Chapter 681: Extraordinary Reliance
In the darkness of night, there lay a deserted fortress ruin in Faraluo. This ruin had long been uninhabited and deserted for many years. However, at this moment, some unusual movements began to manifest here.
Under the moonlight, there was a sudden rumble from underground within the abandoned fortress. As this sound echoed, the previously flat ground of the fortress began to swell unnaturally, then quickly sank again, collapsing a portion of it. The already unstable abandoned fortress experienced further collapse due to this tremor.
Clearly, a violent explosion had occurred beneath the abandoned fortress moments ago, directly destroying the vast underground space, leading to the sinking and collapse of the ground above.
Shortly after this tremor, the ground of the abandoned fortress fell silent once more. This silence lasted for nearly half a minute before movement reappeared, and three figures slowly rose from the ground.
The three figures were the stone demons from the Dark Gold Society: Henri, Rock, and Craven. At this moment, they were using their abilities to traverse through the soil and rocks, returning to the surface. Their bodies were still covered in dark gray, tough skin, but there were more subtle cracks than in their initial state.
Once back above ground, they first surveyed the depressed area of the ground. Rock and Craven then turned their attention to Henri, with Rock directly asking, “It seems everything below has completely collapsed… So, did you find the item?”
“Of course I found it. Don’t doubt my abilities,” Henri replied, reaching into his clothing and pulling out an item, placing it in his hand. Upon closer inspection, it was an irregular block of gold, the very golden base they had been seeking.
“You found it… look, it’s completely unharmed. Even such a powerful explosion didn’t damage it,” Craven murmured, gazing at the golden base in Henri’s hand, while Rock nodded in agreement.
“Yeah, this aligns with the previous findings regarding the crystal. Although this series of items doesn’t show extraordinary reactions, their durability is exceptionally high, surpassing that of many extraordinary items. The kind of explosion we created couldn’t damage it,” Rock said, then turned to examine the extensive pit in the fortress ground and continued, “This item is fine, but the thief is likely not… As a non-‘stone’ extraordinary being, no one could survive such an explosion. Even if they managed to escape, they would be buried by the subsequent collapse. Fighting in that underground environment just means he had bad luck.”
As Rock spoke, during the brief skirmish in the underground space, the three realized they could not quickly subdue Thief K. They resorted to an extreme tactic by scattering explosive sigils and then using the elemental fire power stored in their bodies to create fireballs for detonation. Three fireballs combined with a multitude of explosive sigils were sufficient to obliterate the entire underground space.
In that process, the intense heat and shockwaves from the explosion would encompass the entire underground area without blind spots, allowing the stone demon trio to withstand the impact with their powerful third-tier “stone” skin. Once the supporting structures of the underground space were compromised, a collapse would ensue, burying everything within. Only the stone demons could phase through walls, while other extraordinary beings and humans would be buried alive – a tactic that only stone demons could employ.
“I spent quite a while down there to find this thing. Besides this, that thief found only some scraps of clothing. The explosion we created was enough to turn a non-‘cup’ and non-‘stone’ extraordinary being to dust. Mr. Federico initially intended to capture him alive, but unfortunately…”
Henri continued, glancing at the collapsed pit before him, indicating that their plan to capture Thief K for important intel had gone awry.
“That thief’s ability is rather strange, almost unheard of. It’s too difficult to catch him. Now that he’s gone, at least we’ve achieved our main goal. It’s time to report back.”
As Rock spoke, both Henri and Craven nodded in agreement. The three then extended their sturdy stone wings, channeling their stored elemental energy, and flew into the sky, high above, with the acquired golden base, speeding towards the distance.
After the three stone demons left, the site of the ruined fortress fell into silence again. However, from the shadow beneath a tree at the edge of the ruins, another figure stepped into the moonlight.
Dressed in a wide, flowing cloak with a black base and red accents, a tall black hat, a gentlemen’s evening attire reminiscent of a masquerade ball, white gloves, and a sculpted half-mask, the figure revealed was none other than Thief K – the same rogue who had stolen the “Light of Maria” right under the eyes of everyone and had battled the stone demons, ultimately buried in an explosion. However, he had not been obliterated or buried, instead standing perfectly intact at the spot where the stone demons had just stood, gazing towards the night sky in the direction the trio had vanished.
“Finally gone, huh…” murmured the rogue, looking into the distance under the moonlight. He then reached up and removed his half-mask, revealing a beautifully crafted face, difficult to determine as male or female.
Afterward, the rogue’s body began to undergo a transformation. Under some mysterious power, their chest gradually swelled, their waist slimmed slightly, their features softened, becoming more feminine. Their originally fair skin began to darken. Before long, the rogue transformed into a voluptuous beauty with deep skin, who was none other than Nephnis.
“Wow… this is incredible! I never expected… to have such a soul to rely on. It feels completely different from before…” As Neph examined her body, she spoke with a tone of wonderment. At that moment, the voice of Doro echoed in her mind.
“Because what you’re relying on is not an ordinary soul, but a legendary form I created. Though I’ve infused it with soul attributes, it still differs greatly from ordinary spirit bodies.”
“Is that so… This legendary form, Doro, your new ability after achieving Red Tier, I didn’t expect it would have such an application. It’s amazing,” Neph continued to express her amazement at her previous experience.
“Experiencing it will certainly be incredible, because this is the form that people perceive Thief K to have. How does it feel to become the legend of yourself in a different way?” Doro smiled as she spoke, prompting Neph to scratch her head in response.
“Well, the feeling… um… it feels really strong. If I were to fight against the legendary version of myself, I think I wouldn’t stand a chance…”
“Ha… that can’t be entirely true. Though Thief K’s legendary form is powerful, given the current situation, it wouldn’t reach the level of playing with the three stone demons. It’s largely thanks to you being the vessel that such an effect can occur.
“After all, this is not a simple legendary form, but a legendary soul reliance,” Doro responded. The figure that had just appeared was not an ordinary legendary form created by Doro, but rather a result of her recent development of the extraordinary abilities of the enigmatic writer. Doro referred to it as a legendary spirit reliance.
To create her legendary form, Doro would need to expend not only the basic “Enlightenment” and “Shadow” spiritualities but also additional various spiritualities based on the abilities the legendary form would possess. In addition to the basic and ability-related spiritualities, she would also have to pay a small amount of “Cup” and almost negligible “Stone” to create a physical body and skeleton for the legendary form.
Regardless of the strength or the unrelated nature to “Cup,” Doro required a small amount of “Cup” and a trace of “Stone” because the extraordinary abilities created from legends cannot exist in a vacuum; they must have a physical vessel. Thus, the two spiritualities, which are most closely related to physicality, are needed.
However, Doro had pondered whether it was possible for her legendary forms to exist without relying on physical substances. She conducted experiments wherein she replaced the “Cup” and “Stone” of the vessel for the legendary form with other spiritualities, or adjusted their ratios, to observe the resulting effects.
Most experimental results led to the immediate collapse of the legendary form. For instance, using “Lamp” would create a strong flash before the legendary form collapses, while “Shadow” would merely display the legendary form’s shadow before twisting away into nothing. “Enlightenment” yielded no effect at all, producing nothing at all; using only “Stone” would result in a statue of the legendary form that would then shatter, while using just “Cup” would yield a pile of rotting flesh, achieving d*ath.
The only stable result came from using “Silence.” In Doro’s experiments, using “Silence” while creating the vessel for the legendary form created a legendary spirit… or more accurately, a legendary form in the guise of a spirit body. Compared to other spiritual experiments, this spirit body could maintain stability like regular “Cup” and “Stone” legendary forms, exhibiting a semi-transparent state. It could traverse physical matter like other ordinary spirit bodies and cling to living beings.
Nonetheless, while Doro could create legendary forms in the guise of spirit bodies, these forms could not utilize their innate abilities unless the legends themselves concerned spirits, in which case the legendary form should inherently present itself as a ghost.
In the spirit form, the legendary body could not use abilities; it was merely a created soul. Its own powers could not be guided without physical reliance. Yet this did not stump Doro, as she promptly thought of another type of extraordinary being with the ability to guide the power of souls into reality, which was the Path of Body Reliance, and Neph was precisely such an extraordinary being.
Thus, Doro invited Neph to participate in the experiment, allowing her to attempt relying on the legendary spirit body. The result was that Neph, relying on the legendary spirit form, could indeed guide the powers of the legendary body, releasing its powers through her own body.
However, the intensity of the abilities exhibited by Neph after relying on Thief K’s legendary form did not show a significant difference from typical legendary forms. The power of a legendary form primarily stemmed from the depth, breadth, and the invested spiritual and native qualities of the legend. While the soul contract holder’s reliance could grant a slight enhancement to lower-promulgated legendary powers, the increase in strength for already robust legends was not significant. From a practical standpoint, Neph, relying on the legendary spirit form, was not much stronger than a legendary form created directly by Doro.
Yet there was one exception: Thief K’s legendary spirit form.
Perhaps because she was the very prototype and source of Thief K, upon relying on Thief K’s legendary spirit form, a wondrous reaction occurred between the two, causing the intensity of Thief K’s legendary form to surge remarkably in Neph, reaching an exceptionally high level.
For instance, the legendary form created by Doro based on the Night Demon, spawned within the widely perceived legend of the Night Demon in Tivyán combined with the psychological enhancement of fear, barely matched the strength of a Red Tier on its own. Although Thief K’s legendary form had some degree of dissemination, none could achieve the level of local recognition that Tivyán’s Night Demon held. Additionally, lacking the fear enhancement, the intensity of the legendary form based on Thief K created by Doro was significantly lower than that of the Night Demon in Tivyán, at most approaching the capacity of the White Tier in absence of additional spiritualities.
However, after Neph relied on it, the situation changed entirely. Following her reliance on Thief K’s spirit form, the fusion of legend and prototype allowed the embodiment of Thief K to possess an intensity that transcended the Night Demon in Tivyán to some extent, far exceeding the usual White Tier. If she were to provide additional spiritual expenditure, she could very well approach the standard Red Tier!
Relying on Thief K granted her an incredible degree of speed and agility, just slightly inferior to the Night Demon of Tivyán. Besides nearness to fourth-tier “Shadow” speed, she also possessed many strange abilities borrowed from Doro’s depictions of Thief K’s legend.
In the past few months, Doro primarily acted as a writer spreading the legend, participating in various literary circles to create fan works concerning Thief K and deliberately guiding the image of Thief K towards that of a certain thief in a detective manga she used to read. Subsequently, in Thief K’s few prior thefts in Faraluo, she encouraged Neph to embody this persona, since that thief persona was already highly popular. After this operation, the acceptance of the character increased rapidly, which in turn enriched the legend of Thief K’s spirit form with diverse abilities.
One such ability was “Thousand Faces.” Thief K possessed a shapeshifting ability akin to the Shadow Faced Man, allowing for instantaneous transformation into individuals of different ages and genders. So advanced was this ability that not only could it alter form, voice, and face, but clothing could also change instantaneously, allowing one to shift from the likeness of one person to another.
Additionally, Thief K exhibited many abilities akin to stage magicians. Given the rogue illusionist persona, Thief K could employ skills akin to magical tricks, recreating the spectacular performances of a magician on stage.
One such ability was transformation, where Thief K could, like a magician, change dangerous items, such as flames and blades, into flowers and doves, effectively countering attacks.
Another was escape, derived from classic escape tricks associated with magicians, coupled with the impression that Thief K could always evade police capture. This ability manifests when Thief K is trapped or faced with deadly danger, instantly enabling a getaway and reappearing somewhere completely out of sight of all observers. Essentially, it is a slightly passive teleportation ability, usable three times within an hour, with a maximum range of fifty meters. Just earlier, Neph relied on this ability to escape the explosion in the basement, teleporting back to the surface.
The abilities thus far mentioned are merely a portion of Thief K’s capabilities. The combination of prototype and legend grants Neph, through reliance on Thief K, numerous extraordinary abilities that surpass many typical legendary forms.
However, during her engagement with the Dark Gold Society trio, Neph did not unleash her full range of abilities, as her aim was not to defeat them but rather to resist just enough for them to infer her defeat, leading them to return with what they believed to be their “spoil of war.”
To safely draw the snake out of its hole, the Dark Gold Society devised a fake “Light of Maria” for Thief K to steal, thus pinpointing Thief K’s lair. Following their raid, they aimed to retrieve the golden base. This was the plan of the Dark Gold Society, and Doro’s plan was, in essence, quite similar.
Both the Dark Gold Society and Doro sought to draw Thief K out. They knew that Thief K would not carry the golden base with him during thefts. Doro recognized that if the Dark Gold Society intended to set a trap for Thief K, it was improbable they would showcase the genuine “Light of Maria.” Most likely, they would create a high-quality fake while crafting a marker.
Just as the Dark Gold Society could fabricate a high-quality “Light of Maria,” so too could Doro craft a replica of the golden base. Doro could directly consult the Artisan Guild, and the high-quality replica crafted by Beverly was indistinguishable from the one produced by the Dark Gold Society, and in fact, even slightly superior, given Beverly’s expertise in creating goods.
Thus, what the Dark Gold Society trio brought back was a superb replica of the golden base produced by Beverly, akin to the counterfeit “Light of Maria” prepared for Thief K, with a carefully concealed marker embedded therein. This would guide Doro to the Dark Gold Society’s stronghold, leading her to the true location of the “Light of Maria.”
