It doesn't matter what the lord is.

Alayya opened her eyes, but did not see Merlin, and Xiao Hei and the others had already left.

Alayya looked at the ceiling and closed her eyes, thinking she was hallucinating, but suddenly another sentence rang in her ears: "Focus on practicing swordsmanship. When you master the swordsmanship, you will be able to protect Lid."

This time, Alaya was sure that what she heard just now was not hallucination, so she felt a little relieved. In the giants' territory, Merlin used his own life to help Lid, and Alaya felt that Merlin should be trustworthy. Moreover, Merlin was very smart, one of the smartest people Alaya had ever met. If he said it was okay, it was probably really okay.

After waking up, Alayya felt that her mental state had improved a lot.

She went out to eat something, and when she returned to the inn, she found Jiang Lianqing waiting for her.

"I heard from Xiang Hei that Li De entered the Xi Qin territory. Things like this should be done by soldiers like us. It's my fault that I failed to help him with this. But I promise you that I will do my best to make up for it."

Jiang Lianqing said to Alayya:

"Because of this feeling, I guess you are probably thinking the same thing. Don't worry, since Lid called us here, it means that in Lid's opinion, we can help him. You have to believe in your master."

Alayya took a deep breath and nodded seriously.

Jiang Lianqing didn't stay too long, and left after saying goodbye to Alaiya. After Jiang Lianqing left, Alaiya savored what she had just said, and felt that she had some new insights in her heart, and she felt a lot more relaxed.

The sword energy around her was no longer sharp, but became more relaxed and natural. In this atmosphere, Alayya returned to her room to meditate again, and she could feel that every move in her mind became smoother. She only felt that there were some inexplicable thoughts in her mind, which seemed to help her integrate the swordsmanship of Lid and Qingyun, but Alayya could not find the answer yet.

She just had a vague feeling, but it was difficult to express it completely.

Every swordsman who founded a new school would go through the same stage, and now Alayya was in this unremarkable inn, eating the buns she had just bought and thinking.

24. Qualified

Reed was like an experienced hunter in the jungle, observing the surroundings while walking silently on the barren land.

After breaking through to the tenth level in the Under the Abyss, Lid's martial arts skills all improved, including the art of assassination. Now he is so good at hiding his voice that few people in Yongtian Kingdom can compare with him.

Everything has a price. Because he adopted the little ghost, Lid could hardly use any magic, because the magic in his body would be used to maintain the existence of the little ghost first; otherwise, judging from Lid's talent, it seemed that it was only a matter of time for him to learn illusion magic from Merlin. With such a means of concealing the truth, his plan to invade Xi Qin would probably be more relaxed.

It’s a pity that I can’t learn it.

But if it were to happen again, Lid would probably choose to bring the little ghost out from the bottom of the sea. Because during the long journey, having someone to talk to would at least help alleviate some of the boredom. Moreover, the little ghost had lived for so long and held many unknown secrets, and could also provide Lid with the most critical information.

Such as now.

"I remember seeing a similar tree before. I forgot which country I saw it in when I was still a genius. But the magic in ancient times was very diverse, and I relied on the magic of mirage to travel freely at that time, so I naturally would not spend time studying this kind of thing."

The voice of the little ghost sounded in Reed's mind, and she seemed to be looking at the Immaculate Tree like Reed.

The closer you get, the more you can feel a sense of mystery. It is not the pressure from the superior, but a kind of wonderful guidance, which makes people who approach it speed up their pace, wanting to rush to its side as soon as possible. If you want to make an analogy, it is like a lighthouse in the sea at night, or an oasis in the desert, which makes people feel grateful and worship it.

“Has anyone come up with this before?”

Lid looked at the tree. Its trunk was like dried human skin, but the branches above were worthy of the word "immaculate". The whole tree was as white as jade, and after so many days, there was no dust on it. It was so beautiful that it didn't seem like something from the human world.

The little ghost replied:

"Yes. But the scale was not this large. At that time, I was flying in the sky and could look down on it. The change of dynasties and the passage of time are just a cycle. Everyone believes that they are special, so any evil magic will be used again and again once it appears in the world."

The little ghost rarely used a teasing tone, nor did she come out and hold up her sign.

Lid also felt a vague discomfort in his chest. When he approached the tree, his vitality was lost faster, so Lid had to slow down and think about countermeasures. He was not sure if the problem of losing vitality would become exponential growth if he really got under the tree, and his hair would turn white overnight.

After getting rid of the monster formed by evil spirit, Lid had a quiet night, and then he met a man in black robe who was wandering here.

Unlike the previously severely mutated corpses, the black-robed people still looked human, with no other changes except that they were taller. Their bodies were wrapped in layers of bandages, covered with loose black robes, and their faces were wearing exquisite silver masks.

The closer we got to the Immaculate Tree, the more people in black robes there were. They were obviously on patrol. "These people have the aura of living people."

The little ghost whispered:

"I can feel it. My power works on them, which means they are not just dead objects."

Lid was also silently evaluating the combat power of these black-robed men. If nothing unexpected happened, these should be the elite troops stationed under the Immaculate Tree. These black-robed men might just be sentinels, and there must be countless others like them under the Immaculate Tree.

"The breath of a living person..."

Lid repeated the word, and an idea gradually came to his mind. He said to the little ghost:

"You searched my memory before, remember there was something called horror movie?" The little ghost replied:

"Of course I remember. I get scared every time I see them. Ghosts are so scary..."

"Are you qualified to say that?"

"Yes. Because those things are much scarier than real ghosts. Human imagination is really rich. What about the phone calls in the middle of the night, the blood flowing out of the toilet cubicle, the woman hitchhiking in the mountains... Even I was inspired by watching them. It turns out that even if you want to be a ghost, you have to improve your knowledge level in order to win without fighting. Go on, what's wrong with horror movies?"

Lid listened patiently to the little ghost's sigh before answering:

"When I was a kid, I always had a dream, which was to catch something that appeared in a horror movie." The little ghost answered seriously:

"You really have a bad taste." Lid said with a smile:

"I didn't think much of it at the time, but after my sister watched a horror movie, she needed someone to accompany her to the bathroom in the middle of the night. I thought that if I could catch one of those creatures and beat it up in front of her, she would never be afraid again. If I could follow that creature all the way to its lair and kill them all, the world would be peaceful in the future."

The little ghost replied:

"Mr. Reed doesn't seem to be very friendly to the creatures that appear in ghost stories."

Lid stood up from behind the tree and stared at a patrolling man in black robes. He had been staring at this guy for a long time. He said softly to the little ghost:

"I'm not very friendly to people I don't know."

As soon as he finished speaking, Lid jumped out like a ghost, followed closely by the experienced little ghost. The man in black robe was caught in the little ghost's magic before he could react. Lid rushed to the black robe man who fainted on the ground while being alert to the changes around him. After confirming that the little ghost's magic did not trigger any traps, Lid quickly dragged the black robe man who fainted on the ground behind a dead tree, and then released his power to explore his body.

The black bandage blocked Reed's breath, but the mask had eyes, so Reed's breath flowed in from there and quickly flowed into the opponent's limbs and bones.

Lid frowned slightly. He could feel that the person wrapped in the bandage and mask was indeed a person, and his internal organs were in their original positions, but he felt that he was a little different from an ordinary person. After searching up and down and confirming that there were no triggering mechanisms on the other person, Lid took out a knife from his arms and cut a hole in the bandage.

The black bandages were untied one by one, and Reed finally saw clearly what was underneath the bandages - it was indeed a person.

The difference is that he has one more organ than ordinary people: a pair of wings on his back.

The wings were like a butterfly that had failed to emerge. Not only were they small, but they were also wrinkled. If it weren't for a few black feathers scattered on them, Reed wouldn't have realized at first that they were a pair of wings.

The wings on the back are a symbol of the old gods.

At that moment, Reed felt the hairs on his body stand on end. He looked up at the white jade branches in the sky and felt a little cold for the first time.

25. Disguise

"Resurrect the dead." "Enlighten the ignorant beasts."

This is the miracle that the zombies and beasts claimed to have experienced. Regardless of whether this is an exaggeration, when Lid saw the deformed wings behind the black-robed man, a sentence suddenly emerged in his mind--

"Let those who are qualified ascend."

This may be the third power of that "God".

Lid reached out his hand again and carefully probed the meridians of the black-robed man, and found that his meridians were different from those of ordinary people. His meridians were somewhat similar to Alaya's, but they were far less mysterious and exquisite than Alaya's, just like the wings on his back were far different from those of the real old gods.

"I didn't expect they really have such a method. But how is it possible? To let mortals evolve into gods, such a thing..." The little ghost was still sighing, Lid had already grabbed the bandage and said to it:

"I heard that the old gods cannot reproduce. That's why they sent god-selectors to human society to select the most suitable people to become gods. Since they have a way to turn ordinary people into gods, there is no such thing as a wall that is impenetrable. The Abyss Church has existed for thousands of years, so maybe they have learned something from it."

The little ghost fell into deep thought, and when it came to its senses, Reed had already wrapped himself up with the bandage.

Looking at the mummy-like Reed in front of him, the little ghost was stunned:

"Hey! Wait, you're not planning to..."

Reed continued to wrap the remaining bandages, and then took off the mask from the black-robed man's face. The mask seemed a little strange, as if it grew on the black-robed man's face. Reed really spent some effort to get it, but when he looked at the mask in his hand, he found that there was nothing strange about it - logically speaking, it shouldn't take so much effort.

Lid glanced at the face of the man in black robe. It was a very ordinary face, not as handsome as he had imagined, but not ugly. If he were thrown into the street, the rate of turning heads would not exceed 1%. No one would have thought that such a person could survive the wave and be transformed into a being with a body structure close to that of a god.

Reed put the mask on his face, and felt a momentary stinging sensation on his forehead, causing him to frown slightly.

However, he did not feel any discomfort, so he continued to take off the black-robed man's robe, put it on himself and tied it up, and said to the little ghost: "If I want to get close to the Immaculate Tree, this is the most convenient and safest way, right?"

The little ghost complained:

"I don't see how it's safe."

Lid moved his shoulders and stomped on the man's neck neatly, then raised his hand slightly, and the ground collapsed, burying his body. Lid dusted his hands as if he had handled something very ordinary, and said to the little ghost:

"So it's relative. For example, the success rate of forcing your way in is about 10%, but with this outfit the success rate is as high as 15%." The little ghost said helplessly:

"Do you know how to communicate with those black-robed men? Besides, their patrol routes are fixed. If you leave without permission, you will be easily noticed." Lid shook his head.

"Since they are alive, we can't look at them as monsters. Just imagine them as soldiers in the army. Even though these black-robed men are patrolling here now, they will have to be replaced sooner or later. We just need to wait for someone to replace us, and then we can return to the base camp naturally."

"Even if you can get back safely, what can you do with so many people watching you?"

"What can I do..."

Lid looked at the place where the black-robed man was buried, and after a moment he said with a smile:

"If there are trees, we cut them down. If we can't cut them down, we kill people. If we can't kill people, we set fire, poison, or make a scene. We have an old saying, 'Since we are here, we can't go back empty-handed, don't you think?'"

After he finished speaking, Lid looked outside from under the mask, then adjusted his bandages and walked out. From the time he knocked out the black-robed man to the time he changed into the black-robed man's clothes, it took only five minutes. No one noticed anything unusual here, and any possible problems were quickly covered up by Lid.

Lid walked along the black-robed man's usual patrol route and soon met another black-robed man. The second black-robed man obviously didn't realize that his companion had been replaced by a raccoon. He shook his head slightly at Lid. Lid guessed that he didn't mean anything unusual, so he shook his head as well. The two went their separate ways and continued to patrol their respective areas in silence.

At this moment, Reed suddenly felt something good: his vitality would no longer be lost.

I don't know if the bandages blocked the Immaculate Tree's absorption of life force, but Lid wandered here without any discomfort in his body. He patrolled here and observed the environment here. No one noticed him, even the occasional evil spirit passing by brushed past him, because he looked no different from other black-robed people, only the cold eyes under the mask were always observing in secret.

That night, other men in black robes finally came to find Reed.

The other party came over without saying much, nodded to Lid, and then patrolled along Lid's area. Lid knew it was time to leave, but the black-robed man who came to replace him obviously would not explain to him where the base camp was, so Lid could only follow the direction he came from and walk by feeling. Fortunately, the shifts were unified, and Lid could always meet other black-robed men returning to the camp after get off work on the road, which was equivalent to someone acting as a free guide for him.

Lid observed them and confirmed that they did not communicate with each other, so he did not dare to talk to them rashly. He was getting closer and closer to the Immaculate Tree.

Lid estimated the distance and found that it was only a few kilometers to the Immaculate Tree. He could even see the dry and wrinkled bark from afar. The bark without any luster exuded a strong dead air, which made people feel uncomfortable no matter how they looked at it. Lid estimated the diameter of the tree. Although he wanted to cut it down, a tree that was wider than a mountain range could not be easily cut down even without any protection.

Lid walked calmly. Unlike the nervous little ghost, Lid was not unfamiliar with such an environment. He had sneaked into the enemy's rear alone and solved problems like walking on a tightrope. He had done this before. The key was to keep calm and imagine himself as one of their kind, so as not to reveal any flaws.

Many things appeared in Lid's mind, and Lid kept thinking. His brain was running at full speed to plan the next move. At this time, Lid suddenly heard a low cry. He raised his head, looking for the source of the sound, and finally locked his eyes on a man in a black robe.

The person walked like everyone else, the only difference was that her shoulders rose and fell, trembling slightly.

The other men in black robes turned a blind eye to this.

Reed thought about it and moved over calmly.

26. Interrogation

The sobbing was not loud, but it was very obvious in the overly quiet atmosphere. Reed couldn't help but move closer.

Since we just found out that the black-robed man is a living being, then living people naturally have their own emotions. If someone is sad, it means that someone has something on their mind, and if someone has something on their mind, it means that there are regrets and desires, which can all be used. However, among so many black-robed men, only one person was crying there, and the others turned a blind eye. Lid had to consider whether this was a trap.

So Reed moved closer, but did not talk to her directly. Instead, he observed silently from a distance.

Judging from the crying sound, it was a girl who was not too old, and her height, which was obviously shorter than the other men in black, also proved this. She cried quietly, the others walked quietly, and Lid watched quietly at the side. The whole scene looked very strange.

If no one came to break the deadlock, Reed would probably follow her to the end.

However, at this moment, a man in a black robe walked between Lid and her, blocking Lid intentionally or unintentionally. Lid looked at him, thinking that the man was on guard against him, but he found that he looked at him with a little worry, and even shook his head slightly at him, which seemed to be a reminder to him.

The reminder from the man in black robes made Lid a little confused, but Lid couldn't ask. Because the man in black robes hadn't spoken yet, Lid didn't know what language they were speaking. So far, he had only observed that these people used simple body language to communicate. If Lid opened his mouth and found that the language was not understandable, it would be embarrassing.

Perhaps Lid was lucky. Seeing that Lid was staring at him, the man in black robe consciously slowed down his pace. Lid followed him, and the two gradually left the main group. After confirming that there was no one else around, the man in black robe scolded him:

"You dare to get involved with her, are you going to die?"

Lid didn't know what he was talking about, and he didn't dare to show that he didn't know, so he could only bite the bullet and said: "I hesitated for a long time...but I still feel a little pitiful for her."

After saying that, Lid observed the reaction of the man in black robe, and communicated quickly with the little ghost in his mind. If the other party became suspicious, Lid would take the initiative to kill him.

What Lid didn't expect was that the man in black robe sighed and said with some relief, "I didn't expect you to have such feelings... Don't let the higher-ups know."

Lid replied calmly:

"Yes, I know."

The man in black robe seemed a little angry:

"You don't know! How did Feng Duo die? Didn't he just say a few more words and the higher-ups judged that his evolution was incomplete and he didn't have the qualifications to become a god? If you had talked to her just now, you might have ended up like Feng Duo!"

Lid certainly didn't know who Feng Duo was, but he still said calmly:

"I know. So I was afraid at first, but after thinking it over, I still felt that I couldn't just sit there and do nothing." Lid paused and said:

"Besides, aren't you the same? You stopped me out of sympathy, right?" The man in black robe was speechless for a moment, and after a while he said:

"Because I am the team leader, if anything happens to you, I will also be responsible..."

He explained, and Lid naturally learned that he was a low-level cadre.