Warlock Apprentice

Chapter 2816: Chapter 2817: The Vanished Fragrance

The Mirror Domain!

Dox froze for a moment, then snapped back to himself: Right, how could he be so blind under his own lamp and forget about the Mirror Domain?

The Mirror Domain could actually be considered a special kind of world, and there were definitely plenty of powerful creatures in it. For example, that Laplace from before would count as one.

By using her ability to shuttle between reality and the Mirror Domain, Adanis had subdued You Nu, and she could certainly subdue more Magical Creatures longing for the outside world. There would definitely be no shortage of powerful ones among them.

So Adanis sending out some powerhouse from the Mirror Domain to deal with them was completely reasonable.

Thinking about it now, things like the Lofte World or the Abyss could all be bumped down the list; the Mirror Domain was absolutely the most likely!

"If it’s a Magical Creature from the Mirror Domain, then we need to keep an eye on all reflective surfaces around us." As Vay spoke, he looked back around, searching for any reflective surfaces.

The entrance to the Mirror Domain could be any sort of "Mirror," and as long as it could display an image—be it a water surface, or even a slightly greasy wall—it could be used by Adanis as an entry point to the Mirror Domain.

Dox didn’t check the surroundings the way Vay did, but instead looked at Angel. "Thinking about it now, if Adanis really wants to use an Otherworldly creature to block us, the Mirror Domain is indeed the most likely... That said, it’s been so long already, have you gotten any new intel?"

Everyone turned to Angel as well.

They knew Angel had his own source of information, and even while they were exploring together, he had received some related intel.

For instance, Angel definitely hadn’t known the name "Adanis" beforehand. Yet halfway through their journey, he had gotten this piece of intel. Just from that, it was obvious that Angel’s intel source was anything but simple.

"There is a bit of intel, but it’s basically useless." Angel said, "Your analysis is more useful than it."

"You do have intel?" Dox’s eyes lit up. "Useful or not, just say it first and we’ll analyze it together."

Angel didn’t speak right away, but instead looked toward the Black Earl. "My lord, is there something you wanted to say?"

Just now Angel had sensed some emotional fluctuation from the Black Earl, as if he wanted to say something, but since they had all been talking, he hadn’t cut in.

Now, since Dox had thrown the topic back to Angel, naturally Angel had to ask the Black Earl first.

The Black Earl was silent for two seconds. "I’ll speak after you’ve shared your intel."

Angel gave the Black Earl a doubtful look. He could clearly feel the Earl’s emotional fluctuation; it shouldn’t be something minor, so why suddenly hold back?

Though Angel was puzzled, he didn’t dwell on it. He opened his mouth and said, "The intel I got says that the so-called Otherworldly monster is an Infant Spirit."

"An Infant Spirit?!" Everyone practically said it in unison.

Dox: "You mean that thing that looks cute from afar and still kinda okay up close? Likes crawling all over the place, especially onto people, and loves sucking hickeys into your neck—that kind of Infant Spirit?"

Angel: "..." To be able to call an Infant Spirit "cute," Dox was probably one of a kind.

Angel: "It really is that kind of undead Infant that looks like a black weasel from afar and is downright ferocious up close."

"Tsk." Dox clicked his tongue with open disdain. "I thought it was some terrifying monster, and it turns out it’s just a little baby."

The others didn’t speak, but their thoughts weren’t that different from Dox’s. Infant Spirits... what’s so scary about those?

Even in the Black Earl’s heart there was a flash of realization. When Angel had first mentioned an Otherworldly Magical Creature, he had considered that such a creature entering the Southern Domain might be detected by an Extreme Sect, or repelled by the World Will; there was no way it could arrive without a sound. But now that he knew the Otherworldly creature was an Infant Spirit, the Black Earl understood instantly.

No matter how strong an Infant Spirit was, it had an upper limit. And as a Soul, it was almost never rejected by the World Will. After all, no matter what world undead like these appeared in, they would ultimately be drawn into the Quest World by the Soul Tide.

Vay: "Could there be a lot of Infant Spirits? So many that we can’t deal with them?"

Dox said crossly, "If there really were that many Infant Spirits, the undead aura would already be towering into the sky. You think the Wise Sovereign could just sit still then?"

Vay: "Then could it be the Infant Spirit of some naturally powerful creature’s baby?"

Dox thought it over. "That’s not impossible... but it depends on where it was born. If it’s from some powerful world, then like I said before, places like the Lofte World or the Abyss are all possibilities."

Dox looked at Angel, wanting an answer from him. Angel shrugged. "I don’t know where the Infant Spirit comes from either. My reaction when I got this intel was pretty much the same as yours. But since the intel says it’s a powerful Infant Spirit, we should still make preparations regardless."

Everyone considered it and felt Angel had a point. Stories of people in the Wizards’ Realm dying in regret because they underestimated the enemy were not in short supply, so whether the Infant Spirit was strong or weak, the safest move was to treat it cautiously and be prepared.

As for dealing with an Infant Spirit, that was essentially dealing with undead. Apprentices didn’t have many methods for handling undead, but as Official Wizards, even though undead were troublesome, they did have their means.

With that in mind, everyone began making various preparations against undead.

At this moment, Angel turned to look at the Black Earl again.

The Black Earl understood. "What I wanted to talk about is still related to that scent from earlier."

The Black Earl paused, then, in a somewhat puzzled tone, said, "That scent suddenly disappeared."

The scent disappeared?!

Angel: "Did the owner of that scent leave?"

The Black Earl: "That was my first thought as well, but after I thought it over more carefully, I realized something was off."

At the beginning, when the Black Earl smelled that scent, it had been a faint fragrance. As they moved forward, although the others couldn’t smell it, the Black Earl could clearly feel the fragrance growing richer.

Taking the place where he’d first smelled it as the starting point, combined with their travel distance and with how much stronger the fragrance had become, using these three conditions, the Black Earl could be sure that the source of the fragrance had remained fixed and unmoving.

After coming to that conclusion, the Black Earl had tried to narrow down a rough area where the fragrance originated, to estimate the straight-line distance between them and the source.

However, in the middle of his silent calculations, he suddenly discovered that the fragrance had vanished.

Because the Black Earl had been paying constant attention to the changes in the scent, he clearly perceived that the position of the fragrance hadn’t moved. It felt more like something had blocked his perception of it.

"Blocked the spread of the scent?" Angel frowned. That didn’t sound like much at first, but thinking it through revealed the oddity in it.

This passage wasn’t a straight corridor; there were breaks in the middle and twists in elevation. That was also why they couldn’t smell anything—those "breaks" increased the difficulty of the scent spreading.

And while the Black Earl’s sense of smell was also affected by those "breaks," his nose was so sensitive that the impact was minimal.

But now, even though those breaks hadn’t been able to block the Black Earl’s sense of smell, the fragrance had suddenly disappeared. That meant some kind of stronger "break" had appeared.

And what was this stronger "break"? Some special material, or some special tool?

Angel felt that none of these were likely to be the answer.

He recalled that the Wise Sovereign had said before that Adanis would basically never fight them in reality, and would very likely set a trap to drag them into the Mirror Domain.

In that case, could this stronger "severing" perhaps be exactly the trap laid by Adanis?

For example, a Mirror that possessed the Power of Space?

With Adanis’ abilities, arranging a Mirror that cut off space would be no difficult task.

If that really was the case, then the Black Earl had simply happened to pick up this clue from the Scent. And it was an important clue!

Angel voiced his speculation, but everyone’s reaction wasn’t very enthusiastic. Mainly because Angel’s speculation was exactly that—"speculation"—far too idealized.

So far, Angel’s conjecture was just empty talk, with absolutely no evidence, and he had already jumped to the conclusion that the disappearance of the Scent was a trap set by Adanis.

This naturally failed to convince the others.

At this moment, the one who had always studied Angel’s words very deeply—practically his "reading comprehension-level" spokesperson—Vay, spoke up: "Actually, what my lord said isn’t completely without reason. Didn’t we originally guess that the fragrance was coming from Adanis? This connects perfectly: Adanis set a trap, so the fragrance on her body ended up getting concealed!"

Everyone exchanged glances: what Vay said... seemed to make some sense too?

This could barely be considered a piece of evidence, right?

However, there was also a point of doubt here: if the fragrance really did come from Adanis, then why had she been standing motionless in place before?

Perhaps one could explain it as: Adanis was casting a spell and arranging a trap. But that explanation was still them reverse-engineering from a "result" they’d assumed. If they followed proper logic, there were still plenty of doubts.

At this moment, the Black Earl spoke: "There’s no need to argue. What Angel said is within the realm of possibility. When facing an unknown situation, even if it’s only a possibility, we still need to make preparations."

Everyone thought about it and found it reasonable. They had already planned to act cautiously against the possible appearance of Infant Spirits, and Angel’s guess only required them to be even more careful and to observe their surroundings more closely. It didn’t add much burden, and there really was no need to keep arguing over it.

They temporarily set the topic aside. While chatting idly over the Mind Ribbon, they continued onward.

During this time, Angel and the Black Earl didn’t say anything further.

Angel kept feeling that the sudden disappearance of the Scent was a bit strange. He also knew his conjecture was somewhat over-associative, but he couldn’t help himself from imagining the worst-case scenario.

If it really was a trap arranged by Adanis, then they had to be wary. In reality they still had some room to struggle, but once they entered the Mirror Domain, things became hard to say.

And that Scent... Angel also cared about it somewhat.

If his own conjecture was correct, then the Scent might indeed be, as Vay said, the fragrance of a Scent product on Adanis.

But the Black Earl had mentioned before that this Scent was a bit different from any Scent he’d smelled.

Although the Black Earl hadn’t pursued this further afterwards, putting things together, did the Black Earl actually think that Scent wasn’t from Scent products at all?

Unfortunately... he himself had never smelled it.

Angel thought for a moment and sent a request to the Black Earl for a Mind Ribbon link.

The Black Earl did not refuse and smoothly connected to the Mind Ribbon.

"What is it, did you discover something?" the Black Earl asked.

Angel shook his head. "No, I’m still a bit concerned about that Scent. My lord, are you sure that Scent was the smell of a Scent product?"

The Black Earl: "Not sure. It didn’t seem like any Scent I’ve smelled before. However, my understanding of Scent is not deep. It’s possible that Fragrance Studies has advanced to a deeper stage since then."

Angel: "My lord, is there a way for you to simulate that smell?"

Angel spoke with some hesitation.

He himself could simulate scents through Illusion Techniques, but he didn’t know whether other branches could simulate smell. Moreover, if the Black Earl could simulate it, he might have done so already. Since he hadn’t, did that mean the Black Earl couldn’t do it? And now that Angel suddenly brought it up, would that be a bit rude?

The Black Earl: "There is a way, but I don’t think you’ll agree to it."

The two methods the Black Earl referred to were as follows: First, Angel’s nose could temporarily switch with his, and then he could simulate the smell for Angel to detect.

This method wasn’t difficult, but it would directly connect the Black Earl’s true body to Angel’s flesh. Some of the secrets inside Angel’s body would then be very hard to hide from the Black Earl.

The second method, Angel didn’t have to worry about his own secrets... instead it would become something for Vay to worry about.

The Black Earl could return to Vay’s body, and then Angel could probe into Vay’s body with his spiritual power, temporarily taking over Vay’s body. This way, the Black Earl could also simulate the smell for Angel to perceive.

Between these two methods, the one Angel could accept was obviously the second—but whether Vay could accept it was another story.

There was another point: Vay carried the Noah Bloodline. If Angel took over Vay’s body, he would also be able to probe into the secrets of the Noah Bloodline, which could cause a rift between him and the Black Earl. So after thinking it over, Angel decided to give up for now.

While Angel and the Black Earl were talking, the group arrived at a fork in the road.

This was the first branch they’d encountered since leaving the Hall of Wisdom.

Calling it a fork was a bit misleading, because there was actually only one option.

One of the paths had its walls already collapsed, blocking the way forward, and even the Magical Energy Array had broken down. That route was essentially completely scrapped.

Dox looked at the blocked path and muttered in a low voice, "Could Adanis be playing tricks at the forks in the road? With a fork like this, all she’d need to do is raise a Mirror, and left and right would swap directly."

"If we weren’t paying attention, we might barge straight into the Mirror."

Vay: "It could happen anywhere, not just at forks."

Dox: "I was just giving an example."

Dox and Vay bickered as they walked toward the only remaining path.

Angel, however, watched Dox’s back, a thoughtful expression on his face.

—Was this one of Dox’s flashes of inspiration?