Flames and smoke billowed high above the Linax camp as swarms of insects poured inside. Suddenly, several dull, thunderous detonations rumbled through the air—the explosives buried outside in advance had been detonated.
The man in charge of the ritual was sprinting when a sudden ringing filled his skull. He stumbled for several paces and took quite a while to regain his senses before scrambling clumsily toward a military tent. His legs gave out, and he collapsed in front of a cloth-draped idol. After gasping for several breaths, he clambered back to his feet, stepped forward, and carefully took the idol into his arms before slowly walking out.
Though he was slight in build and the idol looked rather heavy, he refused any assistance. Huffing and puffing, stopping and starting, he took nearly ten minutes to reach the ritual site. He set the idol down in the exact center of the designated ground with his own hands, made several minute adjustments, and finally set a jar directly in front of it.
He glanced at his surroundings. Enclosing the idol was a cage-like structure strung together with metal wire and iron plates. Though crude in appearance, it had been laid out according to precise geometric rules, and under the passing gusts of wind, it gave off a chiming, clattering metallic clatter.
By this point, Major Zephiro had stopped badgering him. In fact, the major had no time to spare for what was happening behind him. Stragglers from the insect swarm were breaking through in ever-increasing numbers, and these were merely the vanguard. Dealing with them was already proving extraordinarily difficult; as the main body pressed forward, the situation would only deteriorate.
Realizing things could not continue like this, Major Zephiro immediately triggered the reserve explosives originally meant for later. Amidst the deafening blasts, two squads of Gigaguards shouldering flamethrowers charged out of the camp, advancing beyond the trenches to sweep the surrounding insects with jets of fire, halting the swarm's advance for a brief moment.
Seizing this window of opportunity, the soldiers promptly poured fuel over the masses of insects choking the trenches and set them ablaze again while speeding up the cleanup inside the camp. Through these measures, the immediate crisis was temporarily eased.
In the rear, the slight ritual director paid no heed to any of this. Instead, he walked over to the young girl, Serafina, and whispered a few words to her. The girl walked up to the idol and knelt before it.
Following the strict tenets of the ritual, the director began lighting the braziers atop the ritual stakes. The laborers nearby had wanted to flee, but he forced them to remain, plunging them into severe unease.
When the last brazier was lit, the sky—which had still been relatively bright—suddenly dimmed. The surrounding gunfire, roars, and the crackle of burning flames seemed to vanish in an instant, plunging the laborers into even deeper terror.
The director took a few steps back, gazing at the idol in the center. The ritual had begun; whatever happened next was beyond his control. All he could do now was wait.
His heart was equally fraught with anxiety. This ritual borrowed elements from the First People's prayer ceremonies. Although several trials back home had proven it viable, those tests had been conducted under ideal conditions with ample preparations. Hastily performing it out in the wilderness left the outcome entirely uncertain.
Taking advantage of a brief lull, Major Zephiro glanced back. Seeing the braziers lit, he thought to himself, *Has it finally begun?* If it succeeded, their expedition would not be in vain.
The entire Linax delegation, including himself, had known from the very beginning that seizing a relic relying solely on their own strength was impossible. Even if they managed to lay hands on it, they would never be able to transport it away.
Therefore, they needed a decisive power—one that could both guarantee they secured the prize and ensure they brought it back safely.
This ritual was the key.
With the collision of the two worlds, they had come into contact with numerous entities from the opposite side. Aside from hostile ones, there were also entities with which their world had maintained long-standing connections and even cooperation.
One of these entities was quite unique. It could serve as a repository for power, and that power could, during a specific window of time, be transferred and channeled to a designated recipient. Naturally, the entity would claim the vast majority of it for itself, releasing only a tiny fraction. Those absorbed energies served as its compensation.
Furthermore, objects possessing anomalous power could also be temporarily entrusted to and stored with this entity, to be retrieved at an appropriate time. Of course, this too came at a price—sometimes, an item could not be retrieved even after paying the toll—and on top of that, the ritual's failure rate was exceptionally high.
Even so, they had decided to go through with it, because success promised returns far exceeding the cost.
Earlier, a dying martial artist in the Linax Federation had entrusted his spirit to this entity. Through ritual communion, the entity would transmit a portion of that martial artist's power into a chosen host.
Even though the entity would undoubtedly swallow most of that strength, leaving only a meager remnant for them, it remained the power of a martial artist nonetheless. So long as it could be unleashed, no one below the limit could withstand it, which would allow them to seize the relic.
At that moment, the twintailed girl suddenly opened her arms. Her eyes radiated light, and the metal coils around the idol began to glow faintly. The suspended iron plates vibrated violently, chiming with an increasingly dense, crisp cadence.
A transmission of power required a fixed anchor. It necessitated an intermediary who had previously made contact with the entity and could endure the concentrated focus of its spiritual power to guide it. Without this process, conducting the ritual would yield nothing at all.
And the girl was currently serving as that very conduit.
The ritual progressed, while the insects surging in from outside grew more numerous. The Gigaguards holding the outermost line were beginning to falter. The insects scrambled onto their bodies one after another, rapidly blanketing them until they looked like men made of writhing bugs.
As more insects piled onto them, the guards grew heavier and heavier until they finally collapsed under the crushing weight. Moments later, the flamethrowers on their backs detonated with deafening booms, turning each fallen soldier into a persistent fireball on the spot.
This was not an isolated incident; similar scenes unfolded across several sectors.
Major Zephiro's face turned grim. In just this short span, more than ten Gigaguards had fallen in the front line. Out of the thirty or so they had brought on this expedition, they could hold out for ten more minutes at most. Yet there was nothing he could do now except wait—wait for the ritual to take effect.
Several minutes later, a subtle transformation began to overtake the wooden idol at the center of the ritual. Though carved from wood, it now took on the uncanny appearance of living flesh and blood. Beneath the half-covering drape of cloth, a grotesque, unsettling smile seemed to emerge upon its face, sending a chill down the spines of everyone who saw it.
After another brief pause, a strange, muffled noise echoed from within the idol's body. As everyone stared wide-eyed, the idol suddenly opened its mouth and, like someone vomiting, spewed a torrential gush of glowing, greenish-yellow liquid. Within moments, the jar below was completely filled, the viscous fluid slopping over its rim.
An instantly nauseating, stifling stench filled the air. At the very same moment, every person present heard a bizarre, rustling noise—a sound that seemed to come from inside their own bodies, as if countless tiny things were crawling under their flesh, bringing acute, maddening discomfort.
Yet with the emergence of this glowing fluid, the surrounding area abruptly fell silent. It took several moments for everyone to realize that the insects had stopped breaching the camp entirely.
Major Zephiro's spirits lifted. He strode outside to take a look and found the camp standing like an isolated reef in the sea, the swarm parting and flowing around it on all sides. He let out a breath of relief, walked up to the director, and asked, "Did it succeed?"
The director shook his head. "I don't know." He quickly added, "Someone must drink the divine water to confirm."
With a wave of Major Zephiro's hand, two soldiers dragged forward a prisoner weighed down by heavy fetters. This was a scout from the former imperial house whom they had captured along their march. He was an experienced fighter who had cost them considerable effort to subdue, making him the ideal subject for this test.
The soldiers wrenched his head back and pried open his jaws, forcing his mouth wide open.
The director took a spoon, scooped up a portion of the liquid, and poured it down the scout's throat. After waiting for a moment, the scout suddenly went into violent convulsions, choked gasps and groans tearing from his throat. His flesh grew scalding hot, prompting the soldiers to immediately release him.
Clutching at his throat, the scout collapsed to the ground, writhing in agony. In mere moments, steam began rising from all over his body, and his flesh seemed to be melting at terrifying speed. After several minutes of muffled, agonizing screams, he dissolved into an unrecognizable pool of gelatinous matter.
Major Zephiro frowned. "What happened?"
The director sighed. "It failed." He offered a bitter smile. "Our preparation time was simply too short."
Major Zephiro cursed under his breath. Once a ritual like this failed, it could not be performed a second time; that power was destined to be swallowed whole by the entity.
Still, at the very least, the insects were no longer invading the camp. That had been another reason he insisted on carrying out the ritual: even if it failed, invoking the power of the entity from the opposite side would still temporarily deter the swarm and preserve the camp.
He surveyed his surroundings, exhaled slowly, and said, "Leave it as it is for now, then."
For now, the only choice was to wait out the insect quicksand before trying to gather news on Major General Therbil's side.
He turned on his heel and walked away without looking back.
However, he failed to notice that after he departed, an eerie expression spread across the face of the twintailed girl kneeling with her back turned—an expression bearing an uncanny resemblance to the grotesque smile seen on the idol moments before.
Chapter 749