Chapter 372: Unexpected Visitor (22)

Dusk.

Frangipani Manor, dining hall.

Luosen and Tiralalin enjoyed a very abundant dinner, but the taste was quite ordinary.

After taking a bite of roasted quail meat, Luosen commented: 'The ingredients are very fresh, but the variety of spices is too few, and the cooking technique is quite primitive; the resulting flavor, though rich, fails to give the palate a pleasant sensation.'

Tiralalin wasn't so picky.

"Dear, this is just a Baron's territory, and the people here are busy making a living all day; having something to eat is already good, and they have no leisure to pursue fine taste."

Luosen shrugged: 'That's also true.'

He then turned to the servant beside him and said: 'Bring another set of utensils, fill the wine, don't neglect the new guest.'

The servant looked bewildered, as there was no guest, but still did as told.

Soon, the utensils were set out, and the wine was filled.

Luosen lightly tapped the table with a silver fork and said loudly: 'Since you've come, don't hide; why not fill your stomach first?'

No one responded.

Tiralalin also wondered: 'Is someone here?'

She felt nothing at all.

Luosen continued: 'I mean, do I really have to ask you to come out?'

After a few seconds, a figure suddenly appeared in the air beside the table.

At first it was a mist-like illusion, but after a few seconds it became solid, revealing a tall, alluring woman.

Taking a glance, Luosen was quite surprised: 'Miss Death Angel Patenuoluosi, this is truly unexpected.'

He had thought the first to arrive would be the Order Sage Tuoluosi.

Luosen had never seen Patenuoluosi's true appearance; seeing the woman before him without a mask, he examined her closely.

The woman had a head of natural dark-purple curls, bright almond-shaped eyes, and a delicate face with a slightly naive air.

At a glance she looked like an angel, but if you looked closely at her eyes, you'd see they were deep, cold, and numb, like a pool of dead water.

She sat down in the seat Luosen had reserved.

After glancing at the silverware on the table, she picked up a silver knife, flourished it in her hand, and spoke in a clear, melodious voice: 'Your Majesty Luosen, I never expected you to also end up in this damned place.'

At those words, Luosen and Tiralalin's movements paused, and expressions of surprise appeared on their faces.

Luosen raised his eyebrows, waved his hand to dismiss the restaurant servant, then asked: 'You actually know the situation of the main plane?'

Patenuoluosi nodded: 'Not only do I know, but Adala knows as well.'

'The reason is simple: we are the true bodies of the void soul projections.'

'This situation is truly beyond Luosen's expectations: we thought you should be trapped in the Abyss.'

Patenuoluosi chuckled, then her expression suddenly turned solemn: 'Your Majesty, this place is the Abyss!'

"."

Luosen and Tiralalin stared at each other, their faces filled with disbelief.

Tiralalin immediately said: 'Miss, you're lying.'

Patenuoluosi shrugged, cut a piece of steak with the knife, and ate it.

"Well, well, what I said isn't entirely correct either."

"A more accurate description is that the spacetime here has some secret links with that of the Abyss."

"These links exist partly because of our efforts, and partly because the spacetime density of this half-plane is weaker than that of the main plane."

"We painstakingly escaped from the Abyss to here, thinking we had gained freedom, but soon discovered we had merely fled one cage for another."

Luosen suddenly noticed a detail: 'Then what about Gaomileer? Is he also a true body?'

"No, he isn't. Haigelite, Tuoluosi, Kaer, and Agemanni aren't either."

"The true bodies of those five are still firmly trapped in the Abyss; what exists in this half-plane are merely elemental projections of their true bodies."

After a pause, Patenuoluosi chuckled again.

"Your Majesty, you really shouldn't have come to this damned place. So far no one has managed to escape from here, and the flow of time here is astonishingly fast; one must expend enormous energy to resist time's wear."

Luosen was half‑believing, half‑doubting these words, and it was clear Tiralalin felt the same.

After thinking, Luosen continued: 'Then what is your purpose in coming to find me?'

"To kill you, or to save you."

Patenuoluosi gave a very strange answer.

After saying that, she fell silent and began to focus on eating and drinking by herself.

Seeing her like that, Luosen and Tiralalin, though full of questions, held their tongues and joined in eating and drinking.

In the silence, the three of them each filled their stomachs.

Patenuoluosi gently wiped the oil from her mouth with a napkin, then said: 'Your Majesty, although the law‑ring strength of this world is extremely weak, its intensity equals that of the Abyss, having already reached the 23‑ring.'

"So, to keep living in this damned place without having your soul worn away by the time‑torrent, there are only two ways."

"One is to advance to the 23‑ring and condense an eternal soul; the other is to master sufficiently powerful time magic."

"Otherwise, your fate will be to be ground to dust by the time‑torrent, just like countless ordinary people in this world who vanish without trace, like the countless refugees who fled the Abyss here and inevitably perish."

Luosen raised his eyebrows: 'Then which path have you taken, Miss?'

"Of course, the second path."

"Although a 23‑law‑ring exists, advancing to it is extremely, extremely difficult—almost impossible; I have trained for thousands of years and have only reached the 20‑ring."

"In fact, even in our Eternal Empire, which is the Abyss today, only three people have succeeded in condensing an eternal soul."

Having said that, Patenuoluosi stood up, walked to one side, and made a gesture resembling a swordsman's salute toward Luosen.

"Your Majesty Luosen, I want to test your abilities. If you pass, we will acknowledge you as my friend; otherwise, we will have to part ways forever."

Luosen really didn't understand: "What strange rule is this?"

"It's a rule I specially developed for you."

"Because Adaila is my sister, and you have repeatedly desecrated her soul projection, even letting it gain complete independence. Although my sister said nothing, as her younger sister I must seek an explanation for her."

While speaking, I don't know where she pulled out a dagger: "Take this, Your Majesty."

This reason is truly flawless.

Luosen dares to do and dares to admit. He also stood up, gripping the hilt of the Extinction Law Sword with one hand: "Miss, no matter what, please apologize to your sister on my behalf."

Patenuoluosi gave a light laugh: "If you're strong, you needn't apologize, for you have the right to do so."

"If you're weak, then go die."

Luosen dared not show any contempt, quickly recalling all computing power from the main plane and raising the intensity of the Heart of the War God to the extreme.

"Then let's come."

In the next instant, he saw Patenuoluosi's body dissipate on the spot into a wisp of faint mist.

At the same time, he felt a strong undulation of time magic.

At this moment, the Heart of the War God simultaneously did several things.

He buffed himself with a supermassive time torrent technique, greatly boosting his reaction speed.

Because it is a supermassive technique, infusing magical power takes time, so the enhancement of the effect is gradual, starting at 10 times, then 20 times, 30 times, all the way up to over 150 times at the extreme.

The whole process took about one-fifth of a second, and under this torrent technique's buff, the surrounding time seemed completely stagnant.

Because much less light was received at the same time, the world in Luosen's eyes became very dim.

At the same time, Luosen also buffed himself with many ordinary auxiliary combat techniques, namely the second-ring Giant Force Technique, second-ring Steel Armor Technique, and second-ring Swift Technique.

In short, he used anything that would help his swordsmanship without hesitation.

Laifu with full computing power could perform a hundred lines of extreme combat operations, with no need to worry about extra time consumption.

After a round of ordinary technique buffs, Luosen's bodily qualities surged violently to a point astonishing enough to make one gasp.

Under the ultra-high reaction speed, the Heart of the War God immediately recognized the opponent's move.

It used the high-level version of time magic, the Spacetime Technique, to distort light, thereby achieving near-perfect invisibility.

One could also feel that the opponent used torrent technique to increase their reaction speed, roughly comparable to his own, possibly even faster.

The opponent claimed to be a 20-ring powerhouse, naturally also possessing a divine body, whose strength was certainly far greater than Luosen's 12-ring divine body.

But the enhancement from high-energy magical rings mainly boosts magical power, not the divine body's physical strength, so speaking purely of divine body strength, the 20-ring is naturally stronger than the 12-ring, but only by about fifty to sixty percent, with no overwhelming advantage.

This wasn't Luosen's random guess, but was told by Tialilin, who had once advanced to a 22-ring powerhouse.

Therefore, if it were in the normal magical-ring main plane spacetime, Luosen would have no chance to fight and would be crushed by the opponent's single finger.

But in this half-plane, a 20-ring powerhouse can only rely on cold weapons for combat.

Luosen used Laifu to obtain astonishing melee strength.

Thus, he gained the ability to counterattack.

Clang~

The Extinction Law Sword was drawn and thrust first at a slightly distorted mass of air ahead.

Ding~

The Extinction Law Sword hit a hard object, blocking its path.

The Heart of the War God is obstinate; when the attack was blocked, it immediately retracted the sword and thrust again.

Ding ding ding ding ding~~

The vibrating sound in the air almost formed a continuous sheet.

About two seconds later, Luosen thrust out a full ninety swords in succession, his arm and the Extinction Law Sword before him turning into layers of overlapping shadows.

But this was not his limit.

Seeing that he couldn't suppress the opponent, his stabbing speed kept gradually increasing.

Patenuoluosi was also quite capable, constantly blocking.

After another two seconds of stalemate, Patenuoluosi voluntarily emerged from invisibility, continually retreating while her dagger desperately blocked the Extinction Law Sword's blade, all the while shouting urgently.

Stop stop stop~~ I surrender~ I surrender~~

Luosen also didn't really want to kill Patenuoluosi, so he sheathed his sword and said with a smile: "Miss, you don't need to hold back against me; I could go even faster."

Patenuoluosi's usually indifferent gaze showed a hint of ripples.

"Your Majesty, your current smug appearance is truly annoying, but I must say that your victory over me is mainly due to the Extinction Law Sword in your hand."

"That's right, but what's the problem?"

"Of course there is a problem. Because this sword belongs to Gaomileer."

"Your sword can deal with anyone, but it cannot affect Gaomileer, just as the Dawn Guards cannot harm members of the Safenos family."

Luosen looked at Tialilin, who slightly nodded: "Your Majesty, she is correct."

This problem is indeed significant, because the Extinction Law Sword is his current greatest reliance.

"I remember you said earlier that passing the trial makes one a friend. So, is there a solution, Miss?"

Patenuoluosi moved her hand and directly threw the dagger in her hand to Luosen.

"Meteor Dagger, a weapon of equal strength and attribute to the Extinction Law Sword. I have two; we each take one."

Obviously, this dagger cannot harm Patenuoluosi, otherwise she wouldn't have given it so readily.

Luosen took the dagger, flicked it a few times with neat flourishes: "Nice dagger, thanks."

Thus, he uses the Extinction Law Sword against everyone except Gaomileer, and the Meteor Dagger against everyone except Patenuoluosi, which together lets him handle anyone.

Patenuoluosi walked back to sit at the table edge: "Your Majesty, I can see you have time talent, but your talent is far from strong enough."

"With such low-level talent, there is no possibility of escaping this damned place."

Luosen felt his heart stir: "Then what?"

"Then, I must help you enhance your temporal aptitude."

Tiralilin immediately said: "This is impossible."

Patenuoluosi gave a faint smile: "For the Dawn Empire it's naturally impossible, but our Eternal Empire has gone further in the temporal domain than you, and our understanding of time is deeper than yours."

She turned her head to look at Luosen: "Your Majesty, the price is that you must help us escape this damned place together."

Luosen answered without hesitation: "There's no doubt about it, but why choose me?"

"Because only you possess a complete high-energy empire, although it's merely a nascent empire, but we have no other choice."

"So, you are both the hope for us to completely escape the abyss, and the sole hope for the future to resist the fallen Eternal Empire."

After a pause, Patenuoluosi added: "Moreover, because you are strong enough; otherwise cooperation would not only be meaningless, but would drag everyone down to die together."

(End of chapter)