Steampunk: Sixth Era Epic-Chapter 766 - Ice and Demon

Chapter 766 -766 Ice and Demon

Bursting through the thick fog, a group of people arrived at the Cassandra Auction House at two-thirty in the morning. For safety, the ritual of entering the dream world was conducted in a room in the basement of the auction house, where many hidden rooms camouflaged with Illusion Techniques lay underground, the purposes of which even Granny Cassandra had not disclosed.

The room chosen for the ritual was much smaller than the one where Grace and Helen stayed. A normal-sized four-poster bed was placed in the center of the room, with a burning fireplace providing light—there were no gas lamps, as connecting gas lines would render the room’s concealment pointless.

The Old Witch’s maids were still arranging the setup, and the scent of “Sleep-Death Flowers” in the room almost made Shard sneeze. While waiting, the witches informed Shard of the precautions he needed to take after entering the dream world, and told him that to prevent Joey Barton from using the three passages to enter death and summon back The Deceased, the True God Church had entrusted the Witch Council to guard the seals on the mountainside during the “Holy Tree Scar” sealing ceremony.

Granny Cassandra and Miss Aphrola planned to invite Sister Delphine to re-enter the Interstice with them and wait at the seal on the mountainside, once Shard returned from the dream world, until the church’s ritual was complete.

As for the seals at the mountaintop and the Nature Chapel at the mountain’s foot, they were to be guarded by the church.

Approaching three in the morning, Shard removed his coat and shoes and lay on the bed in his white shirt, with the witches having spread the white “Sleeping Dragon Grass” around the bed.

Under the pillow was half an umbilical cord specimen that had belonged to the Jester, obtained by Granny Cassandra before the True God Church somehow. Besides the “Demon Amulet” given by the doctor, Shard also held three Relic Rings given by the witches.

The rings were placed inside three velvet ring boxes of different colors but identical designs. Two were of Scribe Level, and one was of Keeper of Secrets Level.

“One of the Circle Sorcerer’s basic principles is not to carry too many Relics on one’s person and certainly not to use more than three that affect oneself at the same time.”

Miss Aphrola said, sitting at the edge of the bed, she opened the ring boxes,

“You’re risking entering the Interstice; you shouldn’t be using Relics at all, but to ensure safety, we’re allowing the use of so many rings during the ritual reluctantly. Moreover, Galina had mentioned that your Resistance to the Whisper Element far exceeds that of an ordinary Circle Sorcerer. Otherwise, Granny would have allowed you to wear only one.”

She gestured for Shard to wear all the rings on his left hand:

“This one is ‘Dream Banquet,’ a Scribe Level Relic. Wearing this ring while dreaming allows a Circle Sorcerer to slowly increase the upper limit of their Spirit. As for entering the Interstice through dreams, it means you can slightly resist the negative effect of a drastically reduced Spirit recovery rate in the Interstice. The negative effect of the ring is a slight feeling of hunger in dreams, which grows stronger over time, eventually causing the wearer to become lost within the dream. However, bearers of a Spirit Rune like ‘Gluttony’ have a strong resistance to this negative effect.”

Shard took the ring and found “Dream Banquet” to be a golden ring with a small green gemstone. The outer circle was composed of interconnected spirals, and the inner circle was engraved with ancient Runes—

[After entering the dream, the dream becomes a feast.]

“This one is ‘Soul Ring,’ a Keeper of Secrets Level. When possessed by a Spiritual Body, it adds an unseen layer of energy shield. The negative effect is that the bearer will hear Whispers and is highly likely to turn into an Evil Spirit, but wearing it for a short period should not pose a problem.”

The “Soul Ring” is a rather beautiful silver ring that even looks a bit like a wedding ring at first glance. The exterior bears an inscription in the letters of the Fifth Era—

“I vow to forever be by your side, becoming your sturdiest shield.”

“The last one is the ‘Apprentice’s Ice Ring,’ a Scribe Level Relic. It’s the legacy of an apprentice Transcendent from the Fourth Era, with a rather inconspicuous effect. It allows Circle Sorcerers to remain lucid in dreams, and to manipulate the power of ice within them. However, this power is only usable within dreams, so aside from special circumstances like today, it’s practically useless. The downside is that it can freeze the soul, releasing the apprentice’s resentful lament. There’s no need to worry about that, though, since Granny and I are watching over you.”

The “Apprentice’s Ice Ring” was truly made of ice. Around the outer circle of the ice ring were inlaid numerous tiny purple gemstones. The ring was exceptionally cold to the touch—so much so that when worn on the finger, one could feel the chill crawling up one’s arm towards the heart. There were no letters or engravings on either the inside or outside of the ring, but when aligned with the light, one could see sentences formed by the tiny gemstone particles sealed within the ice—

“May the power of enduring ice bless me, even if only in my dreams.”

All three rings were now worn on Shard’s fingers, and as for the Black Crystal Amulet he was holding, the witches simply asked for its general purpose and then paid it no more mind.

“In any case, be careful in the dream. Don’t worry about Joey Barton seeing your face; the ritual will blur your image.”

After drinking the orange-flavored sleep potion, followed by the milk-added Soul Calming Elixir provided by Grandma Aphrola, Shard lay his head on the pillow under the watchful eyes of the surrounding circle of people. As the maids lowered the black gossamer canopies around them and snuffed out the fireplace’s flames one by one, the view above became blurred.

Outside the canopy, someone was chanting softly, while another sang quietly. Shard heard the sound of a Rattle Bell, the murmurs as if they were coming from dreams.

The bed was so comfortable, threatening to engulf Shard’s body like a quagmire. He felt drowsiness overwhelm him and thus closed his eyes.

His body fell through the darkness as his consciousness was drawn by some strange attraction. With meditation, Shard envisioned the Jester with whom he had battled on a moonlit icy lake. The witches’ secret techniques latched onto this image, twisting it into a strong longing that bridged the interstice between life and death.

“Shard, now is the time,” came Granny Cassandra’s muffled voice. In the deepest recess of his mind, a black door suddenly appeared. There was no door panel, only a swaying black veil within the doorframe.

Shard reached out his hand, parted the black veil, and entered a landscape shrouded in frigid white mist.

The sensation of momentarily being disengaged from his soul gave him the false impression of having broken free from shackles. Once he realized he was surrounded by the decayed scenery of the Interstice, his first question was:

“What do I look like right now?”

“You still look like Shard Hamilton.”

“But…”

“Outlander, this is your dream, not an astral projection. Those basic first-year knowledge points, you still haven’t fully mastered clearly,”

As “her” light laughter rang in his ears, Miss Aphrola’s voice seemed to come from an extremely distant place, passing through several layers of glass:

“Shard, can you hear me?”

“I can hear you, but not very clearly.”

Shard responded in his mind, knowing before entering the dream that there would be contact.

“What’s the situation now?”

Shard surveyed his surroundings and found the scenery in the thick fog very familiar:

“I’m on the streets of Midshire Fort City’s downtown. The Interstice is even more terrifying than last week when we entered. The fog here is thick; I haven’t seen the Jester or Joey Barton and I haven’t been attacked, at least not yet.”

“Grandma’s ritual went without a problem, so the target should be nearby. Be careful and look around, we will…”

The voice abruptly cut off as this kind of connection couldn’t be maintained continuously.

The Red Butterfly that Grace and Helen presented could detect the “nail” at a close range. When confronting the Jester and the Earl, Shard used a butterfly each time. Now that the last nail had been captured by the Church, the last Red Butterfly was again used by Shard to search for the Jester.

He should now be very close to the Jester’s position, the Red Butterfly on his shoulder restlessly wanted to fly out but hadn’t quite reached that point. What was most abundant in the Interstice were the wandering Undead, so Shard did not boldly walk in the streets. After appearing at the corner of Oak Street in the city center, he trod upon the muddy ground, carefully sticking to the edge of the wall in the mist and entered a shop facing the street.

In the real world, this was a tobacco shop, even Priest Augustus had bought tobacco here once, but in the Interstice, it was just an old three-story building that looked like it was about to collapse.

The level of gloom inside was unimaginable, with large patches of dark gray mold on the peeling walls, much like the post-mortem lividity on a corpse. Corpse Grass filled the gaps in the walls, and the swirling white fog made it impossible for Shard to clearly see the position of the interior walls at a glance.

The first floor was safe, but his first opponent on the second floor was an Undead fat woman spirit carrying a heavy axe.

She was about three or four times as wide as Shard, dragging a blood-stained, rusty giant axe back and forth. It was hard to tell if the axe or her footsteps made a louder noise. Of course, the sound is muffled in the Interstice, so it was not until Shard reached the second floor that he heard the noise.

She was pacing in the spacious second-floor living room, where the remains of furniture with terrifying black exteriors and a body that had long since turned to a mummy were scattered along the wall.

Shard had just jumped up from the broken stairs and showed himself when the fat woman stopped her steps. The rotting face of the spirit howled at him, revealing black teeth and a decayed oral cavity, then she charged at him with big strides.

Shard instinctively wanted to slash forward with Moonlight but stopped himself after a thought:

“Ice and demons…”

With a slight step back, he disappeared in front of the staircase. Then the giant axe chopped directly onto the already fragile floor, with a force that seemed like it could shake the entire building.

By then, Shard had reappeared behind the woman and, to his surprise, found a rotten pig’s head embedded completely into the spirit’s back. The pig’s head stared at him with wide eyes, and as if she had eyes on her back, the woman struggled to swing the giant blood axe behind her.

Shard didn’t dodge but instead gripped his right hand tight. In the dream, he didn’t have Doctor Schneider’s Demon Amulet in his hand, but a symbol of the Demon Script was in his palm. At that moment, writhing black pus oozed from the palm spreading up his entire arm, rapidly enveloping Shard’s right hand, as if it had swelled up.

At the same time, the icy power from the Relic Ring also seeped into the enlarged hand, the chill so intense that even Shard, the user, felt terror.

“Hah!”

The enlarged right hand rose high and firmly grasped the giant axe. Feeling a surge of power, Shard yanked hard and managed to pull the axe out of the fat woman’s hands.

The spirit seemed taken aback and then rushed over like a chariot in a piercing shriek. The black pus swelled again, and Shard reached out with his right hand and gripped the fat woman entirely in his palm.

Chill spread all around, and by the time Shard opened his hand, all that remained was a lifelike ice sculpture. His fist smashed into the statue, and both ice and soul shattered together. Since he had used the Arcane Technique “Psychic Shockwave” during the attack, the spirit’s shell peeled away, revealing the dying soul of a middle-aged woman of normal build:

“If I had realized during my life that my appearance was already enough…”

She left her last words and then departed.

“Is it really that strong?”

The black pus gradually receded, the pulled-out strands of dense black mass slowly flowed back into the Demon Script symbol in his palm. Shard’s right hand returned to normal; he looked at his palm and was sincerely thankful for Doctor Schneider’s help.