Chapter 38
Chapter 38: Secret Warehouse
Moira, who had been missing for two weeks, was the culprit behind the cemetery’s haunting incidents.
Funis had originally thought, like the other witches of the society, that Moira’s disappearance was related to the Blood Wine Society, but her encounter in the cemetery made the truth increasingly mysterious.
Why did she leave the Black Rose Society? When and how had she advanced to the seventh sequence? Why did she create so many confused living souls in the cemetery?
And why did she warn Funis to leave Gray Cloud Fort?
Completely puzzled.
Funis tried to enter the cemetery again and wander around, but could never return to that mist-shrouded maze. That figure suspected to be Charlotte had long since disappeared, and she had searched the entire street without finding her again.
With no other choice, Funis could only continue to the Vivian Glass Factory according to her original plan.
The glass factory was already locked up for the night. She used silk thread to tie stones and smashed high windows, then used needle and thread to jam wall cracks and weave a net, barely managing to climb in with the physical enhancement brought by the seventh sequence.
The factory floor was pitch black. Funis threw thin needles in different directions, then felt her way along the silk threads.
There should have been only her footsteps, but Funis could always faintly hear a “rumbling” low sound.
The sound was vague and unclear, the source weak.
Beyonder advancement brought comprehensive enhancement of bodily functions, including vision, hearing, and smell, so she could hear things ordinary people couldn’t.
The sound seemed to come from underground. After activating soul perception, Funis could indeed see a cluster of white flames below.
This meant there was a space beneath the glass factory, and that space contained living beings.
Funis’s first thought was that the Blood Wine Society’s secret warehouse was underground at the glass factory, and the living beings were innocent girls they had captured for the Whisper Trial.
If she discovered innocent girls, she would rescue them and send them home. If she found little witches who had survived the Whisper Trial, she would hand them over to Cessia.
On the way toward the flames’ direction, Funis had already planned for possible situations and corresponding responses. The abducted girls mostly came from the local Blackwater River District—meddling a bit wouldn’t be too troublesome.
Arriving directly above that cluster of flames, Funis tapped the ground with her heel. The sound wasn’t very crisp and sounded somewhat different from other areas—most likely hollow.
The “rumbling” low sound became clearer.
Funis ignored this annoying interference and searched around for possible entrances.
After fumbling in the dark and tapping around for a while, she found a steel trapdoor hidden under a carpet. It was locked, but Funis violently removed the lock. When she lifted the door panel, choking dust rose up.
Supporting herself against the wall and continuing to feel her way in the dark, regular stairs led straight down to the basement. After descending about twelve meters, Funis finally stepped onto level ground.
After a brief, narrow passage, the area ahead opened up dramatically.
The floor and walls were laid with smooth, clean marble tiles—a spacious area like a ballroom, with over ten support pillars each equipped with whale oil lamps that could burn continuously.
Funis couldn’t find the Blood Wine Society’s so-called precious collection.
She only saw a vague, massive shadow blocking the light cast by the whale oil lamps. That shadow crouched in the corner of this large room, sharp spikes rising and falling.
“Rumble rumble~”
Snoring.
Muffled, yet thunderously loud.
Funis held her breath, and the numerous doubts and confusion in her heart instantly vanished, but she couldn’t help wanting to curse.
“Bang!”
Suddenly, a metallic collision echoed from above behind her.
Funis realized it was the sound of the steel door panel closing. She clearly remembered tightening the support rod screws before coming down—someone outside had deliberately locked the door again.
Just as she thought of retreating, her escape route was cut off.
It was indeed a trap.
But why? And who?
Funis had no time to think about these questions, because a bigger problem was awakening before her.
The snoring stopped abruptly.
That shadow crouched in the corner kept expanding, metal scraping against marble walls with piercing sounds. As the shadow rose and changed, the entire basement shook. In the darkness beyond the lamplight, a pair of dark green vertical pupils gleaming with fierce light glanced toward her.
The white flames Funis had initially seen were indeed a living being.
A creature.
Its head was huge and flat, sword-like bone protrusions breaking through thick skin to protrude outside, rust-like mucus flowing thickly, dark nostrils exhaling scalding air.
The thing slowly crawled out from the darkness. The iron chains originally fastened around its neck had been destroyed by someone, and its thick, long tail casually swept and slapped, easily cutting through marble support pillars.
A supernatural creature.
Like thousands of black swords melted and reforged on its back, its heavy breathing rang with metallic clanging.
That massive lizard resembling a hedgehog locked its evil, terrifying gaze on Funis standing at the entrance. Its sharp-clawed front limbs brought threatening, warning hisses with each forward step.
It roared thunderously.
Only buzzing remained in her ears.
Black Sword Earth Lizard—a supernatural creature combining partial traits of the sixth sequence Instigator of the Wrath pathway. This monster, equivalent in strength to the sixth sequence, was actually being kept alive by the Blood Wine Society underground at the glass factory.
Anyone who could shackle and tame this creature had reached at least the fourth sequence. Funis hadn’t expected the Blood Wine Society to hide such a formidable figure—perhaps that was the loan shark Cessia had mentioned.
See that rust-colored mucus flowing on those black sword-like bone protrusions?
That was the sword rust secretion Funis had been dreaming of.
Cessia had promised she wouldn’t need to fight a living one.
Now the living one was right before her.
But even if she wanted to just grab some mucus, bottle it, and escape, she would first need to find a way to open a steel door locked from outside, while the crouching Black Sword Earth Lizard’s tail could easily reach into the stairway and skewer Funis through.
No escape route.
But thinking again, Funis didn’t necessarily have to flee.
One of the potion formula ingredients for advancing from the seventh sequence to sixth sequence of the Wrath pathway was precisely the spinal fluid of a Black Sword Earth Lizard, and it had to be the complete spinal fluid of an entire lizard to be effective.
Original Sin pathway potion materials weren’t easy to obtain.
Not to mention Black Sword Earth Lizards, supernatural creatures that inhabited overseas regions and were rarely seen. One lizard could only help one sixth sequence Beyonder’s advancement.
Missing this opportunity would definitely be regrettable.
If it were a normal Funis who had set out without experiencing strange scenes, she would probably have accepted her fate and died here. Those techniques and tricks were worthless before absolute power differences.
But the current Funis had integrated the Wrath Chapter of the Original Codex, gaining new authority and pathway.
She wasn’t without a chance of victory.