Azure Scepter

Page 92

Trier gently stroked the girl's back, and Fythia slowly relaxed.

"of course."

“Come find me tonight,” Futia whispered in his ear.

Trier remained silent for a long time. If he wanted it all, now was not the time. A small act of impatience could ruin a great plan.

After hesitating for a long time, he whispered in Faudia's ear, "Not now, let's wait until everything is settled."

PS1: I got stuck on the romance scenes, I'll catch up on yesterday's.

PS2: Now a modified version

Chapter 184 Exploration (Part 1)

As dusk fell, the pale yellow light of the setting sun was tinged with an unsettling crimson hue. The Regent's Garden, now somewhat desolate due to the battle, was covered with intricate, dazzling lines that entwined every inch of the land like a spiderweb, even faintly visible on the marble corridors that had been blasted to pieces.

The entire ritual array was intricate and magnificent, and the solemn sense of order it subtly revealed made Granny Lor somewhat unsettled.

She had always considered herself to be among the top in the Kingdom of Orco in terms of ritual spellcasting skills, but when she saw the incredibly intricate and complex ritual array before her, she still felt a sense of awe for knowledge itself.

Granny Lor didn't even recognize most of the magic array units, and the connections between them were so wondrous and perfect that they were terrifying. Just standing there, with only a fleeting glance at the ritual magic array, she felt her knowledge had been greatly enhanced.

In a daze, she even felt that the spectacular ritual in front of her was writhing in the light, as if it had some kind of life.

She nervously crossed her arms and awkwardly stomped her feet.

Can one truly know the other person's true nature through dream prophecy?

"Grandma, it's magnificent! What's the magic array in the connecting corridor for?" Edith asked curiously, her face full of amazement.

Granny Lor smiled uneasily, but she did not answer, because she did not know either.

My back was soaked with sweat; the courage that had been fueled by loyalty dripped down my spine and onto the ground with each passing moment.

“I’ve already crossed the Foster River; there’s no turning back.” The court mage encouraged himself inwardly, “Courage and loyalty are with me.”

Granny Lor instinctively looked up at Trier, who was not far away.

For some reason, a faint smile played on Trier's lips. He occasionally glanced at the Star Tower, his dark, lifeless eyes seemingly brewing a terrifying conspiracy as powerful as thunder.

Beside him, Noy held two lanterns and stared coldly at him, his gaze seemingly filled with some kind of anger.

"What are those two dark blue lamps for?" Edith asked, turning her head.

After a moment's hesitation, Laura replied, "It should serve as a guide within the dream."

As soon as he finished speaking, Trier suddenly turned his gaze away from the Star Tower. He was silent for a moment, then said in a low voice, "It's almost time, Ms. Laure. We will cast our spells simultaneously in three seconds."

“Granny, you really don’t need to spy on Trier.” Edith tugged at Laura’s sleeve worriedly. “Really.”

In an instant, the cracks in Laura's heart widened rapidly as if the earth had split open, but loyalty and a sense of responsibility ultimately restrained her remaining courage.

"The best way to deal with a conspiracy is to expose it. Trust me, Your Highness," the loyal court sorcerer said, picking up his spellbook and forcing a smile.

Seemingly infected by Granny Laur's emotions, Edith nodded somewhat uneasily. Edith then took out the Holy Symbol and silently cast a blessing spell on Laur and Trier.

"Don't be nervous, Laura." Suddenly, Trier's calm voice rang in Laura's ear, "Nervousness is a very detrimental emotion in any spellcasting."

His voice seemed to possess a certain magic; in an instant, most of the fear in Rale's heart dissipated. The other person's tone involuntarily reminded her of her strict yet kind mentor who liked to drink strong liquor.

But the next moment, Granny Lor felt something was amiss—shouldn't Trier be hostile towards her right now? What was the meaning of comforting her?

“Trier, how long will it take you?” Edith asked.

Trier chuckled softly, “Ten minutes in reality, Your Highness. Please, you and Noy, protect these two guiding lights. Otherwise, Granny Lor and I might have to stay inside for another ten minutes or so.”

“I swear to you with my oath,” Edith said solemnly. “Terre, I will protect them.”

“Thank you,” Trier smiled. The next moment, he used the ritual dagger to cut his palm, and a drop of crimson blood splattered onto the sketch in the center of the magic circle. “Cast the spell, now!”

The world is spinning!

The deep darkness instantly enveloped Trier's entire field of vision, but he felt no panic whatsoever. Instead, he calmly began counting his breaths.

To his surprise, he regained consciousness after only half a breath.

"That's too fast," Trier thought. "The speed at which I regain consciousness is closely related to my spellcasting ability. When I was a demigod lich in the game, it took me at least two seconds. How come it only takes one second now?"

The time traveler was somewhat surprised, but not astonished, because the boundary between the depths of the collective dream realm and the dream world, reached through dream prophecy, was always bizarre and wonderful, where anything was possible.

His ability to wake up quickly proves that his spellcasting ability is very strong at this moment, and at least the risk of this prophetic journey will be relatively low.

The moment he opened his eyes, a faint, lingering palpitation gripped Trier's heart like the cold, sharp claws of a ghoul. At the same time, a stench of negative energy assaulted him like an avalanche.

He remained expressionless and calmly surveyed his surroundings.

At this moment, he was standing in a dark and cramped corridor, holding a dilapidated lantern with a cold, eerie blue flame burning in his hand. The flickering light, like the last breath of a dying man, weakly shone into the darkness in the distance.

The floor was covered in stains, interspersed with bloody footprints and handprints that had turned brown. Several broken holy symbols sat beside the shrine, which was stained with black filth. Granny Lor lay sprawled beside the shrine like a corpse, her skin ashen and her veins shriveled.

Trier looked away.

"It must be because of the spread of the blood plague and the bloody battle last night. The wind of death is very strong here, and it is even reflected in the group's dreams."

When making a dream prophecy, the caster cannot move. They can only passively receive fragments of information from the gaps between the dream world and the dream realm. The scene before them clearly has no clues about the Bloodthorn Lady's container, so he can only stand still and wait passively.

“Laure should need another eighty breaths to wake up,” Trier muttered to himself. “Hopefully, we’ll find a clue in the next scene.”

Out of boredom, he tried moving his feet.

"Crack." The boots stepped on the spider webs on the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust.

—He can actually move?

Moreover, he had a peculiar feeling that his spellcasting ability here seemed to have fully recovered to the level he had at his peak in the game.

In other words, the spellcasting ability of a demigod lich!

Chapter 185 Exploration (Part Two)

Why am I able to act according to prophecies in dreams?

Trier squinted, held out his lantern, and carefully observed his surroundings.

In an instant, the flow of time seemed to slow down, and everything before his eyes became fragmented. In his vision, the various terrifying scenes in the collective dream transformed into self-rotating nodes, with trembling threads connecting them.

Trier paused slightly, the scene of nodes and threads before him identical to the vision he had witnessed when his martial arts skills improved. In the brief moment of his daze, the scene of nodes and threads transformed back into the cold, eerie corridor.

"Perhaps the reason I can move freely is due to my improved martial arts skills," the transmigrator secretly speculated. "It's amazing that martial arts skills can even affect spellcasting abilities."

Suddenly, Trier had a premonition, and he raised his lantern and looked up.

In the deep darkness, a white guide was faintly visible—subconsciously, Trier knew that following that guide would lead to information about the Demon Lord's container.

“The restoration of my spellcasting ability is not an illusion. In this prophecy, I can practically walk sideways with almost no risk.” Trier took a deep breath and made up his mind. “I can try to explore actively and follow that guidance.”

Although he had made up his mind, Trier did not rush forward. He lowered his head and looked again at the unconscious Granny Lor.

Trier could guess what the other party was planning.

When two spellcasters cast a dream prophecy spell in similar locations and at similar times, there is a chance that they will enter the same prophecy. Within the same prophecy, both spellcasters will be able to see the true face of the prophecy.

To be fair, time travelers would also like to know their true image in the prophecy of the dream.

Time ticked by, and after seventy breaths, Granny Lor suddenly raised her head and looked straight at Trier, her cloudy, yellowish eyes bloodshot.

“You regained consciousness after eighty breaths,” Trier said calmly. “Not bad.”

“You…” Granny Lorre’s expression was complicated, “You really are Trier?”

"Then who else could I be? Could I be an extraterrestrial being possessed?" the time traveler asked with a smile.

“I thought you were an ancient lich with ulterior motives.” Granny Lor paused for a moment, then said, “I’m sorry.”

Trier nodded slightly and accepted the apology.

“If I am truly an ancient lich, then your actions have far exceeded the realm of courage and have reached the level of recklessness and folly.”

"So your actions are completely untenable from beginning to end. If I were a lich with ulterior motives, you wouldn't be able to get out at all; if I weren't, then it would be meaningless whether you monitor me or not. You're putting yourself at risk and gaining nothing else from doing this."

"In short, it's incredibly stupid."

Granny Lor didn't refute her; she sighed, "I only want to fulfill my duty. I must protect Princess Edith on a magical level. Please see..."

“Sometimes,” Trier interrupted, “it’s better to fulfill a deeper responsibility than to fulfill a superficial one.”

Before the other person could react, he continued, "You stay here, absolutely, absolutely do not wander off, and take good care of the guide light."

"Get out?" Granny Lor looked confused. "The dream prophecy says no one can move. What nonsense are you spouting?"

Trier took a step forward.

Granny Lor opened her eyes wide and gasped in shock.

This is different from what's written in the book!

"You..." she said tremblingly.

Trier shook his head: "Anyway, just stay here. I might be gone for a long time, so be patient."

"How long is a long time?"

"Time here is extremely chaotic, I can't give you an exact time, but it's definitely a long time." Trillton paused. "When you're bored, you can study magic, see what your area of ​​expertise is."

Laura instinctively replied, "Protection."

Trier nodded, then stretched out his hand and snapped his fingers.

"Snapped!"

The next moment, Granny Lor felt a weight in her palm, and a thick, hardcover book appeared out of thin air in her hand.

She looked down and saw the book cover with the words "The Application Principles of Spell Sequence in Magic Counterspelling, and Exhaustive Case Studies" written in a universal language.

Granny Lor was completely dumbfounded—Trill could actually materialize objects! This was practically the realm of gods creating things out of thin air!

Moreover, judging from the title alone, this book belongs to an extremely difficult subject, and he just casually gave it to me?!

“Study hard, and be patient,” Trier said in a deep voice. “I will check your progress when I come back.”

At this point, the time traveler, carrying a lantern, followed the guidance in his mind and slowly walked into the depths of the corridor.

Not only living beings have dreams, but the deceased do too.

As their immortal nature is reborn, the final glimpse of the material world by the dead often attaches to fragments of their souls, seeping into the depths of the collective dream. Over thousands of years, countless beings have perished, their soul fragments also deeply buried within the collective dream, making this place gloomy, terrifying, and bizarre.

Trier's footsteps echoed in the corridor.

The shrines on both sides of the corridor were dilapidated, and the places where statues of saints should have been placed were all empty, covered with dust and bloodstains. The ceiling and corners were full of knotted cobwebs, but there was no trace of spiders. As Trier went deeper into the corridor, the stench of negative energy in the air became stronger and stronger.

“This can be considered a kind of revelation.” Trier glanced at the shrine. “During the Blood Plague crisis, many churches were abandoned—those bloodstains may indicate that massacres took place in many churches.”

Suddenly, a dull thud came from the wooden door on the left side of the corridor, accompanied by maniacal laughter and the groans of the walking corpses. A moment later, screams and the sound of flesh being torn apart by teeth mingled together.

The dim blue light of the lantern shone on the wooden door, casting countless menacing shadows that danced wildly.

Trier took a silver mirror out of his pocket. The moment he took it out, countless blood-red mycelia clung to the mirror like tree roots. Within half a breath, the mirror turned into a wriggling blood-red mushroom.

“Hmm, red, that’s something that happened in the past,” Trier muttered to himself.

He was then unaffected and walked straight past the wooden door.

The moment I passed through the wooden door, the surrounding environment suddenly changed dramatically.

The stench of negative energy in the air was gone, as were the narrow, cramped corridors and shrines. The bloody footprints and handprints on the ground were also gone, replaced by a semi-circular arena-like space supported by countless steel pillars.

The arches between the columns are covered with rotating gears, some of which are rusty. Due to poor connections, the nested gears occasionally emit hot sparks.

“Gear vault, typical dwarven style,” Trier muttered to himself. “There used to be a dwarven city inside the mountain of Eraf. Now I should enter the fragments of the ancient dwarven dream. Be careful not to get lost.”

With this thought in mind, he looked up at the ceiling—the cobalt blue guiding light of Granny Lor flickered faintly above him.

"I won't get lost for now," he said, following his inner guidance as he walked behind him.

The arena looked empty, except for the ground which was covered with severed limbs and blood.

PS: Adding yesterday's update

Chapter 186 Fearful Aura

Trier crouched down and reached out to pick up a severed hand.

The severed hand had short, thick fingers with only one interphalangeal joint, which means that the owners of these severed limbs on the sand beneath their feet must have been dwarves.

He gently lowered the severed hand and looked in the direction of the bloodstains.

The circular stands, which had been empty just moments before, were now crowded with short, stocky figures. Their eyes gleamed with an unclean red light, a dense network of holes in a honeycomb, filled with hunger and hatred, making one's scalp crawl.