Warlock Apprentice

Chapter 2822: Chapter 2823: Dislocated Time and Space

Hall of Wisdom.

At this moment, the Wise Sovereign was standing beside the core node of the Magical Energy Array, watching the continuously flickering node with tightly furrowed brows.

Just a short while ago, from the feedback of the Magical Energy Array, the Wise Sovereign sensed a vast region of emptiness.

This so‑called emptiness referred to another kind of spatial property completely different in essence from the current space. You could understand it as a stable space being disturbed by another spatial force, forming an uncontrollable area.

Under normal circumstances, once such a massive emptiness appeared, the Magical Energy Array would inevitably suffer backlash, perhaps even collapse. Yet the array was still operating continuously, and without the slightest sign of abnormality. This meant... this emptiness had been acknowledged by the Magical Energy Array.

The Wise Sovereign knew very well that in that region, there was only one kind of spatial emptiness that could be acknowledged by the Magical Energy Array: a Mirror Realm Passage.

Adanis controlled the Magical Energy Array around the Qingkong Poetry Room. With her attainments in arrays, making the nearby array acknowledge the Mirror Domain’s intrusion into reality was not difficult.

Therefore, judging from the scope of this region of emptiness and the speed of its incursion, the Wise Sovereign could basically determine that Adanis had made her move.

Even though the Wise Sovereign could not see Angel and the others’ situation, just from the position of the emptiness he could tell that Adanis’ strike was extremely ruthless and precise.

Adanis had directly encircled Angel and the others from front and back.

The emptiness covered two regions, just enough to block Angel and the others in a corridor with no side paths.

No way forward, and no way back.

Seeing this, the Wise Sovereign let out a deep sigh. He had already prepared to intervene.

He had weighed this earlier: Angel and the Black Earl absolutely could not die here—or rather, could not die right under his nose.

Given these two’s backgrounds, they might bring an even greater crisis to the already shattered Naraku City.

So, the Wise Sovereign chose cooperation, and decided that when they fell into dire straits he would reach out a helping hand.

He simply hadn’t expected that the "variable" he had set his hopes on would be besieged by Adanis before they had even reached the Qingkong Poetry Room.

"Perhaps luck truly is not with this moment... nor with me." After sighing, the Wise Sovereign prepared to pick the right moment to extend help.

Although he was going to save Angel and his group, he could not act yet. If he wanted Angel and the others to truly appreciate the grace of having their lives saved, it was best to do it at the most critical moment—when they were at their most desperate—then extend his hand.

So the Wise Sovereign continued to wait, waiting until the two sides of emptiness were about to close together, until they had absolutely nowhere to escape, then he would strike.

Yet to the Wise Sovereign’s surprise, before the two sides of emptiness had closed, an unexpected change occurred on the scene.

He sensed an aura he had not felt in ages suddenly descend into the emptiness.

With this person’s descent, the surrounding emptiness began to slowly recede. In less than two minutes, this region of emptiness had returned to normal.

Before the Wise Sovereign even had a chance to act, Angel and the others had already resolved the crisis and set out again.

The Wise Sovereign didn’t particularly care about Angel’s group; as long as they were safe and sound, it was fine. What he cared about was that "that person" had actually descended! For the sake of Angel and the others, that man who hadn’t shown himself for ten thousand years had finally appeared!

"Olao..." the Wise Sovereign softly spoke his name.

Olao’s appearance was completely beyond the Wise Sovereign’s expectations. He had imagined scenarios where Angel and the others didn’t need his help and still found other ways to escape; but he had never considered that when Angel and the others were trapped in a desperate situation, Olao would show up and pull them out of the siege!

Previously, the Wise Sovereign had suspected whether Olao might be connected to Angel and the others. Under the witness of the True Words Tome, he obtained a negative answer.

The Wise Sovereign trusted the True Words Tome’s judgment; Angel and the others indeed had no connection with Olao.

But then what was going on now?

Why had Olao appeared?

If Olao had come for the Noah Clan, then why, when members of the Noah bloodline had appeared before, did Olao completely ignore them?

Among this group of people, who exactly was the key to Olao revealing himself?

Unconsciously, a figure surfaced in the Wise Sovereign’s mind.

—Angel.

He had a premonition that this "variable" Angel was not only being observed and used by himself; perhaps Olao had noticed him as well...

...

Elsewhere, in a pitch‑black room within the Qingkong Poetry Room.

After several minutes of darkness, there was a sudden "cling," and the wall sconces on both sides of the room suddenly flared to life.

The sconces could only illuminate the walls on either side; the very center of the room remained pitch black.

However, within the areas lit by the sconces, two oil paintings facing each other could be seen.

Each oil painting depicted a person: on one side, a man wearing a tall felt hat; on the other, a blonde woman with hair cascading over her shoulders, sitting elegantly on a chair.

At first glance, the two oil paintings seemed to be just that—paintings—until... the people in the paintings suddenly opened their mouths.

"Olao, you still refuse to tell me the reason?" The blonde woman raised her brows, gazing through the dark Wall Barrier at the man in the painting opposite.

The man in the painting was Olao, who had earlier appeared for Angel and the others. He had been striking a reserved pose in the painting, but upon hearing Adanis’ question, his shoulders slumped in dejection. He tilted his head against the frame and spoke feebly: "Didn’t I say it already? If they can make it here, I’ll definitely tell you. If they can’t, then saying it is pointless."

The blonde woman—Adanis—said coolly, "They won’t be able to come."

Olao: "If they can’t come, then just pretend this never happened."

Adanis: "And the explanation I asked for?"

Olao: "If they can’t come, you still want an explanation? Don’t look at me like that, I’m your elder at least."

Adanis arched a brow, a faint Red light surfacing in her eyes.

Seeing those glowing red eyes, Olao immediately backed down. "Alright, alright. If they can’t come, I’ll give you an explanation."

Only then did Adanis lower her brows in satisfaction.

After obtaining Olao’s promise, the air fell into silence. The two people in the oil paintings once again entered a speechless, awkward stare‑off.

After the silence stretched for several minutes, Olao poked half his body out of the frame.

Adanis: "Where are you going?"

"Do you have to control where I go too?" Olao muttered unhappily. "Did I ever control you when you went out before?"

Adanis: "That’s because you had no ability to."

Olao was momentarily at a loss for words. Indeed, he did not have the ability to control Adanis—or rather, he had no way to control her. All of his abilities had dissipated in that accident. In those first years, Olao had fallen into desperate situations multiple times, and it was this junior he had personally brought up—Adanis—who supplied him with Energy so he could pull through.

Only in recent years had Olao slightly stabilized, but compared to Adanis, he was still far inferior.

Moreover, the Qingkong Poetry Room was a shackle bound to his abilities. Once he left here, his strength would only continually decline.

Because of this, not to mention restraining Adanis, simply leaving the Qingkong Poetry Room would consume the vast majority of his Energy.

"...I’m just going to wait at the Door. Maybe they’ll still have a chance to come?" Olao hesitated for a moment, but still spoke honestly.

Adanis also leaned out from the oil painting, and with a light leap, landed gracefully on the floor.

Brushing aside the hair by her ear, Adanis looked up. "Your expectations for them surpass those you’ve ever had for any Noah Clan member in the past."

Olao: "Don’t try to trick me into talking. I’ve said it before, if they can’t make it here, I’ll explain it to you. Right now, I don’t want to say anything."

Adanis: "You don’t want to talk now because you think that once you say it, I will definitely go and stop them, is that it?"

Olao shook his head. "No, I understand your temperament. You wouldn’t do that. Even when it’s a Noah Clan member who failed the trial, you’ve never taken their life."

Adanis: "So you’re indirectly admitting that once the secret is spoken, there’s a chance I might go and stop them?"

This time, Adanis changed her wording. It wasn’t "definitely," but "a chance."

Olao let out a sigh and said helplessly, "Even if I don’t say it, aren’t you already going to stop them? And you even went so far as to use that Infant Spirits from the Otherworld. You know full well how terrifying it is... Forget it, what’s done is done. Once the Infant Spirits is released, it’s released. In itself, that’s a kind of test. A test for them, and for you and me as well."

"If they really can break through the hurdle of the Infant Spirits, I hope you won’t stop them anymore... and won’t stop me either."

Adanis fell silent for a moment and gave no answer.

Olao shook his head and said irritably, "You’ve gone as far as unleashing the Infant Spirits from the Otherworld, and you still won’t let them go?"

"Try thinking about it from another angle. If they can even handle the Infant Spirits from the Otherworld, there’s nothing you can do about them anyway."

Adanis: "There’s no way they can handle that Infant Spirits."

Olao: "Then that settles it. The Infant Spirits is an uncrowned trump card. If even after this trump card is flipped, they can still come, then that’s fate."

This time Adanis still made no statement. She merely stared quietly at Olao, and after a long while, she softly asked, "Suppose they do come. What will you do then?"

Olao was stunned for a moment, then he teased, "What’s wrong, are you losing confidence in that mysterious Infant Spirits from the Otherworld?"

Adanis flicked the hair by her ear, then gracefully rolled her eyes at Olao.

Olao chuckled, his brows settling as he sank into thought for a moment before finally saying, "If they really come, then... I’ll stand on their side."

Adanis: "And then? You stand on their side, and what comes after that?"

Olao: "I don’t know."

"You don’t know?" Adanis frowned. You don’t know, and yet you’re that resolute?

Olao shrugged. "I really don’t know. But I believe fate will arrange something."

"Fate?" Adanis let out a cold laugh and said nothing more.

Olao didn’t mind, only smiling with narrowed eyes. "All these years, this is the first time I’ve been this excited, the first time I’ve had such expectations. Even if I also think the chances aren’t high, can you really bear to let my expectation come to nothing?"

Adanis snorted lightly. "Why wouldn’t I be able to?"

Olao’s face collapsed in distress. "Sigh, you were still a little kid back then, so adorable. How did you become more and more rebellious as you grew up? Ah, if Lord Augustine comes back and sees you like this, he’ll definitely think I didn’t teach you well."

Adanis: "He’s not coming back."

Olao: "Whether Lord Augustine comes back or not, what I mean is, you should behave yourself a little."

Having said that, Olao tried to reach out, wanting to rub her hair like he used to do when Adanis was little. But Adanis stepped back and avoided his hand.

Olao awkwardly withdrew his hand, reminiscing aloud about the Adanis of the past as he turned around and walked out of the room.

Adanis watched Olao’s back. Her gaze, always so sharp, for the first time showed a hint of confusion.

Those questions she did not want to touch, the future she did not want to contemplate, and the possibilities she refused to face, all of a sudden surged up in her heart.

Adanis very much wanted to cast these vexing thoughts aside, but the moment her attention wavered, it was as if a voice began echoing by her ear.

—All these years, this is the first time I’ve looked forward to something like this. Can you really bear to let my expectation come to nothing?

Asking herself honestly, could she bear it?

Adanis already had an answer in her heart, but she did not want to let it show.

"Have I really gone too far?"

The moment reflection rose in her heart, obsession followed right up to her brow.

"No! Everything I’ve done is right. It’s all for the Qingkong Poetry Room, and for Olao as well!"

She truly did not want to see a look of disappointment on Olao’s face. But she also did not want to change the status quo, and even less did she want... to be separated from Olao.

Adanis closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them again, the hesitation in her eyes had vanished, replaced once more by cool indifference.

Only, that indifference did not last long before it was replaced by shock.

She suddenly looked back. Her gaze shot toward the direction of the entrance to the Qingkong Poetry Room...

...

After Angel and the others confirmed that the smell came from the Maneater Flower, they continued on.

Perhaps because they knew a "great battle" was imminent, everyone was very quiet along the way, with only Dox looking eager to try his hand. Nonetheless, even Dox did not break the heavy silence.

It wasn’t until they passed a corner and saw a small collapsed plaza that Angel suddenly stopped.

"What’s wrong?" The Black Earl’s nostrils "looked" toward Angel.

Angel shook his head. "It’s nothing. Let’s go."

Angel gave no explanation. He simply caught up with the group again and walked toward the southeast side of the small plaza, where the only passage lay.

As he walked, Angel observed the plaza. When he passed its center, he looked up.

The ceiling above was pitted and uneven, clearly the marks left by a collapse.

Looking at that rough, jagged top, Angel silently sighed in his heart.

—To revisit an old place, only to find it utterly changed.

Back then, when he was not yet a Transcendent but just an ordinary Talented One, the first time he came to the Nightmare Realm, the very first place he arrived at was here.

At that time, all around him were intact corridor rest areas.

When he looked up, he could see the sewer leading directly to the pitch-black sky of the outside world.

Beside him floated two Flying Head Demons.

In a distant alley, a road of blazing red flowers was hidden.

Even though the Nightmare Realm back then was filled with eerie aura everywhere and Angel’s mood was anxious and uneasy... at least at that time, Angel saw the vibrant, thriving side of this place.

But now, everything was both familiar and strange.

No passageways remained, only Ruins. No vitality, only a heavy twilight air.

Faced with such a scene, even if Angel had not been there personally, he would still feel a sense of dislocation—that sense of things remaining while people have changed.