Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong
Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/
Chapter 68: Crystal Eggs
When the survivors knocked on the door, Myss was dozing while hugging his “Hero Cushion”.
Counting from the moment they had entered the dungeon, he had gone nearly two days without proper sleep. Previously, extending his magic had consumed a great deal of his physical strength, and Lord Archdemon had practically turned into a boneless lump of meat paste.
Salaar helped him up twice, but he still couldn’t manage to drag Myss upright. He had no choice but to reach out and let healing magic sweep over Myss in an unreasonable rush, erasing the physical exhaustion of his body.
However, Myss was still a limp lump. “So sleepy…”
As he mumbled, he burrowed his entire head into Salaar’s collar, using this to escape the knocking at the door.
Fine. Mental fatigue. Salaar understood.
Before entering the seal, he had once poured concentrated stimulant potion into himself. The result was that his body had been so excited he couldn’t sleep, while his head had been full of numb drowsiness.
Besides healing, he had to use some other way to wake him up, such as…
Salaar grabbed Myss by the back of his collar, lifted Lord Archdemon, who had gone completely soft, and lightly bit his lips.
“——!!!”
Myss instantly sprang two steps away, looking more awake than he had ever been.
He touched his lower lip, his face revealing a bewildered conflict. Lord Archdemon seemed to simultaneously regret that he tried to dodge, while also feeling relieved he hadn’t been completely dominated. His pupils were moving so fast they nearly left afterimages.
Salaar’s expression didn’t change as he buttoned his clothes and straightened his lapels.
Excellent. He had improved too. His heartbeat had been chaotic for an instant just now, but it was still within controllable range… His chest and back were sour and hot, and because of the shiver, a thin layer of sweat had broken out. But those abnormalities were covered by clothes, just as easy to hide as his heartbeat.
‘If it’s hidden, then there’s no issue,’ Saint Salaar thought solemnly.
“We’re awake,” Salaar called toward the door.
These people were rather polite. They had left them possible time to get dressed.
“There was an explosion outside. Professor Gentry and the rabbits have come into conflict.”
Sean’s tone was extremely certain. “You two come with us. Once we successfully meet up with the Professor, you’ll be free. Take your companions and escape as soon as possible.”
His tone carried a hint of command, as though it was only natural.
“You’re not escaping?” Salaar knowingly asked.
“We’re going to rescue Roman. You go first.” Sean spoke extremely quickly, and a faint urgency was hidden in his words. “If you don’t believe me, we can all go greet the Professor together.”
Salaar and Myss exchanged a glance. Neither of them spoke.
Never mind Salaar, even Myss could sense that the atmosphere was wrong.
This Divine Realm was powerful, yet it had always been all thunder and little rain. It hadn’t truly done anything to them. Myss always had the feeling that he was an outsider. He had a premonition that if they were willing to abandon the priest on the spot, they could simply walk away without consequences.
At this very moment, these survivors were even actively driving them outward. Unfortunately, Myss couldn’t possibly abandon the Abnormal Fruit locator, and he would be even less likely to abandon the Abnormal Fruit here.
“Then let’s go see the Professor first.”
Myss said this decisively, and Salaar silently nodded.
Perhaps because they had confirmed whether Professor Gentry was genuine or not, this time, the survivors didn’t tie them up. Instead, they brought them along and left the room together.
Of the five people, two had broken legs and one was seriously ill, so their speed was hardly brisk. However, there were no rabbit guards and no rabbit pursuers. There was only a rumbling sound not far away.
The group followed the mushroom oil lamps forward and ran straight into Professor Gentry and the other two.
Beverly had blasted down the door leading to the hall, and from the other side of the ruins came the faint sound of rabbits scolding them. Asp had revealed himself. In one hand, he was holding the lop-eared rabbit Clover, who was angrily berating them.
“Bad humans, bad humans!” It struggled endlessly, its three-petaled mouth moving rapidly. “These stones will take forever to move! The banquet was clearly about to start!”
Professor Gentry was the first to notice them.
“Professor, it really is you!” Joy appeared on Sean’s face, but he didn’t rush forward.
Sure enough, Professor Gentry made a “stop” gesture. Asp held the rabbit in his left hand while hurriedly pulling out a magic device that looked like an old-fashioned camera with his right. He aimed it in their direction and took a snapshot with a click.
Amid a sizzling sound, a black-and-white photograph emerged from the bottom of the magic device.
“They’re not illusions, Professor. They’re all physical entities,” Asp said.
Only then did Sean stride forward. “This place can’t create things out of thin air. We tested it for a long time. Its principles are very similar to your…”
At this point, he suddenly stopped and cast an isolation spell on the rabbit. A gray barrier wrapped around the lop-eared rabbit, enclosing all of its scolding inside.
They could neither hear nor see it. Of course, the reverse was also true.
“…In short, Roman was taken by a monster while protecting us.”
Only after making sure the lop-eared rabbit Clover couldn’t hear them speak did Sean continue. “We know Roman is in the castle’s master bedroom. He won’t die that easily. He must still be there!”
Beverly still had the joy of seeing familiar faces again on her face, but when she heard this, her expression quickly dimmed. “Sean, Roman’s status crystal shattered.”
“Status crystals aren’t one hundred percent accurate. Haven’t there been special cases of false death before?”
Sean didn’t waver for even half a second. “Roman must still be alive. Even if he’s dead, we have to see his body with our own eyes.”
“Sean!” Even Asp, who was poor with words, grew anxious. “Look at your team members. This isn’t the time to let your emotions cloud your judgment!”
“We’ll evacuate immediately and send all of you back to the surface. Then the Professor can bring us back for another trip. If Roman is alive, one day won’t make a difference.”
Beverly immediately supported Asp. “Everyone is injured. Forcing yourselves will only hold us back! Right, Fiona? Don’t you hate pain the most?”
She looked at the woman whose neck was wrapped in bandages.
Fiona gave her a faint smile and gently shook her head. In Myss’s eyes, her fox Magibase sat quietly by her feet, looking up at her.
Faced with Sean’s absurd and impulsive request, the survivors remained silent. Not a single person objected.
“The monster is in the master bedroom.” Sean lowered his head, his voice hoarse. “Please. We have to confirm it with our own eyes… He’s our captain…”
“As long as that door is opened… We deliberately conserved our strength just for this moment…”
Beverly looked to Professor Gentry for help. From beginning to end, the Archmage hadn’t said a word.
He only looked at the pale, haggard survivors with an expressionless face. After staring for more than ten seconds, he sighed.
“All right,” Professor Gentry said, then turned toward Salaar and Myss.
“This is our internal matter. You two may wait here for a short while.”
Salaar withdrew his usual demeanor of a brash youth. “One of my guys was also taken. He’s in the master bedroom. I heard that place is very dangerous.”
“I’m very curious. Do you actually know what this ‘magical space’ is? You take the word of survivors who’ve been missing for more than half a year at face value, without even bothering to conduct any further verification.”
Seeing Salaar change his face at lightning speed, Sean looked at him in some surprise for a while.
However, the survivors’ gazes quickly focused on Gentry again, the urgency in their eyes nearly overflowing.
“Don’t insult the Professor…” Asp was displeased.
“My apologies, but from how the development is unfolding, it reminds me too much of a fairy tale.” Salaar said, “An extraordinary mage appears and joins the survivors to fight the monster. I thought only fairy tales glossed over pre-battle investigation with a single sentence.”
Professor Gentry looked deeply at him.
“It seems the two of you understand this kind of ‘magical space’ very well,” he said in a low, steady voice. “No need to worry. I know what I’m doing.”
“Let’s go together. We can’t just leave the priest behind.” Myss quietly whispered into Salaar’s ear, “We’ll treat it as our pre-battle warm-up. If the situation is wrong, we can just escape first.”
He wasn’t so arrogant that he would underestimate the Master of the Divine Realm, but when it came to merely fleeing for his life, Myss still had confidence. At worst, they would follow at the very back. If the sky collapsed, it would hit Gentry first.
Salaar sighed and raised his voice. “All right. We’ll come too.”
Since things had come this far, Tass no longer hid himself. He emerged from Myss’s hair and flew around Myss and Salaar with a heavy heart.
Fork and Knife had already turned into their weapon forms and were equipped on the two of them.
A Dragon Fae in front, two little alchemical snakes behind.
From the corner of his eye, Myss looked at the survivors. Upon discovering that they had hidden their strength, those humans’ faces showed no unease from the plan changing. Instead, a trace of dark joy flashed across them.
Myss secretly arched his back and walked behind Gentry with Salaar, openly craning his head around.
They would have to explore the master bedroom sooner or later anyway, and this way, he could conveniently observe Professor Gentry’s spellcasting methods too. If things took a turn for the worse, he was fully prepared to grab Salaar and make a run for it.
As the group approached, two suits of armor at the door blocked their way.
Professor Gentry casually waved his wand, and the helmets of the two suits of armor flew off with a sound, as if they had been decapitated on the spot.
The helmets clattered to the ground and rolled into the darkness.
Yet the armor bodies did not fall.
“Oh no, the helmets are gone!”
“Who’s going to give the signal? Which way do we move now?”
“Bad humans are too bad. I don’t know magic, waaah…”
Several round-headed pygmy rabbits squeezed out of the neck holes, and a few little rabbits like white dumplings also crawled out of the helmets that had been sent flying.
The rabbits responsible for the helmets dizzyingly pawed at the air, and the helmets shook with them before clanging down again and trapping the rabbits back inside.
Without the helmet rabbits giving orders, the rabbits inside the armor were at a loss. The two suits of armor twisted and turned in an extremely awkward posture and quickly lost their balance.
“I quit! I’m not doing this anymore!”
The armor fell to the ground in a sorry state, and the pygmy rabbits let out tiny screams as they rushed out through the neck holes of the armor.
Myss and Salaar: “…”
The entire process took less than fifteen seconds. The willpower of these furballs was truly beyond words.
Professor Gentry, however, didn’t relax in the slightest. He silently stepped over the panicked pygmy rabbits and raised his hand toward the large door.
Strange magic fluctuations spread out. The huge double doors opened on their own. The fountain-pen wand was pressed into the Professor’s palm, making his posture look very much like he was casting spells barehanded.
A wind of decay blew out again, mixed with extremely fierce magic fluctuations—it felt like a violent winter gale.
The Dragon Fae immediately descended and hovered between the two of their heads. “That’s it!”
Professor Gentry didn’t immediately enter the door. Asp understood and untied a cloth bag. Countless lighting magic devices like fireflies shot out, clinging to all directions like bullets.
In an instant, the space inside the room became as bright as day.
“My God!” Beverly, who was walking in front, suddenly covered her mouth.
Myss immediately craned his head to look, but he couldn’t recognize what he was seeing at all.
The enormous master bedroom was filled with pale, threadlike things. Some were thick, some were thin, and they stuck between everything like spiderwebs. In the middle, there were translucent egg-shaped objects.
The size of those eggs was subtle. Their texture was a little like crystal, and they were covered in dense patterns… Runes?
The larger eggs could fit an adult inside, while the smaller ones could only wrap around a pygmy rabbit. As for the threads adhering to them, they had the texture of raw meat, and their surfaces were coated in a glossy layer of mucus.
They almost filled the entire space. Myss could only see two or three meters inside the door.
“Th-this is…” Asp began uncertainly.
“An ancient alchemical life incubator.”
Professor Gentry and Salaar spoke at the same time.
The difference was that Professor Gentry’s voice was powerful and resonant, while Salaar’s mutter was heard only by Myss.
Myss turned his head and discovered that Salaar was staring intently at that “incubator”, which seemed almost like a living organism itself. He couldn’t quite read Salaar’s emotions.
“I made something similar before, for transforming pets and livestock for nobles.”
Salaar immediately sensed Myss’s gaze. “A real incubator shouldn’t be this… chaotic. This one has gone out of control.”
Humans three hundred years ago could mess around to this extent?
Myss frowned and studied the strange thing before him. There was absolutely nothing about this in the slave’s memories, nor, for that matter, in Antis’s memories. The ancient alchemy magic Salaar spoke of seemed to have disappeared entirely from the annals of history.
“An incubator from three hundred years ago couldn’t possibly be preserved this well…!”
Asp’s voice trembled slightly. His focus was clearly on something else.
The survivors stood quietly beside him, their expressions remained unchanged.
Professor Gentry’s gaze swept over Salaar and Myss. Then he aimed at the nearest and largest incubator, drawing a circle with his wand.
“Hiss.” Myss sucked in a cold breath.
It was that strange magic fluctuation again.
Right in front of them, the chosen incubator rapidly shriveled.
The intact crystal egg became dilapidated and covered in dust. The threads connected to it either withered or simply disappeared, leaving only a crumbling eggshell behind.
Compared to the plump, living incubators around it, this thing was like an ink dot on parchment.
Myss worked hard to analyze the magic fluctuation from moments ago. “…Is this temporal regression?”
“No.”
Without waiting for Beverly to speak, Professor Gentry personally answered him.
“True temporal regression can only be done by a god. I merely briefly reproduced the ‘past.’ Its essence won’t change.”
After saying this, he expanded the range of the spell.
The incubators blocking their path vanished, leaving only some bleak fragments and remains.
That terrifying magic fluctuation was still growing stronger. Myss had the unpleasant feeling of needles stabbing into the gaps between his bones. He quietly focused his mind and used his magic clothing to enhance his perception.
“…The priest is over there!” Myss almost immediately caught the priest’s aura.
Gentry turned his wand and reduced all the incubators in that direction to ruins. With nothing blocking their view, they saw Father Kalen at a glance.
The priest wasn’t far from the entrance. His tall body was curled up like an infant’s, squeezed inside an exceptionally huge crystal egg. His face was pale and his aura was weak, but the breathing of his chest was still stable enough.
The rabbit “Jinx” was still melted onto his body, its red eyes faintly closed, as if it were having a beautiful dream.
And beside the priest was a crystal egg of similar size.
Inside the egg lay a scattered human skeleton.
Beside its skull were dried white hairs. The rest of the bones were wrapped in an adventurer’s clothes, their style exactly the same as those worn by Sean and the others.
“Roman…” Beverly let out a choked sob.
She struggled to suppress the urge to cry and took several deep breaths. “Quick! Save the Father and leave this place! While the existence here still hasn’t acted up, Sean?”
She turned around, and her hair instantly stood on end.
“Sean?!”
Sean was smiling. The survivors were smiling.
Their faces wore identical strange, stiff smiles. There was no grief and no collapse. Five pairs of eyes stared in unison at that skeleton.
Sean placed one hand on the egg containing the bones, but his gaze looked toward the deeper darkness.
“Good evening, Captain.”
He murmured, “…We’ve come to make the dream come true.”
The author has something to say:
Myss: Should I dodge when Salaar kisses me? If I don’t dodge, he’ll suffer if he loves me, but what if he hasn’t fallen for me? Then it feels like I’m being played. But if I dodge, I lose a good opportunity. (begins looping) [melting]
Salaar: Pretends he wasn’t moved, randomly bluffing to one Archdemon (well, there’s only one). [OK]
You villain.
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