Chapter 151: The Master of the Hand.

Inside the gloomy bedchamber of a castle, a black-haired man sitting on the bed suddenly collapsed. Both his hands had been severed by a sword, and crimson blood dripped from the stumps. Half his face looked badly burned, black smoke rising from the charred flesh.

“My King!”

An attendant rushed forward in horror, utterly at a loss as he confronted the injured man.

“Silence!” The black-haired man’s face darkened, his gaze turning glacial. Enduring the pain, he released his dark power. A cloud of black mist enveloped his bleeding wrists, and moments later, new hands grew from the stumps.

Astonishment flashed through the attendant’s eyes. He retreated to the side and stood quietly, no longer daring to disturb his master.

After restoring his hands, the black-haired man touched the right side of his face where the light magic had burned him.

Black mist poured from his fingertips and covered the wounded area. The burns took longer to heal than his severed hands, but eventually, they too disappeared.

The attendant waited silently for quite some time. Only when the black-haired man rose did he dare step forward and remove the bloodstained sheets.

“Saen—”

At the black-haired man’s quiet summons, a cloud of black mist instantly appeared inside the room and condensed into a human figure.

“My King, you summoned me?” The young man called Saen respectfully dropped to one knee and bowed.

Clutching the sheets, the attendant hurried from the king’s bedchamber with his head lowered and carefully shut the door behind him.

Catching the scent of blood in the air, Saen frowned. “My King, who injured you?”

The black-haired man walked to a table beside the fireplace, picked up a bottle, and poured himself a glass of wine. His lips curved into an eerie smile.

“A Little Fairy.”

That Little Fairy had possessed light magic capable of injuring him. He was clearly no ordinary Fairy.

Then again, any Little Fairy who enjoyed the Elven King’s protection was bound to be extraordinary.

“A Little Fairy?” Still kneeling, Saen asked in confusion, “Your power is unrivaled. How could one tiny Fairy possibly injure you?”

The black-haired man took a sip of wine. “This human body can wield only one-tenth of my power.”

Saen gritted his teeth. “If the Light God and the Elven King had not sealed the Gate of Hell, you would never have been confined by a human body.”

Holding his wineglass, the black-haired man returned to the freshly made bed and reclined lazily against the pillows. His eyes narrowed as he regarded the kneeling young man.

“How is the task I assigned you progressing?”

Saen lowered his head apologetically. “Although we breached the royal capital of Pedam, we failed to find the Sword of Ithno.”

The Sword of Ithno was one of the legendary Five Swords. It had originally belonged to the northern Kingdom of Snow. When Princess Anrina married the prince of Pedam, she brought the Sword of Ithno with her, and it subsequently became the symbol of the kingdom.

However, when the Black Knights captured Pedam’s royal capital, they found only the bodies of the king and queen, who had died defending their country. The Sword of Ithno was nowhere to be found. They searched the entire palace without discovering a single trace of it.

The black-haired man mercilessly hurled his wineglass.

It struck Saen in the head and split the skin at his temple. Blood mingled with wine and streamed down his face. Yet Saen remained kneeling with his back perfectly straight, allowing the mixture to soil his collar without moving an inch.

“Please forgive my incompetence, my King,” he said respectfully.

The black-haired man sneered. “It took you more than a decade to conquer one insignificant kingdom, and in the end, you still failed to find the all-important Sword of Ithno. How remarkably capable of you.”

“Please quell your anger, my King... Pedam may be a small kingdom, but Queen Anrina brought many powerful swordsmen and mages with her from the Kingdom of Snow. Their presence was the reason we could not capture the capital sooner,” Saen explained. “However, we have discovered where Pedam’s prince and princess went. Once we find them, we will undoubtedly find the Sword of Ithno as well.”

The black-haired man laughed coldly. “This is the second time I’ve heard that promise.”

Saen lowered his head in shame.

The first time had been fifteen years ago, when Prince Seriu escaped. The Black Knights pursued him all the way into the Faerie Forest and suffered devastating losses.

“I have already waited far too long,” the black-haired man said.

To escape from Hell, he had exploited human greed and initiated a forbidden ritual, ferrying a fragment of his soul from Hell into the Human World and reincarnating in a human body.

That body had restored his freedom, but it also shackled his power and forced him to abide by the rules of the Human World.

If he had been able to deploy his armies from Hell, why would conquering an insignificant kingdom like Pedam have taken more than a decade?

“How are my dear nephew and niece doing now?” the black-haired man asked.

Saen answered immediately, “Prince Seriu is still studying magic and swordsmanship in the Central Court, while Princess Cecile has remained in the Dalia Empire.”

“Has she?” the black-haired man murmured. “If I remember correctly, the Sword of Boshug is in the possession of the empress of Dalia.”

“Yes. The Sword of Boshug was part of Empress Helati’s dowry,” Saen confirmed.

The Sword of Carlos, Sword of Ithno, Sword of Boshug, Sword of Viona, and Sword of Alather were collectively known as the Five Swords of the Austin Continent. Tens of thousands of years ago, the Light God had bestowed those divine magical swords upon humanity.

Although the Five Swords belonged to the forces of light, they were also the keys capable of opening the Gate of Hell. Once all five were gathered, they could cleave the Gate of Hell open and allow darkness to descend upon the Human World once more.

The revered God of Darkness, Miroga Hodeh, had spent ten thousand years trying to break through the seal created by the Light God and the Elven King. At last, he had used a human body to enter the Human World.

As the younger brother of Cecilia’s king, he had launched a coup fifteen years ago, murdered his elder brother, usurped the throne, and taken his place.

Unfortunately, Princess Cecile and Prince Seriu had escaped.

The whereabouts of the Sword of Carlos were also unknown.

The black-haired man—the current king of Cecilia, Danton Trik—yawned and closed his eyes as though settling down for a nap.

“Saen, do not keep me waiting much longer.”

His words were laden with warning and menace.

“Yes, my King!” Saen crossed both hands over his chest and bowed deeply. His body transformed into black smoke and vanished.

Danton Trik lightly tapped his fingers against the pillow.

The power he had once left behind in the Fire God’s temple had actually been destroyed by one tiny Fairy.

Shu Li remained completely unaware that a single sphere of light from him had injured the God of Darkness. At present, he was preoccupied with a different problem.

He was delighted to have found the Fire Spirit. He had even gotten a gluttonous little magical beast as a complimentary bonus.

But how was he supposed to take them outside?

After reuniting with the mother tree, Shu Li briefly recounted his strange experiences inside the underground palace, leaving her astonished.

“I’m so glad you returned safely.”

“Yes. Thanks to the Fire God, not only did I return without incident, but I also found the Fire Spirit.”

Shu Li did not tell the mother tree what the Fire God had revealed to him or about the accident that occurred during his teleportation.

There were still too many uncertainties surrounding the matter. He wanted to return to the Elven Kingdom and personally ask the Elven King for confirmation.

Falm circled several of the roots. “So these are the roots of the Elven mother tree? Incredible! They crossed half the Austin Continent and grew all the way into the Golga Desert.”

The Edas Temple lay hidden nearly a thousand meters underground. In ten thousand years, no adventuring party had ever located it correctly. Yet one Little Fairy had used the Elven mother tree’s root system to travel beneath the ground and reach this place.

After Shu Li finished speaking with the mother tree, the Fire Spirit smiled and greeted her. “Eunomysis, it has been a long time.”

The mother tree shifted one of her roots in response. “Sharo, you disappeared for ten thousand years. So you were inside the Edas Temple all along.”

“Yes. I obeyed the Fire God’s instructions and guarded the temple,” the Fire Spirit replied with a nod.

“I was here too! Don’t forget me!” Falm flapped its batlike wings, determined to emphasize its own importance.

“Falm hasn’t changed at all,” the mother tree remarked, amusement entering her voice.

“That’s right. I’ve always been myself.” Entirely oblivious to the implication behind her words, Falm smugly waved its short, chubby forelegs.

Shu Li coughed lightly twice to draw their attention. “Well...I can enter the space inside the mother tree’s roots, but how are the two of you going to leave?”

Falm flicked its tail. “Isn’t that simple? You have the Fire God’s Mark. We can just go inside.”

Shu Li looked down at the back of his right hand. At his thought, the flame sigil appeared.

“Go inside?”

When Shu Li shrank, the flame sigil shrank with him. The Fire Spirit and Falm were both so large. Where exactly were they supposed to enter?

“Possessing the Fire God’s Mark grants you the power to command us,” the Fire Spirit explained. “Whatever you will to happen can be accomplished.”

Whatever he willed?

Did it work like the teleportation array?

Shu Li silently instructed the Fire Spirit and Falm to enter the Fire God’s Mark.

The moment he finished forming the command in his mind, the flame sigil upon the back of his hand emitted a flash of light, transformed the Fire Spirit and Falm, and drew them both inside.

Shu Li clicked his tongue in amazement.

That...really was convenient!

“Eunomysis, let’s go!”

It was only just past midnight. There was still enough time to sneak into Vanaku and steal Fruit Number Three.

Shu Li beat his wings and slipped into the mother tree’s root system. The root withdrew from the breach in the palace wall.

Suddenly, a tremendous rumble echoed from deep beneath the ground.

“What was that?” Shu Li jumped in alarm.

“The Edas Temple has activated its defensive magic,” the mother tree told him.

Remembering what the Fire Spirit had said, Shu Li relaxed.

“Eunomysis, before we leave, I want to place something at the bottom of the lake.”

So the adventuring party’s journey would not be entirely wasted, Shu Li decided to set aside half the Sunfire Crystals and conceal them at the bottom of the lake. If the white mage was fortunate, he would find them.

It would serve as Shu Li’s thanks for having shown him the way.

After all, without the adventurers, he probably would have struggled to locate the Edas Temple, much less find the Fire Spirit.

The white mage was the only member of the adventuring party whose purpose Shu Li knew. As for what the others wanted, there was nothing he could do about that.

“All right,” the mother tree replied.

After spending some time hiding the Sunfire Crystals beneath the lake, Shu Li traveled through the mother tree’s extensive root system and arrived in Vanaku almost instantly.