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Chapter 191: The Final Trap
Chapter 191: The Final Trap
"How do you manage to bring everything with you? It's like you knew something would happen today", Hermione asked curiously after taking a sip of water.
"You guessed right", Liam said, taking a sip of water as well, half-jokingly. "After all, this morning's events were too suspicious, so I thought it would be better to be prepared. I never expected it to actually happen." He shrugged.
Hermione, being clever, didn't press further and quietly sat there, closing her eyes to rest after finishing her water.
After resting for a few minutes, they gathered their things and continued down the path toward the main tomb. Although this tomb was on the other side of the world, many aspects still adhered to Chinese feng shui principles. After encountering numerous forks in the road, Liam chose the path that led directly to the tomb.
Since it was the correct path, the road became increasingly grand as they progressed. Mosaic patterns began to appear on the walls, adorned with gold and gems. However, Liam walked past them without a second glance. After all, in the wizarding world, there were permanent sticking charms that made it impossible to remove anything once it was stuck, and in countless tomb-raiding novels, seemingly easy-to-grab treasures often turned out to be various traps. Liam wasn't about to invite trouble for himself.
But the frustration of seeing such valuable items and not being able to take them was palpable. Fortunately, after rounding a massive stone pillar with relief carvings depicting the tomb owner's journey to divinity, they found a spacious hall.
Based on the distance they had traveled, they should have already crossed the entire pyramid. However, they were still inside it. The only explanation was that the golden door led to a separate dimension, which elevated Liam's estimation of the tomb owner's magical abilities. Creating a dimension within another artificial dimension was a highly complex task, one that only a deeply studied wizard could accomplish.
This hall resembled the plaza at the pyramid's entrance, except the totem poles were replaced with statues of Native Wizards, their heads adorned with feathered headdresses and holding feathered wands. At the other end of the hall stood a heavy wooden door, intricately carved with the word: "Divine Realm."
This door must lead to the final destination—the main tomb. After all, for a wizard who had gone mad, the only place he would consider the Divine Realm would be where he himself resided.
According to common tropes in tomb-raiding novels, if there were no defenses along the way to the tomb, the final obstacle would likely be a powerful trap, designed to ensnare those who were unprepared or overconfident, leaving them to accompany the tomb owner in death. In a magical world, these traps were often several times more dangerous.
Since entering the golden door, the journey had been as easy as a leisurely stroll, which only increased Liam's unease. When he saw the wooden door before him, he immediately suspected that if there was a problem, it would be in this hall.
With his suspicions, blindly charging in was out of the question, especially with someone who might hold him back. Thinking this, Liam instructed Hermione to hide behind the previous pillar and told her not to come out no matter what she heard. He also had Little Qing secretly protect her.
Once they were hidden, Liam took one of Little Qing's avatars and threw it into the hall. It bounced twice on the ground and stopped in the center of the hall. After a few minutes, nothing happened.
This was a bit awkward, but just as Liam was about to step into the hall, he noticed something odd: most of the sculptures along the way were exaggerated and abstract, with proportions that differed from reality.
Now, the Wizard sculptures in the hall, although exaggerated in appearance, actually have body proportions that are almost identical to those of real people.
"Could it be that one?" Liam thought of a movie from his past life where a famous director played the lead role, muttering to himself. But then he considered that the tomb's owner had killed 100,000 people to create a Blood Pool, so it wasn't surprising that he would do such cruel things.
With that in mind, Liam pulled out over thirty thumb-sized Jade Talismans. Each of these talismans was crystal clear, and if you looked closely, you could see a faint golden lightning flowing inside them.
"These are mostly what I got from Uncle Kiu. I hope my guess is wrong, or it might be a long time before I can get such good jade talismans again", Liam muttered to himself as he had Little Qing's avatar place a Jade Talisman on each statue.
Once everything was ready, Liam held a palm-sized jade plaque and walked into the hall. As soon as his foot touched the floor of the hall, the stone skin on all the sculptures began to fall off, and Liam could see decayed fabric and blackened skin exposed beneath some of the peeling stone.
"Northern Mystic Lord of the Seven Stars and Seven Directions..." Seeing this, Liam immediately recited the Thunder Spell, managing to activate the Jade Talismans on the statues just before the mummies inside them raised their wands to cast spells.
When the Jade Talismans were activated, they suddenly released the powerful energy stored within, filling the entire hall with golden lightning. Liam had to squint to avoid being blinded by the intense light.
After about ten seconds, the lightning storm in the hall finally subsided, and all the mummies were burned to charcoal. Just as Liam was about to step forward to clean up the battlefield, he noticed white soul flames rising from the charred remains of the mummies.
They were actually alive! Liam's eyes widened in surprise as more and more soul flames drifted out of the remains on the ground, slowly forming human shapes in the air. A few minutes later, over thirty figures emitting a milky white light were floating in the air. It seemed that the Divine Thunder had not only destroyed the mummies but also purified the souls inside them.
The leader, a Wizard dressed in a robe and wearing a feathered crown, bowed deeply to Liam in the manner of the local natives, then stood up and began to speak. Fortunately, the souls at the entrance had taught Liam their language, so he could understand what the Wizard was saying.
From the Wizard's account, Liam learned that these Wizards were once disciples or subordinates of the Sorcerer King. They were later turned into something called a Corpse Cocoon, which had a living soul but a dead body.
Although their bodies were dead, they had been deprived of control over them, they could still perceive the outside world. The constant flow of energy from the Blood Pool outside kept them from dying or going mad, allowing them to remain calm and endure their torment.
Because their souls were still alive, they could not be destroyed by the magic in the Tomb Passage. The living souls also ensured that when intruders entered this hall, they had enough mobility to cause severe damage.
"Thank goodness I was cautious, or I would have been dead today", Liam sighed with relief after hearing the souls' account. Even though their combat strength was reduced after being turned into Corpse Cocoons, the sheer number of them—over thirty—would have been enough to seriously harm him.
(End of Chapter)
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