Marvel Magic Case Files

Chapter 812 Bridge to Heaven (Second Update)

The spiral staircase leads to the source of the waterfall, which is a circular pool. In the center of the pool sits an exquisitely crafted spherical device, composed of shimmering iron and silver vine patterns and perfectly curved blue glass, half of which is submerged in a constantly flowing stream of water. It's obvious to anyone with a toe that this is a magical device, as the water in the pool defies gravity, rising upwards to fill the spherical structure.

"I think I remember this thing." The boy gasped. "I know how to use it."

"Go quickly." Upon hearing the boy say this, Salomon immediately tensed up.

Whatever the boy recalls brings him one step closer to unraveling the mystery; Mount Finnbowent holds the answers. To prevent them from reaching Finnbowent, powerful beings from both dimensions are willing to join forces to kill the boy. The sorcerer and the witch both have their hands on their weapons, and the boy, acutely aware of his limitations, remains highly vigilant as he walks towards the exquisite marble platform extending into the pool and towards the device. This is an endearing trait; Salomon doesn't like working with people who lack professional combat skills—like S.H.I.E.L.D. now, whose nonchalant demeanor always raises his blood pressure several times over. The boy reaches out and touches the blue glass surface; the next moment, he's sucked into the device by a flash of light. After the initial panic, the boy quickly calms down.

"Stop! I'm fine!" he shouted quickly to prevent Salomon and the witch from overreacting and using weapons to destroy the device.

Bubbles kept rising from his mouth, but he showed no signs of drowning. The boy seemed oblivious to why he could speak while inside this liquid-filled sphere, not only without needing to breathe. However, this wasn't the only illogical thing. No one present had the energy to delve deeper; only Salomon used his arcane vision to roughly discern the device's workings. Salomon believed it might be a ritualistic device with limited functionality, but its specific purpose was difficult to determine.

"This is the device to the 'Bridge to Heaven'!" the boy shouted, making sure the witch and sorcerer outside the sphere heard him. The spherical device rose from the pool and finally hovered above the water. "I can use this!"

"Hurry up!" Bayonetta pointed her pistol at the flashing golden light inside the waterfall church and began pulling the trigger. The tall windows were almost entirely filled with portals, from which centaur-like lower-ranking angels poured out in astonishing numbers. Salomon launched his attack; the deafening roar of his explosive gun echoed unbearably through the empty hall. Explosive bullets easily shattered the porcelain skin of the lower-ranking angels, turning their inhuman flesh into a bloody pulp. Simultaneously, flashes of lightning erupted from his hands, scorching nearly ten lower-ranking angels as if sweeping away dust.

"Hurry up!" the boy urged. The sorcerer and witch wasted no time, immediately leaping onto the sphere, followed by the remaining lower-ranking angels. Surprisingly, the spherical device generated its own artificial gravity; standing on either side felt like standing on flat ground, with gravity always pointing towards the center. Salomon and Bayonetta quickly began their slaughter around the sphere, preventing the lower-ranking angels from using their weapons to destroy the seemingly fragile object.

The upward process was not so smooth.

After Salomon and the witch slaughtered all the centaur-like archangels named "Honor" and the spellcaster archangels named "Ecstasy" still standing on the spherical device, a gigantic portal suddenly appeared on the towering church dome. Two golden meteor hammers, each as tall as a person and covered in spikes, linked by chains, crashed down from above. Although they missed directly, they caused the spherical device to completely lose control, tumbling downwards. The boy jumped out just before the device went out of control; he transformed into a flying squirrel exactly the same color as his clothes and glided towards a foothold on the church wall. Bayonetta, wearing the arcane scapula, was half-embraced by Salomon as she jumped off the spherical device and landed on a shrine on the church wall where a statue was placed.

Salomon looked up and saw that the stone door that should have been open on the church dome was still tightly closed.

Even if the device hadn't malfunctioned, they wouldn't have been able to reach their target using that spherical device.

"The Archangel [Solemnity], I can't even remember how many I've killed," the witch said with a smile. "Let's warm up a bit."

However, the Archangel ignored the witch and the sorcerer, continuing its flight towards the top of the church, infuriating Bayonetta who fired two shots at it. Even so, the Archangel didn't turn back to fight, but instead used its hammer-like limbs to smash through the church wall, then leaped out without looking back. "That boy!" Bayonetta cried anxiously, "It's looking for that boy!"

The boy got up from the ground and transformed back into a human from his flying squirrel form.

He looked up and found himself on the "Bridge to Heaven".

The Bridge to Heaven is a passageway built of massive stones, stretching gracefully from the top of the waterfall church at the foot of the mountain all the way to Mount Finnbowent, with exquisite torch towers on both sides. This was his destination. The Bridge to Heaven had originally collapsed, but through his power, the ruins were restored into a walkable passage. Even by modern standards, it was an extremely magnificent feat of engineering, but the boy didn't care. He only wanted to use this corridor to reach Mount Finnbowent, rather than pondering the circumstances of its construction, analyzing its artistic style and era like Salomon. He couldn't understand what Salomon meant by "Ionic columns" and "Corinthian columns," or how the sorcerer could deduce from a few columns that this place had once been ruled by the witches and sages.

The boy felt the stone bridge beneath his feet begin to tremble. He turned around and saw an enormous angel climbing the broken starting steps of the Bridge of Heaven. Seeing the hammer, larger than himself, about to strike, the boy ran forward without looking back. He threw cards behind him intermittently, trying to slow the enemy's advance. The Archangel, while climbing the Bridge of Heaven and destroying the connection between the bridge and the Waterfall Church, was unable to deal with the boy's attacks. Whenever the Archangel was about to climb up, the cards the boy threw would always knock it back, leaving the Archangel struggling like a cat hanging on a door.

The boy walked along the Bridge to Heaven to where the spherical device was supposed to reach. In his memory, this was his destination, but the stone door that should have been open was now as if it had been smashed by something, completely losing its original function. He reached out and used a power he didn't understand to reverse time and restore the stone door. The restored stone door slowly opened, but the boy had no time to wait, because the Archangels had caught up, and there was more than one. The ancient Greek-style stone columns surrounding the stone door were broken, and the boy frantically dodged the incoming flail and flying stones.

Suddenly, two hands with bluish-gray skin and blood-red nail polish pierced the crack in the stone door, forcefully pushing it open. Madame Butterfly poked half her body out from behind the stone door and, without thinking, punched the approaching Archangel on the head.

"This guy's really violent." Salomon leaped out from behind the stone door, carrying Bayonetta, his jet engine spewing flames. Lady Butterfly seemed to hear Salomon's mutterings and tapped his helmet with a finger, clearly annoyed. It looked like if Bayonetta hadn't been in his arms, Lady Butterfly might have flicked his head with her finger.

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(End of this chapter)