Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Not many texts could be translated from the fire-damaged booklet. Most of the contents were incoherent, thus not interpretable. But the decoded portion, though not a lot, was crucial.
As the MDT finished interpreted the rest of the notes, Hao Ren started to piece together some of the series of events.
Only a part of Pierre’s findings tallied with the facts. The real situation was far from what the spirit detective had found.
The journal had revealed that the family was not French aristocrats in exile, but they possessed a substantial strength. There were no records about the details, however. One thing was sure, though that the challenges the family faced did not include the element of secular forces. There was only one reason for the family to move to this place, that was Fernan, also known as Hercules, seeking their help.
This mysterious family seemed to have known Hercules from a long time ago and knew the background of this descendant of Olympus. They also knew about the divine artifact that Hercules carried. But they seemed to have no interest in this treasure. This family was here to help Hercules suppress some dark forces that had turned its back against its master.
Hercules had wanted the family to suppress or even kill him when he could no longer control himself.
This dark force seemed to originate from the same divine artifact that Hercules carried.
The MDT had reconstructed the fragmented text and projected them in the air using a hologram.
“The construction of the magic tower is going on as planned. The poor locals could not care less who they are working for, or what the meanings of the symbols and magic items are as long as they get enough money… on the higher ground, one can even overlook at the village… as a pillar of suppression.
“There was a loud noise… Hercules came to visit during a rainy night, his body was in terrible shape, the village was… should work out the worst case scenario, but Xavier became interested in the artifact and thought that he could use other methods… extract its power to slow down Hercules’…”
“It seems that this family has built a stronghold in the forest, which is where we are now. It is a center of magic that could monitor the whole village. At the same time, the erosion of Hercules’ mind was getting worse, and he was hurting the innocent. So he came to seek help. From here on, the family shifted their attention on the divine artifact in Hercules’ hand. They seemed to try to manually extract the power of the divine artifact to suppress the changes in Hercules.” Vivian so interpreted the translated text.
“According to the typical storyline, they were cheating death. But in this situation, they are dead,” Lily said, scratching her chin and trying to sound poetic.
Hao Ren pointed to the subsequently parsed text. “Yes, it was clear that they encountered a problem while studying the divine artifact. Here: ‘…to a dark cursed realm, outside our real world there is a boundary…only frenzy and noise’. The latter part of the passage is not legible. But at last, they seemed to have accidentally opened a door, or some confined evil force had torn open a crack, and they could not stop all this.”
The second half of the journal was like graffiti. Even if the text could be restored, many of the contents would be meaningless as the translated text would sound too crazy and obscure. But from the fragmented text, they could roughly conclude that a will of madness in the divine artifact had lured some members of this family. They were aware that once this will of madness escape, it would bring unimaginable destruction to the real world. But they decided to conceal the fact that the crack had grown larger. Eventually, things got out of control.
“…the last barrier of the boundary is opened, and our real world is about to be exposed to its gaze.” Hao Ren pointed to the last piece of text in the journal. “…we have finally gotten a glimpse of the world on the other side of the boundary, and know that it represents the dark side of the universe, yet…constantly infiltrating, but there is no way to block it. The blind and frantic power is polluting this land, our foolishness has finally caused the biggest disaster… to prevent more people from getting into the disaster, we have to sacrifice…”
The last pages of the journal were missing—not destroyed by fire, but someone tore them off deliberately. It seemed that those who wrote the diary was afraid that some vital secrets would leak out, so they instead destroyed the evidence.
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Vivian was familiar with things about magic. “From what I understand about the symbols on the previous pages, the last few pages were records of the specific rituals and venues where they sealed the evil power. They had foreseen that if the overzealous doomsday enthusiasts got hold of the record, they might reverse-engineer the rituals and release the sealed devil. So they had thought it wise to destroy the record. But this has also created a lot of trouble for us.”
Hao Ren kept the broken journal in his dimensional pocket. He began to feel that things seemed to be unfolding somewhat unpredictably. “What do you think is the ‘evil force’ they face?”
“The power of the divine artifact Hercules carried resembles that of Battie,” Lily said with her arms crossed and her tail wagging. “So the evil force sealed in the divine artifact must be the Malevolence of Battie. Aren’t those things a disaster for human beings?”
The bottle in Hao Ren’s pocket shook as a hissing sound coming from inside. “Ghsssss—”
Hao Ren took out the bottle and shook it violently for a while. The sound of something colliding with the bottle could be heard. After a while, the little guy inside the bottle went silent.
Now everyone had figured out that the use of force was necessary to keep the little Malevolence quiet. This little thing could not be reasoned with at all!
“I have also thought of the Malevolence,” Hao Ren said as he carefully opened the bottle cap, checking if the little guy was injured. She was covering her head with her hands and curling up into a ball—she was not hurt. And then Hao Ren continued. “Of course it is not this noobie but the regular Malevolence of Vivian. There is something I can’t quite understand though: the journal and the ghost keep mentioning the ‘boundary’ and ‘crossing the boundary.’ What that means?”
Vivian thought for a moment. “It sounds like another dimension or a tunnel to a different dimension. Wizards often use these ambiguous words to describe the magic realm. They frequently use words like ‘boundary,”another world’ to describe the supernatural world.”
“So, the divine artifact has opened a tunnel to a different dimension, and summoned some evil force in the alien world to Earth?” Hao Ren guessed. “But this is different from the Malevolence we know. So far, apart from the Malevolence that we found on the planet Inferno, all others are splits of Vivian on Earth. These Malevolences are dedicated to destroying the world on earth. It seems that they do not tend to go to another world. Even if the Malevolence is in a small secret realm, the author of the journal would not use ‘the dark side of the universe’ to describe that place. It is over the top.”
At this time, the little Malevolence woke up. “Ghsss—”
“Oh, some Malevolence tends to hide inside the mouse hole. Can this little guy be quiet even for a moment?”
Vivian looked at the bottle in Hao Ren’s hand. “Is she hungry?”
“Not at all, not yet,” Hao Ren said as he looked at the little guy, who was jumping up and down in the bottle. “What’s wrong with this guy today? It seems something is wrong with her.”
The little Malevolence ran amok in the bottle, screaming and hitting the bottle wall. Usually, when the little Malevolence went berserk, she had a target in sight. But this time, she behaved aimlessly as if the surrounding environment had caused her falling into a frenzy. Hao Ren knew the little guy was behaving abnormally from the beginning, but no one could talk to the little Malevolence and know what was happening to her.
Suddenly, the ghost, which went silent all this while, let out a long sigh.
As the sigh trailed off, Hao Ren felt the ground under his feet shook, and the world around him spun.
The remainder of the old mansion suddenly collapsed with a boom as a bolt of bright lightning struck across the cloudy sky. The violent wind raged through the forest, triggering a wail in between the old trees.
The storm lasted for only half a minute before it gradually subsided. The collapsed mansion suddenly reconstructed itself, the fallen beams lifted back to their original positions, the broken furniture and porcelain, and the burnt portraits—everything seemed to rewind to their initial glorious appearance.
In just a few minutes, Hao Ren found himself standing inside the magnificent aristocratic mansion, surrounded by bright lights, beautiful decoration, with a faint human voice.