I think you're right." Angele suddenly opened his mouth; his eyes were covered by red glow. He checked the magnifier man's memory and acquired random pieces of information. The portal could only be activated through the ritual.
"Let's give it a try."
"Sure, let me try the portal." Vivian flew to the left dish right away.
"What should we use as the offering then?" Fthe irst Elder wondered.
"I have a magical heart here." Angele took out a gray heart from the mirror; the heart was still pumping.
Chapter 549: New World (3)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
He flew to the right dish and threw the black heart onto it after Vivian landed safely on the left dish.
*KA*
The heart landed on the dish without any problem.
The whole scale suddenly leaned to the left, it seemed like the left dish was heavier than the right one.
Angele was surprised after he saw the black heart disappear from the dish. The heart left no trace behind.
"Does it mean that the two things on the dishes must be equal?"
"Green, try this!" The First Elder's voice came from below.
A red shadow flew to Angele, then rotated in the air and slowly flew into Angele's hand.
It was a red arm that was skinned. Angele could see the muscle and the tendon clearly.
He had no time to check the arm so he just threw the arm onto the right dish.
*KA*
The scale shook slightly and regained the balance quickly but it was leaning to the right slightly. It seemed like the arm was more valuable than Vivian.
A strong but cold mentality wave surrounded Angele.
"Do you want to start the teleportation?"
"What are you?" Angele was excited after he heard the voice.
"Where will the scale teleport her to?" He wondered.
"Start the teleportation now?" The mentality wave questioned again, the voice was emotionless.
Angele narrowed his eyes as blue light dots flashed in front of his eyes.
'Analyzing the mentality wave… Target unknown… Not logical… Not intelligent… It's a generated question…' Zero's mechanical voice echoed in his ears.
"So, I have to say yes or no…" Angele muttered as he looked at the left dish. Vivian was floating in the air and she nodded after noticing that Angele was staring at her.
"Start the teleportation or not?" the mentality wave repeated.
"Start," Angele answered.
*WOO*
The sky turned silver-gray for a second but it returned to normal quickly.
Angele saw that Vivian's body was surrounded by a ball of gray fog; she disappeared along with the fog.
"She's gone?" Angele quickly checked the situation using the biochip and blue light dots appeared in front of his eyes.
On the left side of his sight, rows of data were refreshing. Angele could see the information like the density of the energy, the dimension movement, the radiation density, and the movement of the air. The data was being calculated constantly.
'How safe was the teleportation?' Angele questioned.
'The teleportation was extremely safe. The success rate was 99.985%,' the biochip responded immediately.
Angele checked the number of the dimension movement, the number was so large that Vivian had to be teleported to somewhere far from this area.
"Vivian's mentality sigil is still active! The place must be safe!" the First Elder said loudly.
The magnifier man started talking again, "Disappear… many people… just like you!"
The Second Elder's brow furrowed. "Is he trying to tell us that there are many people like us on the other side?"
"That's the only possibility." The First Elder nodded. "This area doesn't feel like the inside of a tornado or the other side of the tornado. It felt like a random dimension fissure and my guess is probably right. An ancient scale like this can only be found in dimension fissures. I think the scales were built for the giants."
"It's highly possible." The Second Elder nodded in agreement. "First Elder, should we use the scale too?"
"Let's do it. It's impossible for us to return to the central continent now and this area just makes me anxious for some reason. We should leave now. There are many human beings on the other side and we should be able to rebuild our organization there." The First Elder finished his words and looked at the other people.
"What do you think? Should we stay here or teleport to the other side?"
"We should teleport to the other side, this is not even a question." Mike stepped forward.
"The children in the team aren't feeling well after we traveled through the tunnel. I think the radiation here is not just from the energy particles and mortals will be hurt if they stay here for too long. However, I don't think we can just trust the magnifier man like this."
"It's easy. I have a spell that can test if he's telling the truth, I've already cast it on him." Angele slowly landed on the ground. "I can guarantee that he's telling the truth." He checked the magnifier man's memory and saw the scene on the other side. It was a glowing cave with human beings living inside. The scene was nice and peaceful.
"That's it then. We should teleport together. Second Elder, Mike, and I will protect the mortals. We should protect them using a metal barrier or an ice barrier so that they won't take too much radiation. Fir and Green, help take care of the children. Also, please put the offerings on the right dish."
The First Elder waved his right hand and a black leather bag dropped into Fir's hand. "These are the limbs of energy creatures I collected. I wanted to use them for lab materials, however, I think this is a better time to use them."
The Second Elder threw a red leather bag to Fir as well. "I have some materials that I don't need too."
The other wizards all handed the materials that they could spare to Angele and Fir. They needed a large number of materials as offerings.
They could not keep the carriages and the bulls. The wizards stored everything they needed in the rings and their relatives to the left dish.
It took them around ten minutes to take all the mortals to the dish that was several hundred meters high.
Angele and Fir flew to the right dish. Angele was the one who dropped the offering.
The mentality started questioning Angele again after he dropped everything on the dish.
"Start the teleportation or not?"
Angele led Fir to the left dish and landed by the wizards who were prepared for the teleportation. He exchanged eye contact with the First Elder and opened his mouth. "Start now."
*WOO*
Angele suddenly heard something ringing in his ears.
It felt like that his body was pulled like noodle and then slowly returned to the normal form. Some bright-silver light blinded Angele's eyes and it felt like that his body was soaked in some strange liquid.
Angele had no idea how long had passed when the silver light disappeared.
There was a black wall right in front of him; the wall was bumpy and there were glowing mushrooms on its surface.
Angele glanced around, he noticed that he was standing on a white platform with the team. There was a large white stone wall behind him and the engraving on the wall looked like a large scale.
The other walls in the cave were black and there was a narrow path in front of them. By the end of the path, there was white light coming from outside.
Vivian was resting on the path with her eyes closed.
The crowd got noisy after several seconds.
"Is everyone doing fine?" The First Elder swung his hands and released some green light. The mortals and wizards at lower ranks were quickly relieved from the pain caused by the energy radiation.
"I'm fine, First Elder."
"I'm good but my muscles are sour."
Mike crouched by a girl with silver hair; he was checking the girl's condition carefully.
"The children are recovering, which means, the area with the scales was the problem."
"Sounds good." The First Elder was satisfied with the result.
Vivian noticed the presence of the team and quickly walked to them.
"I was waiting for you. I checked the surroundings and found that this was just a normal cave. There is a forest and some small hills around. Also, I found a town that's occupied by humans on the left. I checked the energy movement and I'm certain that there was no wizard here. Actually, the density of energy particles here is low, that's very strange."
Vivian's brow furrowed.
"There are over 10 000 people in the town but I didn't find any wizard apprentice and knights here, which means, those people are all mortals."
The First Elder's brow furrowed as well. "That's not good news. Are you sure that you didn't find any knight? Who's protecting the town then?"
"There are swordsmen and normal knights that are not releasing any energy waves but they are still mortals," Vivian explained. "Also, I checked the elementals here."
Raising her hand, Vivian released an oval mirror in the air. Inside the mirror, there was a translucent vortex and there were a few colorful strings in the vortex.
Angele observed the vortex carefully, he noticed that there were only red, blue, and green strings in the vortex.
"Fire, life energy, and water… Those are the only energy particles in the air here. Also, the density is so low that I can barely see the strings." Blue light dots flashed in Angele's eyes. He did the comparison and the energy density in the central continent was 100 times the energy density here.
"That's why there's no knights and wizards here. Alright, let's leave the cave first." There was a serious expression on the First Elder's face as he left the cave first.
The rest of the wizards all had their brows furrowed. The low energy density would be good for the mortals but the spells they cast would be much weaker than before. They had to rely on the energy particles that were stored in their bodies, however, it would be hard for them to collect the energy particles in the air. It was a terrible news to the wizards who enjoyed doing research.
It would not be a problem to Angele, he was a wizard that followed the ancient wizard's path and he could still rely on the refined true form. Although he could not sense the Nightmare Realm here, the pressure from the realm power had already disappeared after the two realms contacted.
The only problem was that the realm power here was barely noticeable due to the low energy density. It was the first time that he found a place that was weaker than the west coast. In such an environment, it would be nearly impossible for them to build a portal that could teleport them back to the central continent.
Wizards' power came from the energy particles, without enough energy particles, they would never be able to build a strong portal.
Although Angele had a huge amount of energy from the negative emotions, he would not build a portal using the power of the souls and the negative emotions.
Chapter 550: Research and Exploration (1)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
The rain was heavy.
There were some small white houses on the empty ground among the vibrant green trees. The white houses looked like white flowers lying on a large green blanket and formed a line; they looked a bit blurry in the rain, but one could tell that they were all well organized.
There was a cave with its entrance blocked by some vines on a hill by the town. The vines were removed and a group of people wearing either black or white robes stepped out of the cave. The raindrops were hitting their robes hard—the noise was quite loud.
Angele overlooked the town below the hill through the gaps between the leaves.
"That's the town you talked about, mother? It's a good idea to stay in the town for now."
The First Elder was walking in front of the team.
"This is the closest town we can find; we can study the scale when we have time. The only problem is the density of energy particles. Green, thank you for finding us a safe place to live." He nodded.
"It's my pleasure. My mother and I are both members of the Elemental Hand. I'm doing it for the organization," Angele responded politely. He glanced at Vivian and noticed that she was smiling.
"Alright, let's build some wooden houses here, we can check the situation of the town. We need to learn more about the environment." The First Elder and the Second Elder started giving orders to other wizards in the team.
The wizards were asked to find the safest area around, purchase daily supplies, and learn about the local language. There were also wizards securing food and water sources. Also, numerous runes were set up as an alarm.
The wizards all had their own missions, including Fir.
Although the First Elder did not ask Angele to do anything, he still decided to help Mike, who was asked to find a safe place for the wooden houses.
He walked down the hill in the rain and started rethinking the whole thing.
He wanted to make sure that the Elemental Hand could leave the central continent safely and live a peaceful life with his mother. Angele's life expectancy was long and he wanted to spend as much time as he could with his mother, however, he still needed to find a way to strengthen himself.
Angele stepped on the grass. He was not actually trying to find a safe location, he was just thinking about the future with his brow furrowed.
'The Nightmare Realm will be separated from the wizard world sooner or later. I need to find a way to keep my ability to activate my refined true form. Without the power of the Nightmare Realm, I'll be restricted by the realm power again…'
Angele glanced at Mike and the other wizard, they were all checking the surroundings in the forest.
'This is my chance. I left the central continent with the organization and I'm far from the central continent. I can't be dragged into countless wars by the sealed forms. The realm power of the wizard world will continue to pressure me and weaken me after the Nightmare Realm left.'
He knew the situation well.
'If I want to solve the problem, I'll need to find out the real reason why the realm power is pressuring me and how it works… Maybe I should collect some creatures from other realms and see what happens…' he continued to think.
'Zero, create a research subject and name it as Realm Power,' he ordered.
'Mission created… Collecting data… No information related to realm power is found… Do you want to increase the search range?' Zero responded.
'No. Pause the mission but update the progress when new data is collected,' Angele responded. Everything returned to normal after some blue light dots flashed in front of his eyes.
Mike waved at Angele by a river and shouted, "Hey, I found a good place here! The river is nice and we can collect some food around it!"
Angele and the other wizard quickly walked to the river.
The twisted river was running down broken pieces of black stones like a white blanket. The grass and bushes by the river were vibrant and clean. Everything in the area was refreshing.
Angele jumped onto a rock and pointed at the river.
However, the flow of the river barely changed and Angele was surprised.
"Right, I forgot that the density of energy particles here is way too low…" Shaking his head, Angele smiled.
"I was thinking about this too…" There was a bitter smile on Mike's face. His robe was soaked in water as he failed to block the splashes. "We relied too much on spells when dealing with basic things. What do you think, Air?"
The other wizard was a female white robe; there was a black scar on her neck. The scar looked like a centipede and it changed Angele's first impression of the woman. "It's understandable. The wizards of the central continent made the spells more practical by casting them to help with our daily lives. It's a way to improve ourselves." She stopped for a second and continued, "I'm a rank 2 wizard who focuses on water spells but I can barely gather the water on my palm without using the energy particles in my body."
She pointed at the river, a string of water left the river and flew to the woman. The water string turned into a small ball of water quickly.
"In the central continent, if I release an energy-infused water string like this, I can easily destroy a small army. However, there's barely anything I can do here…."
Mike tried to calm Air down, however, he looked a bit helpless. They started cutting down the trees by the river. They wanted to create an empty ground here for the wooden houses.
Angele helped them as well. Without casting any spells, they cut down the trees using their physical strength. Angele's attributes were much higher than the other wizards' so he decided to cut down the trees by himself and asked the other two wizards to build the wooden houses.
The rain slowly stopped after a while. The golden sunlight pierced through the dark clouds and landed in the forest. It was bright but still cold.
Angele quickly cut down numerous trees as he thought about the realm power. An empty ground was created without any problem.
He tried to cast spells, however, a rank 2 damage spell in the central continent only had the power of a rank 1 apprentice here. The spell could barely do anything, it felt like that the wizards were two ranks lower than they were here.
The good thing was that Angele's power came from the bloodlines or he would be greatly impacted too. He felt like he was just a strong rank 1 wizard here and would have trouble recovering after using up all the energy particles in his body.
Most of the wizards decided to save the energy particles for critical situations and were using their hands to collect the things they needed.
The wizards were much stronger than mortals so they would not get tired easily. It only took them a couple hours to build more than 20 wooden houses by the river.
The wooden houses spread on the empty ground; they looked like large cubes. The wizards also built fences around the houses.
"That's all we can do for now. We can build better houses later if we decide to stay here for a longer period." Mike was satisfied with the small town they built and quickly sent the signal to the team.
Several minutes later, the other people brought the food they collected here. They also caught some wild boars and chickens. The wizards who went to the town returned with basic tools and condiments. They also learned the local language through some special spells.
The elemental spells were weakened but the spells that would affect people's mind were still usable. The wizards acquired the knowledge of the language without any problem.
The three elders were still in the town, they wanted to learn more about the environment.
There were around 20 people in Elemental Hand's team; they entered the wooden houses and retrieved their items from the magic devices. Also, they put their names on the houses that they selected.
Some of the wizards modified the houses to the way they liked.
Angele selected a house that was close to the forest and waited for the elders to come back.
The three elders finally came back following the signals left by the wizards when the sun started setting.
Vivian had a short conversation with others and walked to Angele's house. Angele stepped out of his house to welcome his mother before she knocked on the door.
"Vivian, how's the situation here? I only visited the dimension fissure the last time I traveled through the tornado and it's my first time here," Angele questioned.
They entered the wooden house together and sat down in the wooden chairs.
"We haven't talked in a while. Too many things happened." Vivian grabbed the cup from the table and sipped some water. "The water is not polluted by the energy radiation and tastes great."
Angele peeked through the wooden window, the wizards all returned to their houses with their relatives. The Elemental Hand finally found a peaceful place to settle down. The members decided to live in this town they created with their families.
The First Elder and the Second Elder were talking with Fir but Angele was not sure what they were talking about. Outside the fences, the trees were marked with glowing red runes that would alert the wizards if anything happened.
"We're safe now. What's your next plan?" Angele questioned in a calm town.
"Plan? I've visited the town…" Vivian sighed. "All I could find were mortals. The mortals here are kind and it might be a good idea to settle down here. What about you, Green? You're young and you probably don't want to waste your time here."
Angele chuckled. "No worries. I need a peaceful environment like this to solve my problem. An environment like this will help me think, also…" He stopped for a second and continued, "It's nearly impossible for me to go back from a place like this. The density of energy particles here is way too low. I can build a portal or send my shadow back to the central continent. Magic circles are supported by the energy particles in the air, however, we have to rely on ourselves now and wizards can't do anything without the energy particles."
"Sadly, First Elder wanted to rebuild the organization in a remote area, but in an environment like this…" Vivian lowered her head and looked at the cup, she looked a bit depressed.
Chapter 551: Research and Exploration (2)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
"If we want to leave this area, we'll have to study the stone wall with the scale on it. Maybe the scale can help us teleport somewhere else, we just need to figure out the method." Angele shrugged.
"The problem is we don't have enough materials as the offering, only a small number of us can be teleported…" Vivian did not finish the sentence.
"Don't worry, most of the wizards that left with us hate the war. If we want to return to the central continent, we'll have to travel through the tornado again, however, it'll take me a while to find another hidden path and I've already made it clear. The wizards are here because it's their destiny," Angele said.
"We need to get used to the environment here and live a peaceful life."
"Yeah, we've already made the decision and we shouldn't regret." Vivian sounded a bit depressed.
They both knew that it would be nearly impossible for the Elemental Hand to be rebuilt in a remote area when the elder council left the central continent. The First Elder, the Second Elder, and the other wizards who joined the team all knew it.
They already gave up everything but they found a safe place to live.
"Alright, why don't we find a quiet place and build a two-level house. We need a good house if we're going to stay here for a while." A smile appeared on Vivian's face.
"No problem." Angele smiled as well.
*******************************
Nine years later…
The gentle sunlight pierced through the forest and reflected on a two-level house with white walls.
The house was built somewhere deep in the forest, surrounded by silver metal bars. There were small flowers that varied in color around the house and bees were dancing above them.
*BAM*
Some black smoke spurted out of the second floor's window.
*COUGH COUGH*
A male was coughing hard inside the house.
In a dark room on the second floor, Angele, who was wearing a black outfit, was coughing with his hands covering the mouth. His long hair was tied up.
There were many white candles on the ground but all of them had already been extinguished. The green smoke from the candles filled up the room and the ceiling was covered with burnt marks.
"Again?" Angele looked at the floor with his brow furrowed; a moon-shaped red rune circle was drawn on the floor using blood and the tiny runes looked in the circle looked like ants.
"It has been nine years and the power of the Nightmare Realm is weakened. The realms will be separated from each other in a couple months. I need to figure out why the realm power is weakening as soon as possible." There was dedication in Angele's eyes.
As the Lord of Terror, Angele's bloodline power could help him return to the Nightmare Realm whenever he wanted, however, if he wanted to figure out how realm power worked, he would have to do tests in the main world.
He spent nine years studying time and space. He also checked the condition of the sealed forms that were still in the central continent and everything was going as he planned. However, Angele had not expected that it'd only take nine years for the realms to separate from each other.
"That's why the beard was not concerned with the sealed forms. It's impossible for the sealed forms to get to the fifth level of the underground world in such a short period."
"Green!" Suddenly, Angele heard children shouting outside. "Vivian asked you to go to the town and have breakfast."
Angele looked out of the window.
Outside of the silver metal bars, there were two children shouting. The two children were around ten years old; the one on the left that looked like a boy was wearing a shirt and there was a slinger on his belt. The other looked like a girl, she had long red hair and her purple dress was cute.
"Alma and Egg Tart…" Angele looked at the two children and smiled. The two children both looked cute, however, the one that looked like a boy was actually a girl and the one in a dress was a boy. It was a tradition of the town, boys would be treated like girls until they were 13 years old and girls would be treated like boys until they were 13 years old.
The wizards and their relatives communicated a lot with the people from the town in the last nine years.
Some of the wizards moved to the town since most of them enjoyed the peaceful life and the environment here was perfect for them.
Only the First Elder and Angele were still living in the forest. Vivian and Fir all moved to the town.
"Breakfast, huh? Alright, you can go play if you want. I'll be there soon," Angele responded quickly.
The two children heard the response and disappeared into the forest. It seemed like they had friends waiting for them.
Angele was not concerned about the dark smoke in the room, he moved away from the window and walked down the stairs.
The wooden staircase led him to the first floor quickly, he walked around the staircase and pulled a black ring on the floor up.
*Crank*
The ring was the handle of a trapdoor which hid the entrance to the basement.
Angele lowered his body and entered the basement, closing the trapdoor.
The basement was empty, there were no decorations there. The only object there was a gray platform in the center of the room; the platform had a diameter of five meters and occupied most of the area.
There were two tall silver candle stands on both sides of the platform; dim red light from the candle stands was reflected off the walls.
Angele walked to the platform but did not step on it. He stopped by the edge of the platform and checked his feet.
A blue glow flashed on the gray platform when Angele approached it. The blue glow came from the flashing light strings that looked like tiny cracks; the cracks were not following any specific pattern.
"I hope I can succeed…. The problem is I only have a couple months left."
The wizards of the Elemental Hand were barely doing any research that required the use of energy particles but it was not a problem for Angele—he had the energy created by negative emotions. Sadly, the energy created by negative emotions was hard to control. Angele spent the last nine years trying to design a special rune circle that could utilize his bloodline power.
The rune circle was designed using the bloodline power and its fuel was the energy created by negative emotions. Angele wanted to use the rune circle to help him with his study.
Angele was a bit anxious as he looked at the flashing cracks.
"Nine years of study… I hope I did everything properly. If I can get the desired result, I'll be able to find out the truth about the realm power and solve the problem. The ancient wizards injured the ancient light without taking any damage and I'm sure I can do it too. Let's start."
Angele stepped forward.
The complicated red rune circle glowed under his feet and a larger rune circle appeared outside the circle he was standing on. Several seconds later, the second circle was followed by a third circle.
The rune circles stacked and all appeared under Angele's feet, covering the floor of the basement.
Angele took out a dried body of a white bird from his pouch.
"In the name of the Terror Lord…" he started chanting the incantation.
The dead bird was revived on Angele's palm and its dried body was filled up with life energy. Several seconds later, the dead bird turned into a normal white bird and left Angele's hand.
The bird rotated around Angele several times and released intense red light from its eyes. The bird charged into the gray platform and disappeared into the rune circles.
"All the realms… All the dimensions… My sigil… Open the tunnel for me…" Angele released some thick black smoke, which all moved to the gray platform.
Some red walls that were covered with countless runes appeared around the platform. The black smoke gathered and turned into a black bead that was slowly spinning. The bead was surrounded by the red walls.
*CHI*
It sounded like a piece of cloth was being torn apart.
The black bead was destroyed and turned into an eye-shaped fissure with pure darkness inside.
Angele stared at the black fissure; suddenly, dark light flashed in his sight.
The basement blacked out for a second and Angele's sight blurred. He noticed that the fissure disappeared completely when he could see things again.
An unknown creature appeared on the gray platform.
The creature looked like a ball that was stuck on a cube. Its body had the color of bronze and it looked like a mechanical creation. Angele could hear the noise made by gears.
The ball was on top of the cube and the two holes that looked like eyes were staring at Angele.
"What's this?" Angele looked at the strange creature on the platform with his brow furrowed. "I created the summoning spell to call the creatures from other dimensions but it shouldn't bring me a robot…"
Angele checked the creature and noticed that the realm power was not pressuring it at all.
"Is the creature too weak? The realm power is not doing anything to it…" Angele was a bit speechless. He named the summoning spell as Angele's Great Dimension Spell. The spell would summon a random creature from a random realm for him but he could not control the outcome, so the creature might be strong or weak.
He wanted to summon something that would trigger the weakening effect of the realm power but it seemed like the robot-looking thing in front of him did not meet the requirements.
Angele waved his hand. The red walls released red electric pulses and the electric pulses quickly struck the bronze robot.
*CHI CHI*
After the noise, only a pile of black dust was left on the platform.
Angele waved his hands again and the dust was blown away from the rune circles. The dust was sucked into a small hole on the ground.
"Again!"
He took out another dead bird.
Angele repeated the process and the bird charged into the rune circles again.
Black light flashed.
Angele's sight was blurred and he saw the second creature he summoned.
It was a man that was standing on the platform, surrounded by the walls. The man was wearing a white fur coat and had short golden hair. The man's face was handsome but his expression made him look like he did not care about anything. The man had his hands in his pockets and he just stood there.
"Where is this place?" The man raised his head and looked at Angele. The man was not speaking using his mouth, he was sending the message using his mentality wave.
"I'm Lord of Ethereal, how did you teleport me to this place?!"
Chapter 552: Research and Exploration (3)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
Angele's eyes narrowed and scanned the man's body using the biochip.
"Lord of Ethereal, huh? Your mentality is strong," he responded to the man's word using mentality wave; however, the man's condition was a bit strange.
The man had strong energy movements inside his body but he was not impacted by the realm power, it felt like that the man could resist the realm power naturally.
Angele was interested in this strong being that was from another realm.
"Let's do a trade, strong being from another realm. I'm interested in the way you use your mentality wave."
Angele's message was a bit hard to understand since he was not good at sending messages through mentality waves.
He repeated the sentence multiple times and the lord finally understood what he was trying to imply.
"That's not a problem!" The man flicked his finger.
"This is the first time I travel to another realm like this and what you're asking is just a common thing to me so I'll just gift you it."
Angele noticed that the knowledge from the lord was sent into his brain through mentality waves.
"Thank you." He quickly improved his mentality wave messages and the message was much easier to understand than before.
"Sadly, my spell can only keep you in this world for a short duration."
The lord looked at the rune walls around him as his brow furrowed.
"It's understandable, you can't break the truth of the dimensions. Your realm and my realm are way too far from each other, it's a miracle that you successfully brought me here."
"As a payback, you can have this." Angele threw a purple healing potion to the lord.
The healing potion traveled through the rune walls without any problem and the lord caught it safely.
"That's some strong life energy force!" A surprised smile appeared on his face. "Thank you for your potion, my wounds will heal faster now."
"You helped me too." Angele smiled. He was not concerned about the healing potion, it was one of the weakest healing potions he had, but it seemed like the lord did not have something like this in his realm.
"Of course." The man chuckled and disappeared into the air.
The smile quickly disappeared from Angele's face as he started thinking.
'Actually, I don't need to put a lot of resources into this summoning spell, I'm just using the power of my bloodline… However, the creatures I summon will be completely random. The first creature can be killed by a mortal and the second one named Lord of Ethereal came from a realm with creatures that all have strong mentality waves. The mentality wave message technique he gave me was practical but that's it. I want to summon a strong creature that I need... I wish the outcome of my summoning spell was not random.'
Angele was using the energy created by negative emotions as the fuel for the complicated rune circles. The rune circles changed the dimension rules and summoned random creatures from random realms using the realm power of a random realm.
There were so many random factors during the procedure and they were out of his control.
"Last time…" Angele inhaled deeply and repeated the procedure again.
*CHI*
Dark light flashed.
The fissure that was surrounded by the rune walls was still there. A one-meter-long tentacle of an octopus reached out of it.
The tentacle slowly moved out of the fissure; it seemed like the creature was trying to leave it. A strong and chaotic energy wave filled up the basement.
Angele stepped back and there was excitement in his eyes.
"Rank 6… That's good enough!"
*PA*
One of the suckers on the tentacle exploded and translucent blood splashed on the rune walls.
A strong and terrifying force field appeared in the basement, it was the realm power which Angele was familiar with.
"Great!" Blue light dots flashed in front of Angele's eyes as he stared at the tentacle.
*PA PA PA*
The suckers on the tentacle exploded one by one and the realm power was weakening the octopus every second.
*ROAR*
The octopus's voice sounded strange, its tentacle returned into the fissure.
After dark light flashed, the fissure disappeared and everything returned to normal.
The blue light dots stayed in front of Angele's eyes for several minutes.
A row of information appeared in his sight.
'Sample collected, analyzing…'
Behind the sentence, there was a white progress bar that was being filled up slowly.
"It's about the time." Angele checked the biochip and noticed it took him half an hour to do everything.
He could summon three random creatures in this specific month of the year.
"It's great that I activated the realm power during my last attempt, otherwise I'd have to do it again next year. I hope I'll get some valid results…"
He glanced at the gray platform, turned around, and walked to the exit of the basement.
Angele pushed the trapdoor open and flew out of the basement. He checked the house, opened the door, and headed to the town.
Most of the wizards were living in the town but they were hiding their true identity from the local residents. The local residents thought that the wizards were just mortals.
The First Elder asked the wizards not to do anything suspicious before they could explore all the areas around.
Angele walked down the hill and entered the town.
The town was surrounded by farms and there were yellow windmills in the farms. There was also a river by the town and the residents built a watermill over the river.
There were chubby middle-aged women washing clothes by the river. They chatted as their hands moved. Their children were playing with the water and looked happy.
There were also armored soldiers on horses patrolling the area. The muscular soldiers were carrying white shields and had swords or iron bows on their backs.
The bridge over the river was the only way that Angele could walk to the town. He stepped on the bridge and headed to the town.
"Green! Are you on your way to Vivian's place?" A boy that was fishing on the bridge recognized Angele. The boy was around ten years and had short blond hair. The freckles on his face looked like sesame on a piece of toast.
Angele recognized the boy as well, it was a boy that lived close to Vivian.
"Jack, fishing again?"
"Do you want me to show you the way? Vivian is having a barbeque party on the other side of the town, I think you may need a guide." The boy named Jack quickly organized his fishing equipment.
"Also, the merchants have arrived. They built a large tent in the town and they brought a circus here." The boy blinked his eyes.
"That's for you." Angele chuckled and threw a small piece of silver to the boy. He collected the silver piece from a mine; it could be traded for several empire silver coins.
Two silver coins would get the boy a ticket to the circus and he could purchase some snacks while watching.
Jack smiled and caught the silver piece.
"Thank you, Green!" He collected his fishing equipment and walked down the bridge with Angele. They headed to the left side of the town together.
It took them a couple minutes to arrive at a two-story house with white walls. There was a spacious garden in front of the house, tables, chairs, and barbeque tools lined up on an empty ground.
Several wizards of the Elemental Hand attended the party. Some of them were drinking and some of them were barbequing, there were also people that were having conversations in small groups.
Fir and Vivian were chatting with smiles on their faces. They both noticed Angele's presence.
"Welcome." Vivian walked to the fence and hugged Angele. "Why are you always late? We already started because you were the only one that did not show up."
"I had something to take care of." Angele looked at Jack.
"Jack, do you want to have a drink here?"
Jack looked at Vivian but he was too anxious to talk. Angele could see his lips trembling.
"I… I… I…"
Two armored soldiers that were patrolling the street passed by and they shouted, "Jack!"
"Your father is looking for you. He's angry, you should head home now!" the soldier in the front shouted.
"Sure, Ham…" Jack was surprised by the loud voice and quickly ran to the soldier.
Angele smiled as he was dragged into the garden.
The soldier named Ham watched the two black robes walk into the garden and talked to Jack in a serious voice, "Stay away from the outsiders, they don't look like good people to me. Your father will be mad if he finds out about this."
"But Green has always been kind to me…" Jack objected.
"No one knows what the black robes are thinking!" The other soldier sounded a bit drunk.
"The children in this town all like them for some reason, especially you and Ruby."
"Alright, go home now. Your father is worried. Did you catch any fish today?"
"Well…"
**********************
Angele was dragged to Fir by Vivian. He grabbed a glass of green fruit wine from the table and took a sip. The fruit wine was sweet, fragrant, and refreshing.
"The First Elder is back with his group…" Vivian spoke to Angele in a low voice. "They're in the living room, waiting for you."
Angele nodded. "Alright, let's go."
Fir finished the fruit wine and put down the glass on the table. She nodded and entered the house first. Angele and Vivian followed after them.
The First Elder and the Second Elder were sitting by the fireplace in the living room. They smiled after seeing the three wizards walking to them.
"Sorry for interrupting the party. I had to gather you here. Alright, let's start." The First Elder looked at Vivian and she quickly locked the door. They walked to the two elders and sat down by the table.
Mike was also here, eating a meat skewer slowly. "You spent years exploring the area, I assume you've got everything sorted out."
"Yeah." The First Elder nodded. "Second Elder, I'll let you do the talking."
"Alright." The Second Elder glanced around. "First Elder and I explored the area over the last several years. We tried to do it as fast as possible so we used a lot of our resources and finally have a general idea of the layout of this land."
He cleared his throat and continued, "There are only mortals in the countries on this land. Their main forces are strong soldiers on heavily armored horses. There are no knights here but there are rumors of wizards going around. The rumors said that people here hated wizards and the kings treated the wizards as their enemies. They would burn the wizards they captured alive and some mortals were killed due to false reports."
The wizards were a bit surprised after hearing the word.
"Which means… If they find out who we are, it'll be a big problem?" Vivian questioned in a low voice.
"We're just rank 2 or rank 3 wizards now and we can only cast weakened spells using the energy particles stored in our bodies. There'll be consequences if we use up all the energy particles…"
Fir, Mike, and Angele remained silent. They did not expect something like this; it was lucky that they were living in a remote area.
"It'll be hard for us to rebuild our organization… That might be the reason why we didn't encounter other wizards in the last nine years… If we don't return to the central continent, we won't be able to collect the energy particles we need." Fir was worried.
"The mortals can kill us if they send a whole army here."
"Don't worry, no one knows who we are as long as we don't expose ourselves to the public. Also, we can return to the dimension fissure in the worst case," Angele said.
"Some people already told me that they wanted to return to the central continent…" The First Elder sighed. "I gathered you here because I want to ask you if you want to stay here or return to the central continent. We don't have enough offerings to send all people back."
"It has been nine years but we don't know what's happening in the central continent… I think I'll just stay here," Fir spoke first. "My family died during the war and I don't want to go back."
"I don't really care. I'll just stay with my mother." Angele shrugged and looked at Vivian.
Vivian hesitated and smiled. "We've already announced that we were leaving the central continent and I don't think there's a place for us there anymore. I think White City Alliance has already created another organization like the Elemental Hand and there'll be a problem if we go back unless we hide in a remote area, but it'll be the same as what we're doing right now. I'll just stay here I think."
Chapter 553: Research and Exploration (4)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
Mike looked at the First Elder. "First Elder, why don't you tell us more about the ruling class here? I'll be staying here too. I'm a normal wizard but I'm one of the strongest individuals here." He looked a bit excited. "If I stay here, my power will be recognized and I'll be respected one day. I won't go back just for that."
Mike was born and raised in the central continent, it was the first time he realized that he could become one of the strongest human beings in a world that was full of mortals. Unlike the wizards that traveled to the central continent from other regions, Mike had not experienced such feelings yet.
Mike, Angele, Vivian, and Fir were all interested in learning more about the local areas.
"This is a town in the Stanley Empire. Only merchants visit this town once per year since we're in a remote area. There are many towns like this in the empire, they don't communicate with other towns often. The empire is much larger than the human empires in the central continent. We visited at least six large cities and we heard that there was a total of 12 to 14 large cities." The First Elder stopped for a second and continued, "Also, Stanley Empire is weakest of the five countries here but it still has around 30 000 soldiers in the army.
"Most importantly, we found many strange ruins here and they looked like unexplored ruins left by the ancient wizards."
Most of the wizards looked excited after hearing these words.
"For the ones who want to go back, we should just let them go." The First Elder sighed. "This might be our chance or our graves… We have to work for the future…"
Angele smiled after he noticed that his mother looked happy. He was not concerned about his power as a wizard, his main problem was still the realm power. He needed to avoid the pressure from the realm power or just solve the problem completely so he could release his true power when necessary.
Vivian was also not a problem for him. In this area, Angele was confident that he could protect all the members of the Elemental Hand.
"Also, one more thing, about your wedding with Fir," Vivian suddenly interrupted.
"Well…" The smile disappeared from Angele's face. He liked Fir but Angele's true form was a humongous scorpion monster and he was worried that their children would be scorpions too.
Fir glanced at Angele with a calm expression on the face and mocked, "Master Green has Becky with him and I think he never thinks of me…"
"Becky…" Angele was a bit speechless. He did bring Becky here but Becky left years ago and Angele had no idea where she was. Although Angele's bloodline was inside Becky's body, he could barely sense it due to the distance.
"We haven't seen Becky for years…" Vivian chuckled. "Fir, Green, if you think it's fine, we'll hold the wedding for you as soon as possible. What do you think? The Fenrir Family needs inheritors!"
A sweet smile appeared on Fir's face. "I have no problem with that."
Angele shrugged. "I'll still focus on my research, I hope you don't mind…"
"I'll try to make you spend more time on me," Fir spoke in a light tone. She knew that a dark wizard that had a strong body like Angele would be perfect for the environment. When the energy particles are limited, Angele would still be able to handle many things. Fir hated the political wars and endless research. She always wanted to live a peaceful life and would never give up a chance like this.
Angele was smart and he was not ugly, also, Vivian always treated Fir well.
The three elders chuckled after they heard the conversation.
"Alright then, we'll hold the wedding in three days. Green and Fir, it won't be a big wedding, we can only work with what we have here." The First Elder sounded apologetic.
***********************************
It was night. In Angele's house that was built on the hill.
There was still orange light from a burning candle coming out of the reading room's window on the second floor.
Angele stood in front of a large stone wall in his black silk robe, scraping something off the wall carefully. He used a silver metal plate to collect the dust.
Most of the wall was covered by a black blanket but it was still visible that there was a painting behind the blanket.
Minutes later, Angele left the stone wall and sat down by the table. He started checking the dust he collected under the dim light.
'Zero, is the analysis on the realm power done yet?' he questioned as he checked the dust.
'Analysis completed, you can retrieve the result now,' Zero quickly responded.
'Retrieving the result.'
*CHI*
A blue screen flashed in Angele's sight for a second as countless rows of data and graphs appeared in front of him. The data and the graphs were the only things he could see at the moment.
The data was being calculated and everything merged into a new formula with a lot of runes in it.
Angele felt relieved after seeing the formula. "The denser the energy particles are, the stronger the realm power will be. According to this formula, most of the energy particles are from a different realm and that's the reason why the realm power of the wizard world was activated. If I can collect the local energy particles and store them in my body, the local realm power will no longer be a problem. However, it'll be hard for me to complete this procedure…"
Angele's head was aching. The power of his true form came from the bloodline of the scorpion woman and the single-eyed giant. The two ancient creatures were both from the Nightmare Realm and the Son of Sun was also from a different realm. He would be a complete stranger to the wizard world if he was not a human being.
"But how does the realm power recognize the energy from a different realm? If I can figure that out, I might be able to avoid the realm power…" Angele's brow furrowed.
"Anyway, let me prepare the materials for the summoning spell." The dust he collected from the mysterious painting was the main material for the summoning spell he created.
Angele wanted to find out the truth about the painting. He was almost trapped in the painting and still remembered how that felt. He spent a lot of time trying to study the painting over the years.
As long as part of the painting was covered, there would be no danger.
Angele flattened the dust carefully using a metal needle under the light from the candle.
"Zoom in," he muttered.
Suddenly, his pupils shrank and turned to the size of holes made by needles. He stared at the dark dust on the silver plate.
The dust was zoomed in; its size increased gradually and filled up Angele's sight.
The dust looked like pieces of random black crystals in his eyes. The sharp crystals lined up randomly and it was impossible for Angele to count them one by one.
It felt like the crystals were made of some dense black substances.
'Magnify them by 100000 times for me,' Angele thought.
*CHI*
One of the black crystals was zoomed in again, the tiny substances on the surface of the crystal turned into a large piece of stone in Angele's sight—the stone was also made of countless tiny black substances.
Angele's brow furrowed.
"It doesn't make sense… The last time I collected the dust, such substances did not appear after they were magnified by 200000 times. Zero, magnify them by 500000 times for me."
*CHI*
The substances on the black crystal were zoomed in again, however, he could still see the black substances. The new substances he saw were then zoomed in again.
The process repeated several times and it blurred Angele's sight. Several seconds later, there was barely any light left on the new crystal in his sight.
Angele's brow furrowed as some blue light brightened up the black crystal, however, he could still see the tiny substances on the surface of the crystal.
"That's impossible…" He was surprised.
'Zero, analyze the sample for me and tell me how many times I have to magnify this thing!'
A progress bar appeared in Angele's sight and it was slowly filling up.
Several seconds later, a list of data appeared behind the progress bar.
Angele as shocked what he just read.
'Alright, following the result, magnify this thing by 156000000 times!' He gave the order quickly.
'Magnifying…' Although the biochip had been upgraded, it still took the system more than ten seconds to complete the process.
Angele's eyes blurred again but what appeared after was still a large black crystal with tiny substances on its surface.
However, he noticed that something was a bit different this time.
'Keep going…'
Suddenly, he felt like someone was standing behind him.
"Who's there?!" Angele attacked using his elbow and countless dark flames appeared on his body. A ball of smoke with something screaming inside charged at the person behind him.
He quickly turned around but the only thing he saw was the edge of someone's white outfit. Although Angele moved as fast as he could, the person still disappeared before he could do anything.
Angele's body was releasing terrifying and twisted force fields. The force fields filled up the whole reading room.
The elbow and the flames all missed, it felt like that he was seeing illusions.
'It's impossible!' Angele glanced around.
'Someone was behind me but I failed to detect him…' His sight slowly fell upon the painting that was covered by a blanket.
Part of the blanket was removed and the face of a woman in a white outfit was revealed. The woman was staring at Angele with one eye, she looked like a living being that was hiding behind a blanket.
"I'm sure I covered the painting with the blanket…" Angele stared at the painting with a serious expression on the face.
He walked to the painting and covered it again.
"The blanket was made of silent stones and it weighs 200 kilograms…"
Narrowing his eyes, Angele looked at the blanket.
"You did nothing in the last nine years. I don't know if you're a powerful artifact or not but I'm glad that you finally reacted to what I just did."
Angele checked the painting and the stone wall carefully. He walked to the table and sealed the dust in the silver plate.
He blew off the candles and walked down the stairs, heading to the bedroom on the first floor.
Chapter 554: Unexpected (1)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
It was late at night.
In the bedroom, Angele was having a sweet dream on a large bed.
Although he was a wizard, he still enjoyed sleeping from time to time; it would make him feel relaxed.
The cold moonlight shined through the window and landed by the bed. A white shadow slowly appeared in the moonlight—it looked like a woman. The woman stood by the bed quietly and stared at Angele.
*Ugh*
Angele made some noise and turned to the other side. The woman could only see his back.
The white shadow disappeared after Angele made the noise like she was never here.
Angele suddenly opened his tightly closed eyes and looked in the direction of where the woman was standing.
"This thing can go through my barrier…" he muttered. The painting started bothering Angele again, however, he had to keep visiting it as he needed the material for the summoning spell.
Also, Angele still wanted to find out the truth about the painting and would not give up just for some strange things that had been happening to him recently.
*Crank*
It looked like that the door was pushed open by some wind; it was dark outside.
Angele got off the bed, walked to the door, and was about to close it.
*PA*
A pale hand grabbed his wrist and tried to drag him to the other side of the door.
Angele's expression changed, it felt like his right wrist was locked by a claw and his bone ached. The pale hand's pull was so strong that Angele could barely stand still.
He realized that what outside the door was no longer his living room, it had to be the entrance to somewhere dangerous.
'I can't be dragged to the other side!'
He tried to resist the pale hand and his body was trembling.
"Damn!" he shouted and stabilized his feet. Angele released a lot of black smoke.
*BAM*
He won.
Angele's sight blurred and everything disappeared. He was holding the handle of the door in hand and could see the moonlight on the living room's floor. The place was cold and quiet.
"Damn it!" He hit the door hard and made some loud noise.
"It seems like you want me to stop…" He assumed the painting was trying to stop him from studying it.
Red light appeared around his eyes and it looked like boiling lava.
"I won't give up the painting. I need the dust for my spell that helps me study the realm power. You'll pay for what you have done…" he muttered.
*BAM*
The door was slammed close.
***************************
There were birds twittering outside the window.
"Have a seat, please. This is a special flower tea I made with tongue fruit and green flower leaves. Try it."
Angele put down two wooden cups and sat opposite Fir in the living room. Fir was wearing a tight black dress.
It was early in the morning and he could see the white smoke rising from the wooden cups. The creamy and fragrant smell of the tea permeated the air.
Fir was a bit surprised after she saw Angele. The elite wizard who was smart and calm looked a bit tired for some reason. She could even see the dark circles around his eyes.
"I apologize if I'm mistaken but are you having trouble sleeping recently? I have some tranquilization potion here…"
Angele smiled. "Thank you, but using the tranquilization potion is risky, I might get addicted. Don't worry, it's nothing serious."
Fir nodded. "I almost forgot that you're a potion master too but our wedding is tomorrow and I hope that you're prepared for it."
Angele was a bit speechless after hearing those words.
The two would be sleeping on the same bed soon but they were talking like they just met each other. Fir was being very polite to him and it made the situation even stranger.
"Don't worry. People all know why we're getting married." Angele smiled.
Fir heard that and nodded.
It was true that Fir never loved Angele and Angele never loved her. They were getting married because Vivian asked them too.
Fir was a wizard that loved research and exploration just like Angele did.
"I can talk to Vivian if you don't like me," Fir spoke in a low voice as she stared at Angele's dark circles. "Also, I'm here to see how you're doing on the hill. Do you mind if I take a look around?"
"Of course, go ahead." Angele shrugged. "Ah, I have some deserts I made in the kitchen. I'll grab you some." He stood up and walked to the kitchen. He disappeared at the corner quickly.
Fir grabbed the wooden cup and sipped some tea. The tea was tasty and creamy, it quickly warmed up her body.
She suddenly heard the footsteps coming from the staircase. The noise was crisp and rhythmical.
"Master Green? That was fast." Fir put down the cup and saw a woman in a white dress walk into Angele's bedroom.
Fir's brow furrowed, it felt like that the woman did not see her at all.
"We're not even married yet and you're already doing this to me?" Fir was Angele's fiancée after all and was a bit angry. She thought the woman was trying to make her jealous.
"I'll find out why master Green loves you so much!" Fir stood up and looked at the kitchen, however, she noticed that Angele was not making any noise.
"Is he doing this on purpose?" Fir felt even worse.
She decided to go and talk to the woman. Fir was certain that the woman was not from the Elemental Hand and assumed that Angele was keeping a local resident in his own house.
"A mortal will get old in just a couple years and she'll no longer be attractive… I'm different…" Fir smiled.
"I'll still be the same 200 years later."
Fir pursed her lips and walked to the bedroom. The door of the bedroom suddenly closed as Fir stepped into the room.
************************
"Fir?!" Angele sat down with a plate of peanut muffins in his hand. He glanced around but could not where Fir was.
The tea on the table was still warm but Fir was nowhere to be found.
Angele's brow furrowed, it only took him around ten seconds to grab the dessert but Fir disappeared after he came back.
"Where are you, Fir?!" he shouted.
No one responded.
Angele noticed that something was off. He stood up and scanned the area using the biochip.
He looked around and noticed that the door was his bedroom was closed.
"I don't think I locked the door…"
He walked to the bedroom but thought of the pale hand he saw last night and decided not to open the door.
"Fir!" he shouted. "Talk to me if you're inside the bedroom!"
Angele moved away from the bedroom, he checked the guest room and the storage but he did not find anyone.
"I have a bad feeling about this… Fir is gone."
He rushed to the staircase but realized that he had not opened the bedroom's door yet.
Angele's expression changed, he walked to the bedroom but he found that someone locked the door from inside.
He hit the door hard.
*Bam*
*Crack*
The door of the bedroom was broken into pieces.
Inside the bedroom, Fir was hitting a door on the other side anxiously.
"Green, are you there?! Come on, open the door and let me go! I don't like jokes like this!"
Angele was surprised after he saw the scene.
The bedroom only had one door and Angele just entered through. There should be a window on the wall opposite to him but it was replaced by another door.
Fir heard the noise from behind, she turned her head around and looked at Angele with confusion in her eyes.
*Crank*
The door Fir was knocking slowly opened. A pale arm reached out and tried to grab Fir.
"Run!" Angele shouted and charged to Fir. He grabbed Fir's arm and dragged her away from the door.
The pale arm missed and everything disappeared after the two wizards' sights blurred for a second.
They were sitting opposite to each other in the living room. The tea and the peanut muffins were still on the table.
The tea was still nice and hot.
"What just happened?" Fir had no idea what just happened. She looked at her wrist but there was no mark on it. "You grabbed my wrist hard, right? What's going on?"
Lowering her hand, Fir raised her head, however, she noticed that Angele disappeared.
A woman in a white dress slowly walked up the stairs. Fir noticed that the woman's face was covered by her long hair.
Fir had trouble breathing. She watched the woman walk to the second floor and could no longer hear the footsteps.
"Green?!" Her voice was shaky. "Master Green, are you still here?"
"Fir! Fir!"
She could hear a voice coming from the far side and it sounded like Angele.
Fir's head ached and her sight blurred for a second again. She saw that Angele was shaking her shoulders anxiously.
"Are you alright? Answer me!"
Fir looked at Angele but noticed that there was a pair of pale feet standing on the second floor. It was the woman but her body was blocked by the staircase.
The woman was wearing a white dress and her skin was extremely pale.
For some reason, Fir knew that the woman was staring at her. It felt like that the woman could see through the objects that were blocking her sight.
Fir could feel a chill running down her spine.
Chapter 555: Unexpected (2)
Translator: _Leo_ Editor: Kurisu
"Green… Did you see that? The woman… The woman in the white dress…" Her voice was shaky. Fir casted several spells when she was trapped in the bedroom but nothing worked. The only thing she could do was yelling and asking for Angele's help but she realized that the woman was still around.
"A woman in a white dress…" Angele's expression turned serious.
He rescued Fir from the bedroom but she just sat there and remained silent. Fir did not say a word no matter what Angele did and she finally regained consciousness after Angele shook her shoulders.
"What did you just see? Tell me about the details…" He suddenly noticed that the light faded away from Fir's eyes again.
His expression turned serious.
"Come on, not again!" He picked Fir up, left the house, and rushed out of the fence. Angele found a random tree and slowly put Fir down by it.
"Cough… Cough!"
Fir started coughing; she was trying her best to breathe. It almost felt like that she was choked by something. Fir leaned against the tree trunk and lowered her head. Her mouth was wide open and Angele could see the saliva dripping down her chin.
It took a while for Fir to recover.
She was still breathing heavily and there was fear in her eyes.
"Green, who the hell is that woman?"
Angele crouched and remained silent for a second.
"I don't know…"
"Why is there something so dangerous in your home?! That thing is more terrifying than a soul form!" Fir's voice was hoarse.
"I'm going to tell the elders about it."
"Don't!"
"I almost died there!" Fir was almost shouting.
Angele's brow furrowed but he was not sure what else he could say.
"I had a problem with my research…"
"Actually, you know what, I'll have to reconsider our marriage." Fir inhaled deeply and slowly calmed down.
"I assume that you didn't tell master Vivian about this… Although I don't know what that thing is, I don't want to stay near it!"
Angele nodded. "Fine, I understand, however, don't say anything to Vivian. This research is important to me but I don't want her to get worried."
Fir stared at Angele with fear and anxiety in her eyes.
"Alright, I won't tell the elders about this. I'll say that I just don't want to get married."
"Thank you… and sorry." Angele stood up and took out a blue potion from his potion. He removed the stopper and blue smoke was released from the test tube.
The blue smoke turned into a small snake and disappeared between Fir's brow.
Fir felt much better after absorbing the snake.
"Flying Snake Potion… Thank you, I needed that." Fir stood up. "Don't worry, I won't tell master Vivian about this, but I think you should talk to her when you need help."
"Yeah, sorry, you wouldn't be dragged into this if you didn't visit me." Angele felt sorry for her.
He had been doing everything alone in his house and the previous visitors did not encounter any problem.
However, after the last time he observed the dust, the woman started bothering him again, and his house became dangerous. Angele did not expect the woman to attack other people.
"I'm a wizard and I understand the risks that are associated with research so I'm not going to tell you to stop doing the research." Fir wiped the dust off her dress. "However, I think you should be more careful when progressing with the research since the woman is dangerous."
Angele nodded with a serious expression on his face. Fir turned around and headed to the town. Her speed increased gradually and she disappeared from Angele's sight quickly.
He stood in the forest and glanced at his house. The place was cold and quiet. The house reminded him of the two-level building in the painting; they looked similar.
"No one can stop me from accomplishing my goal. I don't care if it's dangerous or not!" Angele made up his mind and returned to his house. He entered the living room and closed the door.
He glanced around and walked to the basement again.
Angele pulled up the trapdoor and closed it after entering the basement.
He stood in front of the gray platform and inhaled deeply.
He could still see the countless dark-red runes around the gray platform.
Angele quickly took out a dead body of a yellow squirrel and chanted an incantation. The life energy returned to the squirrel's body and it was quickly revived.
The squirrel jumped down Angele's hand after making some noises. It landed in the center of the platform and disappeared.
*WOO*
The rune walls quickly rose up from the floor and they were surrounded by rotating runes. The gray platform was sealed by the rune walls.
Angele was satisfied with the result.
"I still have some time before the end of the month and this is my last chance. I'll have to wait for a long time until I can cast the spell again."
He checked the time using the biochip and started meditating in front of the rune walls.
Time passed.
About two hours later, Angele slowly opened his eyes and took out something that looked like jujube. He started eating the jujube slowly.
He finished around 30 jujube and his face turned red slowly. There were also silver flames sparking around his mouth.
"It's about the time."
Angele stood up, looked at the runes walls, and opened his mouth.
Silver flames were released from his mouth and slowly entered the rune walls, disappearing into the air.
The jujube were called Silver Sparrow Fruits and were made by Angele. The Silver Sparrow Fruits could help him detect the energy movement better.
The bloodlines inside Angele's body would not help him detect the energy movements better since those ancient creatures did not have such abilities. He wanted to get the best result of the summoning spell so he had to make the special fruits using his knowledge.
Silver Sparrow Fruits were perfect for the occasion.
Angele stared at the rune walls after releasing the silver flames.
"Endless realms… Endless dimensions… Listen to my call and open the dimension gate…"
*CHI*
It sounded like a piece of cloth was torn apart.
Dark light flashed in the basement.
A half-naked woman with six arms appeared inside the rune walls. The bottom half of her body was the tail of a snake.
The snake woman had clean skin and a beautiful face. She looked elegant but wild with her silver snake tail.
"A cross-realm summoning ability… Interesting…" the woman spoke in the Chaos language. The silver necklace made of teeth on her neck was glowing. "Who're you? You went through the defensive barriers and summoned the sage of the six-arm snake race!"
Angele checked the energy wave the woman was releasing; the woman might be stronger than a rank 6 wizard. There was a terrifying shadow in the woman's body, Angele could hear warriors roaring and weapons hitting each other from the shadow.
"Six-arm snake race? I'm sorry, this is a summoning spell that I created, but I can't control what I summon." He had never heard of the six-arm snake race but he knew that there were so many realms and it was possible for him to summon a strong creature from any of the realms.
The snake woman was looking at Angele curiously. "It's the first time I see a creature that walks on only two legs but our upper bodies looked identical…" she said as she glanced around. "Alright, outsider, why do you summon me? What do you want?"
"I have just one simple question that can only be answered by a strong being like you. I wonder why the realm power didn't weaken you when you were summoned here. I'll pay you back if you can show me the secret."
The snake woman was strong but she was not impacted by the realm power. It was hard to believe.
"That's it?" The snake woman looked at Angele and nodded. "The method is simple. If your power is stronger than the limitation set up by the realm, you can just cheat the realm power by building a barrier that will hide your true power around your body. That's what I did."
"Huh? I understand what you're saying but how do you build the barrier?" Angele was excited. He was about to solve a problem that all sealed forms wanted to solve.
The snake woman hesitated.
"It's a simple technique but it's still a secret and it requires a lot of special materials. Also, the barrier can only be built in my own realm. I can build one for you but you will have to pay for it. What do you think?"
"It depends on what you need." Angele smiled.
"Weapons! A lot of metal weapons!" The snake woman went straight to the point.
"Metal weapons?" Angele was surprised, he did not expect such a strong being to ask for something so simple.
"Metal is rare for my realm and the realms around my realm. Get me 60 000 tons of metal weapons and I'll tell you the technique. Also, I'll build a barrier for you," the snake woman spoke with a calm expression on her face.
"60 000 tons of metal weapons?" Angele was scared by the number. He would need a huge amount of energy if he wanted to send the weapons to the snake woman's realm. He doubted if he could accomplish that even with the refined true form.
There might be thousands of realms between his realm and the snake woman's realm. Sending just one weapon to the snake woman was already hard.
"Yeah, my queen will consider it as a fair trade if you can provide 60 000 tons of weapons. The six-arm snake race has been ruling seven realms for over 10 000 years but we barely have any metal weapons. I assume that the number is a bit too big for you?" The snake woman told Angele some background information intentionally.
However, the snake woman noticed that Angele was still calm after hearing the information and she realized that Angele had never heard about the six-arm snake race.
"The metal weapons will not be a problem but the energy needed when transporting the weapons is…" Angele's brow furrowed.
The snake woman was surprised, she thought Angele would not be able to provide that many weapons.
"Well, take this." She thought for a while and threw a silver teeth necklace that was similar to the one on her neck to Angele.
*PA*
Angele caught the necklace and looked at it.
"What's this?"
The snake woman raised her head and spoke proudly, "A dimension locator. We use it to do trade with outsiders. You're lucky, we've only handed out five locators since the empire was funded and this is the sixth one."
Angele knew that he was lucky, he did not expect to do a trade with a strong being from a different realm. It was an important experience for him, however, he knew that it would only happen when the strong being he summoned was strong and intelligent.
Only the ancient wizards had the ability to something like this.