novel
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Translator: Nyoi_Bo_Studio Editor: Nyoi_Bo_Studio
Ruhr, an orc robber, hoarded his treasures in an actually very secret place. His treasures were located in the depths of the Ashes Woods, next to a vacant space that bred skeletons.
In the Ashes Woods, there were places where it was so particularly easy to concentrate negative energy that it was empty and flat. Beneath the ground, the flow of negative energy would slowly transfer a variety of bones here, forming a huge pile of bones. Every night, it would become a large group of skeletons silently absorbing negative energy into the open space and becoming powerful.
This special terrain was called "skeleton pile". When Sui Xiong just embarked on land, he studied such a "skeleton pile."
The place Ruhr used to hoard treasures was located near a medium-sized "skeleton pile". Whether looked at from the sky or on the ground, nothing special could be found. Only by using positioning magic could the coordinate be found.
Positioning magic was a very special magic which made a huge coordinate system for the vast land by combining horoscope and detection. In the system, each coordinate was a place. It was said that there were always people, who were studying the positioning magic, that included "height" in the calculation. That being said, so far they had not been successful.
It was somewhat inauthentic and complicated, yet it still was very popular. For one thing, it was very helpful for taking an adventure in the wild and adventurers could determine the direction by referring to the map. For another thing, it was very helpful for people to hoard treasures because it was almost flawless.
Before the locating magic was invented, treasure hoarders had to design some clear yet difficult-to-be noticed features for their hoarding places. This was indeed a technical job. It was unknown how many people had found the place for hoarding the treasures according to the map left by predecessors, but it was found that the treasures had been dug out by adventurers who passed by and found the traces. Some narrow-minded guys even left traps in those places, which turned out to be a huge trap for the adventurers.
But since the invention of positioning magic, hoarding treasures was much easier. People could make the place so featureless that a group of people could not find anything special even after searching for ten to fifteen days. Only by knowing the exact coordinates of the place would it be possible to find the treasures.
Compared with the predecessors who wanted to compete with future fellows, the treasure hoarders now would find it proper to make the treasure secret enough and then leave their children and grandchildren the coordinates and mining methods.
It was also the same for "Bloody Hand" Ruhr's place for hoarding treasures, whose position was not a bit special. Even with the exact coordinates, Gerrard and others were somewhat confused when arriving at the location shown in the coordinates.
"This place doesn't look special at all. Even if there were treasures, where could they be hidden?" Having carefully observed the surroundings, Palin could not find any trace of the treasures, so he could not help but be a bit skeptical, "Could the coordinates left by that guy be wrong?"
Of course, coordinates could not be wrong. Ruhr's soul, once falling on Sui Xion, could be considered a book that could be read at any time without any hidden information. In addition, Sui Xiong had also told Gerrard all the information therein. He was even crystal clear about the accurate composition of the treasures. Then, how could the coordinates be mistaken?
"The place is right here, so you need to dig into the earth. When you are about ten feet deep below the ground, you will see a magic gear. Unlocking the gear requires Ruhr's blood as a proof, so at that time we will have to bother Ryan." Gerrard selectively mentioned the information, "In short, let's start."
Of course, they had no objection to this, and the three started mining.
Gerrard was infinitely powerful and he was the main workforce of mining. Ryan was experienced and could help with errands. As for Palin, he could only be responsible for the layout of the camp, so that everyone could rest well at night.
In fact, in accordance with the original intention of Gerrard, it sufficed to search for treasures himself alone. He felt that even if he was not that capable of doing that, he could turn to His Majesty Oscar for assistance and did not seem to need any help from others. However, Sui Xiong did not think so. He thought that Gerrard's appearance now made him an outcast of the society and that if he did not work hard to develop some social relationships, sooner or later he must become a hermit master who was left behind and independent. Like creatures such as giant dragons, Gerrard would also live alone in the barren land, where not even a ghost could be seen, let alone friends.
After all, humans were social creatures, so there was absolutely no fun in being around those creatures!
So he asked Gerrard to take Palin, who wanted to expand his vision. He also asked Gerrard to find someone to dismantle the magic gears by using excuses like "I'm so busy". After all, he just hoped Gerrard could communicate with people more and know some friends.
In fact, he had been thinking about how to readjust Gerrard's appearance for this period of time. This bald buddy, though not bald now, had an extremely cool appearance. Even if the issue of having no friends was not considered, such a big body also made it difficult for him to find a girlfriend!
There was a witty saying on the earth, "age, income, characters, and even sex life and death, etc. cannot stop love, but only the physical size is the glaring disadvantage". Gerrard's aesthetics certainly belonged to the human's, so it was impossible for him to like ogres or mountain giants and other large creatures. If he wanted to find a girlfriend, he needed to be turned small again or have the ability to freely get bigger or smaller.
So after the good sleep, Sui Xiong had been working hard to study this topic. At this moment, if someone flew high above the ground and onto the huge floating jellyfish, you could see a muscle on the back of the jellyfish that was constantly changing its shape.
That was Sui Xiong, experimenting and studying the method of changing shape freely.
Sui Xiong himself could change shape. However, his speed of changing shape was not fast and changing shape in this way had a certain risk. So except for him, who was not afraid of death, others could not afford to use it. From the world's magic system that he had seen, there should be better, faster, and safer methods of transformation.
There were definitely solutions to be found.
These days, when Gerrard and others were hurrying, Sui Xiong was absorbed in studying, trying to find this solution.
However, this immediate goal was not to be fruitful soon. He could only be patient and slowly explore and scrutinize it.
When dusk fell, Gerrard finally excavated the magic gear. It was a metal plate at least five feet long with carved complex patterns that looked dazzling. In the center of the patterns, there was a drop-shaped groove that ran through the pattern of the numerous artery-like veins.
The correct way to unlock this gear was to drop the blood with the same heritage that Ruhr's blood had into the drop-shaped groove. Then the blood would flow along the vein into the magic formation to first activate the blood identification formation. If the blood could be identified, it would further activate the remained magic formation, finally, unlocking the gear and open the way to the treasures. And if it could not be identified, then the formation would dim down, and couldn't recover for the next identification before absorbing free negative energy for an entire night.
However, Gerrard certainly didn't have the blood of Ruhr's, because when Sui Xiong found the information in Ruhr's memory, the orc had died and his body had been hard. So the blood inside the body had lost its vitality and failed to pass the identification. Any blood identification formation only recognized blood from a living body, definitely not the blood from a dead body.
So when they found the formation, the rest of the task was on Ryan.
"It looks quite complicated, not at a normal level, " Ryan was not in a hurry to start. He carefully observed for a while and praised tut-tutting, "The one who made the layout of this magic gear must be a good master. He is not only skilled but also at an exceptional magic level!"
"In general, such a magic gear needs a co-operation between a thief who made a living through his hands and a mage who made a living through his brain. But this gear seems to be done by one person, which was hard to come by. To be honest, although the level of magic was not high, we thieves generally cannot learn magic and this person is amazing, as he was able to reach such a level!"
"Then you?" Gerrard asked.
"No problem twenty years ago, but now I am not able to do it, " Ryan shook his head and said sorrowfully, "At that time I learned some spells and basically I knew the spells that are used in this industry. But I have been out of practice because I haven't used that for tens of years."
"Out of practice?"
"Of course, there is no master in this world that will not be out of practice. Why a lot of powerful adventurers have become mere warriors or mages, but when they made an itinerant living they could also put his opponent to the sword and cast spells by using their wand? The point is, as their levels get higher and higher, there is more and more energy to be consumed in one area, and they become out of practice in other aspects, " Ryan said, "But rest assured. Although I could not make these gears, it's still possible for me to unlock it. After all... destruction is always easier than constructing."
Saying this, the old thief looked down and dedicated himself to unlocking the gear. His movements were light and slow, and others could barely see what he was doing. Gerrard kept watching for a while without seeing the slightest clue, so he shook his head and went back to help Palin.
The time needed to unlock the gear was longer than they had expected and even when it turned dark he still hadn't finished. So they stayed beside the treasures and then waited to continue the next day.
At night, Palin made a magic formation around the camp that could shield the consciousness of the skeletons. Although it was close to the crowded army of skeletons, nothing happened and they slept in peace.
On the next day, the sun was good, and Ryan was also good after a good sleep. After eating breakfast he began to work busily and at noon a piece of good news finally came.
"It's done!" He shouted in the deep pit, "Come here, it's actually a small transmission formation."
The three gathered in the pit, standing according to his instructions. Then he activated the unlocked magic and a faint green light projected on their body.
With a slight sense of dizziness, it was dark and bright before them. They had been sent from the pit to a cave.
The cave was unusually dark, but you could vaguely see some golden things glittering in the distance because of gems. The golden things were far more than they had anticipated.
These were the treasures of the orc thief, "Blood Hand" Ruhr. These were the wealth accumulated by the group of thieves that had been raging the four northwestern towns for several years.
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