above the ring

Chapter 5 The Secret of the Study Cave

(PS: A small part of the content of this chapter has been revised. The lineup of the ancient faders has replaced the pure purple blood finger with the white wolf war ghost. For details, refer to Note 3.)
"Fade."

The sound of this call, from far to near, was accompanied by bursts of long ringing bells, and the almost inaudible sound of water flowing.

In front of his eyes, several phantoms gradually appeared in the mist.

It's completely different from looking up and down, and it's completely different from the experience in the game.

At this moment, Lear felt as if he had stepped into another realm, as if he was experiencing the illusion of fog.

"Oh, wake up, fader."

The calling voice gradually became clearer.

"The dead who still can't sleep forever!"

Together with that sound, the shouts of the soldiers were singing, and the music gradually became louder.

"The blessing we lost a long time ago is calling out!"

In the misty mist, phantoms emerged one after another, and scenes of magnificent pictures appeared in front of Lear.

Those are the warriors who have made great achievements in battle, and those are the faded people who were expelled. They were all heroes.

"He Lai Lu, the king of the wild land!"

"Glory, Prayer of the Golden Law!" (Note 1)

"Vic, Knights of the Round Table!" (Note 2)

"Bagram, White Wolf War Ghost!" (Note 3)

"Gideon Offnell, Ser Baizhi!"

The voice chanted everyone's name, and the appearance of each person's name was accompanied by a picture of the most perfect version in front of Lear, as if experiencing that heroic epic time.

Lear had heard similar chanting in the game's first feature film, when it was about the best of the era's faders, but now, Lear heard names he hadn't heard, In other words, it is a character name that is different from those familiar names.

They, who used to be heroes, were recorded by the thick fog and remained here, waiting for the faded ones to see their former demeanor.

Gradually, the call faded away, the illusion formed by the mist dissipated, and the beam of light from the blessing point appeared in front of Lear's eyes, as if the clouds were clearing the clouds to see the sun.

He walked forward, came to the edge of the blessing point, touched Xiang to get the beam of light.

The blessed spot in the dream has half the warmth of the bonfire. In that warm light, Lear gained a very special feeling.

It seemed to be heard, and it seemed to be seen, the blessed beam of light turned into shining light spots and surrounded Lear, hoping that he would move towards a certain place, and outlined the scene where the next blessing point would be in his mind .

It turns out that this is the guidance of blessing.

The blessing point has no name, and the blessing will only guide Lear to a specific scene.

From this point of blessing, what Lear saw was the scene of the city of Stonewell in the distance under the golden leaves all over the sky.

In my memory, it was the first blessing point that came out of the drifting tomb, the gatekeeper boss "Big Tree Guard" who dissuaded countless people, just under the hillside of the blessing point, in front of the Church of Airey.

That was the first powerful boss that the fledgling Fader encountered. Lear remembered clearly that it was because this boss stuck with Old Feng for a long time. It seemed that he had fought for more than seven hours and passed after more than 200 attempts. .

By the way, the first big tree guard boss, Lear, was fought twice. Compared with the Erlian big tree guard and the dragon-suited big tree guard we met later in Wangcheng, this boss is really weak.

But now he is not thinking about the big tree guards. He has to walk through this study cave first. There is no upward path here, only a single opening leading to the depths of the cave.

After touching the blessing point, Lear turned around, untied the shield from behind, tied it to his left hand, and walked forward.

He didn't draw out his straight sword, and Lear trusted his shield more than the weapon in his hand.

This iron-shaped shield with the "block" of battle dust attached is Lear's greatest reliance. With it, Lear is not afraid of all opponents.

Walking into the cave, the first thing Lear saw were the dignitaries of Stonewell City, and those old and weak servants surrounding the dignitaries.

The clothes on these dignitaries were dull yellow. They simply held a cane and stared blankly at the top of the cave, while more dignitaries were leaning cross-legged against the wall, skinny and weak.

This is probably the case for the powerful in this world. In the face of force, the guys in Yurou Township who used to hold power are not much different from those dead monsters on the road.

The old servants around them were no different from theirs, they were just as skinny and weak.

Those who are still alive are not willing to become those dead people who cannot "return to the tree", but they are also unwilling to bear the pain caused by prayer, magic and physical skill training, so they can only find a small corner in the dying years , lingering on.

Most of the people who come to the study cave are like this. The faded people who returned from the border have already abandoned this place for many years. Just be safe.

The rich and powerful who are struggling to survive will not be attacked by monsters, and because of the mutation of the golden law, they cannot die without being hurt by others, and naturally they cannot live like human beings. They can only endure hunger and loneliness, and spend time here. lifelong.

These are the rich and powerful in the study cave. In this world where the jungle preys on the weak, their situation is just the epitome of countless tragedies.

There are people who suffer more than them.

Lear didn't care about those dignitaries who looked alive but seemed to be dead, he stepped on the puddles on the ground, passed them, and walked all the way inside.

Along the way, Lear could see many things that did not belong to Stonewell City, such as the flag of the royal city of Rodel, the magic traces of the royal family of Kalia, and the red soil of Galid. These distinctive things are in the cave. Everywhere in the depths.

In the tunnel, torches would appear at intervals, and together with the torches, apart from the powerful monsters who were too thin to wield long swords, there were some books that had already accumulated dust on wooden boxes.

The outer covers of these books are written with basic combat skills, basic magic perception, etc., and further inside, there are some books that describe the records of the fighters of the faded ones returning to the junction. .

This used to be the base camp of the faded ones. It was probably transformed and used to awaken the fighting talents of the descendants of the king's warriors among the faded ones. It should have been abandoned long ago and was used by the soldiers of Stonewell City. and the dignitaries occupy it.

The deeper the cave, the more traces of the faded person, the fewer the rich and powerful, and more green plants in the depths of the cave.

These green plants tend to be ferns, yellow-green, and don't look like normal lawns. There is no sunlight in the cave, and the germination and rooting of these plants all rely on the power of the golden tree roots close to here.

On the edge of the study cave is the famous "Border Hero Cemetery" - this is the southernmost large cemetery in the border area, and it is the only hero cemetery in Ningmgfu that has been blessed by the Golden Tree. The Golden Tree The root of the tree is buried under this hero's cemetery.

In the Ningmgfu area, there are many cemeteries and tombs, but this one is the only one that can be called the cemetery of heroes.

Decades ago, at the beginning of the War of Shards, the mutation of the golden tree started from the core of the royal city, and had not yet reached the border. Er, and the round table hall in the inner world established by "Knights of the Round Table" Vic has not yet taken shape, and the descendants of warriors who have been summoned by the guidance, obey the call of the "Knights of the Round Table" and use this as the base of the Faded Ones.

Compared with He Lai Lu, the "King of the Beginning" who hadn't shown up for a long time, at that time, the "Knight of the Round Table" Vic, who led the descendants of the faded warriors back, was more outstanding in terms of strength and prestige. Perhaps, this is why he Once hailed as "the fader closest to King Elden".

Of course, Vic, who later became "Burning Fingers", is no longer the famous "Knight of the Round Table" back then.

As Lear stepped into the cave, gradually, there were more and more Grek soldiers dressed in red and green.

Glowing plants replaced the effect of torches, and the tunnel lost the warmth and light of the flames, making it even colder and damper.

Lear didn't really want to confront them. After all, everyone was a human being of about the same height, and he could be stabbed one after another without any pressure in the game, but he was still a little uncomfortable with such a real dream.

So, Lear missed the Grek soldier suit that he had just obtained but suddenly disappeared by himself.

A miraculous thing happened, Lear felt as if he had communicated into a magical space, in this space all the equipment he had obtained before were quietly stacked there, he only felt that he could manifest these equipments to the world with just one thought. reality, and then put it on like changing clothes.

It's probably like in a game, after pressing the esc key, click on the one-key change function in the equipment bar, which saves the steps of taking off and putting on.

This feeling was new to Lear, he tried several times, and finally became familiar with this process.

This process is very simple to talk about, but Lear always feels like there is a delay. It is probably the same as in the game process. Players can change equipment at any time, even in battle, but it is limited by hand speed and equipment. Generally speaking, players would not do such silly operations.

After all, the character will not move when changing clothes, and it is easy to be attacked by bosses or monsters during this period.

Lear changed into a red and green soldier uniform, with a straight sword in his waist and a shield tied to his left hand, and walked slowly in the cave.

Sure enough, none of the soldiers cared about him. Even if they saw Lear, they just looked at him and did not move.

In the quiet and dead underground cave, no one would simply ask a colleague to do something.

For these soldiers, except for those who are loyal to the powerful, the rest are already thinking about the treasures of the powerful.

Of course, for them, the most common currency is probably the little gold runes.

In the library at the bottom of the cave, "Rune" is mentioned.

There were surrounded by soldiers, but there was a dignitary who was different from others in the corner of the library, holding a book in his hand, reading aloud.

Lear stopped and listened carefully to his voice.

"Rune, an item with the greatest effect in the junction, is not only a currency that is used around the world, but also a source of power to strengthen oneself and strengthen the soul. The rise of powerful species such as humans is inseparable from rune."

He was reciting the lore of runes.

The knowledge about rune is probably one of the most basic knowledge in the borderland. It may be that this powerful man is already so boring that he squatted in the corner and chanted these words.

"Rune is an unstable substance that will follow the souls and bodies of nearby living beings in granular form, and attach to the body of life. Under the interaction of biological original forces such as vitality, a powerful force is born, but this The interaction is not that runes are absorbed by life, but a state of mutual benefit and symbiosis, once the living body dies, the runes will gather to the nearest living body around."

That's right, it is precisely because of this characteristic that the powerful beings at the junction will kill indiscriminately, plundering and absorbing the runes that exist in the living bodies in the world to strengthen themselves.

However, rune enhancements come at a price.

In the borderlands, using runes to strengthen one's own strength is a method that has existed since ancient times, but not all methods can effectively use runes. If you do not master the corresponding methods, then there may be a large number of In the case of Rune escaping, he would even be driven into a lunatic by the sudden increase in strength, turning into a beast that only knew how to kill and devour flesh and blood.

And at the junction, the only one who has the correct and effective rune enhancement method is the "finger witch" who serves the finger.

The source of witches' method is the "supreme will" served by the finger.

Under Finger's teaching, the Finger Witches seem to be born to learn this method easily, but they have been given a silent order and cannot teach the method of rune strengthening at will. Therefore, all the runes looted by the faders must come to In front of the witch, use the power of the witch to complete the enhancement.

After the rune is absorbed into the living body and used for strengthening, it will accumulate in the skull of the living body, that is, in the brain, and fuse with the soul of the living body. When the amount of rune ingested reaches a certain level, it will It is compressed in the skull to form eye-shaped beads. This bead is called the condensation product of Rune. When this living body "returns to the tree" and dies, it will turn into "eyes". Eyes", now, people call this "eyes" "Golden Rune".

The latter is the information Lear got in the game. When the dignitary recited the information about runes, some knowledge about runes involuntarily appeared in his mind.

"It's interesting to say that runes are like eyeballs. Maybe the Supreme Will is a Cthulhu mythological creature composed of eyeballs, and the substance called 'Bumping Fire' is also lodged in the eyeballs. of."

Thinking of this, Lear shook his head.

Hey, it's better to think less about useless things.

Suddenly, Lear heard the voice of the nobleman chanting again, and this voice made him extremely interested.

"In the beginning, we just researched how not to become dead people, but we failed. We became the long-lived people we dreamed of before, but we have long been unable to eat, nor can we exercise all the abilities of being human. In the midst of hunger and loneliness, we found a way to heal ourselves that day, we found an interesting thing, which is said to be a forbidden technique that was born from the "melting furnace hundred phases" of Lao Shizi, forbidden technique, forbidden technique."

"What's the name of this forbidden technique?"

Lear leaned over and asked softly.

He spoke Chinese, and he didn't know if the other party could understand his own words, but when he heard what the powerful man said, he couldn't help asking.

"The name of this forbidden technique is 'attaching limbs'."

The dignitary seemed to be able to understand his own words, or maybe it was his soliloquy after a nervous breakdown, because he continued to say: "Through the forbidden technique of 'attaching limbs', the limbs of the dead corpse can be attached to the body of the dead body." Although the process is extremely painful on my own body, once I succeed, I will gain unparalleled strength."

"We thought we had found a way to fight death and death, because this forbidden technique was the power used by frontier heroes, but in fact, we gave birth to a demon. Grek, in order to revive the royal family in his mouth, for Defeating those terrible enemies who have defeated us, he led his guard and became even more terrible demons"

After that, the rich man started to repeat the machine, repeating the last sentence repeatedly.

Lear stood up, and in order to avoid being suspected by other soldiers, he left in a hurry.

Walking to the depths of the cave again, Lear's heart became more and more clear.

He realized more clearly the difference between this dream and the game.

But he still shook his head. He felt that this should be some speculation of his own while playing the game. He had also seen the explanations of the big guys who dug into the details in the post bar, and there were many similar plot analysis videos. So, up to now, Lear still feels that these are just some of his thoughts expressed in a dream through the mouth of a mob who looks like an NPC.

Whether it is true or not, the final truth can only be revealed when he meets Greg.

Going further in, Lear couldn't find any more clues.

When he passed through a large puddle, he ran into a soldier of Greck, who was different from the soldiers in front of him. He kept silent all the time, but rushed towards Lear with his sword in both hands.

After two simple and quick rebounds, Lear knocked the opponent down to the ground.

However, it didn't take long before he got up by himself again, and rushed towards Lear again like a normal person.

"Puppet? Or, the Deadborn?"

After defeating the soldier again, Lear saw the metal skeleton under the soldier's red and green armor.

is a puppet.

Lear breathed a sigh of relief, pulled out his straight sword and pierced through his drive core, however, something unexpected happened.

Blood spurted out and splashed the puddles.

Lear thought of something, took a deep breath, and lifted the soldier's helmet with his straight sword, and then he saw an extremely ferocious face.

This is a living person, a living dead person, a puppet made of living people.

Just like when he killed the "attached" nobleman before, Lear didn't feel any discomfort, but he knew that he might have to hug the toilet again tomorrow morning.

At this time, a silver-white beam of light appeared in the middle of the puddle.

Lear leaned over and touched it as if touching a blessing.

The fog obscured his vision, and after a few seconds, the fog dissipated, and Lear saw the golden tree bud emitting a golden shimmer again.

"Okay, this is passed back."

PS: The following is a large section of notes~
Note 1: The "Golden Mask of Radiance" is replaced here.The law prayers represented by the golden mask should be the defenders of the golden law. Generally speaking, the great men in this group will not have specific names, so they will be called by pronouns. For example, the prayer teacher Colin calls " "Guangyao Golden Mask" is "Mr. Golden Mask". Here I think Guangyao should be an inherited ancestral name, because no one in the branch line of the Golden Mask has mentioned the word "Guangyao", so here I made up the title myself. Glory" is the beginning.

Note 2: "Dead Sleeping Maiden Faiya" is replaced here.Death Sleeping Girl Fia is a character who joined the Fade Force a few years before the arrival of the protagonist, and although she also came from outside the border, her purpose is completely different from that of the Fade. She came for the dead prince Godwin. I mentioned this incident with the protagonist in my own branch, so it should not be counted as the original "warrior" descendant.

Putting "Knights of the Round Table" Vic here is first of all because Vic is known as "the faded one who is closest to the king". ", and the main reason is that there is a "Round Table Hall" in the royal city of Rodel that has the same structure as the Great Blessing Area. I think the "Round Table Knights" should be an organization, and Vic is an early member of the Round Table Knights. A powerful knight, so I don't think it's a big problem to put it here.

In addition, the "Burning Fingerprint" Vic we will meet during the game, and the "Fingerprint Suit" obtained by defeating him are all Vic's appearance after being bestowed with fire. The Fingerprint should refer to the three-finger The trace left by the "hug of fire".

Note 3: "The despised snow eater" is replaced here.Judging from the branch line of the Snow Eater, he is not a faded fighter from the line of fighters who were expelled the first time, and with the character of Mieluosi (the original name of the Snow Eater), it is impossible to follow the "prime king" Ge Fulei.

Originally, I didn’t advance the branch line of the Volcano Mansion. I ignored the branch line of the little maid Raya. I didn’t get the white wolf battle ghost set. I didn’t know the faded hero Bagram until I got this set in the second week. By the way, the white wolf set is really handsome~
There are two reasons for writing this here, first, Bagram was the first Faded to return to the Junction, and was one of the founders of the Hall of the Round Table, of whom I think there are known "White Wolf War Ghost" Bagram and his exclusive stray magician, the "Knight of the Round Table" Vic who appeared later must also be related to the Hall of the Round Table, and then "Sir Baizhi" Gideon, and in the textual research During the White Wolf War Ghost, I found out that the suit worn by the protagonist in the previous promotional video of the Ring of Law is the "White Wolf War Ghost" suit. The official should use this faded hero as the protagonist, so it is more reasonable to put it here.

Remarks: Old readers should know that the character I put here before is "Pure Purple Blood Finger" Eleonora. I have explained to her, but I found that if I continue to advance the plot, I should meet her again, so I delete it here The notes related to Eleonora will be put in the back and the answer will be given from the plot.

(End of this chapter)