Chapter 2412: Time Pause and Hypnosis

Chapter 2412: Chapter 2412: Time Pause and Hypnosis

Thinking about it, Shard stepped down the stairs with Miss Eles. The cold mist in the "Antechamber" of the Underground Cemetery grew thicker. After pushing open the tightly shut stone gate locked from the inside, accompanied by a strange "creak~" sound, a skeleton wielding a rusty broadsword immediately swung at Shard as the door opened.

Both Shard and Miss Eles remained calm, so the Illusion Skeleton passed through Shard’s body and instantly vanished.

Looking further in, the dim passage of the tomb chamber was filled with a chilling white mist that severely affected visibility. Luminous white spirits wandered within, and occasionally, one could hear strange noises made by skeletons and ghouls moving.

"Illusion Technique combined with some Necromancy, though cleverly executed, is still not particularly strong."

Miss Eles assessed:

"Do you need me to break the ritual? I could just shift to Dragonborn form and roar."

"No, no, I’m worried that forcibly breaking the ritual might destroy what we’re looking for. Besides, I’m curious about who’s trapped here."

Saying this, Shard raised his right hand. As a faint Spiritual Light emerged from his palm, it condensed above his hand into a glowing white transparent crystal.

Under the guidance of Sorcery, the white transparent crystal floated beside Shard and Miss Eles. As Shard gently tapped it, Moonlight clung to the crystal, making its emitted Glimmer even brighter—this was a basic application of the "Light Spell."

The crystal rotated clockwise in the air, causing the cold mist within two meters to disappear, the wandering Spiritual Bodies vanished, and the strange sounds ceased. In fact, besides dust, there was nothing in the corridor before them.

"Let’s go."

Shard gestured to Miss Eles:

"Let’s not rush to find things, let’s first see who’s here."

To prevent tomb raiding, the Wright Family’s Underground Cemetery, with nearly a thousand years of history, was designed like a maze, but "Enhanced Spatial Awareness" was most effective in such terrains.

Miss Eles shielded their voices and footsteps as they moved intermittently deeper into the cemetery. The rotating crystal provided Moonlight for lighting, and besides the Illusions broken by the crystal, indeed, some Ancient Corpse Ghosts and Ancient Wraiths emerged from varying sizes of chambers on the sides of the tomb corridor due to activated rituals, but Miss Eles effortlessly dispersed them with a wave of her hand.

The person trapped here was deep within the corridor, the two had not yet seen him but first heard the sound of intense impacts.

As they approached, they saw a bespectacled middle-aged man in his thirties, leaning with slight fear against the side wall of the corridor. A luminous medal-shaped Relic hung on his chest formed a transparent egg-shaped shield to protect him, while two Wraiths, two Ghouls, and an armored skeleton wielding a Longsword took turns striking the shield, attempting to weaken its power.

The Wraiths and Ghouls were not very strong, but the armored skeleton could be classified as "Special Undead." It might be the strongest "Tomb Guardian" left by the Ancient Circle Mage of the Wright Family; although this Undead just continuously struck the shield with its sword, judging by its soul quality, in the cemetery suited for its existence, this entity could be considered a Six-Ring or even Seven-Ring Sorcerer.

As for the pale middle-aged man clearly suffering from over-exhaustion, he seemed to be of the Five-Rings.

The blue-eyed girl glanced at Shard, who gestured for her to stay hidden, then walked out from the cemetery corridor corner himself.

He did not deliberately conceal his presence, so the bespectacled man immediately noticed Shard.

Of course, the Undead also realized the appearance of another living being but, having already targeted an attacker, none chose to assault Shard blessed with "the blessing of a thousand souls."

"Sir, regardless of who you are, considering we’re both alive, could you help me?"

Though despairing, the man leaned against the wall still appealed for help to Shard.

"Sure."

Shard promptly nodded, first pressing his chest’s medal, then pointing forward:

"Sunlight Ray."

The scorching golden positive energy flowed with the motion of his finger, crisply slicing those two Ghouls and two Wraiths diagonally in half. The Wraiths shattered with a piercing shriek, and the Ghouls burst into a blazing fire.

The only unscathed skeleton, its armor shielding it from Sunlight Energy, turned to slash at Shard upon his attack.

Shard casually flung a crimson Moonlight, which collided with the skeleton’s sword, and the Moonlight shattered the blade and tore open the armor, nearly cleaving the skeleton in half.

It had no further chances as the armor shattered; a scorching positive energy flood swept over. Thus, the skeleton maintained its running stance as its burning lower half moved several steps forward before collapsing heavily, while the upper half fell directly at the origin.

The skeleton vanished amidst the blazing flames. Holding the Angel’s Right Arm, Shard continued forward as the bespectacled man finally exhausted retracted the shield created by the Relic, his legs unable to support his body, leaned against the wall, and slowly sat down:

"Thank you...you saved me."

Effort squeezed gratitude from his throat, he then removed a pendant from around his neck intending to hand it to Shard, who stopped him:

"Keep your own Relic safe, I’m not a robber, you just need to answer a few questions."

If he had said this initially, the man might have hesitated. But Shard had already helped him out of a big trouble, and he felt he couldn’t refuse:

"Go ahead and ask. If I can answer, I’ll definitely do so. If not, you might as well kill me."

"Actually, there’s no need for violence... What organization are you affiliated with? Don’t tell me you’re just an unlucky guy tomb raiding alone."

The man gave a bitter smile:

"Please don’t joke around. Oh, my name is Claude Binns. I can only say, I’m a local, and my organization is also local. Is your next question about my purpose? I think you and I should have the same purpose. I’m here looking for the relic left by the Circle Sorcerer of the Wright Family, who designed this trap."

He paused and hurriedly added:

"It’s not a relic that contains Whisper elements, it’s his true relic. My organization is actually quite shabby, and we don’t have many members. Originally, I thought coming alone would be enough, but nearly died here."

He didn’t need Shard to ask, clearly knowing what Shard wanted to know:

"The relic I used is a Poet Book Level Relic [Tomb Raider’s Despicable Medal], which my friend recently bought at the local black market.

In cemetery environments, it increases a bit of luck, making spiritual bodies that couldn’t be directly contacted, directly accessible. Of course, its biggest use is forming the shield you saw, but once it takes more attacks than its limit, it absorbs the user’s spiritual power and blood, until it consumes the soul. The negative trait is that it easily revives nearby undead, and it’s very easy to attract attacks from the undead. Just before you appeared, they were still here because of this."

Actually, it’s a combination of two reasons, but Shard didn’t need to explain this point.

"I thought with this, I’d be foolproof, but luck was too bad and triggered the trap directly... I couldn’t think someone would set up an undead revival ritual in their family crypt."

"You’ve said it all, what else can I say?"

Shard looked him up and down:

"Moon Bay City, like Velindale and Tobesk Royal Capital, due to the city’s importance, the church’s regulation is exceptionally strict, so there aren’t many that can claim to be ’local Circle Sorcerer Organizations.’

I remember there are two mutual aid groups at the docks, a black market with regular meetings in the northern forest, and a group in the Lower District, but they were wanted by the church due to beliefs in asexual reproduction. Besides those, there are a few others, but none are large. Which one do you belong to?"

The man slumped against the wall merely shook his head:

"I can’t say, I won’t betray the organization."

Shard heard Miss Eles’s soft cough from behind, so he stabbed the sword into the ground, reached into his pocket with his left hand to grasp the lady’s pocket watch, and pointed forward with his right hand:

"Adel’s Time Stasis."

Then turned and asked:

"What’s the matter?"

"Only Five Rings, asking questions doesn’t need to be so troublesome."

The blue-eyed girl emerged from the darkness:

"I’m Twelve Rings; I can handle this. It’s not a battlefield where things change instantly, I have time to prepare spells."

She merely prepared slightly and nodded to Shard. When Shard released the time stasis, those sea-blue eyes were already glowing:

"What organization are you affiliated with?"

Because of ’Time Stasis’, the middle-aged man who couldn’t resist had a dazed expression and immediately said:

"Light... Eternal Light."

"What method do you use to obscure fate?"

Shard continued to ask, but this time didn’t get a reply, apparently, the man before him didn’t know about this.

Hence Shard cast Time Stasis on him again, and after Miss Eles retreated back into the darkness, he lifted the spell again. Although this consumed quite a bit of spiritual power, as Miss Eles said, this isn’t a battlefield, Shard can recover fully after a short rest:

"You don’t want to say, I won’t force you."

He spoke to the man who had no awareness of what had happened, merely feeling something seemed off but couldn’t identify what:

"Tell me the clues of the relic left by that Circle Sorcerer, and the way your organization obtained them, then you can leave here. I think it shouldn’t be possible that you’re still greedily seeking that Ancient Circle Mage’s relic."