Chapter 354: Act 117 – From the Lair (Part 1)
The blood of the five-headed lizard filled several containers, and at this time, the team sent to search for the monster’s lair had received news.
The young men split into six small groups to search through the forest, and the group led by Carglis found the five-headed lizard’s lair in a valley about two miles away, behind a cliff covered in moss.
It was in a crevice beneath a slanted rock measuring over a hundred meters long; the expedition team climbed down through the valley until they reached the bottom, parting the dense, arm-thick vines hanging from the top of the rock to discover the foul-smelling lair.
Following Brendel’s orders, the young men did not enter to explore directly but instead sent someone back to report. Upon hearing this news, Brendel immediately set aside his alchemical tools and rushed over with the others.
As the team passed through the dense forest, Brendel first observed the terrain when they arrived above the valley. Just as the messenger’s information had mentioned, the massive boulder spanning the valley appeared to have fallen from the towering cliff on one side, although it had been some years since. The rock, except for the exposed white areas, was covered in green vegetation.
The deeper they ventured into the Black Forest, the less obvious the influence of the seasons became. While it was currently the bleak winter season for Duke Toniger, marked by the dying of all things, the temperature gradually rose as they headed south into the forest.
The forest in the valley was as dense as midsummer, and in the distance, a mountain stream cascaded down the cliff, splashing like a white curtain.
Reaching the pool at the bottom of the valley, Brendel saw Carglis and his team resting there; Meria had sprained her ankle upon entering the valley and was sitting on a rock by the pool, cared for by a few people.
Brendel glanced at Meria—he was already aware of this apprentice priestess—but he inadvertently caught sight of her bare calf—proportionate, dazzlingly white, with just a slight swelling around her ankle—the young man couldn’t help but freeze for a moment.
He quietly approached and tapped Carglis’s shoulder, asking in a low voice, “Are you sure she’s a man?”
Carglis shook his head. “My lord, you know that in the scriptures of fire, a divine child has no gender. As long as they wear the divine robe, it doesn’t matter whether they have one more part or one less.”
The young man chuckled lewdly, gesturing at his own body before responding bluntly with what he had learned in the barracks.
Brendel cleared his throat and asked, “So you’re saying she’s a woman?”
Carglis shrugged. “I never said that. Ever since I met Meria, she has been in a divine robe, or disguised in boy’s clothing. I doubt anyone knows this secret other than her father or her nurse.”
“Meria’s father has wanted her to become a priestess since she was very young.”
“Isn’t that a good thing?”
Carglis smiled mysteriously and replied, “My lord, let’s go down and take a look.”
Brendel nodded, glanced at Meria again, and then walked into the valley with the others, heading to the deepest part of the crevice beneath the rock where the five-headed lizard’s lair was located.
Although it was called a crevice, it was relative to the height of the rock. As Brendel walked, he parted the lively vines—many nameless little lizards scattered from the green plants. He looked up to see the crevice beneath the rock at least sixteen or seventeen meters high, while the top of the rock was hidden from view. A waterfall cascaded from the edge, forming a curtain of water at the boundary of light and dark.
A faint rainbow hung in the water curtain.
“Beautiful,” the noble lady, holding Brendel’s hand, felt a sense of security in her heart as she gazed at the rainbow, unable to help but exclaim.
“Beautiful as it is,” Carglis fanned his nose with his metal gauntlet, “it stinks a bit.”
A nauseating stench seeped out from deep within the crevice, and everyone turned to look, only to see that the dozens of meters wide crevice extended inward into darkness.
Brendel drew the Amber Sword and held it in hand, and the others did the same, a chorus of metallic sounds ringing out behind him.
Only Kuran lit a torch, illuminating the uneven ground, with shadows of some rubble stretching out like long black lines pointing towards the depths of the crevice.
“There’s a cave inside!” Kuran pointed in that direction, saying, “Hey, the terrain here is really strange. It’s surprising that the five-headed lizard found this place to nest.”
Brendel also saw that place. It was the deepest part of the crack where the ground began to sink, forming a hole that led to a massive cave entrance.
He could imagine that this split had likely existed even before the boulder fell. The mountain stream on the cliff had eroded the weaker layers of rock here, entering an underground river, and after prolonged erosion, created a vast hollow.
However, after the boulder fell, it had obscured the entrance to the hollow; by coincidence, it did not completely seal it off, leaving a crack that was accessible.
It had to be said that this terrain was indeed peculiar.
Brendel gestured, and everyone immediately headed in that direction—the stench was coming from beneath the cave. The group could see green traces on the rock outside the entrance, which had originally been where the creek flowed into the ground, but now the moss there was long dead.
The cave entrance was not small; it could even accommodate the passage of the five-headed lizard, so it was easy to imagine—
Kuran brought the torch closer to the cave entrance, but even with the torch’s light, the inside was still dark and bottomless. Xi silently picked up a stone from the ground and threw it inside.
‘Bang,’ several seconds later, the sound of the collision echoed from the bottom of the cave.
Everyone exchanged glances, unsure who should go down first.
Only Brendel knocked on the entrance with the Amber Sword Harlangea and said to Antinna, “I’ll go down to take a look. You all wait for me here.”
“My lord,” Carglis stopped him, “let us go first.”
Brendel brushed his hand away with a chuckle, “Hey, I won’t hesitate to send you on errands, but when it comes to familiarizing myself with places like this, your experience is still lacking.”
He then said to Flour, “Flour, come with me.”
The elder sister of the wild elf siblings was taken aback, placing her hand on her chest. “Me?”
She straightened her face and declared, “I’m an elementalist, my lord.”
“That doesn’t matter. Don’t you remember? Cleaning up the battlefield is your job.” Brendel smiled slightly and replied, “Don’t worry; I’ll protect you.”
“……”
……
It had to be said that the luck of the red-handed soft girl seemed to indeed be somewhat magical. The inclined cave was over a hundred meters deep, but as soon as Brendel landed at the bottom, he spotted something good—
The cave’s base was a spacious area, apparently the lair of the five-headed lizard. In the darkness, besides piles of rotten flesh and bones, there were some dry branches spread out in another corner, and Brendel saw a large amount of armor and weapon fragments among the gaps beneath those branches.
However, those mundane iron pieces were not his goal; what truly caught his attention was a metal glove encrusted with fiery red gems.
Brendel’s heart stirred slightly; he wasn’t sure if it was that item.
At that moment, Flour, empowered by the Wings of Wind, floated down gracefully from above, flapping her massive turquoise wings to land, then quickly folding her wings and surveying her surroundings. She immediately noticed the glove emanating a faint glow in the darkness.
However, she didn’t ask; in the logic of this young elf lady, if Brendel wanted to tell her, he would do so naturally.
Brendel walked over and picked up the metal glove. Immediately, patterns of green light began to swirl in his vision, weaving into rows of text:
Crimson Blessing, Grip of Bahamut
【Glove】
Armor: 2 Defense
Fire Shield: 5 Defense
Deals an additional 10% fire damage on attack
【Advanced Alchemical Array】
Upon seeing these attributes, the young man couldn’t help but internally praise Martha; it was indeed the legendary alchemical gloves.
The item’s level was merely a fantasy, but in the Amber Sword, it was referred to as the “artifact of imagination.” This was a pun, meaning that “Crimson Blessing, Grip of Bahamut” was an artifact-like existence among fantasy equipment, and also suggested that it was rarer than actual artifacts—thus dubbed as an artifact existing only in imagination.
Of course, for an RMB warrior, any artifact of imagination was merely a price tag, but there had once been a sky-high price on a gaming trade website reaching thirty thousand RMB, enough to make an ordinary player like him view it as unattainable.
But Brendel never expected that he would obtain these gloves during his first exploration of the Black Forest in this world. Compared to the five-headed lizard he killed, this item felt like a free treasure.
He was eager to put on the gloves, but just then, he suddenly heard Flour whisper, “Look over there, my lord.”
Brendel turned around.
He immediately saw something unbelievable within the circular lair formed by layers of branches.
There were some white, spherical objects about the size of coconuts, appearing somewhat dazzling in the darkness underground; they were quietly stacked in the lair, with twenty to thirty of them in a single layer.
“Damn!” Brendel mentally exclaimed, “This time I’ve struck it rich!”
Those were the eggs of the lizard beast!
At least a hundred of them!
The value of these eggs could buy an entire Duke Toniger.
Brendel’s heart raced; those white eggs seemed to him like a glittering treasure trove. The young man almost froze for a moment, only remembering something afterwards. He immediately waved to Flour:
“Quick, tell the others above to come down.” The young lord took a deep breath, “We need to get these eggs out!”
……(To be continued. For more chapters, please log in, support the author, and support official reading!)
