The Record of Unusual Creatures - Chapter 776

Chapter 776: Salted Fish

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

Hessiana and Vivian stood in the living room, staring at each other. One ready to embrace, one ready to flee. The dynamic of their relationship reminded one of the Feast at Hong Gate¹.

Hao Ren started looking for Lily as he knew his house was safe. The duo would not demolish it for now.

“Where’s Lily?”

Vivian pointed to the direction of the back door. “We had a fight just now. I used too much a force; she is now frozen in the backyard.”

“Please take a seat and feel at home. I have to go and check out Lily,” Hao Ren said to the visitors before he dashed out to the back.

When he came to the back of his house, his jaw dropped to the ground. There was a large block of ice on the open space, Lily was still-framed inside the ice wielding her claws. But there was a circle of bonfire around slowly melting the ice.

The little demon Y’lisabet was adding firewood into the fire as she murmured, “Medium heat, slow grill… medium heat, slow grill…”

Picking up his jaw from the ground, Hao Ren went up and knocked on the ice. “Looks like it had been a brutal fight.”

Lily stared at him from inside the ice. It took her a while before she finally blinked, looking embarrassed. She wanted to break out of it but it was not an ordinary ice, she could not get leverage of her strength. The only thing she could do was wait.

“Hello, Uncle Ren!” Y’lisabet greeted him while adding some more firewood to the fire. She looked excited.

Hao Ren nodded repeatedly, and waited. But it did not take too long before he heard a cracking sound. Cracks began to appear on the Lily Popsicle, the ice had melted down enough that the husky could crack it from the inside.

Hao Ren quickly dragged Y’lisabet to aside. As soon as they got out of the way, the ice block shook violently from the bottom up before it burst like a fireworks. As fire melted the ice from below, the lower part of the ice had broken easily but not the top. Lily’s head was still trapped in the ice block; she now looked as stupid as it could get.

Lily raised her fist, broke the ice shell on her head and finally freed herself. She took a deep breath and then sneezed aloud.

Hao Ren shook off the ice shards on his body and asked, “You… okay?”

“You’re back, Mr. Landlord!” Lily greeted Hao Ren, her voice loud. She swung her arms and glanced at the backdoor before lunging toward it; her roar was ear piercing. “Battie! I won’t let you get away with it!”

Hao Ren tried to stop her. “Don’t go inside! There are—”

But she was unstoppable and was as fast as light. Hao Ren had managed to grab a bunch of white hair in his hand, which he pulled from Lily’s tail. By the time he looked up, the husky already stormed into the house that was full of vampires.

Immediately afterwards, a loud scuffle broke out. First, it was the scream of Hessiana and Kassandra, then the whine of Lily as she fled. “I just wanted to tell you that there are many of them inside…” Hao Ren said, finishing the second part of his sentence.

Half an hour later, in the living hall. Everyone gathered, with mess all around. Vivian was standing in the middle of the broken coffee table, arms akimbo, began to lash out. “You, you, and you – Doggie! Hessiana! And the two minions of Hessiana! Look at the mess you have caused! It took me great effort to clean up, you know! Stop laughing, Mr. Landlord. You think this is funny? Why didn’t you stop Doggie in the first place?”

Hao Ren stopped laughing and looked at Vivian with a strange expression. “Wait a minute. I am the main victim here, the furniture are mine! How could you treat me as one of them?”

Vivian’s arms still akimbo but she began to move to aside. “Oh, in that case, my bad. You can keep laughing.”

Lily was curling herself up in the sofa; her head leaned against Hao Ren’s arm. “It’s an expensive damage, it’s an expensive damage.”

Hao Ren looked at the husky. He could not be angry with her. He patted her head and then looked at Hessiana who looked visibly upset. “Are you okay?”

Hessiana’s head was full of bite-marks, and she felt her vision blurry. “Everything happened just too fast… why would she come after me?”

“Because you look like her,” Hao Ren pointed to Vivian. “And considering your combat skill, you’re an easier target.”

Meanwhile, Nangong Wuyue was wiping and cleaning up dog hair and blood on the floor. She forced a smile. “Why would you want to quarrel as if coming back from business trip isn’t tired enough? Give me a break, guys!”

While holding a small mirror and carefully examining the bite marks on her face, Hessiana heard Nangong Wuyue and got worked up. “Working trip? What working trip? Lady Vivian, what are you doing now?”

“Saving the world with someone,” Vivian said, glancing at Hao Ren, and then pointed her mouth at Hessiana. “Take out the thing you’re supposed to show us. And, tell us what you know.”

Hessiana nodded, but she still looked at Hao Ren in distrust. “He can solve…”

“He is the landlord here, he has the final say,” Vivian frowned. “You have prejudice against Mr. Landlord. Had you not worked together in Athens? You should know his ability.”

Hessiana pursed her mouth, but she never dared to say no to Vivian. She picked up a suitcase beside her. It was black, nothing special, just like any other suitcases people would carry to work every day. But when Hessiana unlocked the complicated password lock, a strange bloody smell drifted out from the inside the suitcase.

The smell was disgusting. Strangely, the suitcase had been able to contain it all this while. Hao Ren took a peek and found it unusual inside: it was lined with a layer of unknown grey-white leathery material full of bloody red Letta runes and magic circle. The small suitcase was a magical prop with extremely delicate construction.

It was so complicated and mysterious that Hao Ren could not believe there was a line of text at the bottom that read ‘Shanghai Bag Factory’!

Nangong Sanba who was watching on the sideline saw the inside of the suitcase. “What is inside? Why it need such a tight security?” he asked.

“It’s evil,” Hessiana said as she carefully took something that was carefully wrapped in black goatskin out from the suitcase. “To be honest, this stuff is not common even in the otherworlds. The human wizard was capable of creating such an incredible stuff.”

Hessiana opened the wrap. Hao Ren saw a dry and black, weird item of less than a foot long, looked like a fish but had a scary ‘face’, huge teeth and hideously triangular eyes. It was just weird.

Lily looked in amazement. She blurted, “Salted fish?”

Hessiana: “…..”

“This is the larvae of the Infernal Fleshripper. It has been made into specimen for hundreds of years,” Kassandra could not care less about the ‘salted fish’ theory of Lily. She explained with a soft voice. “It is something that shouldn’t have existed in our dimension. It is from an alien world called Inferno that was connected to the Earth in the Mythological Era. It is very, very dangerous.”

Then, she added, “Of course you can call it a salted fish; Infernal Fleshripper is indeed a type of fish. This is the dried form.”

Hao Ren: “…..”

The image of red-haired Vivian was still fresh in Lily’s memory. She frowned at the salted fish. “What does this thing have to do with the magic book?”

“The one who made the magic book and this salted fish is the same person,” Hessiana said, her face serious. “And the wizard must have made more of these sorcerer items, his purpose… maybe it has something to do with Lady Vivian.”

---

Chapter 777: About Inferno

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

The terrible, red-haired Vivian reminded Hao Ren that the information Hessiana brought was very important. He gathered everyone in the family. Y’zaks joined them as he returned from the outside. Since the coffee table was broken, Hao Ren moved the dining table to the center of the living room. Hessiana placed the dried body of the “Infernal Fleshripper” on the table and began to explain.

“It was Mythological Period,” Hessiana said, facing Hao Ren, her serious face looked the same as when Vivian was lecturing them. “You should know already that Earth was quite different back then. Magic was widespread, supernatural power was the norm, humans weren’t well-verse in magic and the cities they built were fragile, they needed protection. The otherworldlings at that time had not only built super structure unimaginable to humans today but the magical environment at that time also made the planet very different from today. The alien dimensions were linked to the earth, some of them were artificial and the others naturally occurring since the beginning.”

Hao Ren nodded slightly. He had heard of this before from Vivian, but no harm to brush up the knowledge, he thought.

“At that time, the otherworldlings had built many things. Families who self-proclaimed as gods had built huge ‘divine kingdoms’, such as Mount Olympus and Asgard. But now the ruins of these magnificent places are nowhere to be found on earth because these ‘divine kingdoms’ are in different dimensions,” Vivian said, continued what Hessiana started. “These divine kingdoms are artificial dimensions. There are some natural dimensions, which have existed and linked to Earth as far as I can remembered. They include Inferno and some demonic planes. Even some of the otherworldlings, such as the shadelings originally lived in these dimensions. Their hometown is called the Shadowy World; it is a frozen place with no starlight. I have been there once and it’s astounding.”

This was new to Hao Ren. He immediately link it with the coming of otherworldlings to Earth.

They were originally inhabitants of the Plane of Dreams. They came to this universe through the crack on the Wall of Reality.

Were the alien dimensions of ancient times also from the Plane of Dreams? Or, in other word, had the rupture on the Wall of Reality not only brought a large number of other races to this space, but also flung the dimensional debris of the Plane of Dreams here?

Hao Ren exchanged a look with the others as if they already had the same conclusion in this mind. But they did not harp on this point. Taking into account the condition of the Wall of Reality and the theoretical model of Grand Unified Theory, the leaking of dimensional debris into this universe through the crack on the Wall of Reality was entire normal. Instead, what mattered most was the scale of the leakage. By now, it seemed that the leakage was more serious than imagined.

“After the collapse of the Mythological Era, the alien dimensions were basically gone,” Hessiana continued. “The artificial divine kingdoms lost their support after the death of the master. Most of them collapsed, and the rest closed. The one dimension that we have found in the Temple of Olympus is a closed dimension while the natural dimensions are in exile. The demon hunters could not have destroyed the space-time structure, so to sever the foundation of the otherworldling races the demon hunters locked them in and destroyed the link between them and the main plane.”

“Now those alien dimensions should be still floating in the cracks of space-time. There are no way to rebuilding links from the inside, so they wander in an endless space-time until the universe comes to an end,” Vivian said. Suddenly, she felt a chill ran down her spine. “I was lucky that I didn’t go and hibernate in any of those dimensions. I would have been trapped inside and drifting endlessly now.”

Hao Ren looked at the Infernal Fleshripper on the table, wondering what kind of environment could give birth to this quirky creature. “What kind of place is Inferno?”

“The craziest among all the dimensions. There are no intelligent life in it, only beasts,” Hessiana said as she compressed her lips and looked up at Vivian. “You should ask Vivian. Everything about the ancient times I heard it from others but Vivian was the one seeing it.”

Vivian sighed, recalling the past memory. “I have not been to Inferno though. Even during Mythological Era, few had been there. The link between Inferno and the main plane was unstable. Unlike other dimensions where there were fixed passages or method of access, the door to Inferno opened randomly on Earth. The first level of Inferno was easier to understand. Some daring wizards would explore the dimension, where there were poisonous air and hot springs of extreme temperature, so hot that the whole world was boiling. The Infernal Fleshripper lived on the first level. Monsters occupied the second level of Inferno. They were beasts in flesh and blood, lacking intelligence. They mauled and killed each other. Killing instinct dictated their actions. They would rip apart all the mortals that intruded into their space. Back then, Hades had tried to form an Undead Legion explore Inferno. But the twisted monsters in Inferno ripped those skeletons and zombies apart. It is an insane place.”

“An awful dimension filled of primitive beasts,” Hao Ren said, scratching his jaw. “Why did the wizards want to study the place?”

“The creatures in Inferno were born with immense strength, and their flesh and blood contained a special primitive energy,” Vivian said. “Although those bloodthirsty monsters are dangerous, the wizards regarded them highly. Some ointments made from Infernal creatures were said to be useful in casting taboo spells, such as elevating human beings into immortal witches, or opening the portal to deeper, distorted dimensions. During the Mythological Era, wizards were minions of the otherworldlings. At that time, they were forced to explore Inferno by their masters, but after the end of Mythological Era, some wizards did that on their own initiative.”

Lily immediately yelled. “Oh, wait a second. Inferno not in exile? I thought the demon hunters had cast it away together with other alien dimensions after the Mythological Era ended?”

“The demon hunters had cast away other natural dimensions, except Inferno.” Vivian shook her head. “Like I said before, Inferno is an unstable dimension. Its connection with the main plane is completely random. There is no native intelligent races, no one could control the connection—even the demon hunter could not get hold of the dimension. So after the end of Mythological Era, Inferno still linked to Earth from time to time when some surviving otherworldlings or wizards were crossing over. But after that, the demon hunters interfered. They used a kind of dimensional disturbance power to push Inferno away. Though it hadn’t destroyed the connection with Earth completely it had greatly reduced the frequency of connection. Since then, Inferno had not appeared for almost two thousand years. The last time it appeared was during Augustus period, a door was opened in the north of Rome where monsters swallowed up a few villages. That was the last time the appearance of the ‘gate’. Unfortunately, the Inferno gate incidents at that time wasn’t big enough to leave any historical clues behind.”

Hao Ren listened to the stories, wide-eyed. What happened after the end of Mythological Period surprised him. His eyes landed on the specimen of the Inferno Fleshripper. “That thing…”

“That thing was made into specimen hundreds of years ago,” Hessiana said as she nodded. “It means that a wizard had opened the Inferno gate hundreds of years ago, and brought something out of it alive.”

“Hundreds of years ago? It was already the time when humans and the demon hunters ruling the earth.” Hao Ren felt it incredible. “Hadn’t the demon hunters discovered the opening?”

“I don’t know, but the wizard obviously had evaded the demon hunters. We found some clues pointing to the activity of the wizard in Europe until American Revolution broke out.”

“So in summary there was a wizard who had opened the gate to Inferno hundreds of years ago, and brought something out from it. Then the wizard had left behind a magic book that could summon the evil-spirit Vivian…” Hao Ren knocked on the table with his knuckles. “What is the connection between the two things?”

“There is evidence shows that the summoning ritual recorded in the book is just one of the wizard’s many taboo spells. We found some random manuscripts left behind by the wizard,” Hessiana said as she slid a glance at Vivian. “His summoning of the ‘King of Blood’ was not the ultimate goal, but he wanted to make use of the power of the King of Blood to bring him deeper into Inferno. He must have left behind many more manuscripts. And, there may be more than one taboo spell associated with Vivian. The secrets should be hidden somewhere where he opened the gate to Inferno.”

“Where?”

“Northern Europe.”

---

Chapter 778: The Worldly Influence of the Hessianite Family

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

After listening to what Hessiana said, Hao Ren thought it would be necessary to make a trip to Northern Europe.

The “Evil-Spirit Vivian” incident two months ago was still fresh in his memory, and since there were no new instructions from Raven 12345 yet, Hao Ren decided to take the matters into his own hands, sort of. He already knew that the author of the magic book had left behind not one but many relics. So he was determined to get to the bottom it.

“The place we are going to is desolate, away from human settlements. We are not going to take the conventional route to avoid drawing unnecessary attention,’ Hessiana said. She seemed to have guessed from the beginning that Hao Ren would make the trip. And, she already had a plan in mind. “I will get everything arranged.”

While saying, Hessiana leered at Hao Ren. Hao Ren felt goosebumps popping up on his skin. He rubbed his nose instinctively and said, “Ahem, I know you don’t particularly like me, but you don’t have to do it so explicitly. I can go on my own if you don’t feel like buying the flight ticket. I have made more business trips than you have.”

Vivian snorted in dissatisfaction, and Hessiana rolled her eyes back at her. “I am not as stingy as you think.”

In fact, Hao Ren did not need her help. He could ask the MDT teleport him; it was easier, faster except that he did not know the place. But since Hessiana offered her help, he decided to take up the offer for this ‘local’ trip.

The magic book still bothered Vivian. She was not only disturbed by the appearance of the red-haired double but also the Inferno dimension. “When are we departing?” she asked impatiently.

There was an instant sweet smile on Hessiana face. “No hurry, Ma’am Vivian. The ruins are not going anywhere. Let us discuss first and rest for a couple of days before we go.”

Vivian stepped back. “I think we’d better set off early; I’d have kittens even just staying with you for one more second.”

Hessiana pointed at Turcan and Kassandra. “All right. The two of them can dangle on the old poplar tree outside; I’ll stay with you…”

Vivian glared at Hessiana again. Hessiana threw her hands in the air as if she was surrendering. “Okay, okay, we will depart soon when everything is arranged, probably within a week. We need preparations; the place we are going to is rather desolate. Also, it used to be the door to Inferno; we have to prepare for the unexpected.”

Lily blinked. “What preparations do we need? It’s my first time going to hell.”

“It’s not hell. It’s Inferno.” Hessiana slid a sideways glance at Lily. “And we are going to the old site of the Inferno gate. The gate has been closed for hundreds of years, we’re not going to enter. And, we couldn’t. You’d better prepare some things that could dispel curse and magic. The wizard liked to lay traps in his lair, mostly to trap the otherworldlings.”

Hao Ren glanced at his teammates. None of them looked like a magic expert. Vivian might be knowledgeable, but she was scatterbrained; the other otherworldlings might fit the bill, but they were only half-baked. He seemed to have little choice. He clapped and said, “Dress warmly. The Nordic weather is rather unforgiving.”

Hessiana thought the ‘shelter leader’ was going to make a speech or something, so she waited expectantly. But Hao Ren had nothing more to say. She looked at him, bewildered. “That’s it?”

Hao Ren nodded seriously. “That’s it.”

“How did you all survive until this day?” Hessiana buried her face in her hand. “The demon hunters in this town must be all sleeping.”

But Hao Ren did not tell her that the demon hunters in town had already surrendered themselves to him.

Two days later, other than Hessiana and her two sidekicks, Hao Ren and his team—Vivian, Lily and the Nangong siblings arrived at the airport.

Y’zaks and daughter stayed back because the duo had zero clue about wizardry and Inferno. When something went wrong, they could turn out to be a burden. Meanwhile, the Nangong couple had their restaurant to take care of. Anyway, as far as Hao Ren was concerned, exploring the ruins on Earth was just a walk in the park.

The Nangong siblings’ combat strength was average, but they had their talent in their own rights. Nangong Sanba knew a thing or two about witchcraft and Nangong Wuyue was the only professional nanny in the team.

Earthbound operations had lower combat strength requirement, so the Nangong siblings seemed to be a sensible choice.

They departed the international airport. The destination: Finland. There was nothing much to say about the journey as Hessiana had arranged everything, from passports to flight tickets, all done in two days mobilizing her vast resources of her vampire family. It reminded Hao Ren about what Hessiana once said; every surviving otherworldling family had some kind of shadow of influence in the human world. So he did not ask further.

After arriving in Finland, they did not stop in Helsinki. Instead, Hessiana had arranged transport heading straight to a small airport in the north of the city, where a private plane was already waiting on the tarmac.

The plane was a twin-engine, small propeller aircraft marked with the name of a Russian company. Hao Ren saw the same mark on the facilities at the small airport. Judging from the size of the airport and the models of the parked aircrafts, this was obviously not a commercial airliner but a private airport of a large company. Lily stared curiously as if she recognized the Russian named company. “Solanke… now I remember. It is a Russian import-export company… I saw the name while I was surfing the web.”

“Hessiana’s family built the company. Everything here belongs to me,” Hessiana said as she did a little stretch in the cold wind, looking happy. “Like I said, most surviving families of the otherworldling have established their influence in the human world. It is one of them. I sourced most of my weaponry through the human connections. They are weak, no doubt. But they could get things done rather efficiently.”

Hao Ren blinked as he looked around with interest. In the hanger in the distance, two tractors were slowly pulling out as several ground crew in uniform were busy outside. They were humans. All personnel at the airport were humans.

But did the workers know that their behind-the-scenes boss was a vampire family?

He asked casually but Hessiana laughed. “It’s true that workers often call Boris a vampire. Boris is my human servant; he is not a vampire. Human employees don’t care who their real boss is, what they want is salary. Less than ten people at the top know for who they are working. You know what; they all are under a blood spell. This is necessary. Desperate time calls for desperate measure; I can’t afford to let them go around telling people about my secrets.”

Lily let out with a long “Oh—” in awe as she felt that Hessiana was very capable. Everyone turned and stared at Vivian in unison.

Feeling awkward, Vivian asked, “Why are you lot staring at me like that?”

“… In a sense, you are rich,” Lily said to her but pointing at Hessiana. “Aren’t you ashamed of yourself compared to your mini double?”

“Didn’t you already know how wealthy Hessiana was in Athens’ sanctuary? What is so surprising about it now?” Vivian asked. “I don’t interfere with what she is doing. If I do, her company won’t survive very long.”

Vivian might be pessimistic, and a little idealistic. But for the things that had happened for the past ten thousand years in her life, Hao Ren had run out of words to comfort her. “Maybe you shouldn’t buy stocks for the sake of the world’s economy.”

It was once again proven that comfort talk was not his forte. Vivian’s face had turned dark red.

---

Chapter 779: The Problem of a Jinx

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

There was a place that did not exist on maps; it was hidden from all civilizations, like a hermit sitting between the border of Finland and Russia near the Arctic Circle. Humans had been expanding their territory, but there were just some places on the planet that humans could not reach, like the city of the sirens in the deep sea, or the cursed land, which connected to Inferno.

The supernatural forces in these places were keeping the prying eyes away; there was no way humans could get in through the usual mean. But compared to the heavily guarded city of siren, Nasaton, the entrance to Inferno was less challenging. Hessiana had found the secret location of the crack between Finland and Russia. She was now arriving with the group to the location.

The team boarded the private plane of Hessiana family, and flew from Helsinki to a secret airport at the upstream of the Kemi River. They disguised as Solanke senior officers conducting an internal visit to evade the eyes of the demon-hunters. Then they drove north along Kemi River until they reached the entrance to the mysterious realm. This entrance was located not very far from the secret airport of Hessiana family; it was half a day away by car. When they landed, it was only noon. Vivian decided not to stop but continued their journey.

The Arctic wind were unforgiving. They dressed themselves in long, thick windbreaker to protect themselves from the wind and to look less conspicuous. Standing on the tarmac, they all looked like spies that were planning to blow up the airport. Hessiana talked to one of her human servants; she needed to sort things out with her stuff as she rare came here.

The human who talked with Hessiana was a fat, old, bald man with a strikingly red nose and a neck that seemed too short for the collar. Wearing a fine designer suit with a matching pair of shiny shoes, the old man looked as if he had just come back from a high-end ballroom function. This man was Boris, chairperson of Solanke. Legally, he was the nominal owner of Solanke but few people knew that the man was working on the behest of the vampires for as long as a century and a half. He was merely looking after the backyard of a vampire family from the Athens sanctuary.

Boris reverently reported to Hessiana. He had been waiting for three days in this cold, remote airport when he learned his master was coming. The power of the blood spell had created an irresistible sense of loyalty in him. Lily looked on. She then asked Vivian, exhaling cloud out of her mouth and nose, “Do you really not want to live with Hessiana? Even if you don’t, you can just spend her money. It’s hard to imagine how rich this little Battie is now.”

Hearing the conversation, Boris turned to look at the strangers. He did not know who these people were, but he knew that whoever was close to his master must be somebody. So he imprinted the faces of the strangers in his mind, thinking that perhaps someday he might need this personal connection.

Vivian looked away awkwardly. “I just couldn’t stand the atmosphere in the sanctuary. And, I don’t like the lifestyle of Hessiana. She is a grown-up now; I’m not going to interfere in her life. What’s more, we don’t click.”

“Of course, the main reason is that you don’t want to jinx her, right?” Nangong Sanba pulled his clothes closer to his body and slid a suspicious glance at Hessiana. “To tell the truth, you really think you could jinx her? She has a solid background.”

“Solid background? Wasn’t Troy solid enough? Wasn’t Cleopatra powerful enough? Wasn’t the Roman Empire mighty enough?” Vivian sneered at his optimism. “They all couldn’t last ten years after I joined them…”

On one ear, Hessiana was listening to her subordinate while on the other ear, she was tuning in to the conversation between Vivian and the others. At this time, she could not stand it anymore. She interrupted Boris and pointed to Vivian. “Boris, please take care of this madam, she is the ancestor of Hessiana family. Everything in the Hessiana family belongs to her.”

She shot Vivian a provocative look, as if she was proud of her decisiveness. But Vivian ignored her. Boris appeared stunned. He quickly came up, bowed, and greeted the master of his master. Vivian was startled. “Get up! What are you doing? Hessiana, stop it. I said I don’t need for your—”

Before she could finish, Boris’ cell suddenly rang. He quickly excused himself, went to aside, and answered the phone in Russian. Seconds later, he hung up and came back up to Hessiana, his face tense. “Master! We have a problem. Something happened to the two factories in North America…”

Hao Ren’s jaw dropped to the ground. He jumped at Hessiana, “Take back your words immediately!” he demanded.

Hessiana: “…..”

Ten minutes later, they left the small airport in two SUVs. SUV was most appropriate for the road condition in the cold zone. Hao Ren, Vivian and Hessiana were in the same car. Hessiana had still not recovered from the shock of the bad news. Mostly, she gazed blankly at the car roof during the entire journey and mumbled to herself occasionally, “…how could this be possible, it couldn’t be real…”

Hao Ren squinted at her. “You have known Vivian for so long and yet you don’t know her hoodoo power?” Hao Ren said.

“It must be a coincidence!” Hessiana seemed to not hear Hao Ren. She looked up; her eyes sparkling. “Even if Vivian is a real jinx, how could it happen so quick and so accurately? It must be a coincidence! Ma’am Vivian, do you want to challenge the fate with me?”

Vivian curled herself up in the back seat and was still at a loss. “You’re kidding me. The Americans still lived on trees when I first challenged fate. Don’t even mention that.”

Hessiana pouted and glared at Hao Ren, who was still trying to make of what happened. “What? Have I offended you again?”

“Why are you not bankrupt yet?” Hessiana was gnashing her teeth. “You seem unaffected despite staying with Ma’am Vivian. I thought Ma’am Vivian had finally shaken off the jinx curse. Why are you not bankrupt yet?”

Hao Ren rubbed his nose and said, “Maybe the one behind me is tougher. And now think about it, Vivian, when you first rented my room, weren’t you afraid of jinxing me?”

Vivian looked at Hao Ren. “That was why I tried to raise money to pay for my rent from the start. And, I even offered to do the house chores in lieu of the rent I owed you. I didn’t want to take advantage of you and at the same time drag your down with my jinx. But then, I found that you didn’t go bankrupt even I ate and slept in your house without paying a single cent. At that time, I knew that you’re immune.”

Hao Ren thought for a moment, suddenly he came to a realisation; he was magic-immune. Though he felt the Goddess was the reason he could resist Vivian’s hoodoo, he still could not help associating it with his special ability. “Looks like I was born to be your caretaker. Am I the only person on Earth who could feed you?”

Hessiana was breathing fire as she glared at Hao Ren. “Shut up! When I picked wild fruits for Ma’am Vivian hundreds of years ago, your ancestors were still in fluid form!”

Hao Ren snorted and buried his face in his hand. “Have I smelled jealousy?”

At this time, Turcan who was driving in the front cut in. “People, it’s metaphysics, it’s not scientific.”

Hessiana was in a bad mood. She hit Turcan on the head with her elbow. “Get lost! You freaking fantasy creature lectures science to us?”

But she forgot that she had been arming her crazy strike team with technology.

The SUV they rode in suddenly jolted as if the tyres had slipped. Hao Ren quickly stopped Hessiana. “Stop it! Let him drive.”

“It’s not about the driver,” Hessiana said, pointing out the window. “We’ve reached.”

---

Chapter 780: Town by the River

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

 

Hao Ren peeked out from the window and found that the SUV was driving across a wasteland. The road was rugged. Even with the SUV’s superb suspension, the ride was still quite bumpy. Except for more desolation, the surroundings did not change much.

Hessiana asked Turcan drove the vehicle up to a higher ground and let everyone get off. She said this was the destination.

“Nothing unusual here,” Hao Ren said as he looked around the barren terrain, broken stones and patches of snow remaining in the cracks in the rock. The Arctic wind blew all day long. There were no signs of life here except a handful of low-lying, tenacious plants persevered in the cracks on the leeward sides of the boulders.

Hessiana looked up at the sky. “Wait,” she said.

The sun was slowly setting. As it set closer to the horizon, two huge shadows gradually extended from behind them. Hao Ren turned his head and found that two huge boulders sitting close together on a small mound not far away were casting the shadows that looked like a tuning fork. Looks like the gap between the two shadows was pointing towards the direction of the river.

“We found the way of accessing the ‘mysterious realm’ in another manuscript,” Kassandra explained. “Every month, there are seven-day window when you can enter the mysterious realm. During this period, the sun will shine on the two boulders on the riverbank and cast a shadow that acts as a pointer. The position of the ‘gate’ is always changing relative to the position of the sun. When the path appears, you still need a bell made by the wizard to disturb the water surface in order to open the ‘gate’. Of course, Master has already got the bell.”

“Wizards like to do these weird and incomprehensible things. Back then, they were competing with each other to hide their own hermitage in the most complicated way. Their method became weirder by the day. Sometimes, even the wizards found themselves having to spend hours figuring their way back,” said Vivian. “They did this to evade the pursuit of the demon hunters, but soon they turned it into a sport in disguise, where wizards secretly competing with each other to create the best and most creative secret realm. I knew a guy got himself killed by the demon hunters on the way home because he couldn’t find the door back home.”

Nangong Wuyue looked at Vivian sideways. “How did you get to know so many people?”

Lily rolled her eyes. “You might as well ask her why the people she knew all ended up dying…”

At this time, the sun has set to the position where the shadow of the boulders had reached the river. Hessiana took the lead. “Let’s go, the path has appeared.”

They follow path to the riverbank, but Hessiana kept going. The strange thing happened, she stepped her foot on the water and walked on the surface right to the middle of the river.

The weather was cold but not cold enough to freeze the river surface. There was thin layer of ice formed on the river edge but it was not known whether this was because of the weather or the influence of supernatural forces.

Turcan and Kassandra followed from behind Hessiana. By now, Lily figured that it might be magical environment of the mysterious realm, so she took up her courage and ran to keep up with them.

But she ran into the water.

Lily got the shock of her life and jumped out of the water frantically. She was soaked from the knee down. Hessiana glanced over her shoulder, asking curiously, “What are you doing?”

Lily staggered up the riverbank, embarrassed. “Isn’t the river surface walkable? Why I couldn’t do that?”

“Who told you that you?” Hessiana threw an inexplicable look. “We have magic helping us to walk on the water.”

Everyone: “…..”

Feeling embarrassed, Lily banged her head against Hao Ren’s arm. “It’s my fault, I was over imaginative. It’s my fault, I was over imaginative…”

“Guys, please wait on the riverbank.” Hessiana motioned with her hand and yanked out a quaint copper bell. When she had found the exact position, she gently rang the brass bell.

A thunderous sound came out of the bell!

That caught everyone by surprise. As the bell rang, a shockwave burst under Hessiana’s feet and ripples on the river spread. The ripples reached the water edge, onto the mud and then up the rocks on the riverbanks. The surroundings was rippling like water, pulsating in tandem with the rings of the bell!

Then the weird thing happened. Buildings and trees that did not exist before began to emerge on the wasteland. Swaying shadows that looked like houses rose up on the riverbanks while ghost-like figures emerged between these wavy shadows. Hao Ren began to hear voices engaging in trivial conversations in some ancient European language. Hao Ren instinctively switched on his translation plug-in. A few fragmented conversation drifted into his ears, it was about some seigneur.

Suddenly, the illusions disappeared, and the vision before Hao Ren’s eyes normalised.

Everyone looked around and found himself still standing by the river, at the same spot before the vision. Something not there before had now existed. Houses, streets, wooden towers; it was a small town built on the riverbank.

Hao Ren looked at the houses, they were very ancient, most of them were constructed of wood and stone, and wooden trestles that seemed like docks of fish boats extending out from the houses into the river. Most of the roads between houses were dirt roads, but there were some slated or pebbled roads. Black oil lamps were hanging from the lampposts on both sides of the roads.

The town seemed as old as hundreds of years—or even longer. It was as if a medieval town that came straight out of a movie.

Lily looked up at the sky and found the sky had changed. A thick layer of smoke of unknown thickness was now shrouding the town. The smoke seemed to have come from a fire that had been burning for days. The dim surroundings made the quiet structure look even spookier.

“Is this the mysterious realm?” Hao Ren appeared a little surprised. “I thought… I thought it was only a castle or something.”

Hessiana and her team returned to the shore. They laughed at Hao Ren’s naivety. “A witch’s lair doesn’t mean it has got to be small.”

“But this is just too big,” Hao Ren said, pouting his mouth at the surroundings. “This is simply out of scale with a hermit’s home.”

“I don’t know what happened back then. But it seems that the wizard had dragged the whole town into his enchantment,” Hessiana said, nodding. “We hadn’t had time to explore the town in the past. This is only my second time here. As Kassandra said, there is only a seven-day window. The last time I came, the window was closing; I managed to linger for a half an hour before it kicked me out. So be careful, my experience may not be of help.”

Nangong Sanba quietly took out his magic props from his toolbox. He placed Letta rune cards on the houses, poured some pungent-smelled magic oil on the ground and ignited them. Immediately, the magic oil burned. Despite the wind, the flame was steady. Under the illumination of the flame, some small shadows began to retreat.

Hessiana’s brows knit together and coughed when she smelled the burning magic oil. “What’s that?”

“It stabilises the spiritual dimension.” Nangong Sanba looked serious; his eyes glowed in white in the dark, as if his pupils had disappeared had disappeared from his eyes. “I see many spirits. I am afraid our presence has disturbed them.”

Lily immediately drew out her Frostfire Claws. “I’m not afraid of ghosts.”

Nangong Wuyue also raised her hand. “Me too. Elemental creature has no feeling towards the spirit.”

Hao Ren looked at the two in surprise, wondering when chicken duo had suddenly become so darling.

Nangong Sanba shook his head and said, “The spirits may not be a threat in themselves, and they keep the place stable. If they get out of control, the dimension might crumble. So I need to stabilise it.”

“It’s your call.” Hao Ren nodded and rubbed his arms instinctively. “After hearing what you said, I start to get goose bumps.”

Hessiana gave him a sideways glance. “People like you are still afraid of ghost?”

“Not that I’m scared. But imagine that there are hundreds of pairs of invisible eyes staring at you in the dark…”

“Stop it, Hao Ren!” Hessiana snapped. She started to rub her arms too. “I’ve got goose bumps.”