"Did you see it?"
the Papalar asked in a low voice.
Fang Plover searched the forest with his eyes. The mist as thin as a veil hung above the forest. Among the dark shadows there, several pale shadows appeared silently, wandering around the edge of the forest like ghosts. And disappeared.
There were also some grotesque undead creatures, skeletons or zombies, with green fire flashing in their eyes. They walked in groups and walked silently through the forest with heavy steps. The direction of Altori was shrouded in a layer of mist, it was quiet and lonely, and a remaining spire could be seen in the distance.
There was a skinny monster perched on the spire, and it looked around with eyes flashing with pale flames from time to time. It let out a scream, suddenly opened its ragged wing bones, flew into the air, and circled around the spire and circled over the forest.
Ai Xiaoxiao was so frightened that she almost screamed, but as soon as she uttered a syllable, she quickly covered her mouth with both hands. The little girl rolled her eyes and looked around, then breathed a sigh of relief and patted her chest. Said: "Huhu...Ai Xiaoxiao, Ai Xiaoxiao, fortunately you reacted quickly enough..."
Hongye was joking on the sidelines, and couldn't help but look back at her, and then at Fang Plover, who was not far away. Her light brown eyes couldn't help but reflect a sense of humor, wondering why everyone in this team was so interesting.
"It looks like the undead army has attacked Altori."
"The fact that the Crow's Claw Temple has been hiding the news from the north is very questionable."
Sylvide's head was reflected in the crystal. She looked at this scene through the light screen and said - Miss Ship Officer's beautiful face fell into Fang Plover's eyes. From other directions, it was just a wisp of black crystal. It's just the ghostly fire projected from inside.
Fang Yu picked up the recording crystal and photographed this scene.
There was a sound of rustling bushes shaking behind him. Blackbo led a tall and burly man and walked out from there, parting the cedar branches, and said to everyone: "We know that castle is to the west of here. There is a road leading to that place, about an hour or two's journey."
The tall man behind Blackbo was named Kweed-Dragonfire, and he was the real leader of the redeemed. Of course, he was not originally called this name, but it was said that he had personally seen Nicol Bolas, the moody man. Not only did the Dragon Witch not kill him, she also left a mark on him.
The brand remained on the latter's left chest, like a golden paw print, with blazing golden flames coming out all the time, as if it would burn through his soul at any time - a few days ago, the redeemed person's The founder got the news from Blackbo and showed up at Gray Tree Ridge with several redeemed people, and then briefly described his experience to everyone.
He showed the mark to everyone, which reminded Fang Yu more than once of the power that Ms. Misu left on Dickt.
Through the ring of golden flames, Fang Plover instinctively felt familiar with the same power, which also meant that the other party was not lying. It's just unclear why Nicol Bolas or Ms. Misu didn't kill each other and leave this mark.
"That's a contract."
The man himself replied succinctly.
He pressed his hand on the mark: "I understand that you may not believe it, but I can feel her intention."
"The lady gave me this power to ask me to do something, and what I am doing now is just obeying this wish."
"As for others thinking that we are followers of the Dragon Witch, of course you can think so too."
Although it sounds weird, frankness makes people feel trustworthy. Fang Yu has seen too many hypocrites who cover up their actions, so he can appreciate such frankness. What's more, he has always understood that the Dragon Witch has two completely different souls in her body——
After listening to Blackbo's words, he once again set his sights on the latter. This tall man wore a leather armor, put a bearskin on his shoulders, carried a huge sword on his back, and carried a magic furnace on a steel hook underneath. , his bronze face was full of seriousness, and he nodded in this direction.
The two took several redeemed people with them.
On Fang Plover's side, there were only Saya, Hongye, Papalar, Luo Hao, Jita, Ai Xiaoxiao, Alisa, and the elf lady carrying a long bow who was standing guard at the edge of the forest, plus Hongye. The people I brought are all the manpower for this operation.
In addition, Xiao Kong, who has just recovered, and the young man named Benn also participated in this operation together with Saya.
After receiving the answer, Fang Pliover said:
"Then let's leave now."
He stopped and looked at the bleak scene in the direction of Artori.
The Papalar man held his crossbow, jumped down from the roots of an old tree, and suddenly said: "Wait a minute, I have a question, where did the residents of Altori go?"
Before he finished speaking, several eyes suddenly glanced over and fell on him. There are tens of thousands of people living in the four towns in the north. Everyone wants to know where these people have gone, but it is obvious that this question is somewhat inappropriate at this time.
He looked at the empty forest around him and couldn't help but shudder. Thinking that he had asked the wrong question, he quickly closed his mouth and stopped talking.
"Maybe don't think so much..." Alyssa replied with some difficulty: "Maybe they are trapped somewhere, just like the people underground in Mount Piriede."
The Papalar shook his head, a little disapproving: "But in comparison, I would rather believe that the Crow Claw Temple covered up the news. There may be some conspiracy behind them-"
"Shut your crow mouth, Parker."
But everyone understands that it is unjustifiable for so many people to be trapped in one place. But can the temple really cover up the news on such a large scale?
Or should I say, something else happened...
Everyone felt a little heavy in their hearts and walked on the road in silence.
There was no starlight in the winter night, and the entire forest was so dark that you couldn't see your fingers. Even the thick snow under your feet was stained with the color of night, and it was pitch black. The group walked through a dense forest, with one foot deep and one foot shallow. The tall and burly man, Kweed, occasionally took out a small star tracker to determine the direction and whether they had deviated from the original route.
Miss Naturalist also had a more compact star tracker in her hand. She constantly compared the directions of the two horizontal and vertical tracks on it to make sure that the pointer was always facing the west. Then she turned around and nodded towards the plovers. nod.
The monster standing on the spire in the direction of Altori would occasionally fly over the forest, but luckily it didn't notice them below. It was just that when the shadow of its huge wings passed above its head, it was enough to make people feel scared every time. People are frightened.
They did not dare to use torches, so they could only move forward by feeling, working in pairs and helping each other, and the front and back queues were not far apart to prevent anyone from getting lost.
After walking for about half of the time, they crossed several mountains and finally gradually moved away from the direction of the monster's flight and entered a valley. Entering a valley, the snow poured down from the hillside and flooded the forest. The stream below melted the snow slope and solidified into ice, like a glacier.
Only then did everyone light up their torches. There were no traces of the undead in the forest, but there were some rustling sounds in the darkness. Occasionally, the bushes moved, which made everyone startled - but these were just dead souls hiding under the trees over the winter. They were just wild animals, frightened by the fire and running away.
Blackbo has a map in his hand. Follow the directions on the map and follow the 'glacier' down to reach the Snow Stone Castle. The castle was built on a cliff. After they walked along the frozen stream for about half an hour, they saw the castle from a distance - standing on the top of the mountain.
It took them about another quarter of an hour to climb up the hillside, marching along the cliff to the north, and crossed several rugged rocks before arriving at the castle.
Fang Plover signaled everyone to extinguish the torches, walked out of the forest, raised his head and looked at the outer wall of the castle - the gray stone wall was covered with thick moss, and it was covered with a layer of snow, making it gray in the night.
Alyssa and Miss Elf walked over with a roll of rope, "Miss Etila," Fang Pliance reminded a little worriedly: "Be careful." Our Miss Nightingale looked disgusted and said angrily: " Master, are you too biased?"
"That's different," Fang Yu knew clearly that the other party was joking with him, so he replied: "Miss Aitila is like a sister in my heart."
"Tsk, favor one but not that."
Miss Elf swept the snow off his shoulder and told him not to worry with her eyes.
This is also true. The two of them climbed up the wall easily. The elf lady has a strong figure. Although she is a saint of the Temple of the Holy Tree, she is not inferior to her sister who is the twin sister of Nightingale.
She even stretched out her hand to make the vines on the city wall hang down, and grabbed the two of them and rolled them up. Then the two of them hung down the rope from there, and Kweed took over from below, picking up everyone one by one. Finally, the tall and burly man grabbed the rope and climbed up.
There was silence in the courtyard of the castle, but Aitila grabbed the Papalar who was about to take a step forward and pointed in a direction. Only then did everyone see that there were several undead wandering in the darkness there. biology.
They are just low-level undead, with skeletons hanging from tattered clothes.
But Aitila took off the long bow from behind, turned around and looked at the others. Several rangers followed suit and each aimed at their own targets. They loosened their bowstrings, and several arrows shot out. Only one or two missed, flying through the gaps in the skeleton's ribs, and hitting the wall with a low sound.
But Miss Elf's arrow accurately hit the skull of the skeleton. The arrow passed through there, bringing with it a flash of green fire and a soft 'click' sound, and the skeleton fell down.
Several points of cyan fire exploded in the darkness, and the undead creatures fell one by one.
But at this moment, a low roar suddenly came from below the city wall, and a tall zombie rushed out of the stable in that direction, with pus flowing from half of its rotten face. It staggered and rushed up along the horse path of the city wall with its teeth and claws.
Kweed took a short spear from his waist and threw it hard. The silver-gray short spear hit the zombie and passed through the head. The monster fell backward and then rolled down the stairs.
The former jumped down the stairs in two or three steps and landed next to the zombie body. He lowered his head and fiddled with it with his hands. After making sure that the latter was dead, he pulled out his short spear with his hand, bringing out a stream of yellow pus. The juice gushed out, making Ai Xiaoxiao gag on the city wall.
But Fang Yu saw it clearly. The moment the opponent threw the spear, a golden light flashed in his eyes.
That light was no stranger to him, and the ring of golden flames on his chest was slightly warm.
He covered the ring with his hand and led everyone down.
There was no threat in the courtyard. Fang Plover looked up at the main part of the castle hidden in the darkness in the distance. It was about four stories high and divided into three buildings in the southeast and west. There were halls, studies and bedrooms inside. Countless rooms.
He had seen similar fortresses in Istania, but the styles of the castles in the north and south were completely different. It could only be said that they might be somewhat similar in function. They didn't have the structural diagram of the castle, so they could only use the stupidest method to search this place like a carpet.
"In which direction are the servants' rooms?"
"Is there a dungeon here?"
"Is there a shrine?"
Fang Plover divided everyone into several groups, and three or three groups were separated to explore the place in order to save as much time as possible.
Over there, Kweed also used the same method. He and Blackbo each led a team of people to explore the buildings on the east and south respectively. After Blackbo and Fang Plover said goodbye, they led the people in that direction, and Fang Plover and the others dispersed one by one, entering the main building on the west side from the hall.
They checked each floor separately. There were some scattered undead creatures wandering in the dark corridors of the castle, but they were not difficult to deal with. The clothes worn by these undead creatures clearly indicate that they were servants and guards here.
Accompanying Fang Plover were Jita and Miss Elf. The former turned around and asked softly:
"Brother Ed, how many servants and guards are there?"
Fang Yu shook his head.
These wandering undead may not really be transformed by the dead, but the starlight they disperse here combines with the dark power to form such an image.
But where those servants and guards went in the end is unknown. Only the empty rooms and the whispers lingering here seem to tell what happened here.
It seems that the undead have also attacked here before, but for what purpose, it has become an eternal mystery. Perhaps it cannot be ruled out that there is another force that killed everyone here in a short period of time. Otherwise, it cannot be explained why none of the guards and servants escaped from this place.
"Have Ben's friends really been here?" Miss Naturalist asked again, her voice soft in the darkness.
"There are also people from the Altori Adventurer Guild," she batted her eyelashes up and down. "If they also died in this place, can these undead be seen here as well?"
"Maybe ask someone else."
Fang Yu rummaged around on the bookshelf. He lit a candle, picked it up from the table, and swept it around with a faint light - a thin layer of dust accumulated in the room. , Jita has already judged before that it would be like this if no one took care of it for at least a month or two.
But judging from the rumored time for the army to go south, it couldn't have been more than a month or two anyway. That is, the time when the 'living people' left this place was probably much earlier than the fall of Altori.
Calculating the time, it turned out to be almost the same as the timeline when Ben's two friends disappeared.
He silently recorded this detail in his mind and put back the books that contained no information. There was no diary or any written records. Either there was nothing strange here in the first place, or someone who left here took them away. All information.
Other people's voices soon came from the communication crystal:
"There is nothing on the fourth floor and the attic is empty."
"The same goes for the third floor."
"A worn robe was found on the second floor. It had the emblem of the temple on it, but nothing else."
But a robe doesn't mean much. At best, it means that the clergy of the Crow's Claw Temple have lived here for a period of time, but around Altori, this is nothing.
They also need stronger evidence.
But the news from Kweed and Blackbo was equally unsatisfactory. Fang Yu asked about the situation there, and they found nothing about the Adventurer's Guild or the undead of Ben's friends.
"Let's gather together first," Fang Plover replied, "Let's go to the dungeon and have a look."
He took Jita out of the room. Outside the door, Attila was checking into the distance along the corridor. She seemed to have met the end of the corridor and stopped there.
"Miss Aitila," Fang Pliover held up the candle and shouted in that direction. But Miss Elf turned around and waved to them, motioning them to come over and take a look. Fang Yu was startled for a moment, then walked over holding a candle, "Did you find anything, Miss Attila?"
The light of the candle reflected the end of the corridor, which was just a gray stone wall. Other than that, there was nothing suspicious about it. But Miss Elf pressed her hand on the stone wall, roughly drew a range, then turned back and said to the two of them:
"There's a secret door here, Ed."
"Ah?" Fang Yu was stunned for a moment, looking at the tight walls, he couldn't tell where the secret door was. "Miss Attila, you said there is a secret door here?"
Miss Elf nodded, "I feel that the wall here is slightly different from the surroundings, but I haven't found out where the switch is yet, but there must be a secret passage behind it." She said, while singing Fingers tapped on the stone wall.
What came back from the wall was just a muffled sound, but Aitila's pointed ears twitched slightly, apparently she had heard something.
Fang Yu believed that he was just an ordinary person and could not match the sensitivity of the elves. He knew that the elves had an innate inspiration based on their ability to detect these details. This kind of instinct cannot even be inherited by the chosen ones. Only real elves have this ability.
Of course, not all chosen ones cannot inherit the talents of their original race. For example, Parker seems to be an exception——
…
