Chapter 109
“It’s my friend, and it’s coming with me,” Lynn pointed to the fly demon and the brute force demon.
“No, only you can go down,” Dyo said firmly.
“You, a wizard, afraid of a half-elf like me?” Dyo chuckled. “Besides, with its height, it might just tear down my castle trying to navigate the stairs.”
In the end, Lynn followed Dyo alone, descending through winding staircases.
They finally arrived at the castle’s dungeon, where candles illuminated the area, making it quite warm. In the center, there was a pool with an irregularly shaped stone at its center.
The stone was rough, but from afar, it seemed to shine with a smooth, iridescent surface, resembling polished rainbow glass.
However, there were patches of blank areas on its surface, resembling unprocessed flesh, giving it a bizarre appearance.
Some researchers, dressed in coarse robes, carefully poured a specially concocted liquid onto these flesh-like areas. As the liquid touched the surface, the flesh areas emitted a colorful, iridescent glow, but as the liquid evaporated, they returned to their original state. Meanwhile, researchers carefully scraped off the powder from the exposed flesh areas.
“Is this your research result?” Lynn asked.
“Twenty years ago, a meteorite fell, landing in a village. When the kingdom’s patrol team discovered the village later, not a single living being remained. Everything inside had turned into wax figures.”
“At first, this flesh lump was highly unstable and turned an entire village into wax figures,” Dyo explained. “Later, it was secretly brought back and studied. We found that any living being that came into direct contact with or was contaminated by it would turn into a wax figure.”
“After research, they discovered its strong assimilation ability. It could assimilate other substances into wax figures and had terrifying defensive capabilities, able to absorb all magic.”
“But it also had a weakness; when it encounters water, its infectious nature temporarily disappears. However, it becomes extremely hard. In this state, its ability to absorb magic doesn’t disappear,” Dyo continued.
“So, after twenty years of painstaking research, they finally developed a special liquid. This liquid can temporarily suppress its infectious nature for a long time, containing some of its powder. If applied to the body’s surface, it can immunize warriors from magic for five hours. However, after five hours, they will all turn into wax figures,” Dyo looked at Lynn. “Do you dare to take it?”
“I do,” Lynn said, deeply intrigued by the blob of white flesh.
No wizard could resist such fascinating research source material.
“This is the formula for two types of liquids. The first is the one I mentioned earlier, which can be applied to a warrior’s body surface. The other is a liquid that can be maintained on its surface for a long time, keeping it constantly moist. If it becomes dry, it will automatically corrode nearby objects, transforming them into wax figures before consuming them, and its size will continue to grow,” Dyo explained.
“Did that wizard from before know about its existence?” Lynn asked after a moment of contemplation.
“He didn’t know. I didn’t tell him,” Dyo replied.
Didn’t Harin know? Was it that he genuinely didn’t know, or that he knew but pretended not to?
Lynn thought the wizards had many tricks up their sleeves. Perhaps Dyo’s concealment was merely what she believed to be well-hidden.
But Lynn didn’t voice these thoughts.
“I heard that the spells cast by you wizards are very similar to magic. I’m curious if your spells can also harm it,” Dyo, standing nearby, looked somewhat excited, seeming eager to witness such a scene.
Lynn couldn’t help but smile inwardly. The essence of a wizard’s spell lay in thoroughly analyzing the structure of magic, which is why it was called a spell rather than magic. Not only was it more powerful, but its greater strength lay in its evolvability. Even if there were no suitable spells at the moment, wizards could create entirely new spells to deal with situations by studying the essence of things. That was the most terrifying aspect of wizards.
“I’ll take it, then,” Lynn said.
Lynn took the two formulas and several barrels of prepared liquid from Dyo.
After confirming the formulas, Lynn found that the raw materials needed for the liquid to keep the object moist were quite common and could be bought even in Demon City.
However, Dyo still gifted Lynn a batch of seeds of the magic grass.
Then, Lynn ensured that the entire surface of the object was coated with the liquid to maintain its glassy state before placing it into a spatial accessory.
As Lynn placed it into the spatial accessory, a sense of relief washed over him. Since it could be placed into the spatial accessory, it meant the object was not a living being.
After Lynn left, Dyo summoned the guards and executed all the researchers in the basement.
Emerging from the staircase and glancing at the Ironblood Queen beside him, Lynn couldn’t help but speak.
“I have one more thing to ask of you, Your Majesty,” Lynn said.
“Go ahead,” replied the Ironblood Queen.
“I wish to make a copy of the knowledge in your kingdom’s library,” Lynn said.
“The library? Take all the books inside if you want,” the Ironblood Queen said nonchalantly.
“But can you do me a favor?” Dyo spoke up.
“Speak, Your Majesty.”
“All this knowledge is yours, but I have a daughter. As a mother, I believe she shouldn’t be buried with the kingdom,” Dyo began. Pausing for a moment, she continued, “As long as she stays alive and can live peacefully as a commoner.”
“Agreed,” Lynn nodded.
If they had asked him to take the girl as a student, he would have refused. It would have been too troublesome. But simply taking a princess and allowing her to live as a commoner wasn’t difficult.
In the Continent of Vanquished Gods, there were many places. Even if Demon City wasn’t suitable, there were other human settlements.
Soon, a little girl was brought over.
The little girl looked about five or six years old, adorable with her emerald green long hair and dressed in a white princess gown. She had part of the elven blood in her veins.
Lynn sent the little girl into the Alchemy Laboratory. The little girl was obedient, showing no resistance or refusal. Just before being taken away, she cast a last reluctant glance at the Ironblood Queen.
Exiting the castle and led by one of Dyo’s trusted female guards, Lynn and the fly demon made their way to the library.
They took all the books from the library.
As Lynn and his companions emerged from the library, the entire city of Whitefall was engulfed in flames.
From afar, demons continued to arrive incessantly. The more people died here, the thicker the scent of blood and the aura of death became.
The more demons were attracted, creating a vicious cycle.
Lynn attempted to upload the books, only to be informed that this knowledge was already backed up in the wizard network, rendering it worthless in terms of rewards.
Just as they exited the library, the fly demon spotted a flame demon1 charging towards the castle.
“A demon is heading towards the castle,” the fly demon remarked.
Suddenly, a flag was raised above the castle walls.
Lynn’s pupils slightly contracted upon seeing the flag because it bore the emblem of the Abyss Wizard Academy. Moreover, judging by the special magic ripples on it, it was not a replica but had been prepared in advance.
Seeing this flag, the flame demon, originally intending to go to the castle, had to stop in its tracks. After hovering in the air for several seconds, it turned and unleashed havoc within Whitefall.
The cacophony of screams in the city sharply contrasted with the quietness within the castle walls.
Dyo had also become involved with the Abyss Wizard Academy? Didn’t she say she refused to cooperate with their conquest of the kingdom? Yes, she had refused to start a war, but she hadn’t said she refused to cooperate. Otherwise, how could she be sitting in her current position?
Perhaps only she and a few of her trusted confidants were involved, while the rest of the citizens were treated as pawns.
Through their brief interaction, Lynn found Dyo to be a woman of strong purpose and determination.
She might be planning something, but it no longer concerned Lynn.
As demons continued to surge in numbers, and with Lynn’s current experiments not requiring souls or flesh, and lacking the tools to preserve souls or keep flesh fresh, there was little purpose in staying here any longer.
Lynn and the fly demon departed from Whitefall. Over the next few days, the fly demon summoned a gold-eating demon, and together with Lynn, they scoured the wilderness in search of ore veins.
Eventually, they stumbled upon a small deposit of yellow jasper. Lynn summoned Iron Serpent No. 1 to excavate the ore underground, while the fly demon summoned some lemures to act as laborers.
After nearly half a month of toiling, they completely exhausted this modest yellow jasper deposit.
In total, they mined two hundred tons of raw yellow jasper, equivalent to 200,000 kilograms. The ore’s yellow jasper content ranged from 10% to 20%, relatively low. On the market, 10 kilograms of yellow jasper were worth 1 magic stone.
If they could extract all the yellow jasper ores from within, it would yield a windfall of three to four thousand magic stones.
In the end, Lynn spent two thousand magic stones to purchase this batch of raw yellow jasper from the fly demon, filling all his portable storage items to the brim.
Having made a fortune, the two continued scouring the wilderness for ore veins when suddenly, the earth beneath their feet trembled violently.
Even the clouds floating in the sky were shaken.
“Not an earthquake. The entire world just trembled,” the fly demon halted, its antennae trembling uneasily above its head.
Lynn raised his head, noticing that the density of the wizard network in the sky had increased nearly tenfold compared to before.
“There’s something over there.”
In the far distance, a colossal black pillar of light pierced through the heavens and earth, traversing the entire world in an instant.
The white sea of clouds rapidly turned black to the naked eye.
Boom!
The air was filled with thunderous roars.
It sounded like glass shattering. At the edge of the sky, the dense aura of the Abyss greedily surged into this world like a surging tide.
In a trance, Lynn seemed to hear hymns echoing from the end of the void, as if the entire Abyss was welcoming the arrival of a new world.
——
- TL/N:
-Tolkien invented the name “Balrog”, and the Tolkien Estate even made a copyright claim on the name.
-The author wrote [ 炎魔 yán mó ], so I directly used ‘flame demon’ for now to keep things simple. ↩︎