stonecrandall Chapter 468-477: The Intersection of Time and Space 3
Chapter 468-477: The Intersection of Time and Space 3
Chapter 468-477: The Intersection of Time and Space 3
True "life alchemy" creations must be nurtured for at least seven years in an environment completely isolated from external magical interference, during which time they must be irrigated with stardust and "programmed" with ancient incantations every day.
Once born, its magical growth curve will explode exponentially, far surpassing that of a nature wizard.
More importantly, these creations are almost immune to traditional magical defenses because their very existence is a reinterpretation of the laws of magic.
"I think that's more likely." Saruman's breathing quickened slightly. If the owner of that voice was indeed such a being—then everything would make sense.
That terrifying magical power was not accumulated, but rather a "natural talent setting" that was fully loaded from the factory.
The more you think.
Saruman was increasingly inclined toward this option.
It's no wonder Saruman would overthink things upon hearing a single incantation.
Geniuses are all proud.
This is especially true for prodigies.
therefore.
That's the only way to think about it.
Saruman's mental state was somewhat balanced.
For the sake of his own psychological balance, Saruman's memories began to flood back. He suddenly remembered that thirty years ago, in an underground chamber of an abandoned alchemy workshop in Eastern Europe, he had seen a well-preserved infant corpse with skin as white as porcelain and empty eye sockets that gleamed with silver light.
An infant does not have a heart inside their chest cavity.
There was only a tiny, slowly rotating fragment of the Philosopher's Stone. At the time, he thought it was a failed experiment, but now he thinks it was probably just a half-finished product that was interrupted midway through the experiment.
Perhaps the true "life alchemy" creations have already been controlled by someone, and are being used to explore dangerous relics or similar tasks?
If a reclusive alchemical family or a mad but genius sorcerer truly created a perfect "Alchemist Child," it would most likely be used for such a purpose.
"In any case, this guy might be just as dangerous as the ruins themselves." After thinking about it for a long time, Saruman finally came to this conclusion.
"Actually, it's alright."
Kag patted the hilt of the greatsword, revealing a warrior's pragmatic attitude, almost rugged. "The stronger he is, the better! Whether he's a boy or an old monster, as long as he's strong enough to survive in this hellhole, and even fight, it means he has a way to deal with the dangers here."
"We don't need to confront him head-on. We can just follow him like a shadow, observe him, and perhaps find a way out of this area! Let him lead the way while we reap the benefits. Isn't that better?" Kag's warrior intelligence is definitely above average.
"Uh—" Saruman was silent for a moment. Although Kag's idea was simple and direct, it was also a survival strategy in unfamiliar and dangerous situations.
He finally nodded, without saying anything more in objection, but his vigilance remained undiminished.
"In any case, we can't rush into the city. Before we act, I need to figure out exactly where we are. This stone tablet—perhaps it can give us the answer." His gaze returned to the broken stone tablet.
A massive stone tablet inscribed with strange characters. His thirst for knowledge and a sense of foreboding drove him simultaneously.
Kag did not object. He turned his attention back to the unconscious Lina, carefully moistening her chapped lips with water and wiping away the fishy-smelling sap seeping from between her scales. As he cared for Lina, he couldn't help but glance frequently in the direction of the desolate city.
The image of that deadly green light kept replaying in my mind.
"Avada—" Kag murmured the unfamiliar word. As a warrior, his understanding of magic was far less than Saruman's, but the fleeting glimpse of death he had just witnessed was deeply imprinted in his mind.
"What kind of magic is that? It's so—clean and efficient! More direct than any sword or blade, as if death itself is whispering—"
He couldn't comprehend that power, but that didn't stop him from feeling its absolute terror. The unknown entity within the city was using this terrifying power to fight something, which filled him with both hope and an indescribable awe and unease about the road ahead.
Just as Kag was gazing into the distance.
Saruman devoted himself entirely to deciphering the stone tablet.
He walked slowly around the massive stone tablet, his fingers tracing the cold, rough engravings that seemed to bear the weight of countless years. He would sometimes crouch down to carefully examine the details of a symbol, and sometimes stand up, step back, and observe the overall arrangement and energy flow between the symbols.
"Strange, these characters."
Saruman's brow never relaxed.
He continuously took out various auxiliary tools and documents from his magical storage bag—a magnifying glass engraved with True Sight runes, capable of magnifying and analyzing energy traces.
An ancient dictionary tanned from dragon skin contains fragments of texts from many lost civilizations, as well as his own illustrated notes on the semiotics of different magical systems.
"Is similar knowledge only found in the remains of ravens?"
Saruman seemed to have found a breakthrough.
From the same place.
He immersed himself in the deciphering work.
Time seemed to lose its meaning in this deathly silent world. The twilight sky remained eternally unchanged, and the black rocks beneath their feet exuded a chilling aura of death. Only the occasional rustling of Saruman turning pages and the faint syllables of his low, testing incantations broke the suffocating stillness.
"Fortunately, there aren't any disgusting enemies outside this city." Kag faithfully fulfilled his duty of guarding. While taking care of Lina, he vigilantly watched his surroundings, especially the direction of R'lyeh City.
Occasionally, indistinct sounds could be heard from within the city. Sometimes it was the green flashes of the "Avada Kedavra" incantation, more numerous but relatively faint, and other times it was a dull thud or an indescribable, eerie noise, like the grinding of boulders. This convinced him that the battle within the city was still ongoing.
That powerful "young" wizard is still active.
In this regard.
Kag became even happier.
Of course, he couldn't be happy after seeing Lina's condition. Lina's situation was still not optimistic; her transformation seemed to be continuing slowly but steadily.
The scales were expanding and their color was becoming deeper. The occasional murmurs he uttered in his coma were also becoming more and more like a non-human language.
"Alas!" Kag felt a pang of heartache seeing her pained expression, and could only place his hopes on Saruman's research and the possible turning point brought about by the unknown wizard in the city.
"How is it?"
Kag would occasionally ask his teammates for directions.
However, the focused teammates did not give a reply.
"How do I convert this symbol?" Saruman's research was progressing slowly and with difficulty. The writing system on the stele was completely different from any language he knew.
Its structure is non-linear, not necessarily connected sequentially, and is full of recursive and self-referential symbols, as if describing a concept that transcends three-dimensional space.
Therefore.
This increased the difficulty of deciphering the symbols. Moreover, many of the symbols themselves carried a slight spiritual pollution; staring at them for a long time would cause his thoughts to become confused, and even produce brief hallucinations—he saw huge, slippery tentacles wriggling on the surface of the stone tablet, and heard mad hymns coming from the depths of the sea.
no way.
This illusion could not be allowed to continue, so Saruman had to frequently stop and use calming spells to dispel these mental influences from time to time.
Sweat soaked his silver robe, and his face was pale from the excessive strain on his mental energy. But he did not give up; his thirst for knowledge and desire for the truth sustained him.
Finally, after countless attempts, comparisons, and logical deductions, he found a breakthrough. Several core hieroglyphic symbols that appeared repeatedly on the stone tablet had a faint correspondence with certain patterns he had seen in a tattered book about ancient continent legends in an extremely obscure document about the Raven Relics.
The book that contained vague information about the sunken continent and ancient gods, which was considered mythological fabrication, now seems to have been verified here.
"Ravens are indeed my lucky stars."
Saruman sighed, combining the context of the symbols on the stone tablet with speculation based on energy flow and relative positions, as well as the difficult piecing together and interpretation of those legendary fragments.
"The Eternal Sleeping City"
He muttered to himself, his trembling finger pointing to the largest set of symbols at the top of the stone tablet, resembling a twisted crown, "—R—La—La—Ye—? R—La—Ye?"
Saruman successfully deciphered the place name.
just.
They still failed to realize the seriousness of the problem.
"R'lyeh————"
Saruman repeated the unfamiliar name in a low voice, trying to find any related information in his memory, but he obviously came up empty-handed.
He didn't know what "R'lyeh" meant in the Cthulhu Mythos, its connection to the sleeping god Cthulhu, or that this was the ultimate forbidden place that countless terrifying legends pointed to.
all.
It's all because of ignorance.
Therefore, they are unable to perceive their own situation. Of course, this might also be a good thing from other perspectives, at least it prevents Saruman and others from losing sanity faster due to fear.
He continued to decipher the other, relatively clear passages on the stone tablet.
Saruman immersed himself entirely in deciphering the stele, driven not only by scholarly dedication but also by the instinct of a drowning man grasping at a last straw. He paced slowly around the massive, tombstone-like stele, his fingers tracing its cold, rough surfaces, each mark seemingly bearing the weight of time heavier than the mountains themselves.
He would sometimes crouch down, using a magic magnifying glass engraved with the runes of true vision to carefully discern the subtle differences in the residual energy at the edge of a symbol; at other times he would stand up, take a few steps back, and squint his silver eyes to observe the overall layout and the obscure energy flow trajectory between those distorted symbols, trying to understand the inner logic of this non-Euclidean geometric arrangement.
Time seemed to have frozen into solid ice in this desolate world.
It seemed to be rushing by, heading towards some predetermined end. The eternal, dim yellow sky above, like a dirty and lifeless curtain, firmly covered this abandoned land.
The dark rocks beneath my feet exuded a bone-chilling cold, as if they could freeze my soul.
Only the occasional rustling sound of Saruman turning the pages of an ancient book, like the friction of withered leaves, and the faint, almost deathly syllables of his low chanting of probing spells to test the reaction of a certain symbol, barely proved that there was still a trace of activity belonging to the "living ones" here.
soon.
Saruman's efforts gradually yielded results.
The text was fragmented and full of warnings and taboos.
That malice and indifference, seemingly from the very beginning of the universe, sent a chill down Saruman's spine, straight to the top of his head!
His blood seemed to freeze in that instant.
"—The Realm Beyond Time—"
"—When the stars return to their places—"
"————The Old Ones————The Rulers————Sleep————"
"————Do not disturb————Do not see————The eternal————nightma————"
"————All that touches———— will inevitably suffer———— distortion and———— annihilation————"
Despite lacking knowledge of the background information, the dangerous aura conveyed between the lines already sent a chill down Saruman's spine.
"The Realm Beyond Time"? "The Great Old Ones"? "The Eternal Nightmare"?
Even the most superficial understanding was enough to paint a picture in his mind that was far more terrifying, more ultimate, and more despairing than the infinite corridor!
This is not the outer perimeter of any ruins or another level at all!
It is a separate, entirely different forbidden dimension! A cage where even the rules of time can be distorted! They did not escape that stone cage by luck, but foolishly and self-destructively jumped from a smaller cage into a larger, more terrifying, and more incomprehensible ultimate cage!
"How could this happen!"
Saruman's face turned extremely grim, his previous glimmer of hope fading once more. If the inscription on the stone tablet was true, then the city of R'lyeh itself was an extremely dangerous place, and the "wizard" fighting within its walls was likely facing something far more dangerous—
Just as Saruman was shocked and bewildered by the information he had deciphered, hesitating whether to tell Kag and what to do next, deep within the city of Laleye, that childlike yet cold voice once again pierced the deathly silence, resounding throughout the dim world!
"Avada Kedavra—the Plague!"
This time, it's not just a single death ray.
With that announcement, countless streams of dense, boiling green magical light burst forth, like a flood bursting its banks, or like a living plague cloud.
They suddenly erupted from a certain area in the city center!
The green light instantly illuminated large swaths of distorted buildings, making them appear like a ghostly realm.
The light was not static, but rather surging and spreading wildly, as if some kind of living, highly contagious, and destructive energy was spreading unchecked. Its scale and magical power far surpassed the sum of all previous "Avada Kedavra" attacks!
Saruman abruptly raised his head, gazing at the churning scene within the city, which resembled a green hell, and feeling the terrifying magical energy surging forth, seemingly capable of annihilating all life!
"My God!" All his doubts and hopes were shattered at this moment, leaving only unparalleled shock and horror!
Saruman couldn't help but gasp in shock!
"That—that's no ordinary wizard! That's—a legend!!" His voice became shrill with utter disbelief.