Chapter 1212 (1/2)
Chapter 1212: 383. There’s been a change_2
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“Death Energy is restless…”
“It seems like something is disturbing this river…”
“Look, look, the direction of the river water has changed!”
A mud person raised his hand and pointed to a small patch of the river surface.
In the direction he indicated, the river water that should have flowed from west to east had strangely remained stagnant, forming an island.
The Earth Vein Wizards began tilting their detection spells towards the river water, trying to understand the cause of the disturbance.
At that moment, numerous whirlpools appeared on the surface of the river, producing slurping noises as if countless monsters were hidden beneath.
The Earth Vein Wizards realized things were developing in an uncontrollable direction.
They wrote letters on the spot, handed them to a Magic Messenger, and sent them to the Earth Vein Pillar’s base within the city to report the condition of the Underground River.
Before receiving a reply, the Earth Vein Wizards felt they should do something.
They summoned a band of Rock Spirits and hastily assembled an Earth Rock team of over a hundred members.
Many wizards adept in Earth Rock Magic, together with the Rock Spirits, acted, casting Earth Rock Magic towards the river surface and rapidly constructing downward-thrusting earth spikes.
“Crash, crash, crash—”
The earth spikes fell like raindrops, hitting the whirlpools on the river surface, followed by an explosion that released venom and shards of stone sharp as blades.
The Earth Vein Wizards sought to use Earth Rock Magic to kill the monsters beneath the river surface.
Strangely, whether it was attacking the river with earth spikes or bombarding the river water with massive magical rocks, the whirlpools on the river surface showed no change.
The Earth Vein Wizards gritted their teeth and simply used Earth Rock Magic to elevate the riverbed, seeking to strike the source of the whirlpools.
“Boom, boom, boom—”
The black riverbed, covered with debris, slowly rose above the water, causing the river water to backwash towards the shore.
As the dark green river water reached the knees of the Earth Vein Wizards, everyone was astonished to discover that the whirlpools had drifted to the bank along with the river water.
A Rock Spirit, at the request of its master, reached out to touch the whirlpool, and nothing happened.
The Earth Vein Wizards were left confused.
It’s no wonder they couldn’t make sense of the situation.
The strongest among them was only at the Five Rings level, and had there been a Sixth Ring or Seven-Ring Wizard here, perhaps they could have solved the mystery earlier.
Fortunately, the base on Ground Level promptly sent them a reply.
The leader of the Patrol Team opened the letter and read quickly.
His terra-cotta-colored face was filled with worry.
“Mates, these whirlpools have been locked by some kind of large-scale ceremony of the Undead Cult. We won’t be able to get rid of the whirlpools or restore the river to its original state until the ritual array is destroyed,” he said.
The bad news made everyone’s heart sink.
Before they could retreat as instructed by the letter, a black hand emerged from the whirlpool, followed by a forearm and then an upper arm of the same color.
This odd creature seemed immune to the wizards’ passive sensing abilities of surrounding objects.
All the Earth Vein Wizards present failed to notice the arrival of swarms of black creatures in the dimly lit underground space.
…
…
“Here you go, Selena, another hundred Non-metal Mineral Distribution Maps.”
Noland came into Selena’s study, unceremoniously took a seat on a chair, and used [Mage’s Hand] to lift a teacup to quench his thirst.
Using a Sea Monster Form together with a Breathing Method for passive deconstruction of the Sea Area certainly was both fast and stable, but Noland inevitably ended up swallowing countless mouthfuls of dreadfully salty sea water.
Whenever he returned, he was so desperate that he almost wanted to embrace the kettle and chug it down.
Selena watched Noland wolf down his drink and couldn’t help but chuckle, so she cast Water Creation Magic to form a large blob of water for him to drink his fill.
“You’re back just in time. We’ve just received a batch of non-metallic ore in the warehouse, and you can transport them away later,” she said.
Selena briefly flipped through the Nonmetal Mineral Distribution Maps Noland had given her, while binding the documents she continued, “Lonco stopped by earlier today. He seems to have noticed that you’ve been secretly moving non-metallic ore from the warehouse, so he came to me to probe indirectly, trying to find out what you’re up to.”
Noland slurped up the water blob before him, sighed with satisfaction, and said, “I knew he would come asking. Among those non-metallic ores I brought back before, a few had been tampered with, and it must have been Lonco’s doing. Now the Spell Marks on the ores have been erased by me, and as the caster, he would naturally sense it.”