Chapter 127: Frey Wants to Speed Run This Challenge

The ancient stone walls seemed to absorb the faint light atop the mountain. Shadows filled many corners of the old castle, and unknown secrets potentially lay hidden behind every door. The cold stone walls and dim corridors exuded an even more chilling aura, heavy with the threat of imminent slaughter.

The groups moved through the castle's passageways, maintaining a wary distance from one another. Gazing out the window, they could only make out the hazy outlines of mist-shrouded forests and valleys. Everything appeared indistinct and mysterious.

The two Traitors, thralls of their respective vampire lords, could only wield their master's powers when the lords were awake. Vampires typically sealed themselves away in safe, light-proof locations to slumber during the day, awakening only at night. Consequently, the Traitors had only one opportunity each night to unleash those terrifying and unknown powers.

On this first day of the five-day killing game, the challengers remained unscathed and at peak strength. Unable to access the vampires' powers during the day, the two Traitors dared not attempt a direct confrontation against the other ten challengers.

Instead, they wisely disguised themselves as ordinary challengers. The strategy for daytime exploration naturally became one of sticking together, ensuring no one strayed from the group's sight.

This forced the Traitors to move with the collective, preventing them from committing murder or making progress on their own objectives during the day. It also served to significantly stall their currently unknown mission.

Ascending the stone staircase from the cathedral-like main hall and traversing winding corridors led to a second-floor gallery. From here, people could still clearly look down into the hall below. Venturing further inward, past three massive locked bedrooms and several washrooms and storerooms, the most striking feature was a two-story library that spanned the space between the second and third floors.

The library was lined with towering, ornate, dark mahogany bookshelves that stretched from floor to ceiling and were packed with ancient tomes from the Honing Empire, including antique manuscripts and rare maps. A writing desk sat in the center, and it had an inkwell and a quill made from the feather of an unknown bird. Clearly, this had once been the study and workspace of the castle's master, Sir Caligula.

Surprisingly, Frey did not ask the group to linger in the library to pour over ancient texts for clues. Instead, he led them up the spiral staircase to the castle's third floor. The levels from the third to the fifth floor housed not only three standard enclosed bedrooms per floor, but also Sir Caligula's private quarters, a conference room, a workshop, an armory, a weaving room, an art studio, a stillroom, and the tower chambers.

Many of the rooms they passed could hold potential clues. However, the Detective showed no interest in them. It was as if he had identified and dismissed the distractions, focusing solely on the most efficient course of action he had already determined in his mind.

After a thorough three-hour exploration of the castle's interior, the challengers confirmed that the five-story structure was protected by powerful magical wards capable of withstanding immense attacks. In fact, the bedrooms featured specially reinforced barriers.

With three bedrooms per floor across levels two through five, there were exactly twelve secure bedrooms in total. Each challenger already possessed a magic key sitting right in their pockets that was capable of unlocking the door and windows of their assigned room.

At this point, the mechanics of this Shadow Realm dungeon became much clearer. If everyone gathered together at night, when the vampires awakened and the Traitors could wield their powers, there was a high probability that the two Traitors would wipe them all out in a single stroke.

Therefore, the obvious strategy for the nights was for everyone to separate and take shelter in the secure bedrooms. Even if the vampire thralls possessed offensive or curse-breaking powers capable of breaching a bedroom's defenses, they were limited to using such powers only once per day. When that was combined with the Shadow Realm's inherent adherence to strict logic, it meant that only one to two bedrooms could likely be breached in a single night.

The more concentrated the living arrangements, the higher the probability of multiple challengers being killed in one go. On the flip side, the more dispersed the group, the lower the likelihood of fatalities that night. If the Traitors weren't flushed out early, however, five days might be enough for the two of them to wipe out all the other challengers.

The room assignments had been public knowledge since the start of the Shadow Realm scenario. Challengers holding key roles, especially the Detective, were in particular danger. The only way to avoid this was to share a room with a trusted fellow challenger.

Since other challengers might be willing to sacrifice themselves to protect the Detective, it was crucial to prevent the Traitors from killing the Detective on the very first night. The sooner the Detective died, the more heavily the scales would tip toward a victory for the Traitors.

Conversely, by effectively misleading the Traitors or engaging in a flawless game of psychological maneuvering, it might be possible to cause them to come up empty-handed for the entire night!

Having finished surveying the castle's interior layout, the group followed Frey downstairs and back to the ground floor. Frey went to the kitchen and pantry to gather some portable food, stowing it in a leather crossbody bag he had found upstairs, before heading to the wine cellar to retrieve a few bottles of sweet white wine.

It was nearing nine o'clock in the morning. Beyond the massive double doors, light flowed freely through the window frames. Beams that streamed through the stained glass of the vaulted ceiling cast a shifting pattern of light and shadow across the otherwise dim interior.

Frey pushed open the great doors, and the group followed him out of the historic castle for the first time. The intense sunlight hit them with a shock unlike anything they had ever experienced.

At last, they beheld the full, magnificent view of the castle wreathed by the clouds. Stepping out through the main gate and looking back, the relief carvings on the ancient castle's exterior walls stood out sharply in the morning light. The limestone masonry formed a distinct boundary against the surrounding lush green forest, while the overhanging upper-level terraces and soaring spires looked truly spectacular within the swirling mist.

Next, Frey instructed everyone to head to the cliff's edge to verify whether the information provided by the Geographer and the Lawyer was accurate. If the information proved true, then the credibility of those two individuals would be significantly bolstered.

The castle was surrounded by mountains and forests. Lush greenery abounded, yet the desolate autumn air lent the surroundings an eerie, forbidding quality. Twelve figures threaded their way through the woods as the atmosphere grew increasingly tense.

Within the mist, the trees loomed like uncanny silhouettes, while the shallow stream transformed into a mysterious passage vanishing into the fog. They knew the true objective of this excursion was to assess the condition of the bridge.

In a mere five minutes, guided by the precise directions provided by the Geographer, the group arrived at the edge of the cliff. The sight before them was terrifying: the road leading to the city-state had been severed by a massive chasm. Even before their eyes could fully take in the sight, the sheer scale of the gorge, over eight hundred meters deep and over a hundred meters wide, was staggering.

Just as Lance had predicted, the bridge had indeed been destroyed. Someone had deliberately sought to trap everyone within this ancient castle. It was undoubtedly the work of a Traitor wielding the powers of the vampires before the Shadow Realm challenge even began.

The giant drop, the immense gap to the far bank, and the aerial-restriction magic of the national defense barrier had cut them off from the rest of the world, turning them into prisoners on this rocky place.

On this bleak, chilly morning, everything remained shrouded in baffling mystery. Just as the group's spirits were sinking to their lowest, Frey, looking for all the world like a detective on the verge of cracking the case, strode alone toward the precipice!