Chapter 493
Chapter 493
CRACK!
Zion's telekinetic force snapped the neck of a Hound standing guard.
At that moment, Adol softened the soil to prevent noise when the Hound fell.
As they quietly dispatched the Hounds and tried to enter the castle ruins, Boris gave a stop signal.
He had spotted other personnel guarding the interior.
'Those guys are...'
Black knights wearing dark armor.
They were modified knights who could use demon race battle techniques and felt no pain due to stimulants.
Boris gestured toward them and signaled to Visco.
Visco nodded, placed his hands on the ground, and released a mist that caused hallucinations.
TSSS!
The shallow hallucinogenic mist spread across the ground, gradually reaching the black knights.
The initially motionless black knights began to show strange reactions.
"UUUUGH!"
Though they had lost their minds due to stimulants, their bodily functions weren't completely paralyzed.
The effect of the hallucinations was doubled by combining Visco's bloodline ability with chemicals made by the alchemist twins and Feinan's mist-generating device.
The affected black knights drew their swords and summoned battle techniques.
WOOOONG!
They began swinging their swords and fighting each other.
Under the hallucination, they had recognized each other as enemies.
After confirming Visco's hallucinations worked, Boris's team headed straight inside.
Inside the castle ruins, they saw other personnel guarding the path to the underground.
Boris glanced outside, then sent a signal to Bacchus's team waiting through the secure communication channel.
Hidden in the reed forest, Bacchus received Boris's signal and generated vampire-specific ultrasonic waves.
WOOOONG!
At that moment, figures hidden in the rear forest revealed themselves.
THUD! THUD! THUD!
They were the Red Knights from the north that Zeke had brought.
Led by Bishop Castic, the Knight of Silence, who had been one of the five-star knights in Zeke's previous life, they had all been reborn as vampire knights through Carmilla.
Since demonic energy had penetrated to their marrow, making it difficult to restore their minds through normal methods, they were all turned into vampires as a last resort, giving them new bodies free from demonic energy.
Through the powerful energy of Carmilla, who had become a Royal Vampire, the Red Knights could escape their bodies saturated with demonic energy.
Though they lost their human capabilities and strength, they boasted impressive combat power with vampire-specific strength and agility.
"Distract the enemies and draw their attention!"
Upon receiving Bacchus's order, the Red Knights mounted ghost horses and charged noisily, luring away the Hounds and knights at the castle ruins.
With the Knight Killers already eliminated by the vampires, they could freely roam the interior.
As the Red Knight unit moved freely, the forces guarding the castle ruins hurriedly chased after them.
This created gaps in their defense.
"We move too."
Bacchus's vampire intelligence unit also took advantage of the gap to move inside the castle ruins.
After signaling Boris that troops had moved, he began attacking snipers and Hounds in the outer areas.
Vampires moving stealthily in the darkness were as fearsome as top-class assassins.
After receiving Bacchus's signal, Boris led the intelligence unit to approach further inside.
Serena stepped forward toward the knights guarding the underground path.
"Halt! Who goes there?!"
The knights were startled to see beautiful Serena approaching in the darkness.
Serena didn't miss that moment of distraction.
She instantly transformed her entire body into metal and rushed forward.
SWISH!
Serena's hands, transformed into sharp blades, pierced through the knights' armor and into their hearts.
"KUHAK!"
The knights fell, bleeding from the quick and powerful strike.
After securing the path underground, Serena gestured to Boris.
The intelligence unit cautiously descended underground, checking that no one was following.
It appeared the old underground structure had been excavated and modified, with supports placed throughout the walls.
As they went deeper along the walls, they saw more of Jimenez's knights standing guard.
Boris gestured to Zion behind him.
Zion extended both hands toward the knights on guard.
CRACK!
The knights' necks snapped instantly, and they collapsed.
Once again, Adol made the floor soft so the armored knights fell without making noise.
Without enhancements, Zion's telekinetic power had weakened, but after training with Arina, he could control his ability more precisely.
Boris had Adol bury the fallen knights to remove any trace, then examined the area they had been guarding.
There was an arched entrance with a corridor stretching beyond it.
However, only the nearby entrance was visible, while the interior was shrouded in darkness.
It seemed like strange sounds could be heard.
'This feels ominous.'
He had good intuition.
Boris said to Serena.
"Scout ahead."
Serena nodded and took out two metal spheres from her chest. She placed them on the ground and activated her bloodline ability, causing their surfaces to split open and transform into beetle shapes.
TINKLE!
The two metal beetles fluttered their wings and took flight.
They were one of the exploration tools made by Golin and enchanted by Feinan, magical devices that applied familiar magic and required Serena's metal-manipulation ability to operate.
As the beetles' vision was transmitted to Serena, she could examine what lay inside. While moving the beetles deep into the corridor, she discovered something strange.
'That is...?'
Inside were countless experimental subjects with horrifying appearances - some with melting skin making endless noises, others with grotesquely swollen arms, and some with bodies that seemed boneless and gelatinous. They had lost their human form.
Serena reported these experimental subjects to Boris.
"How many are there?"
"It's difficult to estimate, but at least in the thousands."
After considering, Boris said to Visco.
"Looks like we'll need to use the new weapon here."
Visco put down the bag he was carrying, opened it, and took out several metal canisters. Following Serena's guidance, he placed them in a line on the floor in the space before the experimental subjects. He opened the lids and activated the magic circuits as Feinan had instructed.
"It's ready, Captain."
"Good. Zion, Serena, go lure them here."
Zion levitated while Serena transformed her entire body into metal. The two slowly headed toward the experimental subjects.
GRRRR!
The subjects looked even more horrifying in person. They noticed Zion and Serena approaching.
GAAAAAAH!
They began charging madly toward the two. As they attacked, Zion unleashed his telekinetic force.
SPLAT!
The heads of the approaching subjects exploded from Zion's telekinesis. Surprisingly, even with their heads destroyed, their bodies continued charging.
Zion shook his head in shock.
"Ugh, what are these things?"
Serena sighed and said.
"Zion, I told you not to play around in the field."
Zion grumbled and nodded.
"I got it, I got it. Always nagging..."
At that moment, Zion and Serena simultaneously lifted their bodies to the ceiling. The experimental subjects passed beneath them and continued rushing forward.
GRAAAAH!
As the subjects approached, Boris signaled to Visco."Visco, now!"
Visco activated the devices planted in the floor.
BOOM BOOM BOOM!
Plasma nets unfolded from the metal canisters. The mindless charging subjects were caught helplessly in the plasma nets.
SPLAT! SPLAT!
Their bodies burst upon contact with the plasma.
GAAAAK!
The interior was instantly filled with scattered flesh pieces.
"Urgh.
"Visco barely suppressed his rising nausea. Even Boris, with his strong stomach, felt queasy.
'Not pleasant to look at, but perfectly effective.'
This plasma generator was developed by adapting the magical formula from the plasma shield engraved on Zeke's Hersion. Though it was disposable, they confirmed it was extremely helpful in actual combat.
Boris, along with Visco and Adol, stepped over the remains and continued deeper inside. Zion and Serena were waiting ahead.
Serena reported.
"Captain, the path is blocked"
Boris examined the front and saw she was right, it was a dead end. It seemed strange that there was nowhere to go further, even after searching the space where the subjects had been.
Boris used his Imperial Intelligence Bureau background to examine various parts of the blocked wall.
"There's something here. Visco."
Visco took out what looked like a metal rod from his bag and handed it over. Boris applied it to the spot he'd discovered.
Surprisingly, a hidden magic circle appeared, creating a portal in front of the wall. It seemed the experimental subjects had been placed there to prevent outsiders from accessing this portal.
Boris looked with amazement at the interference magic artifact created by Hades.
'As expected from a dragon-made artifact, the performance is impressive.'
Boris finished marveling and entered the portal along with his party.
WOOOOOOONG!
As they stepped into the portal, a completely different landscape unfolded before them.
A vast space made of solid stone appeared in front of them.
‘So we’ve completely left the ruins where no grass grows.’
Still, judging by the scale of the portal, it didn’t seem to be too far away.
At that moment, Adol conveyed something through sign language, and Boris understood, nodding in response.
‘It felt like a completely different location, but it turns out this space exists separately in a deeper underground level of the previous area.’
Judging by the condition of the stone walls and floor, this place also appeared to be an excavated ruin.
The vast space didn’t seem to have any guards.
It seemed they didn’t expect any intruders to break through the portal.
Then, Serena spoke.
“Captain, there’s a path over there.”
Boris moved in the direction Serena pointed.
Following the path, they found a staircase leading downward.
After sending the metal beetle Serena had used earlier to scout below, Boris cautiously descended the stairs with his party.
The space below was also lined with stone walls and floors like the upper level, but as they went down, a strong scent of blood filled the air.
‘This is…’
There was another staircase leading further down to the side, and about ten meters below, a massive cavern came into view.
Boris crouched and peered beneath the railing to observe the cavern.
Thick red smoke constantly rose from below, and dozens of mages were moving busily in the area.
KUGUGUGU!
A massive wheel inside the wall turned, producing a grinding sound, while on the opposite side, people were locked in cages ,most of them seemed to be from the Southern Continent.
One of the mages shouted.
“Damn it! The ratio is off! Throw in one more!”
At those words, other mages walked toward the cages and pulled out a man from inside.
The man’s eyes were glazed over as if he had been drugged, and his whole body trembled.
The mages threw him into a hole in the wall near the massive wheel.
The wheel continued turning without stopping, producing a horrifying noise.
KUGUGUGUGU!
Moments later, small crimson granules poured out from a small opening beneath the wheel.
The mages collected these granules and handed them over to other mages nearby.
Those mages gathered and refined the granules, crafting ominous dark red gemstones.
Boris realized what they were making.
‘Bloodstones.’
They were producing Bloodstones, a crucial material for summoning demons.
Boris understood that the massive wheel-shaped device embedded in the wall was being used to manufacture artificial Bloodstones.
If this place were destroyed, both Jiemens and Abyss would suffer a significant blow.
And then, it happened.
WOOOOOOONG!
A dark portal formed inside, and from within it, a presence radiating an ominous energy stepped out.
A powerful aura that seemed to press down on everything, and a body covered in solid Hersion armor.
The moment Boris saw the figure’s face, he instinctively held his breath.
It was a face he recognized.
‘Edward Jiemens.’
It was none other than the second son of the Jiemens family.