Do ratmen dream of the sacred tree of spirits?

Chapter 101 Arrival

Fafnir and Kingsley entered the district bishop's office, where Sister Fanning was already standing. "Who gave you permission to notify the Eastern District Joint Inquisition!" Bishop Leighton shouted, somewhat losing his composure, before they could even greet him.

"I'm sorry, Lord Leighton—" Bishop Kingsley tried to explain, but Fafnir preemptively admitted his mistake: "I'm sorry, Lord Leighton, it was I who informed Mr. Victor, and it was I who contacted Lord Demerly and Sister Fanning for help."

"I see you all don't want to work here anymore," Bishop Leighton sneered to himself. "I'll settle accounts with you after the two chief judges leave."

Alas, Fafnir felt a pang of guilt and helplessness, feeling deeply sorry for Bishop Demetrius and Sister Fanning. But whether he was trying to contact Mr. Victor or to investigate spiritual pollution, he couldn't do without their help.

"Now, you are here to wait for Viktor Zaitsev and Gavin Aldrich. You should be old acquaintances with Viktor. I order you: if Viktor comes, you are responsible for greeting him and delaying him as much as possible. If they don't come, then pretend I didn't say anything."

Bishop Layton paused. "I need to investigate the shallow spirit realm now, understand?"

"Yes, we obey your command," the three replied in unison.

"Edmund, keep an eye on them," Bishop Leighton ordered his assistant.

A bunch of disobedient brats, I'll deal with them later.

Upon receiving the letter from the Eastern Region via the spirit realm transmission system, Bishop Layton was filled with shock and anger. He was furious that someone would bypass his authority and report to his superiors. At the same time, he was worried that the region would send people to deal with the spiritual pollution within his jurisdiction, as this would greatly diminish his political achievements. He could only try to resolve it in the shallow spirit realm. Bishop Layton thought he had to act immediately; if he could resolve it, he could at least make up for it. He didn't know when the two bishops had departed; they might be using spirit realm travel combined with a spirit-powered vehicle to quickly arrive in Lorraine from the Holy City of the Eastern Region. He had to act quickly.

Bishop Layton arrived at an open space. He concentrated all his attention on mobilizing the spiritual energy within him. The third-order spirit realm traversal spell was still very difficult for him, and he couldn't guarantee that every spell would be successful. "In the name of Eldrasil, I stand upon the earth—"

After failing twice and expending considerable effort, Bishop Layton finally felt his spiritual "sublimation." Layton was a pure elf. Although he was a bishop of the Church of the God of Death, he was also a follower of the Holy Tree. Without pure elven blood and the help of "Eldrasil," he could never have reached the level of a messenger.

Bishop Leiden murmured in the language of spirits: "Every grain of dust on this land reflects your memory—I locate myself in nothingness."

The material world vanished before his eyes, and Bishop Leiden felt himself become an abstract being existing between the material world and the shallow spiritual realm; his body no longer possessed any real sensations.

"Damn it, it's been so long since I've entered the spirit world, and the power of 'Eldrasil' in the spirit world has been greatly weakened." Bishop Layton muttered to himself. In this place without direction or distance, the strength of spirituality determines the speed of movement in the physical world, which of course requires the use of specific spirit world magic.

"In the name of Eldrasil, I brand your mark here—" Bishop Layton somewhat clumsily cast a third-order spell to probe the spirit world. Fortunately, Bishop Layton was even somewhat pleasantly surprised. He quickly sensed a different kind of spiritual fluctuation. The peak of the spiritual fluctuation was only about second-order. He thought, "I'll just go and take a look."

He continuously channeled his spiritual energy, traversing towards the "southwest direction" of the material world, while also constantly monitoring spatial fluctuations in the shallow spiritual realm.

Found it! The detection spells indicate this roughly corresponds to the eastern part of the material world. It seems even without much familiarity, this mere shallow spiritual realm is easily handled. Bishop Layton thought, although there's a spiritual monitoring array in the basement, its effectiveness is nowhere near as accurate as monitoring from the spiritual realm himself.

He arrived at an area, at a location not far away where unusual spiritual fluctuations were observed.

This is... amber? A whole piece of amber?

It was fixed in a specific location within the shallow spirit world. Bishop Layton approached the source of the contamination, filled with curiosity. He was quite certain that the second-order spiritual fluctuation before him originated from it. With his spiritual vision and perception activated, Layton clearly sensed the black spiritual threads emanating from it. Hmm—it might not be real. Bishop Layton hadn't studied spiritual matters in a long time, but he knew that many existences in the spirit world were images, a combination of the real and the unreal. The situation before him might be the "aftershocks" or "residues" of the material world, or perhaps a small-scale aggregation of rules—

Of course, the simplest way to resolve spiritual pollution is to destroy this imagery; the extinction of the spirit world will inevitably lead to the extinction of spiritual pollution in the material world.

"Eldrasil, I call upon you, your roots are the sword in my hand, severing those beings that do not belong to this world—"

This was "Spiritual Blade," a basic third-tier attack spell from the Divine Tree system. It could draw upon the power of the Sacred Tree to inflict massive and intense spiritual damage. The spell was quickly cast, but a spiritual intuition instilled in Layton a strange sense of fear—

No, you shouldn't do this, stop—stop!

The moment the "Spiritual Blade" struck the amber, there was no expected spiritual ripple as the image shattered. The amber absorbed all his attack, and then it "crashed"—a spiritual collapse. Countless cracks appeared on the amber's surface, each radiating outwards purer black spiritual threads, expanding densely outwards.

"What the hell is this! Damn it!!" Bishop Layton tried to leave the shallow spirit realm, but before he could make a move, the cracks in the spirit amber widened and shattered, revealing a pitch-black cavity inside. It instantly expanded to the size of a whole person, with strong and unstable spiritual fluctuations constantly spreading outward from its edges. A hand reached out, and the strong spiritual fluctuations were at least at the top level of a messenger. Under spiritual vision, it looked like a hand burning with golden flames.

Bishop Layton's body was instantly obliterated. Before he could even see what was in front of him clearly, the intense pain left his mind blank. Forcibly suppressing the fear surging from the depths of his spirit, Bishop Layton, realizing the perilous situation before him, quickly constructed a spell and infused it with spiritual energy: "In the name of Eldrasil, erect a wall of spirituality!"

The third-tier "spirit barrier" had been completed, and before he could catch his breath, Bishop Layton saw the creature emerge completely from the void.

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