Three Sovereigns

"Why is this…"

The supervisor looked around. The lightning he had imagined from Teleportation didn't appear.

"Finding it strange?" William asked.

Without waiting for the other party to answer, William appeared beside the supervisor the next moment.

He gently placed a hand on the other party's shoulder.

"Didn't I say? You're the only one who will die here today. There's no need for you to get a few more people to send themselves to their deaths."

Why? When? How?

Cold sweat instantly trickled down the supervisor's forehead as he stammered.

"You… Wait a moment. I'm Duke Simon's Palace Mage. If I die, the duke will quickly find out. When that happens, you will be on the wrong end of Thorn City…"

"Oh, so?"

Before he could say anything else, the lightning in the hand on his shoulder pulsed. With a plop, his knees went limp and he kneeled on the ground. The lightning made him lose consciousness.

"Are you… crazy? This is a Palace Mage sent by the duke!"

Sigmonds finally came to his senses when he saw the person who called himself the Presiding Judge lay the supervisor on the ground. The other party's subsequent actions made his scalp tingle.

A sharp icicle appeared in that person's hand and trembled slightly at the supervisor's neck.

Too many things had happened in the mine today that exceeded his understanding. Be it this Skull Temple, the Soul-Ingesting Spider Demon in his throat, or the alterations to what he knew over the past two months.

Previously, his mind had been in a buzzing state. Perhaps it was because those things were too distant from what he usually came into contact with, but even seeing them with his own eyes felt visceral.

But when he saw that the Presiding Judge was planning on killing the duke's Palace Mage, he finally found something he could understand and came back to his senses.

He knew very well what it meant to kill a registered mage, especially a palace-registered mage.

William turned his head and glanced at Sigmonds. The icicle in his hand didn't stop and stabbed through the supervisor's throat.

"Is there a problem?" the person asked.

Looking at the supervisor who was no longer breathing, Sigmonds trembled and took a deep breath.

"Every registered mage has a recording spell named 'Resound.' That spell is connected to the Astral Lighthouse, and it will record the last scene he saw before his death. Duke Simon has the authority to check the records in the Astral Lighthouse. He will soon know that you killed a Palace Mage. When that happens, you will be wanted in the entire Blackwater Province."

A magic chanter was an extremely precious existence in this era.

Due to the number of Astral Lighthouses and the density of the ether circuits built in the Astral World, the total amount of magic power Astral Laws could guide into Currere from the Astral World was very limited. Therefore, the number of registered mages who could use that magic power was also very limited.

According to the public data of the Platinum Ring Alliance, the entire Astral Laws system could only maintain the existence of about 20,000 mages at the same time, and there were only about 12,000 legally registered mages on the Vic Continent.

Compared to the population of Vic Continent, those people could be considered one in a million elites.

Bloodline, resources, talent, and diligence—only people with multiple characteristics or even all four could become a true mage.

It was precisely because mages were so precious and rare that the laws of the Empire clearly stipulated that killing registered mages was an absolutely unforgivable capital crime.

Typically, the person who could kill a mage was often another mage. Therefore, there was an entire chapter in the Astral Laws about reducing the instances of mages killing one another: for example, it strictly stipulated the appropriate situation and combat rules for mages' battles to minimize the number of casualties in a duel between mages.

For example, when registering as a mage at the Astral Lighthouse, the Awakening mentor would set up a spell named 'Resound' in every mage's ether domain. Firstly, it made those who wanted to murder a mage think twice. Secondly, even if a mage was killed, the local law enforcement department could determine the murderer's identity based on the last scene they saw before their death.

"Interesting, but this isn't knowledge a miner should know, right?"

After hearing his explanation, the other party didn't seem very worried about accepting his fate of being wanted. Instead, he was a little curious as to why he knew so much about magic chanters.

"Where did you learn about the technique, Resound?"

Sigmonds saw that the other party didn't panic at all and hesitated for a moment before speaking.

"I once had a magical affinity. I even attended the preparatory class at Arcana University."

"What does 'once' mean? I've never heard of magical talent disappearing."

Sigmonds smiled sadly when he heard that.

"Of course, it didn't disappear. It was bought."

"Bought?"

William's interest was piqued.

"I don't know how it happened either. My mother was seriously ill back then, but going to the Church for treatment required a huge donation. A masked mysterious person approached me and asked if I was willing to sell my magical talent to him."

Sigmonds fell into his memories as he spoke.

"Because I was in urgent need of money, I agreed to it. He took out a transfer contract and got me to sign it with blood. Then, he used a serrated dagger to carve a mirror image of my constellation on my chest. He gave me ten gold riels afterward. From that day onward, my perception of magic became worse and worse. About a year later, I couldn't sense the existence of any magic even in the Astral Lighthouse. It was also at that time that I was dissuaded by Arcana University to continue and came here after many transfers."

As the other party recounted his past, William used the spell, Magic Detection, to briefly detect Sigmond's mana fluctuations.

Ordinary people's ether domains formed a human-shaped outline that wrapped around their bodies like mist, while the ether domains of magic chanters focused on the brain or heart before flowing with magic power to circulate in their bodies.

However, Sigmond's ether domain consisted of a few stars on his chest that formed an inverted constellation map. Magic constantly dissipated from it.

His perception of the astrological constellations was grafted to others, causing him to be unable to accumulate more magic power in the ether domain.

It was like a constantly leaking bucket.

In theory, if he relied on meditation to construct his own circuit in the ether domain and didn't rely on his fate to resonate with the Astral Laws, he could still recover his magical talent. However, he would completely lose his talent in the few spells in the fate constellation.

Of course, this would also make him a so-called heretical mage.

"What happened later?"

With this in mind, William continued asking.

"What later?" Sigmonds asked curiously.

"What happened to your mother? Was she saved?"

Sigmonds lowered his head when he heard this question.

"No. Back then, one of the patients sent in had bloodsucker fever. The Priest didn't notice in time or carry out the quarantines, and that night, the patient acted up and killed all the patients. He ran away after completing the vampire's advancement ceremony."

"Have you ever regretted it?"

William looked into Sigmonds's eyes and asked.

"What regret? Regret saving my mother?"

"Regretting giving up the chance to become a magic chanter,"

Sigmonds looked into William's eyes seriously and said.

"I do regret not having the chance to become a magic chanter, but it's not for any other reason. It's because I've forever lost the chance to kill that vampire with my own hands."

"Very good."

William nodded, then patted the other party on the shoulder.

"What's good?"

William suddenly changed the topic and looked at the supervisor he had killed.

"Weren't you very curious about why I dared to kill this Palace Mage? To be honest, I didn't know about that spell named 'Resound' before you told me about it."

"Doesn't that mean…"

"Of course, even if I knew about this, I would still have killed him. This is because if I don't kill him, the thing hiding in his body won't be exposed."

"What is it?"

A stream of flames shot out from William's magical medium. Just as the nearly white flames were about to touch the supervisor's corpse, a black miasma suddenly spread out, dissipating the flames.

The supervisor's originally silent corpse staggered to its feet like a marionette.

"So you've already sensed it? How boring. I originally planned on letting my children empty out everyone here after you left."

A hoarse voice sounded from the supervisor's penetrated throat. Then, the corpse began to convulse and morph. It was as if something was treating the corpse as a cocoon that was about to hatch.

With a heart-palpitating sound of flesh tearing, a Lunar Monster with a lithe upper body and eight spider legs tore out of the corpse. A thick miasma spread around her, covering her private areas.

The Whispering Empress's spawn—Webweaver.

"Then, when you return, you will see them waiting for you calmly. Before you can heave a sigh of relief, everyone will suddenly shatter into pieces. When that happens, I guess your expression will definitely be very interesting, am I right?"

"When I saw the Soul-Ingesting Spider Demon, I knew that there were definitely Webweavers. They are like Subdemons to Stumbling Demons—they are all fragments of the power of powerful Lunar Monsters," William replied calmly.

The Webweaver stretched its limbs, and the thick miasma condensed into a barbed spear in her hand.

"Gosh, I never expected someone to know the characteristics of a Webweaver. I originally thought that all information related to the Webweaver race had been destroyed after the Astral Laws were promulgated."

"Was that supervisor your contractor?" William asked.

The beautiful Webweaver chuckled.

"Do you think that if he were, you would only need to destroy the statue of my master behind you to banish me back to the Moon Realm? I'm sorry to tell you that he isn't. My true contractor only wanted me to possess him as the last insurance to protect this temple."

Sigmonds felt a chill down his spine when he heard this.

The evil being in front of him was actually summoned by Duke Simon, so everyone here today was doomed. Duke Simon wouldn't allow the secrets here to be exposed no matter what.

"There's probably something wrong with Duke Simon's head to sign a contract with the Whispering Empress, who symbolizes conspiracy and betrayal."

"You didn't escape despite seeing a high-level Moon Realm spirit. I think there's something wrong with your brain."

William smiled and didn't comment before continuing.

Therefore, what's Duke Simon's goal in digging up this temple? Since he dares to sacrifice to the three Void Sovereigns at the same time, I don't believe he's just digging up more Elementium Silver.

The Webweaver strolled around William. When she heard this question, she stopped and blocked the three goddess statues behind her.

"Are you trying to get information out of me?"

"If you don't want to say it, you can choose to fight first."

As William spoke, the magical medium in his hand lit up.

"Hehehe, you're really interesting. I'm a little curious about who you are now. The Paladins from the Demon Burial Machinery are all crazy, and the Demon Hunters from the Obliteration Tower don't even have personalities. There are only two organizations that have access to Moon Realm knowledge, but you don't look like one. Could it be that you're also a Moon Realm contractor?"

As it spoke, it smiled charmingly at William.

"Well, I swore never to reveal my contractor's goals. Therefore, although I want to tell you the full extent of my great undertaking and admire your terrified and despairing expression, it's a pity that I can't do it at all."

So is that really the case?

William sighed slightly. He felt that the situation was much worse than he had imagined.

Since there were three Void Sovereign statues here, it meant that Duke Simon definitely didn't just sign a contract with the Whispering Empress.

Although he wasn't too sure what the so-called 'great undertaking' he needed to complete by signing a contract with the three Void Sovereigns was, William had seen what the three of them could do together in-game.

The three troublesome and petty goddesses had once joined forces to sink an island that housed hundreds of thousands of people to the bottom of the sea because they weren't willing to publicly believe in 'Them.'

"Therefore, dear, can you tell me which organization you belong to? Is it Demon Burial, Obliteration Tower, or another Moon Realm parish?" the Webweaver stroked the spear and asked him.

"Is there a possibility that I'm actually a member of the Doomsday Watchers?"

The Webweaver chuckled.

"Hahahahahaha, you are a funny one. Doomsday Watcher? This happened 800 to 900 years ago, right? Have you heard too many bard stories?"

William raised the sword in his other hand—Judgment 2—a weapon that could truly eliminate Lunar Monsters.

"Then, I'll be direct. I'm a Doomsday Watcher and a member of the 13 judges."