Hogwarts Raven

Chapter 364, Section 363: The Mysterious Female Corpse and the Divine Servant

The reeds along the Nile River rustled in the morning breeze.

Before us lay a riverbank, overgrown with reeds, the water shimmering in the morning light. However, this tranquil scene was shattered by a commotion on the riverbank.

A large crowd of onlookers gathered on the riverbank. A circle of temple guards had already been erected, holding spears and looking solemn, keeping all the curious onlookers at bay. In the middle of the riverbank, several priests dressed in dark robes were surrounding a corpse covered with a white sheet, chanting something in hushed tones.

"A bizarre female corpse."

Ian stood on the outskirts of the crowd, squinting as he surveyed the commotion ahead. At least twenty temple guards formed a human wall, their bronze spears crossed, blocking the entire riverbank. Fine beads of sweat glistened on their bronze skin in the morning sun, but their hands gripping their spears were as steady as rocks—clearly, they had undergone rigorous training.

"Step back! This sacred ritual is not to be desecrated!" a guard shouted, his spear pointing dangerously at the fishermen in the front row. Ian noticed that the guards' armor was engraved with runes different from usual—not the common Eye of Horus, but three overlapping rings with a star-shaped pattern in the center.

Ian intended to approach directly.

But the guards' tight blockade prevented him from approaching from the front. Ian quickly looked around and found a dense reed bed upstream on the riverbank, relatively secluded and out of the guards' sight. In this hidden spot, he silently recited the Disillusionment Spell again, and his figure gradually merged into the air, dissipating like morning mist.

“The Disillusionment Charm is truly a great invention.” Ian carefully bypassed the guards’ cordon and, using the reeds for cover, silently approached the core area where the corpse was located.

As he drew closer, Ian held his breath and observed carefully. He saw the priests using some kind of silver powder to draw intricate magical runes on the white cloth covering the corpse. The runes shimmered with a faint blue light, their lines twisted and ancient, carrying an unsettling sense of oppression—this was clearly the scene of some ritual.

However, the people who were blocked outside could not see it.

In the middle of the riverbank, five white-robed priests formed a pentagram, placing the female corpse at the center. The lead priest, wielding an obsidian dagger, was carving intricate symbols on the corpse's exposed abdomen. With each cut, fine golden sand seeped from the wound, gleaming with an eerie metallic sheen in the sunlight.

"Is it a sealing rune?"

Ian's pupils contracted slightly—he recognized some of the runes as "sealing runes," typically used to suppress powerful evil spirits or seal dangerous magical items.

But it was just a mortal corpse before him. Why go to such lengths? Ian silently shifted his position, trying to make out the symbols. But the angle was too poor; he could only make out a few broken lines—like a variant of some ancient language, or perhaps part of a star map.

Even more strangely, after completing each symbol, the priests would invariably look up at the sky, as if confirming the position of the stars. These priests appeared extremely tense.

The leading priests frowned, their eyes revealing an unusual solemnity and...fear? Their attitude towards the corpse was as if it were not a victim, but an extremely dangerous source.

Ian tried to get a little closer.

He hoped to see the full extent of the demonic runes or hear the priests' whispers. But the priests were so tightly packed that they formed a human wall, and he couldn't find any gap to squeeze next to the corpse.

"No. It's not just about sealing magic runes."

Ian's wand felt slightly warm inside his sleeve. The structure of these runes was unlike any sealing technique he was familiar with; it was more like—a reverse application of some kind of summoning circle?

Just as he was trying to find a way to squeeze in.

The priests suddenly stopped what they were doing. The eldest priest took out a small bronze bottle from his robes and poured the black liquid inside onto the woman's forehead. The moment the liquid touched her skin, all the engravings lit up with golden light, and the woman's mouth opened automatically, releasing a wisp of blue smoke that condensed into a blurry human shape in mid-air.

This scene was witnessed by the crowd outside. A gasp erupted from the onlookers. The guards immediately tightened their defenses, their spears pointed at the outer perimeter, forcing the crowd to retreat a few steps. Ian seized the opportunity to move behind a crooked palm tree, lightly tapping his temple with his wand: "Enhanced vision."

His vision suddenly cleared, and he saw the face formed by the wisp of blue smoke—it was the dead maid, but her expression was so ferocious that it was unrecognizable compared to her peaceful corpse. Her mouth opened and closed silently, as if she were accusing something, while the priests raised their amulets as if facing a formidable enemy, chanting exorcism in unison.

What shocked Ian the most was the mark on the woman's left wrist.

As the incantation was performed, the three concentric circles gradually oozed with golden liquid, and the eye pattern in the center actually began to rotate, staring straight at the direction of the temple!
"Make way! Make way!" A rude shout rang out from behind the crowd. Ian turned around and saw the scepter priest striding towards them with four elite guards. The crowd parted like a red sea. A child was unable to dodge in time and was kicked aside by a guard. The child's mother dared not speak out in anger and could only hold her sobbing child tightly.

When the priest saw the female corpse, all color drained from his face. His withered fingers gripped the scepter tightly, his knuckles white, and the sun disc at the scepter's head trembled and emitted a faint hum. When he saw the sealed body, his face turned deathly pale, his pupils contracted sharply, and his body even trembled slightly.

In an instant, the scepter priest forcibly regained his composure, adopting a compassionate yet solemn expression. When he spoke, his voice remained as authoritative as ever.

"This unfortunate soul has desecrated the sacred river and must be immediately sent to the temple for purification!"

He announced loudly and authoritatively, "Her soul has been corrupted and must be immediately taken to the temple for a purification ritual to prevent the evil from spreading!"

At this moment, the priests finished drawing the runes and began to wrap the white cloth layer by layer with special metal strips and talismans, as if handling a fragile and deadly treasure. The ritual ended abruptly and hastily. As the priests packed up the ritual implements, Ian saw the youngest priest's hands trembling, almost dropping the bottle containing the black liquid. The older priest glared at him fiercely and whispered something, and the young priest immediately turned ashen-faced.

Let the priests try it.

The guards immediately wrapped the body in a white cloth soaked in medicine.

The people in the temple acted swiftly, roughly dispersing the last few onlookers who refused to leave. They used a specially made stretcher to lift the sealed body and quickly retreated towards the temple. Ian was forced to retreat, hiding deep in the reeds, and watched helplessly as the body was taken away.

Just as the scepter priest turned to leave, Ian keenly noticed a detail—he seemingly casually reached out and straightened the hem of the maid's corpse's skirt, his fingertips swiftly pinching off a small piece of fabric, the movement so fast it was almost imperceptible. Then, without a sound, he tucked the fabric into his wide sleeve, as if nothing had happened.

Ian's mind raced. This action was no accident. Why would the scepter priest keep a part of the corpse? Was it for research? Or... to cover something up? Just as the crowd began to disperse, the buzzing of discussion continued like a swarm of bees. A few bolder residents whispered among themselves in the distance, discussing the bizarre scene they had just witnessed.

Ian also overheard the conversation between the two fishermen behind him.

"See those? Those gold grains."

"Shut up! Do you want to be sent to the mines?"

"But this time is different; we've never found it before." ...

These people were talking about it.

After Ian and most of the others left, he walked to the exact location where the body had been found, squatted down, and pretended to have a stomachache, while actually carefully searching every inch of the ground.

The marks of the collapsed reeds were still visible, and golden sand remained on the soil, resembling tiny fragments of gold in the sunlight. Just as he was about to collect a sample with his wand, he suddenly noticed a tiny blue dot flash by in the sand.

“This is…” Ian carefully brushed aside the sand, revealing a blue crystal the size of a pinhead. It was so tiny that it would have been impossible to spot if the sunlight hadn’t been shining at just the right angle. The minuscule crystal fragment, only the size of a pinhead, emitted an unnatural luster.

Ian carefully took it out with his fingertips and placed it in his palm.

When his fingertips lightly touched the crystal, a familiar warmth immediately followed—exactly the same as the replicas he had seen in the temple chamber and in the hands of that mad old man.

This blue crystal… he recognized it. It wasn't a natural mineral, but a man-made imitation—a replica of the "Eye of Ra." The real "Eye of Ra" was a legendary sacred object, containing the power of the sun god and capable of dispelling darkness. This imitation, however, was something the temple created for reasons unknown.

"A replica of a fragment of Ra's Eye?" Ian concealed the crystal in a hidden pocket in his sleeve, his brow furrowed. The maid's corpse, the golden eye sand, the replica fragment of Ra's Eye, the priests' unusual tension.

These clues swirled in my mind, but I could never piece them together into a complete picture.

The temple's reaction was quite intriguing. Their tense sealing of the corpse, even resorting to "sealing runes," indicated that they knew a great threat lurked behind it. However, the scepter priest's act of secretly keeping the cloth suggested that the temple was not a unified entity, and perhaps someone was carrying out a clandestine plan.

He got up, looked around to make sure no one was watching, and then quietly retreated to a more secluded bend in the river. The reeds here were taller and denser, and the current was slower, making it an ideal spot for casting spells.

Ian took out the blue crystal and placed it in his palm, then tapped it lightly with his wand: "Manifestation."

The crystal levitated and began to slowly rotate. The silver light emanating from the tip of the staff enveloped it like liquid, gradually revealing its internal structure—appearing to be a pure blue on the surface, but actually filled with black filaments, exactly like the corrupted fragment in the temple. Even more astonishingly, as the analysis spell reached its third stage, the crystal suddenly projected a blurry image:
A dark room contains seven crystal containers arranged in a circle, each containing a human brain floating within. A blue fragment on the central pillar pulsates, while golden threads connecting to the brains continuously deliver some kind of substance into them. The image abruptly ends here.

The crystal snapped in two with a "crack," landing in Ian's palm, its luster slightly diminished. He stared at the remains, suddenly understanding the meaning of the mark on the maid's wrist—three concentric circles representing the arrangement of the containers, the eye in the center being the very fragment being offered! The people at the temple weren't just trying to create a man-made sun god.

Do we need man-made artifacts?
"What a blasphemous act! It's madness before destruction!" A horn sounded in the distance, announcing the approach of noon. Ian put away the crystal fragments and glanced one last time in the direction of the temple. The magnificent complex gleamed golden in the blazing sun, but in his eyes, it seemed shrouded in an invisible black mist.

Even sunlight cannot penetrate it.

"It seems I'll have to go to the temple again tonight."

Ian muttered to himself, his fingers unconsciously tracing the wand.

The maid's death, the golden eye sand, and the counterfeit fragments of the Divine Eye are like scattered pearls, and he is about to find the thread that connects them.

As Ian turned to leave the riverbank, he didn't notice a string of unnatural bubbles rising in the water behind him. A dark shadow resembling a human hand flashed briefly underwater before quickly disappearing into the murky water. Further away, a small bird perched quietly on a palm tree, its wise eyes fixed on Ian's departing figure.

As Ian pushed open the wooden door of the "Golden Palm" restaurant, the morning light slanted through the colorful ceramic beaded curtain above the door, casting dappled shadows on the stone floor. He chose a low table by the window, tapped his fingers three times on the surface, and called the owner to have a proper breakfast, something he hadn't had before.

"Have you finished watching the show?" The one-eyed shopkeeper put down a steaming fig bread, his voice extremely low. "The city is now swarming with the temple's spies."

"It's not much of a spectacle," Ian said with a slight smile, cutting the bread with a specially made knife. This seemingly ordinary utensil was plated with mithril, capable of detecting most common poisons. The aroma of the bread filled the air, mingled with the sweetness of honey and cinnamon, perfectly masking the faint magical fluctuations emanating from the blue crystal in his sleeve.

The noise in the restaurant was louder than usual. Three linen merchants sat in a corner, glancing nervously at the door every now and then; two women who looked like washerwomen whispered to each other, their ceramic cups empty but not being refilled; even the fishmonger, who was usually the noisiest, was unusually quiet today, only tapping the table with his stubby fingers.

"I've heard that the golden sand in the eyes can move."

"My cousin in the guard said that the maid's tongue was..."

"The high priest personally ordered the house of the family whose clothes she had previously worn to be burned down. It seems that the family was also taken away, but it's unknown whether they will be released."

Fragments of conversation drifted into Ian's ears. He slowly dipped his fingers in honey, feigning interest in the newly served date porridge, while secretly scanning the entire restaurant out of the corner of his eye. As the third group of guests hurriedly paid their bills and left, the curtain was lifted again, letting in a gust of wind carrying the fishy smell of the river.

That's a woman.

She wore a linen dress typical of ordinary merchants, yet her gait still carried the rhythm unique to priestesses. The woman who had removed her black robe wore a Theban-style beaded veil, but the runes still shone faintly in Ian's eyes—and sure enough, just as Ian had predicted, the woman in the black robe emerged from the crowd.

I sat down opposite him.

"The river fish soup here is quite good."

Ian pushed an empty bowl over, the bronze striking the stone table with a crisp sound.

The woman didn't touch the cutlery. Her fingers formed a peculiar hand seal under the table, and Ian immediately felt the surrounding sounds become muffled—a simple soundproofing spell, but the way it was cast was typical of the Heliopolis school.

"You saw what happened at the temple last night, didn't you?"

As she spoke, the colorful beads on her veil trembled slightly, “Those containers, those connected brains, and…” Her voice suddenly lowered, carrying a metallic sharpness.

"That thing that is awakening."

(End of this chapter)