Chapter 2417: Chapter 2418: Hidden

"Angel, you’ve reached the fifth floor?" The speaker was Kanter, who knew Angel had arrived as soon as he saw the Authority Eye move.

"Angel is here?" Nis also snapped back from his teasing.

"Yes, I’m currently at the sub-control node on the fifth floor." Angel paused, then used the Authority Eye to look at Nis: "Did you need something from me, Wizard Nis?"

"A small matter, but it’s not important, it can wait. Have you found any research material on Soul Arms over there?" Nis quickly asked upon learning Angel was on the fifth floor.

"I found quite a bit, but I haven’t had a chance to read them carefully yet. I’ll bring them to you later."

Hearing this, Nis let out a long sigh of relief. The material he found on the fourth floor was pitifully sparse. If there was none on the fifth floor, he would have had to start researching Soul Arms from scratch.

"That’s good, that’s good." Nis didn’t bother with words of thanks; instead, he kept the gratitude in his heart: "You’ve seen why I sought you out—the arm of the Night Butterfly Witch has been found, and I’ve kept it for you. Also, Lord As Night and I have chosen suitable organs for you. Would you like to take a look?"

Though Nis was ostensibly asking, he barely gave Angel time to respond before leading the Authority Eye to a metal platform nearby, pointing to a small container:

"Inside this holds the demon horn that contains all the petrifying power of the Dark Gold Gargoyle. We don’t know what Soul Arms it possesses yet, but its petrifying power can aid you in practicing Petrification Sight and various earth spell techniques."

After introducing this, Nis moved to the other side: "As you can see, this is a tail. While Lord As Night and I have different opinions on which magical creature it specifically comes from—I think it resembles the tail of a Karn Marsh Ape, while Lord As Night suggests it’s from a Tide Sand Monkey—we can’t confirm either. However, both creatures can interfere with water and earth elements within a certain range; the tail likely inherits related abilities."

After the tail, Nis also introduced an abdominal tail bee stinger, a pseudo ear from an unknown wild cat, and eight auxiliary legs from a poison spider.

Lastly, Nis arrived at a man-sized container where the cold liquid swirled, yet nothing could be seen inside.

"Your view likely won’t show you anything, but this container holds an exceptionally precious organ. Ignoring the value of the Soul Arms, just the rarity of the organ itself places it among the top three in this exhibition room."

"These are Butterfly Wings from an Invisibility Wing Scorpion; they’re not easily seen by the naked eye, with a wingspan of about three meters, flying at incredible speeds, and at full velocity, can even cause sonic disturbances. Most importantly, these wings have been removed at a high level, perfectly preserved, with activity nearly matching that in its previous life—a masterpiece of a Biological Alchemist!"

After his admiration, Nis glanced at Angel:

"Currently, only these few are suitable for you, and after transplantation, there’s no need to enter internal circulation. Which one do you want?"

Angel pondered for a moment.

Speaking only of these organs, Angel felt no particular inclination toward any, and was unaware of what Soul Arms might be inside. As far as the organs go, a transplant might assist in practicing some cross-series spell techniques.

If it’s just about this auxiliary function for practicing cross-series spells, Angel personally felt it’s dispensable. After all, he hasn’t yet fully consolidated his abilities in the Illusion Series, embarking on a new battlefield seems a bit premature.

He thought about it and said to Nis: "I’ll choose the Butterfly Wings of the Invisibility Wing Scorpion."

"You chose this one?" Nis was momentarily surprised but quickly packed away the Butterfly Wings: "That’s quite nice, you do have an eye for these things."

Angel smiled, saying nothing.

If he were to choose, he would likely exclude the Butterfly Wings first, primarily because they relate more to mobility and wind abilities—the former overlaps with the Gravity Meridian, and for the latter...he hasn’t planned for cross-series practice yet.

The reason for choosing this was purely based on its high value. The rest have little affinity with him; it wouldn’t make much difference choosing any of them, so he opted for the most expensive one.

If he can’t use it, he can simply hand it to Nis. Whether Angel personally likes it is unimportant, but he can see that Nis is quite fond of the Butterfly Wings; he was very excited discussing them. So even if it isn’t useful to him, it wouldn’t be a waste.

The fourth-floor exhibition room also has retrieval limits; you can only take these two. After packing the Night Butterfly Witch’s arm and the Butterfly Wings, Nis and the others left the exhibition room.

"By the way, did you encounter that Fire Scale Summoned Demon on the fifth floor?" Nis curiously asked in the corridor outside the exhibition room.

Angel hesitated: "I did, but there was a slight incident in between."

"A slight incident?"

Angel nodded, controlling the Authority Eye, and then briefly narrated the process of encountering the Fire Scale Summoned Demon and the eventual reversal.

After recounting, Angel inquired about the identity of the Mist Shadow from Nis and Kanter.

"A mass of mist and shadow with starlight flickering inside? Are you sure this is a creature?" Kanter asked the same question as Ironclad Granny.

"I’m certain," Angel understood he likely won’t get any more intelligence from them.

"Is there such a creature? Let me think..." Both Kanter and Nis fell into thought.

Seeing no responses from the Mind Ribbon, Angel temporarily disabled the Mind Ribbon, indicating Toby and Dangross to manage.

After once again checking the fifth-floor Magical Energy Array and confirming there were no traces of the Mist Shadow, Angel got up and left the sub-control node.

Upon leaving the sub-control node, Angel vaguely felt like he had overlooked something...

He left Room 03 and headed toward the last room on the fifth floor.

Room 01.

Room 01 was the simplest of all rooms on the fifth floor, lacking any cuts of light or misty fog; it looked like the most normal room.

The internal rooms were very few, not even having a main hall, just a corridor leading to three intersecting paths.

These three paths led to the data room, laboratory, and training ground respectively.

There’s no study or bedroom.

This style reminded Angel of Nausicaa; he had once visited her residence in Apprentice Town, which was similarly clean and efficient.

Though outwardly only three rooms, Angel knew very well that the training ground actually concealed another room.

He didn’t go to the training ground right away but headed to the data room first. The compilation of knowledge apparently needs to be prioritized.

The data room was organized cleanly, devoid of miscellaneous materials; it contained various reports from the base laboratory, which Angel didn’t look through carefully, but instead replicated all via illusion technique, planning to throw them into the Wilderness of Dreams later...he recalled the library in the New City seemed to be built, now empty, perfectly suitable for some solid content.

Angel didn’t stay long in the laboratory, which contained many materials used by Bloodline Wizards and some corpses of Sea Beasts, having had their useful parts removed, leaving only the materials that Bloodline Wizards could utilize effectively.

Lastly, Angel arrived at the training ground.

The training ground was desolate, appearing empty, yet standing in its center caused Angel’s blood to feel slightly stirred.

The training ground connected to a Magical Energy Array, having the effect to simulate various environments. However, the training ground wasn’t activated presently, so Angel still felt the peculiarity due to the lingering aura here.

Room 01 often trained here; even when not present, his residual power still permeated the area. For ordinary people or low-level apprentices, arriving here might directly cause them to cough blood and perish. And this was merely the unintentional remnant aura of Room 01, indicating that Room 01 was undoubtedly a wizard of formidable strength from the Bloodline series.

Feeling his uncontrollable blood surges, Angel felt a bit apprehensive about Room 01. Room 01 differed from 02 and 03; he was distinctly orthodox, pursuing the truth of bloodline wizardry. If he inevitably encounters Room 01 in the future, hiding oneself at the earliest moment is imperative to avoid being locked onto by him.

Passing through the seemingly tranquil but blood-soaked central training ground, Angel arrived at the other side.

The walls here seemed no different from those nearby, but to Angel’s vision, it was a convergence point of various magic patterns.

"Concealment, shadow, space, extension, constant..." Angel slowly recited the magical tattoo horns visible in his view, finally locking his gaze onto a wave-like doodle symbol: "...Activate."

With pure primordial magic power, Angel directly pressed on "Activate."

Accompanied by the brilliance of the magic patterns, the hidden door previously obscured by the magical energy array slowly emerged.

Angel did not immediately step inside but instead contacted Earl Mi, preparing for any potential danger.

The danger here referred not only to the "potential misty shadow in the hidden room" but also to any possible mechanisms inside the hidden room.

After all, Angel couldn’t see the interior of the hidden room from the main control node, so he didn’t know if there was any mechanism inside. By treating every unforeseen danger as present, he would avoid panicking when danger struck.

Once everything was prepared, Angel gently pushed open the door and as the door opened, a large amount of white frost mist floated out.

A biting cold wind echoed across the sky above the training ground.

When the frost mist had almost dissipated, Angel finally stepped inside.

To his surprise.

The interior had neither the mechanisms he imagined nor any misty shadows. Apart from being somewhat cold, everything was as expected.

Angel scanned the small hidden room where the surroundings were empty, with only a laboratory table in the center.

The center of the laboratory table was empty, but both sides were piled with various letters, as if someone had intentionally pushed them aside.

The number of letters was very large; at a glance, there were at least hundreds.

Initially looking at the empty laboratory table, Angel’s mind briefly floated a thought but upon reflection, it vanished without a trace.

He did not delve deeper, as he was now more curious about the contents of these letters than the thought itself.

Approaching the laboratory table, Angel organized all the letters.

After organizing, Angel found these letters appeared numerous but in reality came from only four sources.

The first type of letters, although the style and color of the envelopes varied, were made of pulp paper. Angel categorized these pulp letters as one type, and they constituted a substantial portion.

The second type, letters all originating from a Void Merchant Group called "Turmoil," totaling at least half of the hundred were from this group, making them second in quantity.

The third type of letters Angel recognized slightly, also originating from the Flash Merchant Group.

The fourth type of letters lacked a fixed source mark and were instead represented by a strange beast-shaped symbol.

After grouping the letters by source, Angel picked a few from each type for a brief look.

The pulp letters were sent by "X" from the laboratory, containing intelligence about the Southern Domain Wizards’ Realm. The timeline spanned many years, recording significant events in recent years, even including reports related to Angel himself, such as the Night Demon City upheaval in the Black Demon Country Capital, the Eternal Night Country dome incident, the Half-step Mystic at Black Castle... etc.

Angel believed this type of Southern Domain intelligence likely wasn’t limited to these and more surely existed. These were selected because they recorded representative major events.

Beyond the pulp letters, messages from the Turmoil Merchant Group were most abundant. After reading a few, Angel roughly identified them.

It seemed to be a Void Merchant Group employed by the Lacey Association headquarters specifically tasked with conveying their opinions to 01.

These types of letters contained intelligence solely relevant to the Lacey Association itself.

Concerning letters from the Flash Merchant Group, just like 03, these were inquiries from 01.

Angel speculated that the Flash Merchant Group might belong to an intelligence-oriented organization within Void Merchant Groups?

Lastly, the letters bearing the strange beast-shaped symbol had no signatures, documenting the current situation of a person called the "City Lord."

Since Angel only perused one letter, the exact identity of this "City Lord" remained unknown.

...

After categorizing the letters types, Angel commenced reading them one by one.

Angel merely replicated the pulp letters received from "X" using Illusion Techniques without thoroughly examining them on the spot. Primarily, since they recorded major events in the Southern Domain, their urgency could be deferred.

As for the letters from "Turmoil," "Flash," and "unsigned," Angel pondered for a second and decided to start with the letters from Turmoil Merchant Group.

Opening the letters one by one.

As the rapid reading progressed, Angel gradually understood the origins and history of the Snook Base Laboratory.

Soul Arms was a secret project collaboratively created by the Lacey Association and a soul force from the Quest World. Due to some unenclosed reasons, they couldn’t be implemented in the Origin World, thus being dispatched to the Four Corners Wizards’ Realm.

Regarding the "unenclosed" reason, Angel guessed it might be twofold: firstly, the biological specimens across the various Wizards’ Realms exhibited diversity and disparity requiring physical trials. Secondly, it might be related to "live sacrifice."

The core essence of Soul Arms requires assistance from a Quest World force, and since Quest World is a Soul Plane, affecting the Material Realm necessitates a connection.

Live sacrifice is the cheapest form of connection.

Just live humans as sacrificial offerings can connect the soul force to descend special soul armament primal liquid.

Yet this low-cost connection demands a massive consumption of living humans. Live sacrifices, even in the harsh Southern Domain Wizards’ Realm, remain absolutely taboo.

Wizards aren’t concerned about a few individuals; once this floodgate is opened, it would resemble a tilting flood, destroying all previously constructed dams.

Because applying live sacrifice isn’t limited to Quest World.

Demon Gods, Evil Gods, Outer Gods, all kinds of malignant transcendent beings, and even some unknown entities can use similar live sacrifices to descend powers.

If not prevented at the source, all efforts would come to naught.

Therefore, live sacrifice is certainly prohibited, even in the Origin World. The Lacey Association dared not engage in this in the Origin World, hence coming to the Four Corners Wizards’ Realm where the regulatory forces are slightly weaker.

But even in the Four Corners Wizards’ Realm, they dared not stand out.

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