Azure Scepter

Page 63

P.S.: Sorry for the long wait QWQ, I sent a red envelope to express my apology.

Chapter 124 Oris

"boom."

The boots crushed the translucent plague maggots, sending blood and dust flying everywhere.

"So, Oris really going to kill you?" Fythia stared intently at Hult, her fingernails turning white from the pressure. "Do you humans really enjoy fighting amongst yourselves?"

Noi glanced at Futia, then at the extremely disheveled Hult, and then gently translated, "Hult, please don't be nervous. Elves aren't very good at expressing themselves tactfully. She just wants you to explain why you're wanted. After all, Oris is a paladin, and he should be quite reliable in theory."

“I don’t know!” Hult’s face was scarred from torture. “After leaving Beaver Town, I contacted the Princess as soon as you asked and reported everything exactly as it happened! Then, Oris suddenly declared me a traitor and a demon worshipper and wanted to cut off my head!”

"Did you miss some details? For example, did you meet that hypocritical bishop before?" Fauci frowned suspiciously.

"She asked you if you had met with Bishop Vercingetorius beforehand," Neu translated verbatim.

“It couldn’t have been Bishop Vercingetorie who framed me; he’s a respectable and good man.” Hult shook his head with absolute certainty. “In fact, by the grace of the heavens, I owe my escape from death to him! Lady Feudia, please don’t slander this respectable and good man.”

"He...a good person?" Futia blinked, her clenched left fist turning even whiter. "He desecrated my sister's corpse..."

“Ahem.” Trier’s cough interrupted Futia’s anger. “Let me ask you—Hult, please give a brief account of what happened to you after you met Princess Edith, starting from that night.”

Fythia took a deep breath, then sighed sharply. Her pointed ears twitched unnaturally from her anger. The elf rubbed her forehead hard, then fell silent and said nothing more.

Hult looked ahead nervously: "Your Excellency Trier, there are infantry units ahead. They might be here to arrest me!"

“In addition to the infantry units that serve as fixed outposts, there are actually more than 20 hidden sentries spread out in a fan shape in the woods to our right front,” Trier explained. “Don’t worry, they pose no threat.”

Trier's voice was calm and even, but the steadiness in his syllables gradually calmed Hult's emotions.

“After my audience with His Highness Edith, I went to sleep. I was so scared that I couldn’t sleep,” Hult tried to recall. “Then the next morning, I had breakfast with the cook and planned to visit Sergeant Pot-Kui—he’s been staying in the lower city just in case.”

“A wise choice, and then what?” Trier encouraged.

"Around noon, Oris returned with the infantry of the investigation team, and they all looked to be wounded. After Oris returned, he publicly convened a meeting of the investigation team. I was not qualified to attend, so I stayed in the guest room of the castle to pass the time—near the afternoon, several guards suddenly arrested me!"

“I was given a severe beating and then taken to Oris.” Hult began to tremble, and Trier noticed that the young soldier’s pupils were somewhat dilated with pain. “He…he greeted me first, then ordered the guards to release me, and then suddenly, as if he had been electrocuted, he began to tremble violently, then his movements became very stiff, and then he began to talk to someone who wasn’t even in the air, after saying a lot of things I couldn’t understand at all, he suddenly declared me a traitor—oh right, he claimed to have received a revelation from the radiance…”

Upon hearing this, Trier noticed that Hult suddenly fell silent—Hult had glanced at him cautiously.

Back in Beavertown, Trier, in an attempt to conceal his sudden surge of knowledge, claimed to have received a radiant revelation...

The time traveler couldn't help but think to himself: If Oris wasn't lying, the style of the Radiant Revelation was truly bizarre. The Oris who had truly received the revelation didn't look like a legendary paladin; he looked more like a shaman performing rituals in a primitive tribe, or an unlucky fellow possessed by an evil spirit...

“Fodia, has Oris ever had these strange symptoms before?” Trier asked, turning his head to the side.

Futia blinked, her eyes filled with confusion: "How could that be? Do all you human paladins receive divine revelation?"

“He doesn’t seem to have divine revelation, he seems to have epilepsy.” Trier told a lame joke, but no one laughed except for Fythia.

“Hmm…” Futia rested her fair chin on her left hand and pondered for a moment, “But speaking of which, when I was in the capital of the Kingdom of Orco, I seemed to have heard some rumors about Oris.”

"It is said that Oris was once just an unknown mercenary knight, or more politely, the Hedge Knight. Twenty-one years ago, the year I was born, the border Count of Cedar Castle in the Kingdom of Orco clashed with the orcs in the deep mountains, and Oris joined the Cedar Castle Count's army as a mercenary knight."

"How do you know so much about these obscure historical facts?" Noy asked, tilting his head.

“I’m the military attaché at the Elven Embassy,” Faldia explained casually. “Gathering this information is part of my job.”

"To get back to the point, due to its overly aggressive strategy, Earl of Chesswood's army was quickly brought to the brink of collapse by the orcs' relentless ambushes and harassment. According to later survivors, Oris fled into the forest out of fear of death before the army's defeat, and when he emerged again, he was wearing a gleaming emerald green plate armor, antlers like those of a deer grew from his helmet, and his skin was stained with a rough texture like that of pine trees."

—Auris is a holy knight who swore an oath to the ancients. Trier thought to himself.

According to the game "Azure Scepter", the Oath of the Ancients is a vow of paladins. Paladins who take this oath emphasize goodness more than lawfulness, and they generally strive to defend life and light in the world.

Paladins who have sworn an oath to the ancients can temporarily become the embodiment of ancient natural forces upon reaching level 20; this ability is known as "Ancient Warrior." When actively using the "Ancient Warrior" ability, the physical characteristics of the Paladin who swore an oath to the ancients will undergo temporary natural changes, and they will gain extremely exaggerated life regeneration effects and enhanced divine magical abilities.

"The returning Oris seemed to be divinely inspired. He publicly declared that he was inspired by the radiance. After the death of the Earl of Cedarburg, he bravely rallied a small number of the remaining troops and, on the fourth day after the human army's defeat, launched a counterattack against the orcs. He ultimately succeeded in beheading six orc military commanders and thwarted the orcs' counter-offensive and plundering plans."

"According to the survivors of Cedar Castle, before each major battle, Oris would mutter to himself and convulse uncontrollably as if struck by a chain of lightning—although I never saw him lose his mind when I was with the Kingdom's survey team..."

At this point, Fythia looked at Trier: "Trier, based on your experience, is this really what divine revelation would do?"

Chapter 125 Mutation

"Trier, based on your experience, is this really what divine revelation means?"

The time traveler simply smiled and did not answer—he didn't know what divine revelation felt like either, and he claimed that his divine revelation was merely a temporary measure.

According to the rumors recounted by Fythia, there is a certain probability that Oris, as a legendary paladin, was indeed guided by a god of the Radiant pantheon. If we consider it from a darker perspective, Trier even suspects that this renowned legendary paladin may not have any autonomy at all, and Oris may simply be a puppet of some being.

In the original history, Oris's role in the Undead Crisis was far from glorious.

According to some researchers, although the Kingdom of Orco had already become aware of the plague outbreak at least a month before it occurred and had formed an investigation team, Oris, the actual leader of the team, squandered this hard-won advantage.

Under Oris's command, the investigation team acted slowly before the crisis broke out, became disoriented during the crisis, and when the plague had progressed to an irreversible point, Oris, as a paladin, decisively refused to take on any responsibility and chose to leave, leaving behind only chaos.

"He doesn't care before things happen, he messes around when things happen, and he runs away after things happen. This is the legendary paladin Oris who received divine revelation," Trier thought to himself.

After the Kingdom of Orko was utterly destroyed, Oris joined the expedition against the Lich as part of the expeditionary force. Throughout the nearly one hundred years of historical changes in the game, this paladin who deserted his post remained in a high position, unshaken. Even in the version where the Azure Laws shattered, the gods were forced to traverse the Material Plane, and countless lives were lost, the elderly Oris still managed to survive.

In a forum poll to determine the most hated character, Oris came in third place, and Trier also voted for him—counting the game's timeline, countless players have tried to kill this annoying old man over the past century, but thanks to his catfish-like agile and slippery escape skills, he always manages to escape.

"Your Excellency Trier! They're here!" Hult's trembling voice interrupted Trier's recollection.

Looking up, Trier saw the knight approaching.

The middle-aged man looked tired with puffy eyes, but his dull, gray eyes held a cold, insightful quality, like a gleamless dagger.

Behind the middle-aged knight was another young man, followed by some crossbow-wielding sentries who no longer concealed their presence, and about five or six fully armed cavalrymen and attendants.

Trier did not draw his weapon; he simply looked up and met the gaze of the middle-aged knight.

"Stop!" When he was ten paces away from the hanged corpse, the middle-aged knight gently pulled the reins, and the armored warhorse suddenly reared up and stopped. Amidst the neighing of the warhorse, the middle-aged knight jumped off the horse.

Trier noticed that the other person first glanced at the hanging corpse at the front, then looked at Futia at the back of the group, and finally turned to face him—the middle-aged knight did not make eye contact with him the entire time.

“Lord Trill.” The middle-aged knight bowed his head respectfully and gave a standard knightly salute with his lance. “May your spirit shine as brightly in the Dream Realm as it has ever been, just as the edge of our longsword remains sharp.”

Any spellcasting that does not rely on rituals and storage stones requires the spirit as a medium to manipulate the dream realm. Therefore, "the spirit shines in the dream realm" is generally used as a greeting between spellcasters, and this obscure code usually only circulates among a small number of high-level spellcasters.

Trier remained unmoved.

Since the middle-aged knight was wearing heavy armor that hindered spellcasting, he was unlikely to be a mage. Therefore, logically speaking, he could not have known this extremely obscure code word on his own.

Therefore, someone must have told him the code. Considering that the other party knew him, a reasonable deduction is that this middle-aged knight was an old friend from his childhood and knew his secret of being a mage.

If the other party is an old friend, and they don't say it directly but choose to use coded language, then it's easy to deduce that they are testing you—testing whether you are still in a state of amnesia.

However, it is still difficult to judge whether the other party's attitude is friendly or not at present.

Trier disliked inefficient probing and beating around the bush, so he replied directly, "I've recovered most of my memories, stop beating around the bush."

"You have amnesia?!" Futia's surprised voice came from behind.

“Yes.” Trier readily admitted, without turning around, “I do have some hazy memories of many things from the past, but after divine revelation I remembered many things.”

At this moment, another young man behind the middle-aged knight also jumped off his horse. Trier glanced at him casually and couldn't help but frown.

The boy's eyes darted around, his face was deathly pale, and there were obvious bloodstains on his neck, as if he had been strangled with wire. Several heavily armed soldiers subtly surrounded the boy, who seemed to be under duress.

The middle-aged knight in front of them was no benevolent person. His ability to subdue and coerce another knight silently meant that he likely had high-ranking wanderers under his command.

With this thought in mind, he commanded the hanging corpse to be on high alert for the shadows that might allow the wanderers to pass through.

“As you wish, great Trier, I dare not go around in circles any longer.” The middle-aged knight still kept his head down. “I think that now that you have regained most of your memories, you should remember that you are still in a state of exile by the Duke. According to the decree of stripping you of your public rights signed by the Duke in the Year of the Fallen Leaves, from a legal point of view, you have been stripped of all inheritance rights and are forbidden from approaching any city.”

"So I'm a fugitive now?" Trier asked with a smile, glancing at Hult beside him, who was also wanted by the authorities.

The middle-aged knight raised his head, his eyes, which had seemed clouded with dust, suddenly brightened: "I think this law is unfair, and everyone thinks so."

"Who are you referring to, 'everyone'?" Trier asked bluntly.

The middle-aged knight glanced at Fytia without any attempt to conceal his feelings, then looked at Noy: "People who are different from the Kingdom's Survey Team, people who truly possess honor, for example, the relatives of the noble Lady Noy."

“I am a monk who has sworn an oath; worldly blood ties are no longer with me.” Noy tilted his head innocently, then blinked. “Nordman, in the name of Radiance, you shouldn’t be spouting riddles anymore. What exactly are you trying to say?”

“Forgive my presumption.” The middle-aged knight Nordman turned his gaze to the side. “Lord Trier, before you meet those arrogant members of the Kingdom’s Survey Team, you should first meet your true supporters.”

"Nonsense!" Futia suddenly leaped past Trier, her speed startling even him. Her fingers rested on the hilt of her scimitar. "Human, watch your words! Princess Edith is far from arrogant!"

This is a battle between the arrogant and the riddle-maker. Trier thought to himself.

The middle-aged knight remained unfazed and calmly retorted, "Since you're referring to humans, I think you, an elf, have little say in this human land. As far as I know, you're a military attaché at the elven embassy, ​​and it's understandable that your remarks on these topics might be tinged with racial prejudice."

Fythia froze, her deep blue eyes slowly lowering before she quickly asked, "Are you from Vercingetorie?"

“I am loyal to the Duchy.” Nordmann spread his hands.

Fythia narrowed her eyes and threatened in a cold voice, "Then take us to see the Princess, immediately."

"It's none of your business, you elf, to tell me what to do." The middle-aged knight also narrowed his eyes. "Whom to see is up to Trier."

Trier's mind raced. As the conversation grew increasingly heated, his weighing of the pros and cons and consideration of various situations became more and more refined. Just as he was about to speak, a green flash suddenly streaked across the corner of his eye.

A sudden change has occurred!

The handsome young man, surrounded by heavily armed soldiers, suddenly sprang up and plunged the dagger at his waist into the neck of one of the soldiers next to him. The movement was swift, ruthless, and without the slightest hesitation!

Blood spurted out, staining the withered fir trunk red.

"Back off! He'll die the moment I draw my sword!" The boy's pale face was tinged with hysteria. His neck was pressed tightly against the fir tree, and his entire body was buried behind the heavily armed soldiers. "Ms. Futia, be careful, they are all demon worshippers!"

Chapter 126 Demon Worshippers

"Dare to pull it out and you'll die!"

"Shut up, you devil worshipper!"

Nordman bent his body slightly, his spear poised to stab, but the handsome young man lowered his head even further, while simultaneously drawing his dagger out slightly.

The other heavily armed soldiers immediately dispersed, their gleaming weapons reflecting the boy's blood-stained face. The middle-aged knight Nordman turned his head and silently waved to the person behind him.

"Help! Help me! Lady Futia!" The boy's eyes turned red, his muscles contorted and grotesque, like a wild beast driven to the brink of despair.

"Don't fall for it! He's a traitor!" Nordman roared. "Beast! Let him go!"

Her azure pupils contracted sharply. At this moment, Futia felt completely helpless. She was not an indecisive person, but the development of the situation was far beyond her comprehension.

What on earth happened!?

She wanted to draw her sword and join the battle immediately, but at the last moment, the elf instinctively looked to Trier for help.

"Hurry up! Please, Futiya!" the boy screamed desperately. The hostage soldier, due to cerebral ischemia, had already begun to roll his eyes back like a dead fish.

Nordman snapped, "Shut up!"

The roars grew louder and louder. The more the soldiers moved, the tighter the dagger in the boy's hand became, and the tighter the dagger was inserted, the closer the soldiers got to the boy.

Fresh blood, bubbly and sticky, dripped onto the road, and the cracks in the pebbles were filled with blood-stained dust.

"The Nordman people are moving clockwise, they are making way for the mages in the group to cast spells, the spell is a human immobilization spell."

Suddenly, a chillingly calm voice pierced the noisy hostage scene—the sound wasn't loud, but it brought a brief silence to the scene like a heavy hammer blow.

Nordman and the sergeant, their strategy exposed, froze. The beautiful young man with the crazed look in his eyes had just shown a hint of joy when Trier coldly uttered his second sentence: "Put down the hostages and weapons immediately, or you will die."

"Impossible, unless you send me to Lord Oris!" Whether from excitement or fear, the boy's voice trembled violently, and he gripped the dagger in his hand even tighter.

Trier looked directly at the boy, his tone still calm and unhurried: "If you lay down the hostages and weapons, I guarantee your personal safety."

"Believe you? On what grounds?" the boy sneered, for some reason not daring to look Trier in the eye. "I only believe in Lady Faldia!"

“I believe in Trier/I am a paladin,” Faldia and Trier said almost simultaneously.

The boy's face twitched slightly, and the bulging veins on his fair face made him look ferocious, like a demon that had crawled out of the abyss.

As if to prove his point, Trier took out the glowing holy emblem and gently tossed it to the boy: "See for yourself."

The boy's eyes reflected a holy halo, the milky white light swirling and refracting. The holy emblem struck the stone with a "ding," briefly losing its light, before bouncing up and falling back down in the soil.

The emblem shone brightly again, its light dazzling.

The boy was evil, and far more evil than anyone could imagine. The last time Trier saw the Holy Symbol shine so brightly was when he faced the Clever Speaker in Beaver Town.

Trier's previously indifferent expression suddenly softened with a friendly smile. He looked up at the boy again. The boy's face was almost contorted, anticipation, tension, and doubt churning like boiling soup over his nearly distorted features.

“Sir Trier, I suggest we eliminate him on the spot,” Nordman said quickly. “He is a complete traitor, and we should not hesitate to sacrifice hostages.”

“I am not a traitor, you demon worshippers are.” The boy’s tone gradually calmed down. He made no attempt to hide his resentment and glared fiercely at Nordman and Hult not far away. “Paladin, I have one more request.”

“Go ahead,” Trier said gently, mentally outlining the plan of action to Noe and the hanging corpse.

"Give me that fugitive!" The boy's eyes bulged, blood vessels like spider webs covering the corners of his eyes, his handsome features completely buried by hysterical madness.

"Lord Trier, don't listen to him!" Upon hearing the boy's request, Hult shuddered and ran directly behind Auris, who had been watching the show with great interest. However, when Auris saw Hult running towards him, he was also frightened and hid.