Millennium Witch.

Chapter 146-145- Invitation

Through Elliott's descriptions, his journey of exploring the mysterious garden unfolds like a scroll before Yvette's eyes.

Elliott came to the Arctic with the investigation team. Within the Divine Graces, there are five tiers from S-rank to D-rank, each dealing with different levels of investigation difficulty. When investigating the Blood Demon incident, he and his partner Bai Zhi were only a D-rank investigation team. Later, they earned some merits, improved their combat power, and thus became C-rank investigators, participating in the operation.

Accompanying him were an A-rank investigator who served as the team leader, a B-rank vice-captain, and two team members who were both C-rank—each with their corresponding level of magical mechs as combat partners.

After they found the secret garden, just as they were about to approach it, strange things began to happen.

They discovered that the mysterious garden would recede as they approached, like a mirage on the horizon.

After sprinting at full speed and flying a certain distance, the mysterious garden disappeared completely. When they turned around, they found that the garden had reappeared behind them. Even the analysis equipment on the magical mech could not figure out why this had happened.

So the team began to think that the entrance to the Mysterious Garden might be in this area, but it was impossible to enter directly.

Based on this idea, the group searched the ice field and finally found a magnificent white door in a cave under a glacier. It was carved with beautiful patterns, depicting various unfamiliar creatures and scenes, so complex that it seemed to be depicting a world. Moreover, the door was enormous, and even a three- or four-meter-tall magical mech could easily enter it.

After making contact with the door, the Divine Grace Investigation Team entered the dark world beyond it with little effort. It was pitch black, and all light could hardly travel far, even with increased output power.

Elite guided Bai Zhi forward until the darkness before him was restored to light. However, when the surrounding scenery became clear, he discovered that he and his teammates were separated, and he found himself in an unfamiliar place.

What came into his view was a street with mechanical puppets walking around. These puppets were old-fashioned, not highly skilled, stiff, and humanoid. They didn't speak and didn't react at all to the magical mechs that suddenly appeared next to them.

Then he saw many bizarrely shaped metal buildings nearby, their facades covered with pipes, and metal obelisks with various colored runes flowing around them like data.

Looking up, the scene that appeared was even more terrifying. There was no sky; instead, there was a brass-colored mechanical structure. Countless enormous gears, bearings, and levers slowly turned and meshed, forming a vast mechanical star map. The heavy structure was covered in rust and made loud noises, as if it would collapse at any moment.

Without a doubt, this is a super city filled with metal structures and mechanical puppets. Elite's location is likely just one floor here, and the mechanical star map above his head is probably just a ceiling, with even higher floors above.

After being stunned for a while, Elite and Bai Zhi, who were new to the place, did not realize what the problem was. They simply felt that the scene was in line with the mechanical aesthetics of the puppets, but their fellow puppets were too stiff and not lively at all, and each one looked like a fake human.

After failing to communicate, Elliott saw what appeared to be a tower leading to the upper levels in the distance, but he got lost as soon as he tried to go there.

To clear a path, he used the heavy cannon of the magical mechs. He had barely fired one shot when a crude steam robot came over, warned him that he couldn't use weapons there, and even gave him a ticket.

This didn't sound like a problem, but after receiving the ticket, Elite and Bai Zhi were shocked to find that their rune weapons were malfunctioning. Despite the fact that there were no abnormalities during the inspection and the magic energy supply was sufficient, they just couldn't use them!
Thus, Elite and Bai Zhi, their fighting strength drastically reduced, began their "wilderness survival" in the mechanical city. They discovered magical energy flowing in the building's pipes, and managed to steal some, solving their energy problem. After figuring out the maze-like street layout, they traveled for dozens of kilometers before finally entering a towering, pillar-like tower. Passing through the tower, they reached the upper level, only to find that this wasn't the top floor either, and they had to continue searching for their way…

And so, they were trapped in the mechanical city for nearly fifty years.

They discovered that each floor here had its own unique rules of order, and failure to comply would result in immediate punishment. Moreover, the way these rules were implemented was extremely bizarre, completely beyond the knowledge they had in their database... To be honest, even magic was insufficient to describe the strangeness of these rules.

They also encountered magical creatures that looked exactly like gears, bearings, or brocade plates, which, like the patrols here, would attack outsiders like them. Fortunately, they didn't get tickets during their encounters, and were still able to fight, managing to escape unscathed.

Finally, one day, after many trials, they climbed to the top of the mechanical city, saw the dazzling night sky filled with stars, and overcame the heavy guard of magical creatures before leaping off the edge of the top floor.

In the instant of the fall, countless eerie lights and shadows rapidly shifted.

As they plunged into a crystal-clear body of water dotted with wildflowers, the giant city behind them vanished, leaving only a small, exquisitely crafted, bronze-colored metallic island floating quietly on the azure waves not far away.

They sank to the bottom of the water and moved forward underwater. When they climbed out of the water, they found themselves at the edge of the mysterious garden, surrounded by high white walls. Every so often, there was a large gate in the wall, guarded by magical creatures in the shape of statues.

So, under the fierce attack of the magical creatures, they forced their way through the gate and returned, battered and bruised, to the icy plains of the real world. Exhausted and unable to fight any longer, they finally encountered a powerful aberrant creature and were shattered at the bottom of the icy canyon, where they remain to this day. ...

After listening to Elliott's description, Yvette and Abella both fell silent.

Even for these experienced immortals, they had never seen such a bizarre place.

And once you enter, you'll be teleported to an unknown place? Are those places interconnected, or does each person have a separate island as a prison?

Yvette had previously thought this place might be a super ruin of the Origin Civilization, but as someone who had been to the Origin Civilization, she was certain that the Origin Civilization did not have this technology, unless Elite did not enter the real world, but entered a virtual online game through a vision device.

The problem is that Elite and his partner are both machine race. Can machine races not distinguish whether they are in a virtual world or the real world?

Moreover, the injuries they sustained in the Secret Garden were also brought out, and the wear and tear on various parts was genuine. How do you explain that?
Thinking about this, Yvette suddenly felt that this was somewhat similar to the Dream Mist, but the Dream Mist was a genuine origin world, while everything in this Mysterious Garden was too fantastical and lacked the weight of reality, so it didn't feel quite the same.

"Master, are we really going to go into this place to look for someone..." Abella said fearfully. For the Divine Heir, living was the most important thing. Risking his life for so-called friends... was that something a Divine Heir could do?
Even for the sake of the master, it's impossible!
At most, she would light incense outside and then burn the manuscript she had written for her master.

“…Let’s go take a look,” Yvette said, though she was a little hesitant, but not as cowardly as Abella.

Seeing that Yvette still wanted to go see him, Elliott tried to dissuade her, clearly not wanting the two to repeat their past mistakes. But Yvette quickly silenced him with a single sentence: "Are you planning to go back like this?"

Elliott lowered his head. As the White Dove Detective, the mystery lay ahead, yet he couldn't solve it; as an investigator, the mission lay ahead, yet he couldn't complete it; as an ordinary machine, his companions were inside, yet he couldn't save them. Now, his companions were either missing or dead—a result he found difficult to accept from every angle.

“I’ll go with you,” Ellit finally made his choice, “but I can’t guarantee your safety.”

“You can use the equipment here to transmit information to the sanctuary, so that even if others come later, they can use your information as a reference,” Yvette said. “We’re just going to take a look; we haven’t decided yet whether we can go in or not.”

After all, she was a naturally cautious person. If she wasn't sure, she would rather just take a look and let Bingyu stay inside for hundreds or thousands of years until she was strong enough and confident enough to come and rescue her.

As a mechanical being, Ice Rain should have this lifespan... probably.

“Okay.” Ellit breathed a sigh of relief.

A few hours later, guided by Elliott, Yvette saw the location of the Secret Garden through the car window.

Looking down from above, it was indeed a vast water garden, or a boundless, wondrous lake. Tiny flowerbeds and pavilions dotted the clear water like floating lotus leaves. In the center of the lake, a pure white ivory tower stood silently, radiating a sacred and tranquil glow in the dark polar night, like a white lighthouse.

She parked the car and got out, and Abella and Elliott quickly followed her to admire the magnificent spectacle from afar.

But just a few seconds later, a white door suddenly appeared in front of Yvette.

The door was small, just big enough for one person to fit through, and emitted a soft, intangible glow. Without any warning or external force, the pure white door silently opened inward, revealing what lay behind it—a darkness even more profound than the polar night.

Elliott was stunned and exclaimed, "What's going on?"

Yvette and Abella were also surprised. According to the Divine Grace team's exploration results, it would take some time to find the entrance here, and the Mysterious Garden itself was just an illusion; the real thing might not be here at all.

But why did the door appear on its own initiative as soon as Yvette got out of the car, right in front of her?

Is this an invitation from the Secret Garden?
(End of this chapter)