Chapter Thirty-One: [Soul Furnace]?
2016-01-09
Author: Zhu Sheng Fu Tu
(Hmm. The side story of this book has begun to take shape. Due to certain reasons, the plotline of the Succubus Queen that had to be cut will be updated regularly on the public WeChat account. The side story intertwines with the main plot, and some parts of the future storyline may feel like a significant leap, but the content will all appear in the side story. The first side story will be updated this Wednesday, featuring a separate volume for the Succubus Queen and the Fallen Witch’s storyline. After following the public WeChat account, you will be able to see it.)
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The howling wind.
The closer Soren got to the God of Death’s ruins, the more he felt the chaotic energy shrouding the air.
Casting spells in the Eastern Kingdom requires a high level of concentration; if one lacks the ability to concentrate, spell backlash may occur. Soren’s sight revealed a portion of the exposed surface of the God of Death’s ruins. Even before approaching the entrance of the ruins, he already sensed a surge of chaotic magical energy rising from deep underground. According to the map’s markings, this place had been occupied by an immensely powerful lich that was studying chaotic magic, and a magical energy had always enveloped the interior of the God of Death’s ruins.
Lich.
Such creatures, nearly standing at the peak of undead existence, are exceptionally difficult to deal with!
Under normal circumstances, few adventurers would willingly confront them, because even if one were to kill a lich, if their phylactery is not destroyed, these terrifying undead can resurrect within ten days. Even gods, no matter how powerful, find it challenging to confront liches, and many divination spells fail to locate the phylactery. Unless one possesses a deity with special powers, few can easily kill a lich directly.
Soren was indeed one of those deities with special powers.
Because he had a very powerful domain—[Killing Domain]—any deity mastering death-related domains can annihilate a lich’s soul upon killing it. Thus rendering the phylactery that ensures their survival useless. This is also why some liches serve deities possessing death-related domains, and very few liches would dare to provoke deities of that domain voluntarily.
Liches seek the secrets of death.
Although they possess immense powers beyond human imagination, liches are still quite distant from deities. Historically, many demigod liches have appeared, yet only one has ever successfully ascended to godhood.
That is the Lich God—Vishalon (Weak Divine Power)!
This fortunate lich god was originally a member of the ancient Red Robe Wizards. Later, he received guidance from [Lord of Storms] in his research and was promoted to divinity through Her powerful divine power.
However.
At that time, the Lord of Storms only intended to establish a pantheon, requiring a godservant to service and exploit. As a result, the Lich God was forced to seek cooperation and form an alliance with the [God of Mages]. Thus, the [Lich God] successfully established relations with the Goddess of Magic, allowing him to avoid the Lord of Storms’ retaliation. This fellow is the kind of god who plays both sides; while associating with the [God of Mages] to cozy up to the Goddess of Magic, he also seeks to appease the [Lord of Storms] for Her forgiveness, all the while secretly currying favor with the [Lady of the Night] to secure more survival leverage.
To this day, he fears that the [Lord of Storms] will reclaim the power She bestowed upon him.
(Note: The [God of Mages] has assisted the Goddess of Magic for a long time. He was once the most powerful mortal mage, defeating the [God of Prophecy] in a battle that lasted for years and imprisoning that deity within the staff. Later, he served the Goddess of Magic and was elevated to divinity by the second generation of the Goddess of Magic. He is one of the Goddess of Magic’s important subordinate deities.)
The Lich God has a tense relationship with most deities of death, viewed by many as a potential enemy encroaching upon the godhood of [Death].
………………
Buzz.
An eerie vibration emanated from deep underground. Then it gradually calmed down.
A powerful lich remained within the God of Death’s ruins, and Soren could guess what it was after—power related to the [Death] domain.
It had been here for decades; if it hadn’t discovered something, it would be hard to stay so long near the Death Desert, shrouded in chaotic energy. The environment here is utterly unsuitable for magical experimentation; if the failure rate for magical experimentation in other places is around fifty percent, here it rises to at least ninety percent. The external chaotic energy has affected everything; the wild radiation of the Death Desert has created local tidal surges.
Death Domain.
As one of the gods mastering the Killing Domain, Soren was determined to obtain this power!
——“Shadow Hide!”
Soren’s figure slipped into the darkness. He needed to confront a top-tier lich, so even as a deity, he dared not be careless.
Moreover!
This lich had occupied this place for decades. If there were truly powers left by the God of Death, the enemy was likely more than just a simple lich.
Soren suspected that the opponent might have advanced to become a—[Demigod Lich]!
——“Disarm Trap!”
The entrance to the God of Death’s ruins lay beneath the dunes. Before nearing it, Soren noticed an outer warning trap.
As the God of Half-Elves and Wanderers, such traps were not difficult for Soren; he easily disarmed three outer trigger traps.
——“Shadow Leap!”
Interdimensional phasing helped Soren evade the first mechanism inside. Such mechanisms are too troublesome to deal with; one must destroy the surface structure of the walls, which could easily alert the lich underground. Thus, traversing through the Shadow Plane was the easier option.
——“Dimensional Shift!”
Once inside the God of Death’s ruins, darkness enveloped him. Undead do not need light, and the lich had not installed any illumination tools here.
On the contrary.
Over decades, it had laid out as many as a hundred traps outside. Almost every three steps had a trigger trap.
Soren’s glance quickly identified at least five traps set with [Finger of Death] and [Disjunction].
“Damn it!”
“This lich is indeed ruthless!”
Soren paused for a moment at the junction and murmured, “If a team of legendary adventurers came through here, they might lose a few just on that path.”
“All traps trigger an instant death judgment!”
“A slight failure to resist, and even legendary professionists would instantaneously perish!”
Instant death traps.
This type of trap causes great unease even for legendary wanderers to disarm. Because wanderers’ saving throws are not particularly strong, failure in disarming the trap can lead to instant eradication.
Passing through the ‘death corridor’ set up by the lich, the number of traps significantly decreased.
However, the high-level warning devices increased in number.
If Soren were not a deity, it would be quite uncertain when a triggering device would alert the lich below. No wonder no one had thought of defeating it for so long; it was likely that few professionists from the Eastern Kingdom could get past the first half of the route.
“What is this?”
After passing through the passage, Soren’s vision suddenly widened. It was a vast hall, surrounded by broken marble columns, with parts of the hall having collapsed, where a large amount of quicksand had accumulated. Many wall carvings near the right side depicted grotesque undead creatures, reminiscent of a war in the Underworld and reapers wielding massive scythes.
“Indeed, it is the God of Death’s temple!”
“It appears to belong to an evil faction god of death.”
Gods of death extremely rarely belong to the good faction. The current [King of the Dead] is merely neutral; before ascending to divinity, he was a good warrior, forced to turn neutral upon assuming godhood. Although the King of the Dead’s doctrines lean slightly towards good, they mostly maintain the neutral characteristics of the death domain.
“Evil faction gods of death?”
“It seems there are only a few candidates?”
The carvings on the walls provided clues for Soren regarding which deity this temple belonged to, significantly narrowing down the possibilities.
“Could it be the [Bone King]’s temple?”
Soren carefully observed his surroundings, murmuring, “The scale of this temple should belong to the Giant Temple range. Only gods with at least medium divine powers could build such a giant temple.”
“Well then.”
“The candidates are few: [Bone King], [God of Murder], [God of Death]—Naraku, [God of Slaughter], [God of Tyranny]…”
“The God of Murder can be ruled out.”
“He was sealed in madness, and his church has basically vanished. The temple is mostly destroyed.”
“After all, his main enemy is the [King of the Dead].”
“The [God of Death]—Naraku is still alive; if this were his temple, it wouldn’t be abandoned, so he can be largely ruled out.”
“As for the [God of Slaughter], there’s no need to consider him.”
“He has too many enemies; it’s hard for him to maintain such a large temple.”
“Thus the most likely candidates are the [Bone King] and the [God of Tyranny].”
The Bone King is Milkor.
The second-generation God of Death. After his fall, Klanvor took over the death priesthood. The God of Tyranny was the manifestation of the Demon God of Fear and disappeared from history after being replaced.
This temple is most closely related to the two of them.
………………
Soren passed through the first layer of the corridor.
With a short staircase, a flicker of light began to appear before him.
Soren’s vision revealed some strange puppets, clad in pitch-black metal armor, standing motionless in the corners.
“Bone Guards?”
Soren quickly spotted the bony frames beneath the armor; these were Bone Guards of challenge level 12, crafted from high-level undead, most of whom were powerful warriors in life.
“It seems to resemble the [Bone King’s] temple.”
Soren circumvented from the side, and after entering the second layer of the God of Death’s ruins, some undead guards began appearing before him. In intervals, there were also strange large cauldrons.
The cauldrons were filled with dark green liquids, and occasionally, semi-transparent wraiths would emerge from within.
“Death Boilers?”
“Is someone extracting soul essences here?”
Soren had previously seen a similar boiler in the temple of the [God of Death]—Naraku. It could extract soul essences in a simple manner, somewhat akin to the method of nurturing a gu, boiling a batch of low-quality souls to obtain a high-quality soul or a fragment of purified soul.
Refining souls could only be done in a god of death’s temple.
There were a total of thirteen boilers.
Nearby were undead guards, and in the side passage were piles of bones; some souls would enter the bone pile, and after a moment, a Bone Warrior would emerge.
“Holy shit!”
“This place has already turned into a production line for undead!”
Through the mist ahead, Soren saw a portal, from which a rich power of death emanated; this place connected to a certain region of the Underworld, and this temple ruin had established a passage to the Underworld.
“So many souls?”
“Could it be that the [Soul Furnace] is below?”
At that moment, Soren seemed to recollect something, his expression slightly changing as he murmured, “Could this be the place where that team of adventurers discovered the [Thousand Souls Head] after the Saint’s Cataclysm ended?”
In an instant!
Old memories flickered in Soren’s mind.
The time was approximately three months after the end of the Saint’s Cataclysm. A team of legendary-level adventurers explored the Death Desert in the Eastern Kingdom.
They cleared three underground ruins within the Death Desert.
The most difficult battle occurred in the second death ruin, where they encountered a [Demigod Lich] and [Thousand Souls Head].
Ultimately, they discovered the [Soul Furnace] left behind by a fallen god of death.
Of course.
Their true discoveries likely went beyond this; the information released would certainly only be the most basic details, and they would not fully disclose the extent of the benefits they obtained.
“If this is indeed the case!”
“You’ll have to be cautious next! It seems I need to prepare a bit!”
Soren halted his steps.
The average profession level of that team of adventurers in his memory was around level 22, consisting of seasoned veterans who had undergone intense battles during the Saint’s Cataclysm. When they swept through here, they lost three members and only then managed to slay the demigod lich and the thousand souls head. Although Soren now possesses deity-level combat power, he does not have a significant advantage compared to a team of legendary adventurers.
If he did not take this seriously, he could very likely find himself in a perilous situation.
“Demigod Lich.”
“Its challenge level is 21, mastering the legendary spell [Time Stop], which can counter other legendary professionists but is ineffective against itself.”
“In addition, there are legendary spells such as Wish, Dimension Door, and Wail of the Banshee, etc.”
“It seems I need to summon a Demon Avatar for assistance in battle.”
“Thousand Souls Head.”
“Its challenge level is 20, mastering fear aura, necromantic spells, and domination spells, etc., it is a semi-spiritual creature composed of numerous twisted souls, making it a very difficult monster to kill.”
“Quite troublesome, huh!…”
Soren furrowed his brow, pausing in a certain dead angle, lost in thought.
Two legendary challenge level monsters.
Even from a deity’s perspective, they were very troublesome enemies!
………………
(PS: Two-in-one chapter.) (To be continued ~^~)
