Azure Scepter

Page 57

Noi nervously tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. An anxiety and unease, not from the influence of supernatural forces but entirely from her heart, was pounding wildly in her mind like a wound-up toy monkey.

As a bound spirit, Noi was terrified by the other party's completely incomprehensible and bizarre words and actions.

This fear is not a raw fear of death, but a hidden fear, like black fungus, that silently takes root in the heart on a rainy day. It is a psychological fear.

Looking at the shadowy, desiccated face of the figure, Noah couldn't help but feel that the other person was a lingering echo of his own past actions.

But... this is a powerful legend...

"Please sit down," the shadowy figure said slowly, revealing a hollow smile.

With the lich's whisper, a finely crafted iron throne, forged from a sword blade, appeared out of thin air before Noy's eyes.

Noi silently covered her mouth; she knew she was scared, and at that moment, she even had the thought of turning around and running away.

Under the influence of fear, vision begins to blur, and everything in sight seems to lose focus.

Suddenly, Noy's unfocused gaze fell upon the black notebook at the feet of the shadowy figure. The next moment, a terrifying yet perfectly reasonable guess surfaced in her mind—this powerful lich had gone mad because he had read Trir's notebook and understood...

Her pupils gradually focused, and she instinctively glanced at the notebook at the feet of the shadowless figure.

A black cover, withered and yellowed paper, and illegible Chinese characters—yes, it's the diary Trier wrote every day when he was a child...

"Calm down, Noyi, calm down." She pursed her lips, her mind racing. "The reason the other party suddenly went berserk just now seems to be because you saw this notebook... Why don't we try again?"

Noy deliberately looked down at the black notebook.

The next moment, the shadowy figure let out a mournful roar: "No, no, no! Don't come any closer! You're from the painting! You're from the painting!"

The lich cowered in terror, clutching the black notebook tightly in his hands: "Stay away from me! Stay away from me! You monster! Don't even think about taking my treasure!"

"I am the victim, the only one, and the traveler. I am Neu Hall! No, no... save me..."

Noi stared dumbfounded at the rambling, shadowy figure, as if she had been frozen in place.

What do you mean he's Neu Hall? Neu is obviously a female name, isn't she? Neu thought to herself, her mind racing.

Then, the shadowy man did something even more unimaginable to Noy: he grabbed the oak table and smashed all three internal organ tanks behind him!

"boom!"

"boom!"

"boom!"

Amidst the crisp sound of the clay pot shattering, the shadowy figure laughed maniacally, "You desert corpse, die! I've found your life box!"

The shriveled heart, the twisted liver, and the spleen, dehydrated into black mud, were crushed by the shadowy figure's foot in the next instant! As the foot crushed the heart, the shadowy figure's body convulsed and twisted even more, and his expression became increasingly hysterical. A moment later, his shriveled body disintegrated, and countless beetles surged out from the cracks to envelop the remains.

The sound of beetle-like tweezers tearing flesh echoed continuously, making Noi's scalp tingle. However, what chilled her even more was the shadowy figure continuing to spout madness: "Suffering, blood, the pain of flesh!"

"May the radiance protect me..."

The bizarre sight before her completely terrified her. Trembling, she raised the Holy Symbol, intending to unleash a Blazing Sunburst to perish together with the enemy.

She had had enough of this horrific and insane sight before her!

Suddenly, a pair of strong hands landed on Noe's trembling shoulders. She screamed and turned sharply to look behind her—it was Trier.

Chapter 110 Madness (Part 4)

Although the Shadowless Man had long since become a desiccated corpse, its body was suddenly ripped open with countless bloody wounds as a swarm of acid-like beetles appeared—Trier knew that this was the result of the Shadowless Man, as a legendary lich, having a huge misunderstanding of himself.

The shadowless man seemed to think he was still alive.

The swarms of beetles covered the face of the drought lich like mud. Its battered and mangled body collapsed to the ground, and the blood gushing from its wounds quickly twisted and transformed into new beetles, which then began to frantically devour the few remaining bones of the Shadowless Man.

The shadowless man did not scream; it continued to mutter incomprehensible ravings. Soon, beetles filled all the holes in its body, and amidst a chilling rustling sound, its body exploded into a pool of warm blood.

Blood spread rapidly, reaching Trier's boots.

Trier watched silently as the drought lich went on a rampage of self-destruction, and the murderous intent that had been boiling in his heart was extinguished as if it had been doused with cold water.

Without a doubt, the Shadowless Man has truly gone mad. Legends can distort reality with their own will, but to distort reality, one must genuinely believe in their own understanding. If the Shadowless Man's ravings could be faked, the sight of him being devoured by beetles created by his own will absolutely prove that he has completely lost his mind.

“He seems to have deciphered my diary in some unknown way, and then saw something in it, and then went mad.” Trier observed the lich, who was no longer a threat, without any reaction. “His symptoms of madness include self-awareness disorder, hallucinations, delusions, and emotional outbursts—it’s rare to see a mad legend like this, and it’s worth observing, but from a risk perspective, I should kill him as soon as possible.”

Just as Trier was about to control his ghouls to find and smash the phylactery left by the drought lich in the laboratory, a cold hand suddenly landed on his palm and then gripped his hand tightly.

“Trier…what happened to him?” Neu asked, trembling. “What did he see?”

“We’ll know when he dies—he won’t die anytime soon. We need to find the life capsule he left in the lab so that even if it’s resurrected, it won’t be able to come back anytime soon,” Trier said slowly to himself.

At this moment, the beetles that had torn apart the shadowy figure's remains began to slaughter each other. As if under a speed-up spell, within moments one beetle devoured all the others. Blood gathered around the last beetle, as if being siphoned by a pump. Maniacal laughter echoed in the air, interspersed with strange dog barks...

“Ah, it was that poor bishop who feared death who sent you, wasn’t it?” The blood re-coagulated into a twitching humanoid “blood element,” with the last remaining beetle embedded in the blood element’s eye-like position. “I remember you, you were called Noy by Vercingetorie, Noy Hall.”

"The third time! He's repeated that phrase for the third time!" Noy looked extremely nervous; her translucent figure flickered as if a signal was malfunctioning. She shrank back and actually ran directly behind Trier...

“You weren’t this timid before. There’s nothing to be afraid of. Look, it doesn’t even have a spellbook on it, so it can’t cast any spells.” Trier pointed helplessly to the forehead of the shadowy figure that had turned into a blood elemental. “See, there’s no danger at all.”

"It's not a matter of danger!" Noy timidly poked his head out. "He's completely..."

"You are Noy, but who am I?" The shadowy figure stretched out a hand made of blood plasma and slowly covered the beetle on his forehead. His voice was muffled, like the numb groan of a long-dead walking corpse in an empty cave. This numb and hollow voice even reminded Trier of a rigid machine made entirely of gears and transmission rods.

Trier stared at the lich for a moment, then said in a deep voice, "You are the Shadow Man."

The words were like an invisible hammer blow, instantly shattering the beetle on the Shadowless Man's forehead, and causing his entire body to explode and scatter as if hit head-on by a cannonball.

"The Shadowless Man is the answer to the question, but not the whole answer." A blurry black object emerged from the blood out of thin air. This indescribable black object had stopped its electrocution-like convulsions. The blurry black object rapidly disintegrated and collapsed, and then in an instant, it reassembled into something fragmented.

"What!?" Trier's eyes widened in surprise.

Although he always prided himself on his strong will, the "thing" reassembled from the shadowless figures still gave him a sudden jolt.

He struggled to move his eyes, and the first thing he saw was a deformed, grotesque mass of flesh that could barely be called a hand. The fingers were turned outwards as if reflected in a mirror, the nails were like scales, tightly gripping the inside of the fingers, and the shriveled, black skin hanging from the cracks was like worms sticking to the entire palm.

The hand is connected to the elbow, and below the elbow are the ribs of the chest cavity that are turned outwards and reversed from left to right. A constantly rotating eyeball is hanging on the edge of the left rib.

“Even a mistakenly conceived corpse looks more like something than this,” Trier thought to himself. “From a certain perspective, it seems to fit Dadaist aesthetics quite well.”

He took a deep breath and forced himself to observe the nerve bundles on both sides of the Shadowless Man's body that twisted wildly like wings. These nerve bundles formed inexplicable mushroom-like tumors, with a heavy fish-scale tail sewn together from fingernails at the end of the tumor. The tail did not appear to be upside down, but the fingernails were arranged like nautilus shells with countless twisted and unrestrained faces.

Laughter, sobbing, terror, indifference...

Trier's gaze swept quickly over the countless faces on the shadowless man's tail, and soon he found a face made of a pottery jar—the fourth viscera jar of the drought lich.

"Found it," Trier thought.

"Master, let's go..." Noi pleaded weakly. Just looking at this horrible and distorted thing made her feel extremely uncomfortable. She felt as if a rusty file was churning inside her stomach. "Please..."

The face formed from the pottery jar grinned, revealing a peaceful and serene smile. He looked like a monk who had suddenly attained enlightenment: "I have achieved enlightenment!"

"I am the Shadowless Man!"

"I am Vercingetorius!"

"I am Noy!"

The shadowy figure paused, then stretched out the acanthus-like tendrils of muscles cascading from his nerve bundles, assuming a pose of embracing the sun: "I am Radiance!"

“You may think I’m crazy, but time always branches out, leading to countless futures, but they are not parallel, but coexist... You don’t understand this, so you don’t understand my profound wisdom.”

Noi was completely stunned. Such crazy and blasphemous words were far beyond her comprehension, and her spirit began to enter an unstable state.

The more Trier listened, the more serious his expression became. Behind the seemingly crazy words of the Shadowless Man, there was actually a vague understanding of divinity. He didn't know if this was just the ramblings of a madman or if the other party had really learned something from his diary.

However, what's strange is that, from the most basic logic, it's impossible for him to be so crazy as to write about gods in his diary—perhaps the Shadowless Man came into contact with this knowledge during his long journey?

Trier hesitated for a moment, but then he made up his mind.

The face of the invisible pottery jar showed a look of disappointment: "But I am not all of these. I am the answer to the question, but what is the question?"

"Yes, yes, I am the problem itself. I am who I am, and the problem is me. What I am is not important. I am a self-realizing circle!"

"Crack!" The longsword shattered the entrails container hanging on the tail.

Chapter 111 Plan

The invisible man's internal organs container was incredibly hard. Trier pressed his wrist forward sharply, and fine, sharp cracks suddenly appeared on the container. The stench of negative energy assaulted his nostrils, and the cold blade emitted a high-pitched, shrill hum, almost at the limit of human hearing. Trier remained unfazed. The next moment, a burst of intense heat erupted from the blade, and the fine cracks simultaneously exploded across both the blade and the container.

The sword and the entrails container shattered simultaneously, sending fragments flying everywhere. A terrifying crimson light flowed and flickered at the edges of the metal and ceramic, like burning flames.

Trier was prepared. He suddenly ducked, his dark eyes reflecting the shards of metal whistling through the air, almost brushing against his cheek. In the next instant, he lunged forward, the pool of blood on the ground exploding into a spray of crimson. The murky blood droplets mingled with the shooting shards, reflecting the pure white holy flames emanating from the broken blade in Trier's hand.

"boom!"

Amidst the sounds of bones cracking and flesh shattering, the Holy Slash shattered the lich's nails, scales, nerve tendrils, and bulging muscles like a storm. With a sudden twist, most of the blade pierced through the shadowless man's ribs, which spread out like wings, while the guard, like a spider seizing its prey, pressed firmly against the throbbing, unidentified flesh within the ribs.

The eyeballs that had been constantly moving outside the shadowy man's ribs suddenly froze. His body hissed as if deflated, and holes suddenly appeared on his withered black skin. Then, his internal organs shrank rapidly like a punctured balloon.

Trill spun his sword and hurled the lich's twisted remains to the ground, splattering warm blood with cold bone fragments.

Even without considering the lich's resurrection ability, the vitality of such a high-level undead is quite tenacious. Therefore, Trier did not let his guard down. He aimed slightly, and the broken sword burning with holy flames suddenly fell!

"Crack!" The lich's mutated body instantly burned into snow-like embers, which then slowly fell like snowflakes.

"Ring ring ring..."

At that moment, fragments of the sword blade and the internal organs container rained down on the ground, while a sharp spike pierced the ground next to the black notebook.

Suddenly, a blood-stained iron glove rested on the edge of the notebook, its fingers curling inward, and scooped the notebook up.

Only then did Trier breathe a sigh of relief, his gaze quickly sweeping over the information panel at the corner of his eye.

[XP+3000]

He couldn't help but frown.

A legendary lich could not possibly provide only 3000 experience points. Based on his past experience, beings of this level could conservatively provide over 30000 experience points. This meager amount of experience undoubtedly means that the drought lich is not completely dead.

“As expected, no lich would be so crazy as to run around with all his life boxes.” He sighed almost imperceptibly. “However, on the bright side, he is unlikely to come to my laboratory again anytime soon. After regaining control of my legacy in the laboratory, the threat posed to me by a mad and insane lich is very limited in the short term.”

"However, we still need to be vigilant. Although he has gone mad, he will most likely be hostile to me after his resurrection. If given enough time to plan, there is still a high probability that he will affect me. However, he has had four internal organs jars cleaved, which is an extremely serious injury in the short term. Therefore, if he wants to make a comeback, it will take at least a year. So, before dealing with Loseville, I can almost ignore him."

Trier threw down his broken sword and tapped the bridge of his nose hard with the knuckle of his thumb. The pain that went straight to his brain suddenly made his mind, which had been gradually becoming drowsy due to excessive control of the undead, feel lighter.

He took a deep breath and quickly came up with a plan: "Whether or not I eliminate Losewey, I should find time to completely kill the Shadow Man after this is over. Although the Lich's Life Box is hard to find, it can be done with some costly methods."

"Forget it, let's not think about that too much for now. Let's check the legacy I've left for myself first." Trier exhaled slowly and looked up at the wall full of magic storage stones.

A slight smile played on his lips. His gaze didn't linger, but quickly swept over the horde of undead and the group of tomb knights that stood silently like rocks behind him, completely blocking the stairwell and room; and the silently burning witch flames and embers...

Due to the Shadowless Man's destructive exploration, the number of undead in his laboratory has decreased significantly. However, even the undead he currently possesses could become a crucial and decisive force influencing the balance of power in the entire Southern Duchy if deployed in battle at the right time.

Moreover, Trier knew very well that although the Shadow Man had destroyed a lot of undead, he should still have hidden a lot of strange things in the various dark chambers; even if he was willing to break the oath a second time, the remains of these intruders could be transformed into a lot of good things.

He has now returned to his laboratory and reclaimed the legacy he left behind. The paladins who took up their posts for self-preservation are no longer irreplaceable. However, Trier still has no intention of breaking his oath directly.

On the one hand, although he was forced by circumstances to take the paladin's oath at Cord's grave, he always valued his promises, and therefore, from the perspective of his own inner peace, he did not want to break the oath.

On the other hand, considering the promise made to Harlan to "protect the people of the Southern Duchy," using his identity as a paladin and his status as a high-ranking noble within the duchy to influence and leverage the power of the entire Kingdom of Orko to oppose Losevie is far more efficient than resurrecting a massive number of undead and then directly confronting Losevie.

Finally, through Noy's memories, Trier learned that his ancestral home in this life was in the Southern Duchy, and that he was quite high in the line of succession. So, in a sense, defending the Southern Duchy was not only to fulfill his promise to Harlan, but also to protect his own rights.

After all, whether one continues to pursue advancement in necromancy or seeks godhood, both require substantial wealth and power as a foundation. Rather than starting from scratch, it's better to make full use of the existing conditions.

But in any case, Trier's tense mood eased considerably after regaining control of the laboratory.

Looking at the undead army he had built in the past, a hidden doubt suddenly flashed through the mind of the cheerful paladin: "Where did these high-quality undead corpses come from? I can't possibly import corpses from the Great Swamp, can I?"

"Never mind, who cares?" He didn't dwell on the issue. He turned his head, his gaze sweeping over the horde of undead, and looked at the plate armor glowing red on the left side of the room, and the unsheathed, simple wooden-handled longsword stuck in the ground.

P.S.: I recommend a book: The Winter Sun Lord of the Frostfall Lands.

Chapter 112 Harvest (Part 1)

“Hiss…”

The ashes of the drought lich slowly drifted down, and the dust that fell to the ground made a sound similar to strong acid corroding metal.

Trier slowly walked past the embers of the drought lich and stood before the simple, unadorned longsword with a wooden hilt.

The longsword was stuck in a rock, and as Trier approached, he felt the thick smell of blood in the dark room grow colder. The cold was bone-chilling; it felt as if a layer of dry powder was being torn away from the air.

"This longsword should be the legendary weapon 'Lightless' mentioned in the diary," Trier thought to himself.

He reached out and grasped the wooden hilt of the sword.

The rough wooden handle, upon first touch, sends a chill, like that of polar ice, through the rough texture into the palm of the hand. The invisible coldness instantly transforms into a sharp, steel-like substance, and the icy pain even spreads through the muscles and nerves, turning into a kind of numbness.

Trier remained expressionless; he did not let go of her hand.

He endured the pain and looked down, following the angle of the light, from the hilt along the spine of the sword to the tip of the blade.

The simple handguard matched the rough wooden handle perfectly, and the dull metal was almost lusterless. This theoretically precious and powerful weapon seemed to be covered with an invisible layer of rust, looking as if it was made by a clumsy blacksmith and had not undergone any maintenance.

Generally speaking, the sharpness of a sword is directly proportional to its reflectivity. The smaller the blade angle, the thinner the blade, and the sharper it is. A small blade angle means that the entire blade has a strong ability to concentrate light. However, a dull sword cannot penetrate a stone.