Chapter Thirty-Four: The Pursuit of the Divine

The mask hid apathetically inside the Unie, acting like a social outcast and a shut-in. I asked him if he was doing all right. He merely muttered some incomprehensible nonsense about "outdated protagonists being worse than dogs."

The heavy hardware brought by Simoco was terrifying. I was not well-versed in firearms, but Lamia looked at those armaments like a child fascinated by toys.

Typhon said, "Now that we have secured one sealing stone, the situation looks favorable. We must conceal it in the safest place possible."

She probably wanted to hide the stone within the Black Coffin, but frankly speaking, the access mechanism of the Black Coffin was quite a trap. Against bizarre sorcerers like the Pale Lady and Ambrose, it would likely prove as flimsy as a decoration.

Norris said, "There are still two remaining, and falling into the enemies' hands poses a grave danger. You witnessed yourself what the Pale Lady can accomplish with it."

Typhon asked, "What do you imply?"

Norris stammered in panic, "I am not rushing... Your Excellency, yet for absolute certainty, shouldn't we acquire all three stones... and keep them in our possession to feel... secure?"

Typhon pondered for a moment and said, "Find a way to destroy this sealing stone."

Christina suggested, "Put it into the Eucos reactor. I refuse to believe anything in this world can withstand the reactor's extreme heat."

Typhon smiled and said, "An excellent approach."

Norris urged anxiously, "How can we do that? This stone concerns the greatest secret of Augustus's life. It could be an incomparable treasure, or perhaps demon blood of boundless magical power..."

Typhon fixed her dual pupils upon Norris, causing the tumor on Norris's body to hurriedly close its eyes. Typhon said, "I suspect you desire this stone quite intensely as well."

Wenling began to sweat, and Norris trembled, saying, "Ah, I cannot conceal it from you, but I am, after all, a member of the Giovanni clan."

Typhon said, "You would be wise to banish that notion. My priority is self-preservation, rather than collecting stones of unknown utility..."

Suddenly, Simoco's teeth chattered violently, and he said, "She... is summoning us."

Typhon asked, "The Pale Lady?"

Simoco replied, "Yes."

Typhon said, "She has also established a blood pact with you?"

Simoco shook his head in agony and unbuttoned half of his shirt, revealing his own bones gnawing at his flesh.

Chris asked, "Does the Pale Lady know your condition?"

Simoco cried out, "No, I can tell her I eliminated you all. I know her location..."

Typhon and Christina engaged in a silent exchange, their gazes locking and flickering rapidly. After half a minute, Typhon said, "Very well. Tell her you have completed the mission. Everyone, prepare yourselves; we are going to find her."

Doing this was wise. There were still several hours until dawn. Once we located her, we could wait for daylight to make our move. By then, even if Typhon and Chris were unable to fight, the Pale Lady would be reduced to mere fish on the chopping block to us mortals.

She was located less than five kilometers away. After the Unie drove three kilometers, we proceeded on foot.

That place had once been a gas station on the wasteland, which had expanded into a small settlement consisting of about twenty ruined small brick houses. Simoco raised his head, pointing at a three-story red brick building in the center of the village—the most intact structure in the area—and said, "She is inside."

I saw pale mists swirling around the building, resembling the hands of a gigantic corpse gently touching it. It also resembled a hungry, dragon-sized leech, coiled upon the earth, greedy and venomous, sucking away warmth and devouring life.

Norris said, "She is absorbing the energy of the sealing stone and creating shadows of death through it. In this way, even during daytime, she can move briefly." His voice was trembling.

Typhon asked, "She is capable of such a feat? Why did you never mention it?"

Norris replied, "This sealing stone... perhaps did not originally belong to Augustus, but was instead devoured by the Cappadocians from Cappadocius himself. The Pale Lady is... a master among the Cappadocian bloodline."

Chris asked, "Does that mean we must stop her right here?"

Norris urged anxiously, "Yes, absolutely!"

The building was as gloomy as if drenched in boiling ink, emitting white smoke from within the pitch darkness. Typhon said, "Fishbone, would you kindly go scout ahead again?"

Lamia asked, "Why must it be him every time? Malacheni is likely using this shadow of death to detect outsiders."

Typhon sighed, "Lamia, I hold you and your husband in high regard, but do not forget that you are both warriors, both soldiers."

Lamia offered no further retort. She told me, "I shall wait here for your return."

I told her not to worry, as I possessed a hundred ways to preserve my life. First, I drank the Waters of Ammon, followed by the Eye of Odin, smeared hardening potion over my skin, and after a moment's thought, swallowed some viper's blood as well.

Norris complained, "Your array of concoctions is expensive enough to cover a dinner for me."

I replied, "Buffs must always be stacked to the maximum."

Despite making all these preparations, I still felt my skin crawl. I stepped into the long shadows cast by the building, invoked the Shadow of Lasombra, entered the grand hall, and peeked my head out.

The hall was littered with corpses—about twenty individuals who had been killed shortly before with their throats torn out. They were all armed, yet the dead included the elderly and children.

These were settlers who had braved the hazards of the sun and bizarre storms, evading swarms of demons, and struggling to survive in this cruel world. Yet the Pale Lady had set her sights on this place, on their lives, turning it into a graveyard and her slumbering nest.

An unforgiving beast.

The second floor presented the same scene: not a single survivor, not even anyone who managed to escape. Malacheni's injuries required quiet recuperation among the dead. These people meant nothing to her; they were merely sustenance. She slew them entirely devoid of emotion.

I grew colder and colder, as though I had swallowed a block of ice, freezing the blood vessels throughout my body until they felt brittle. I braced myself, each movement sending excruciating pain through my frame.

Upon reaching the third floor, I encountered more dead settlers, as well as a large chamber. Inside it, everything I witnessed made me doubt reality.

The Pale Lady paced like a phantom, her long wedding dress sweeping the dusty floor. Ambrose's spine protruded, transforming into a rack that bound him, while pale hands gripped his flesh to imprison him. He was severely injured, blood flowing continuously.

He seemed to notice me, offering a smile, yet said nothing further. It appeared I had been overly paranoid; he had not perceived my presence here. In that case, I intended to let the Pale Lady enjoy herself a little longer, since Ambrose was the primary culprit behind her demise. In-fighting between the two served us best; this was good news for us.

The two sealing stones they had seized rested on a peculiar stand composed of six identical human hands with bluish skin, holding up the black stone.

The Pale Lady thrust a black dagger into Ambrose's abdomen. Ambrose shrieked in agony, black blood spewing simultaneously from his wounds and his mouth. Once finished, he remarked, "What a... complete mess."

The Pale Lady said, "You shall pay the price for everything you did to me, and to the Cappadocian bloodline."

Ambrose's golden hair covered half of his face. He said, "I am sorry, I truly am sorry, but I had no choice. I had to stop your father—Cappadocius. He had already lost control."

The Pale Lady let out a banshee-like scream that nearly frightened my soul away. She demanded, "What did you do? What did you do?" Her dagger continuously plunged into Ambrose's body, moving with such speed that I half expected her to shout "Ora ora" or "Muda muda."

Ambrose screamed in agony under her torture. When she finally paused, Ambrose gasped, "I... saved your life! I let you live."

The Pale Lady retorted, "You wished to use me! To pry into the deepest secrets of necromancy through me."

Ambrose shook his head. "That was of no use to me; I was not studying death.... I am sorry, I lacked the strength to protect you back then, and I could not draw... their attention. The only thing I could do was... to allow your soul... to survive. You could never know who I was."

The more they spoke, the more confused I became, leaving me no choice but to wait for them to speak further and clear up the lingering mysteries.

The Pale Lady cried, "You made my husband betray me! You slashed every inch of skin upon my body! You reduced me to something more shattered than a corpse!"

Ambrose stated, "Yet I enabled you to occupy Stoneberry's body until you revived from it, did I not, Mary? Everything I promised Brother Lorenzo, I did not break."

The Pale Lady screamed, "You have the nerve to mention my elder brother's name? That scoundrel Stoneberry admitted that during the raid on the ancestral sanctuary, you killed him with your own hands!"

Ambrose replied, "He was my dearest friend, the one who trusted me most, but... because he too was controlled! I had no alternative. I could only fulfill his dying wish after his death. You were unaware; you were not under control, which is why I preserved you. You know Cappadocius went mad; years of seclusion left him bewitched by demons, and the goal he pursued could never be allowed to materialize."

The Pale Lady asked, "Do you know where the sealing stone leads? Do you know what kind of god Augustus strives to become?"

Without answering, Ambrose said, "Do you remember? When our Giovanni clan was first incorporated into the Cappadocian bloodline, it was you and Brother Lorenzo who imparted to me the profound principles of necromancy. I have always been deeply grateful for your kindness."

The Pale Lady coldly drove her dagger into Ambrose's limbs. Ambrose shuddered, yet he no longer shrieked. The Pale Lady remarked, "We never anticipated bringing such disaster upon ourselves."

Ambrose said, "No, you speak thus because you are ignorant of what Cappadocius truly did! Even Augustus did not know the full extent; I alone hold the truth."

The Pale Lady demanded, "What truth?"

Ambrose answered solemnly, "At the height of the Cappadocian bloodline, the number of kindred within our ranks far surpassed all other lineages combined. Yet why did that vast multitude of kindred vanish almost overnight? Why did we of the House of Augustus encounter so little resistance when hunting down the remaining Cappadocians?"

"Why? Tell me why!"

Ambrose said sorrowfully, "Because Cappadocius buried a thousand of his progeny deep within the caverns and slaughtered every last one of them, in pursuit of the opportunity to ascend as a god."