Book 14, Fiend – Chapter 23, Moon Ring

The sound of battling rang out unabated throughout Moon Lake Castle, and the battle was extremely fierce.

Within the room.

“Right now, we only have a single moon ring. We still are missing two.” Delia looked towards Linley and Bebe as she spoke. Bebe frowned. “It’s just two. Let’s go. We’ll go and kill two more of the gold-robed guards, that’s all.”

“Don’t be hasty.”

Linley retrieved the moon ring, first binding it with blood, and then removing the contents of the moon ring. “This gold-robed guard really is quite rich. His total networth is over a million inkstones. Right. There’s a few amethysts as well. What a coincidence.”

Before this, when Linley had been struck by the Godslayer Arrow’s soul poison, and then executed his Voidwave Sword, he had used up quite a bit of spiritual energy.

Linley immediately stored one of the amethysts into his Coiling Dragon ring, completely refining it, and then allowed his spiritual energy to begin to absorb the soul essences...Linley’s ‘sea of consciousness’ thus had its spiritual energy completely recover as a large amount of soul essences began to be absorbed.

“The Boss is the smartest. He first took out the treasures inside.” Bebe spoke, and the nearby Delia laughed as well.

During this Fiend trial, they only needed to give up the moon ring. As for the wealth inside of it, one was permitted to take it for one’s own use.

“Let’s go out. Everyone, be careful.” Linley instructed.

Linley was the first to walk into the corridor. Just as Linley walked out the door...

“Huh?” Linley’s face suddenly changed dramatically. Right outside the door, a spear suddenly pierced towards Linley like a lightning-fast viper. Linley was caught completely off guard and wasn’t able to react at all.

“Bang!” Linley was sent flying by that spear thrust, but in mid-air, Linley somersaulted lightning-fast, landing on the ground. Linley looked at the person who had ambushed him; it was a gold-robed guard who was wielding a silver spear, a look of utter shock on the guard’s face!

“What powerful defense.” The guard hadn’t expected that Linley would be able to take this spear thrust of his head on, without even his clothes being damaged.

Bebe and Delia immediately came out, both shocked as well.

“Three Gods?” The face of the gold-robed guard changed dramatically. “Flee!” He knew well the limits of his own power; perhaps one against two, he had a chance, but one against three, he would be finished. He had no idea that actually, his comrade had already been killed by Linley.

In a flash, the gold-robed guard moved over a hundred meters, fleeing at a speed so fast that not even Delia had a chance to catch him.

“Shkreeeeeee!” Bebe emitted that ear-piercing sound.

Suddenly, from behind Bebe appeared that illusion of a Godeater Rat. This time, the illusion was only five or six meters tall, the same as the height of the corridor.

“Ahh!!” The gold-robed guard suddenly discovered that he was unable to move.

“How is this possible?!” The gold-robed guard’s eyes were filled with terror.

Bebe opened his mouth wide.

A strange energy surrounded the gold-robed guard, who stared back disbelievingly and in terror towards Bebe. He could sense his soul shudder and his divine spark shake. “No...” He had never heard of someone being capable of devouring another person’s divine spark in battle!

Two divine sparks flew out from the gold-robed guard’s head, landing into Bebe’s mouth.

“Gulp!”

Bebe swallowed the two divine sparks, then snorted. “You dare to sneak attack us? You were looking for death!” As he spoke, Bebe’s body flashed forward as he stored the corpse into his interspatial ring. The interspatial ring of the gold-robed guard was a moon ring as well.

“Boss, we now have another moon ring.” Bebe snickered as he looked at Linley.

“Bebe, don’t be in a hurry to use your Godeater ability.” Linley said. “There are countless dangers in this castle. We need to be prepared for all possibilities.”

Linley knew that executing the Godeater ability actually consumed a considerable amount of spiritual energy.

“It’s fine. I don’t know how to use soul attacks, or how to create a soul defense. It doesn’t make a big difference if I use up a bit of spiritual energy.” Bebe said openly, and Linley couldn’t help but shake his head and laugh.

Linley’s group wandered about on the third level of Moon Lake Castle for a long while without discovering a single person. From the fourth level beneath them, however, the faint sounds of slaughter could be heard.

“The third level has really been cleaned out!” Bebe cursed softly. “All I see on the floor is bloodstains, chunks of flesh, divine artifacts, and divine sparks. I haven’t seen a single moon ring. Can’t they leave a few behind? Why take everything away.”

Linley and Delia, hearing Bebe say this, couldn’t help but laugh.

“Linley, it seems there’s nothing else to get on the third floor. Shall we advance to the fourth?” Delia looked at Linley.

“Alright.” Linley didn’t have any other ideas.

He had just acquired two moon rings. He was still missing one.

In the dark stone staircase, Linley’s group moved down carefully, one step at a time, on guard against ambushes at all times. The fourth floor was naturally quite large. Linley’s team selected a primary corridor, carefully advancing forward through it.

“Bang!”

“Haaargh!”

In a room in front of them, the sound of a battle could be heard, and from the sound of it, it seemed very chaotic. Most likely, quite a few people were battling each other.

Linley’s group exchanged glances, then silently crept closer.

“Whoosh!” Three figures suddenly charged out of the room. The three of them were very cautious; when they saw it was Linley’s team, they didn’t attack. One of them said, “Oh, it’s three of you. Best of luck.” As they spoke, the three didn’t waste any more time speaking, immediately departed.

“They came with us.” Linley’s team was certain about this.

There were a total of just a thousand people in the Fiend trials.

As Deities, their memories were naturally excellent. When they had exited the metallic lifeform, with but a single glance, everyone had memorized every other person’s appearance.

“Boom!” A corpse flew out of the room, fiercely smashing against the wall then falling to the floor.

“That’s a Fiend trial participant!” Linley’s team immediately recognized him. “Then...there are definitely gold-robed guards inside.” Not hesitating at all, the three of them immediately flew in. However, before Linley’s team even had a chance to draw near, a golden-haired youth charged out, collecting the corpse on the ground.

“Hmph.” The gold-haired youth clearly was very delighted.

But he immediately saw Linley’s team.

“He is also a Fiend trial participant.” Linley’s team was very surprised, but then they had the same thought.

“Can it be that for the sake of a moon ring, he went after his own side?” Linley couldn’t help but think back to what the silver-haired old man of the Fiend Castle had said. The old man had told them to be careful and to avoid dying in the hands of their own people, rather than that of Moon Lake Castle’s.

“That really is the case...” Linley’s team’s hearts grew cold.

The gold-haired youth glanced at Linley, then without wasting any time, immediately scurried towards a different direction.

“It seems we need to be careful.” Linley’s team continued to move forward. After that event, they didn’t dare to be overconfident when encountering other members of the Fiend trials. Perhaps others would desire their moon rings and attempt to kill them.

“Huh?”

Linley’s team reached a narrow corridor and discovered four people there, all familiar figures. It was four men who had been seated behind them in the metallic creature.

“Hey, Linley, it’s you guys?” The leader, a muscular bald man, laughed.

“Fettes [Fei’di’si], it’s you guys.” A smile appeared on Linley’s face as well. Only, Linley’s team wasn’t completely relaxed either.

After all, Linley’s team had just seen people on the same side kill each other.

In truth, they weren’t really on the same side. They were just all Fiend trial participants. They didn’t have much of a relationship with each other.

Fettes and the other three walked over smiling, with the leader, Fettes, saying, “Well? How have you done? How many moon rings have you acquired?”

When the subject of moon rings came up, Linley immediately grew guarded while sending a message with divine sense to Bebe and Delia, “Be careful. These four fellows were on fairly good terms with us on the way over, true, but it’s possible that they have designs on us.”

“Got it, Boss. I hope they do, actually.” Bebe messaged back.

Linley nodded to himself.

“Oh, how many can we possibly have gotten? If we had enough, we would’ve left the castle long ago and returned to the metallic lifeform.” Linley laughed calmly as he spoke.

Fettes and the other three all had a thought.

Linley’s words clearly suggested...although Linley didn’t have enough moon rings, he should have at least acquired one or two moon rings.

“Right. We don’t have enough either. Best of luck. The four of us are heading off now.” Fettes laughed as he spoke.

Linley nodded in a friendly manner.

Although Fettes and the other three said they were leaving, they walked in Linley’s direction. Although from the looks of it, they just intended to walk past Linley, Linley and his team, who had been on guard this entire time, were storing energy, preparing to unleash their most powerful attacks at any moment.

“Whoosh!”

Fettes and the other three suddenly attacked. Logically speaking, a sneak attack at such a short distance shouldn’t have given Linley’s side time to react. Unfortunately, Linley’s team was already prepared. As though a natural reaction, at almost the same time the attack was launched...

“Haha...” Bebe suddenly let out an extremely excited, wild laugh.

“Hmph!” Linley’s adamantine heavy sword struck out like lightning.

Two had joined forces against Linley, while another was dealing with Bebe and the last one with Delia.

Clearly, Fettes’ group knew that Linley’s group was led by Linley, and thus Linley should be the most powerful one. That’s why this was how they divided themselves up this way.

Four on three.

“Bang!” A lightning-fast exchange of blows, but two people on Fettes’ side directly fell down.

One was killed by Linley’s Voidwave Sword, while the other was stabbed through the head by Bebe’s dagger.

Linley’s entire body was covered with that earthen yellow membrane. The enemy’s blade smashed down on Linley’s head, but Linley’s Pulseguard Armor allowed him to take no damage at all. However, the ‘Voidwave Sword’ fell upon Fettes, causing him to collapse and die, then and there.

As for the person who wanted to kill Delia, he was entangled by Delia’s ‘Spatial Wind’ while Delia herself dodged, causing him to be completely unable to draw close to her while instead being struck by Delia’s ‘Spear of Cortez’. Fortunately, he was able to dodge fast, and thus although stabbed in the chest, he escaped with his life.

“Flee!” The two lucky survivors, seeing that the situation was grim, immediately fled.

At the same time, a divine clone suddenly appeared out of Fettes’ corpse on the ground. That divine clone naturally collected the interspatial ring while at the same time fleeing at high speed.

“Swish!” Linley’s Bloodviolet suddenly appeared and delivered a back-handed blow.

Dimensional Decapitator!

The fusion of the ‘Fast’ and ‘Slow’ aspects...in the past, Linley perhaps had only gained 10% of the total insights into these two aspects, but after having spent over twenty years in the Yulan continent and thirty-plus years in the Infernal Realm, he had nearly mastered half of these two aspects.

The power was more than four or five times greater now!

Killing a Demigod with one sword strike was incomparably simple. Fettes’ body was neatly cleaved in half.

“Hmph. His clone was a mere Demigod.” Linley laughed calmly.

“This Fettes most likely wanted his divine clones to all be Deities through their own power rather than fusing with divine sparks.” Delia glance sideways at the corpse on the floor.

Linley stretched his hand out, collecting the other corpse of Fettes into his interspatial ring as well.

“Bebe, Delia, let’s go inside the room and see if there’s any moon rings.” Linley laughed as he spoke, and then the three of them took into a room that seemed to be a storage room.

As Linley saw it, since Fettes was the leader of the group, he should have moon rings in his own interspatial ring if they had them. However, without actually checking, there was no way to be sure.

The three entered the room, but were surprised when they did.

“Huh?” Linley’s group discovered that one of the walls had been moved aside, revealing a tunnel within. The tunnel headed towards a downwards slope, most likely having some sort of connection to the fifth floor.

“A secret passage?” Linley’s team exchanged glances.

“Let’s not rush in.” Linley said. “If Fettes’ interspatial ring has a moon ring, there’s no need for us to risk ourselves.”

But right at that moment.

“Swoosh!”

A human figure blew in like a gust of wind through the tunnel. Linley’s group was greatly shocked, while Bebe cried out in surprise, “Regina, it’s you?”

Regina saw Linley’s team and was instantly overjoyed. “Save me!” As she spoke, she immediately flew towards Linley’s group as she let out a sigh of relief. Right at this moment, two more people flew out from the dark tunnel. Upon seeing Regina have helpers, and three of them, they were so frightened, they immediately flew back into the darkness.

“Linley, kill them! They have a Deathgod Golem!” Regina said hurriedly.

“What’s a Deathgod Golem?” Bebe looked at Regina in confusion.