Sanctuary Paradise

Chapter 900 The Onion Knight
A few minutes later.

"Oh! That's wonderful! We've finally escaped this cunning trap."

The joyous celebration subsided. Beside the dry well, a knight dressed in peculiar white armor—wide in the middle and narrow at both ends, making him look like a giant onion—laughed heartily, looked at Xin Lailai beside him, and expressed his heartfelt gratitude with unbridled joy:
"My dear friend, I owe you all this thanks to your help. As a token of my gratitude, please accept this. It is the symbol of a knight of the Caledonian knight. As long as you wear it, the power of any Caledonian knight will become your most reliable ally!"

The onion-shaped knight spoke, pulling out a tattered, shield-shaped pendant, while Xin Lailai stared at it in silence once more.

……

[Rusty iron pendant]

Category: Amulet

Durability: 3/10
Effect: (None)
Description: A cheap iron pendant with the word 'Kallet' crookedly engraved on it, seemingly without any collectible value.

……

"Excuse me, but how many of these Kallet Knights do you have?"

"It is only one of us! But do not worry, my dear friend, as long as the storm has not subsided, the name of us knights of the Kallet will never be extinguished."

"..."

"Lai Lai, your weirdo-attracting constitution is acting up again..."

"I have nothing to say this time."

Not knowing how to complain, Xin Lailai gently rubbed her forehead, expressing her helplessness in her mind. The onion-shaped knight in front of her seemed to have completely ignored her reaction, shoved the tattered amulet into her hand, and then laughed and turned to walk in another direction.

"My dearest friend, thank you for your help! But alas, we must embark on our journey to find our old friend. So let us bid a hearty farewell here and celebrate our next meeting! Hahaha!"

"Uh, wait a minute, may I ask if you came from the Pilgrim's Way?"

"Hmm? Holy Road? Come to think of it... I do seem to have seen a stone tablet like this when I came from that side?"

"Well... however, if my dear friend wants to take that path, I advise you to give it up. That path has long since become the territory of those despicable and pathetic undead. The lord guarding that place is an unkillable monster. Even I only managed to pass through his clutches by chance, without finding a way to truly defeat him."

In response to Xin Lailai's question, the knight dressed as an onion lowered his head, stroked his chin, looked in a certain direction, and offered a sincere suggestion. Upon hearing this, Xin Lailai's expression immediately changed, and her gaze toward the onion knight shifted.

Walking the pilgrim's path.

He had initially thought that the Onion Knight before him was just an ashes that had emerged from the settlement near the entrance to the Pilgrim's Path, but according to what the Onion Knight had just said, there was a good chance that the other party had come from the other end of the Pilgrim's Path and had even faced the guardians inside.

"May I ask what exactly this immortal monster you're talking about is?"

"An immortal monster? Hmm... Let me think about it. That thing has crystal magic. Although its body is very fragile, it cannot be killed. Fortunately, as long as we defeat it temporarily, we will not be hindered by it for the time being."

“Ah, right, my dear friend, if you are determined to cross that road, perhaps you could try to find that wretched man in the big hat who refuses to leave the castle. Although he has spoken ill of us, with your intelligence, my dear friend, you will surely be able to gain his approval.”

Possessing the magic of crystallization?!

And other ashes that seem to belong to the Mage?!

As soon as she finished speaking, Xin Lailai's eyes lit up, clearly showing great interest in the undead monster and the 'big hat' that the Onion Knight had mentioned.

You see, they've been studying the magical principles of this world all along, trying to find a way to truly leverage their advantages as mages. Unfortunately, due to the different rules of the world, they haven't made much progress in this regard.

Or rather, although they found a way to control magic, they remained at the level of simply using cellular energy to transport magic and using mental energy to apply it in a simple way.

As for deeper operations, it's not that they don't want to do them, but whenever they try, they end up back in the same situation they encountered when they first tried Crystal Magic in this world—their mental energy can't access their mana.

The reason they can use the basic version of Crystal Magic is because its principle is simple and pure enough. It simply guides magical power toward the properties of matter, making it more inclined toward the 'force' nature that it inherently possesses.

To use a more vivid analogy, if we compare mental power to a hand and magical power to an independent entity, then the basic version of the Crystal Element Technique is like pulling on the clothes of magical power and tugging it towards the material world a couple of times, without actually penetrating into the body of magical power.

—Incidentally, if the focus is not on the material realm but on the spiritual realm, the result will be that magical power will gradually exhibit 'idealistic' characteristics, that is, it will tend towards the 'law' aspect.

—As for its specific manifestations, it can produce various changes based on the information in spiritual energy, such as attracting and calling upon the surrounding elemental energy, transforming it into other extraordinary energies, and so on.

Of course, this has nothing to do with them now. After all, if they only stay at the current level of manipulation, let alone converting magic power into other extraordinary energies, it would be extremely difficult to even restore the basic version of the Crystal Element Technique to its original state.

Back in the Demon Slayer world, they had become terrifyingly powerful "Skywalker" level experts thanks to their magic chips. But now, let alone achieving such a high-precision operation as "walking on air," even forming a palm-sized piece of magic crystal would take them several seconds. Furthermore, if they wanted to maintain the existence of these magic crystals, they would have to semi-permanently occupy a portion of their "stamina bar."

According to their speculation, the reason why the magic power in this world is in this state is most likely because the blessing rules have performed some kind of 'notarization' on the extraordinary energy of the entire world. This 'notarization' is like an invisible film covering the surface of the extraordinary energy of this world, preventing external forces such as spiritual power from interfering with it at a deeper level.

As for how to solve this problem... their solution was quite simple—it was to 'copy'.

Since the rules of blessing in this world have categorized their methods as 'spells', it means that the system of 'spells' that exists in this world is not fundamentally different from the 'spells' they perceive and understand.

Since no fundamental differences have emerged, the mages of this world must have encountered the same problems they faced. Yet, despite these problems, they spread the concept of magic throughout the Ash World. This can only mean one thing:

—The mages of this world have found a way to solve the problem.

Perhaps it's some kind of targeted spell structure, or perhaps it's a foundational structure of magic born from this world... In any case, since the mages of this world can cast spells smoothly in this world, they only need to find a native mage and refer to the other's method of casting spells to naturally find a way to solve the problem.

"Yang... cough, Brother Gerbak, thank you for the information! This is a token of my gratitude. Have a safe journey! Charité!"

"Hiss—!!"

As Xin Lailai spoke, she gathered a ball of soul light equivalent to 5000 soul points, tossed it to the Onion Knight without further ado, whistled, flicked the reins, and excitedly steed her spirit horse toward its destination.

"Haha! You too, my dearest friend! May we meet again under the protection of the storm!"

Upon seeing this, the Onion Knight laughed heartily twice, offered his loyal blessing to Xin Lailai, and then turned to continue walking in the direction he wanted to go. Then…

"Hmm? Strange, why have we suddenly accumulated so many more souls?"

"Hmm... Haha! I understand now, this must be the storm's reward for our victory over the trap!"

...Half a day later, the Pilgrim's Path.

[Note: Due to "Blessing of the King's Fire", the current status has been fully restored.]

[Note: Due to "Blessing of the Royal Fire", the Element Bottle has been fully replenished.]

[Note: Your soul has been recorded by the "Spark"]

"Um...where is this?"

"Ahem, this is the entrance to the Pilgrim's Path. I apologize, Sister... We accidentally got into a little trouble and got carried away."

Warm firelight flickered under the night sky. In an area resembling an altar, Xin Lailai, sitting in front of a campfire, coughed lightly and apologized somewhat embarrassedly to the blindfolded nun in front of her, her gaze clearly avoiding her eyes.

Because they were so eager to embark on their path as sorcerers, he and Lingyuzi were so focused on getting there that they only realized the blindfolded nun's soul was still in their backpack when they saw the campfire. They quickly stopped and decided to settle down there.

"I see... Please rest assured, Lord Black Sword, this little bit of fatigue will not cause me to fall into a deep sleep, so please don't blame yourself."

The blindfolded nun spoke, glancing around at the area beside her. After a moment's hesitation, she said:

"Speaking of which, Lord Black Sword, what about the cries for help earlier..."

"Oh, that guy was just a weirdo who got stuck in the well. We pulled him out, chatted with him for a bit, and then left. But thanks to him, we got a lot of useful information."

"Weird guy?"

"Yes, he calls himself the Knight of the Kallet and gave us this as payment. Have you heard of him, Sister?"

As Xin Lailai spoke, she took out the [rusty iron pendant] that the Onion Knight had given them and showed it to the blindfolded nun, asking her some questions with curiosity.

While Onion Knight's behavior was indeed a bit bizarre, considering his ability to traverse the Pilgrim's Path alone, he is likely no ordinary character.

"Knights of the Kallet... I've seen this title in books. They say they are knights who accompany the storms and are always trying all sorts of strange 'fools.' Legends about them have circulated all over the world, but few people have ever seen their true faces."

"..."

No, he was just saying it casually. So the Onion Knight really does have a big background?
"Could I ask... what else was mentioned in that book?"

"Hmm... I remember it also said that the Cutler Knights were upright and friendly nobles who did not love souls or fire, and they valued promises exceptionally highly, but for some reason, they were not well understood."

"..."

It would be a miracle if anyone could understand that kind of unreliable behavior.

"Well, at least I've made a decent friend..."

After a brief moment of hesitation, Xin Lailai gently rubbed her forehead, put away the pendant in her hand, and stopped thinking about the Onion Knight, instead discussing the information she had obtained from him:
"Speaking of which, Onion... uh, that Knight Kallet told us that there is a guardian on the pilgrim's path who can use crystal magic and cannot be killed. Does Your Excellency have any ideas about this?"

On their journey, they also discovered that although the blindfolded nun always spoke of her humble position, in terms of knowledge, she, who had guarded the Fire Offering Ritual for many years, knew a lot of information that ordinary people did not.

“A guardian who uses crystal magic? This… I’m sorry, Lord Ash, I’ve never heard of such an Ash or a ghost. I think it must have arrived there after Hochlinn crossed the Pilgrim’s Path.”

"As for monsters that cannot be killed... if they can be killed by magic, it means they have a clear will. However, if that's the case, they should be unable to be resurrected once they are killed."

"Lord Blacksword, I think... perhaps the Sir Cutler you mentioned has misunderstood something? Maybe he didn't kill the Guardian, but thought he had defeated him?"

"Does that mean it's not that it can't die, but rather that it has some kind of illusion of death...? Indeed, that possibility is more likely."

"However, just in case, it's best to have a few extra precautions. After all, it's possible that the guy has multiple lives, or that he really possesses some kind of resurrection technique..."

Xin Lailai lowered her head and pondered, rehearsing various possibilities in her mind, while the blindfolded nun silently watched the black-haired youth who was lost in thought, without making a sound to disturb him.

……

……

The next day, the entrance to the Pilgrim's Way.

Upgrade successful! Current level: LV.26

……

[Black Sword]

...

...

Strength: 30; Stamina: 30
Agility: 30; Intelligence: 30
Temperament: 30; Soul: 30
……

"call……"

As the first rays of dawn filtered through the trees, Xin Lailai, having adjusted herself to her optimal state, slowly opened her eyes on the altar. After letting out a long sigh, she stood up and nodded to the blindfolded nun beside her.

"Lord Black Sword, please be careful."

"Well, I'll pay attention."

As the gentle reminder faded, the blindfolded nun's figure and the spirit horse beside her dissipated into countless flames, and in soul form, they were collected by Xin Lailai into the backpack space of the Blessing interface.

Then, Xin Lailai took out her polished longsword and shield, looked at the narrow path and the dark green, lush forest in front of her, gazed at them for a while, and then strode into the middle of it.

Intelligence, routes, equipment, potential unexpected situations... they have considered and prepared for everything that can be taken into account in advance.

Therefore, let him look forward to... what mysteries the magic arts of this world hold!
……

(End of this chapter)