826 Chapter 826 Mastermind Behind the Resort
With a deep frown on his face Marcus turned towards Mrazivý and beckoned her forward.
When she arrived, he made sure that she stayed out of sight while observing the surroundings as well.
Soon she was wearing a similar frown to Marcus and an air of tension had built up around her.
Using both of her hands she pointed one behind her signaling that she wanted to head back the way they came and the other she tapped her head with to inform Marcus she wanted to use telepathy to converse.
Nodding his head, he agreed and the tow of them flew back deeper into the long tunnel where it was far less likely that anyone would pick up on their conversation.
‘I was really hoping that your hunch that necromancy might be involved was wrong, but it seems you were right.’ Mrazivý said using her telepathy, a deep grimace on her face.
‘Yeah, I wish I had not been right as well. Just all the bone dust and the skins gave me a feeling. I found similar things when I fought a necromancer in the past.’
‘I don’t think you have ever mentioned that to me before. When did this happen?’ Mrazivý asked.
Swiftly Marcus gave her an abridged version of what had happened and told her that it was not a fond memory that he liked to relay which is why he had not told her before.
‘I suppose so long as you dealt with the problem it is fine. Necromancy is outlawed by the adventurers guild, so a practitioner within Borealia could have caused some problems.’
A confused expression, Marcus had never heard this before. He figured it was likely frowned on in most civilized cultures, but it was another that it was banned across the entire adventurers guild.
Catching onto this Mrazivý explained that while necromancy was not inherently evil and there were records of a few necromancer that used their powers to protect their homes and were considered champions, plenty more were regarded as horrid villains that caused unimaginable tragedies.
It was apparently common for necromancers that wanted more and more power to eventually create an undead creature they could not control, which would then become a blight on the land it inhabited after it killed its creator.
Hearing this remined Marcus of one of the taboos of forging which was the creation of undead weapons. Thabon had mentioned that whenever one of these were successfully created, they would turn everything around into a wasteland devoid of life.
‘Well at the very least the necromancy here does not seem to have lost control of his creations. Otherwise, I would doubt they would continue to move so orderly.’ Marcus said, offering up a small bit of positive news.
‘Yes, but that means that whoever made them is still around and likely the one in charge who made this resort, or at least a confidant. Whatever is going on here could be incredible dangerous to the entire world. An information network that can see and hear every action of some of the most powerful people in numerous nations is under the control of a necromancer. They could have been building up their strength for centuries and preparing to launch an attack on life itself.’ Mrazivý said, expressing what the worst-case scenario could be.
And while Marcus hoped that was not what was going on, it was certainly possible.
‘Still, I doubt that a single individual even with an undead army could take over the world. The other great spirts are around to prevent something like that from happening.’ Marcus thought to himself.
He then asked Mrazivý whether they should simply contact the adventurers guild to assemble a raid force, but she shook her head.
‘No, we do not know if any higher up within the guild is connected. We have ruled out the guild members on the island since they are infected as well, but that does not exonerate then entire guild. And even if none of them are involved the being running this place has likely the best surveillance system in the world. We are probably already working on dwindling time before they catch on. We found this place and it is our job to follow it to the end. If we are out of our depth, we need only call in Boreas for backup.’
Sighing Marcus could not disagree with Mrazivý’s logic, and finding out exactly what was going on and what they were up against was imperative. It was possible they had stumbled upon something bigger than they ever imagined.
Going back to the room they had found, Marcus scouted out a path for Mrazivý to take so they could head deeper in without being noticed.
They wanted to find the control center where the information that was being gathered by the pseudo soul fragments was being transmitted to and destroy it if at all possible.
Of course another goal was to take out the entity behind everything happening here, but only if they were something they could handle.
As of right now they had not idea if they were up against a person, monster, or beast, but it was clear that whatever had created this place was high level and very intelligent.
‘We are defiantly getting closer.’ Marcus thought as he held up a hand to stop Mrazivý.
He had found a passageway that was far more heavily guarded than anywhere else, and it clearly led to somewhere important.
The number of detection and defenses enchantments as well as their quality had vastly increased.
Thankfully, none of them were beyond what Marcus was capable of disabling. It would simply take him time.
Naturally he could have always left Mrazivý and headed on alone without bothering to disarm anything, but he knew she was liable to do something dangerous if he left her back, and having her around was comforting if they could into a battle.
‘At least there are no undead watching the area. Whoever set this place up probably thought it unlikely anyone could get this far undetected.’ Marcus thought as he called Mrazivý over.
With her using her dragons eyes to help, he began work on disabling the enchantments, until they finally came to a large sliding door that was sealed tight.
Behind it Marcus and Mrazivý felt that it was likely that they would find what they were looking for.
So far, the two of them had come across all manner of facilities, but not the one that related to the pseudo soul fragments.
The entity behind this place also remined elusive and was possibly behind this door.
Accessing the enchantments on the door using his glyph tuning skill Marcus changed the parameters on the alarm to not go off when he and Mrazivý went through and made it so the defenses were turned off for the next five minutes.
With that done Marcus opened up the door ever so slightly and allowed Mrazivý to slip through before he closed it again.
Yet on the other side of the door, they were met with a foul and sinister aura that permeated the area.
It was oppressive and Mrazivý was visibly sickened by it to a slight degree.
This was an aura of powerful undeath and something Marcus would have exhibited as well had he been a normal ghost.
In this presence it was clear that nothing weak willed could live, and Marcus guessed that anyone under level forty would die just by being in the vicinity of whatever was creating this aura.
Looking into the room, neither of them could see any sort of entity where they currently were, but farther in voices could be heard muttering.
Along with walls were shelves filled with all manner of books and ingredients, and with a quick glance Marcus could tell that they were horribly unorganized.
‘I suppose that this might be where things that are not sued regularly are stored.’ Marcus thought after a cursory glance.
Some of what was on the shelves actually looked rather interesting, but since he had more pressing things to deal with Marcus pushed down his curiosity and carefully continued forward.
Soon they found a set of stairs that led up to room above which moved away from where the voices were coming from.
Using her eyes Mrazivý motioned towards stairs, indicating that they should go up first.
Shrugging his shoulders Marcus did as Mrazivý wanted and ascend the stairs.
At the top they came into a well decorated room that looked like a large and opulent studio apartment.
Yet despite how nice it looked; it was clear that the room had not been used in a while.
Unfortunately, nothing of major importance was found here, other than the discover that whoever had designed the place was likely a man judging by the clothing they had found.
‘I suppose it is time we bite the bullet and see what we are really up against.’ Marcus thought, looking over at a balcony that would overlook where the voices were coming from.
Carefully opening the door, Marcus and Mrazivý peered down and finally got a look at the entity that had created the resort and was using it to infect people with a nearly undetectable surveillance device.
Looking down below they saw five individuals, four of which were clearly a manner of undead.
The fifth, who they could easily tell was the strongest, looked mostly like a normal human at first glance, but on closer inspection, it was clear they were undead as well.
His skin was even paler than Marcus’ despite the fact that he was a ghost, and when it caught any form of light it was partially see through.
‘He’s a lich.’