Chapter 491
Chapter 491
Chapter 491
Zeke headed to Baranaon, confident of Ramon Jiemens's location based on information from Baron and enemies.
To stop Ramon Jiemens, he first went to Hoshgar Nirvana's mansion in Baranaon.
"Master!"
Richmond and Bane , who were staying at Hoshgar's mansion, greeted Zeke warmly.
It felt different from being forcibly summoned as usual.
Zeke let Bucephalus and Raven play freely in the mansion's front yard.
Looking around Hoshgar's mansion after a long time, Zeke was momentarily speechless at its transformation.
"...Richmond. What happened here?"
Surprisingly, Hoshgar's mansion had become gloomy, bizarre, and depressing as if a lich lived there.
Monster statues were placed everywhere, and one side was piled with monster byproducts, unidentifiable bones, and strange-looking ancient artifacts.
Although people avoided it before, calling it the Ghost mansion, it looked more grotesque now than then.
Richmond smiled shyly at Zeke's words.
"Hehe, isn't it wonderful, Master?"
Richmond had a completely different aesthetic sense from others.
Zeke coldly said to Richmond:
"Clean it all up. Before I burn it myself."
Richmond's jaw dropped, seemingly shocked by those words.
"What? Clean up? There's nothing to clean..."
WHOOSH!
When Zeke created white flames, Richmond finally started moving frantically.
"I-I'll clean it up! Of course, Master!"
Richmond's undead and Durahan began cleaning up the grotesque items piled in front of the mansion.
After watching this briefly, Zeke clicked his tongue and approached Bane.
"Bane, have you caused any trouble? If so, speak up quickly."
Bane shook his head.
"I'm qualitatively different from that monster-obsessed lich."
Unlike ordinary liches, Bane was an Elemental Lich who could use elemental magic and had high self-esteem.
As Zeke nodded, something appeared behind him.
WOOF! WOOF! WOOF!
Dozens of Ice Wolves armed with protruding ice blades ran around the mansion's front yard with fierce eyes.
Bane, despite being a skeleton, had a satisfied expression watching them.
"Aren't they cute, Master?"
"..."
Zeke had forgotten they were both liches from Nirvana.
After ordering the threatening Ice Wolves to be tied up in one corner of the garden, Zeke went inside with Bane.
He took out a box from his chest and handed it to him.
"What is this, Master?"
"Open it."
When Bane opened the box, intense cold air burst out.
Bane looked at Zeke in surprise.
"T-this is?"
It was an Elemental Stone of ice attribute, enhanced with eternal ice crystals.
Zeke said to Bane:
"Would it be possible to create an artifact using this?"
After examining the Elemental Stone carefully, Bane shook his head.
"Whew, such a stone containing tremendous cold... To conclude, it seems impossible with my skills."
"If the only 8th Circle ice attribute mage can't do it, who can?"
"It's not about circles; this item seems fundamentally unmovable by magical power."
The Elemental Stone, containing primordial cold, had to be considered in the realm of authority.
Even Bane, an Arch Lich, couldn't handle authority, so creating an artifact with the Elemental Stone was impossible.
Zeke understood Bane's words and nodded disappointedly.
Then Bane, looking at the Elemental Stone, remembered something and spoke:
"This cold reminds me of that."
He continued.
"Do you remember the request I received before?"
Zeke thought for a moment and nodded.
"The request to melt the coffin trapped in ice. It was Arthur Draker's request."
"Yes. The cold I felt from that coffin was similar to this."
Zeke was surprised by Bane's words.
'Then does that mean someone froze that coffin with authority?'
Zeke also possessed the authority of freezing.
And that authority was obtained after absorbing the Snow Queen, a Nephilim.
'Could the Snow Queen have frozen that coffin with freezing authority? Or did another being use authority...?'
He couldn't know why Arthur Draker had a coffin frozen by authority, or what he intended to do by thawing it.
'Perhaps information about that coffin might also be in Arthur Draker's legacy.'
Zeke put the Elemental Stone back in the box and stored it in his inventory.
At that moment, Richmond, who had finished cleaning the mansion, entered.
"Phew, I've finished cleaning everything, master."
Zeke was looking at him dismissively when he noticed the incense burner in Richmond's hand and asked.
"What's that, Richmond?"
Richmond replied as if he just remembered.
"It's what I mentioned before. The ancient relic that was discovered in the Natural Undead Dungeon."
"You still had that?"
"I had put it aside and forgotten about it, but found it while cleaning up earlier."
It was surprising that he had piled such a precious ancient relic together with monster materials, even if it looked like junk.
"Bring it here."
Since it was an ancient relic from the mansion of Hoshgar, the first head of Nirvana, it probably wasn't ordinary.
Zeke examined the old incense burner that Richmond brought.
'There seems to be something to it.'
Just by looking, he couldn't sense anything special.
"Richmond, did this incense burner have any special properties?"
"As I told you before, spirits kept coming out of it, which was quite troublesome."
"Hmm, it seems fine now though?"
"Look at this."
Richmond raised dark mana toward the incense burner.
As if responding to the lich's dark mana, an eerie wailing sound echoed from the burner.
KIAAAAAAAK!
At the same time, spirits began to surge out of the burner like rising smoke.
KIAAAAAAAK!
Spirits with indistinct forms poured out and flew around erratically.
Zeke observed the pale spirits that were making noisy wailing sounds.
Richmond shook his head with a disgusted expression.
"These creatures keep jumping out."
"They don't seem like wraiths or ethereal monsters."
"Yes, they can't really be called spirits since they don't possess any cursed power. They just make noise and act annoyingly."
Zeke raised his Blood King's power to try to subdue the spirits flying around.
KIAAAAK—
KIIIIIK!
KAAAAK!
However, the spirits only gathered around Zeke who had raised his Blood King's power, but didn't seem to be subdued. They appeared to be responding to his power like insects drawn to light.
'Neither souls nor spirits. This is my first time seeing something like this.'
Zeke examined the incense burner with his Third Eye.
Surprisingly, even with the Blood King's power, he couldn't properly see the structure or the inside of the burner.
It seemed that powerful seals were placed on the burner itself.
'I wonder if examining it with Dragon's Wisdom will reveal something.'
If an ancient relic couldn't be properly analyzed even with the Blood King's power, there was a high possibility that a very powerful force was sealed within it.
Zeke slowly placed his hand on the incense burner.
Then he activated Dragon's Wisdom.
WOOWOONG!
Zeke's mind began to connect with the incense burner.
The spirits flying around screamed even more intensely.
At that moment, a message appeared before Zeke's eyes.
[Exploring unidentified ancient relic.]
[Detected powerful sealing force in the ancient relic. Would you like to release this seal?]
When Zeke chose to release it, a powerful light erupted from the incense burner.
WOOWOONG!
As the seal was broken with the powerful light, numerous spirits surged from the burner.
KWAKWAKWAKWA!
Countless spirits gushed upward like a fountain of specters, enveloping Zeke.
KIAAAAAAAK!
Unlike before, these spirits now contained strong resentment and cursed power.
Richmond and Bane were startled seeing Zeke engulfed by the spirits.
"Master!"
"Master!"
Zeke raised his hand as if to say everything was fine.
At that moment, Zeke's shadow writhed and rose up.
KWAKWAKWAKWA!
The shadow, linked to the Shadow Armor, wrapped around Zeke's body, protecting him from the spirits.
Simultaneously, the shadow opened its mouth wide and began to devour the spirits that were pouring out like a waterfall.
KIAAAAK!
The spirits, sensing something ominous about being pulled into the shadow, retreated and tried to escape.
However, black hands stretching out from the shadow caught all the fleeing spirits and absorbed them.
KIAAAAAAAK!
Thus, all the numerous spirits that had jumped out of the incense burner were inevitably sucked into Zeke's shadow.
Another message appeared before Zeke's eyes.
[The lost souls are transforming into shadow spirits.]
The countless lost souls had become shadow spirits that followed Zeke's commands.
'Hooh?'
Zeke summoned the shadow spirits.
As the black shadow rippled, the shadow spirits revealed themselves, and their number was enormous.
Though they couldn't exert the power of a shadow summon, the sheer number of thousands of shadows gathered together would certainly create an intimidating presence.
If combined with other shadow summons or guardians, he could create a shadow legion.
'I've gained an unexpected benefit.'
Zeke became curious about the identity of the incense burner that contained so many lost souls.
He delved deeper into the burner's information through Dragon's Wisdom, accessing the Akashic Code.
WOOWOOWOONG!
As Zeke dug deeper, the incense burner began to vibrate violently.
With no more lost souls to expel, an unknown energy began to rise from the burner.
Zeke recognized this energy.
'This is the same energy I felt from the outer beings?'
Simultaneously, new information began to flood into Zeke's mind.
TSUTSUTSUTSU!
The memory information contained in the burner was directly projecting scenes from the past.
—KUAAAAAAAK!
—SAVE ME!
—UAAAAAK!
Terrible screams and unbearably cruel scenes unfolded before Zeke.
In front of a palace with pointed spires stood a massive demon statue with dozens of arms, and before it was a vast courtyard. Numerous soldiers were lined up there.
The style of armor worn by the soldiers and the palace itself were unlike anything he had ever seen before.
It seemed to be an ancient civilization that had disappeared long ago.
Opposite the soldiers, hundreds of humans and demi-humans were bound to frames in front of the courtyard, screaming in agony.
Masked soldiers tortured and killed them brutally, then displayed their corpses on spears like exhibitions.
'What is this...?'
The fresh blood of those who were tortured and killed horribly flowed through grooves carved in the courtyard floor toward one place.
The blood flowed to form a lake of blood in front of the demon statue, where someone sat in meditation.
They wore a golden crown resembling a lion's mane on their head and a mask made of gold on their face.
Their bare upper body was adorned with ornaments made of bone, jewels, and gold, while women surrounding them scooped blood from the lake with golden urns and poured it over his body.
The man in the golden mask bathed his entire body in blood while constantly chanting an ominous spell.
That's when it happened.
KUGUGUGU!
A large wheeled cage entered in front of the courtyard.
Soon the cage stopped in the middle of the courtyard.
KIIIIIK!
The soldiers stepped back and pulled tightly on the chains attached to the cage.
Then one side of the iron cage opened with a clanking sound.
KUNG!
The heavy iron wall fell to the floor, making a loud noise that resonated throughout the courtyard.
Soon something leaped out from inside the cage.
KIAAAAAAAA!
A terrifying sound that shook the soul.
From the cage appeared a half-human, half-bird creature with a human face and four pairs of wings.
Bound by soul chains, the creature struggled to break free.
Zeke realized the identity of the half-human, half-bird creature trapped in the cage.
'A Nephilim?'
A Nephilim who inherited the blood of the constellation was trapped in the cage.
At that moment, the man wearing the golden mask who was sitting in the lake of blood stood up.