The Holy Man of Another Century Gospel

Chapter 152 Breaking Through the Barrier
While Eric was half asleep, the wood elf woke him up, indicating that it was his turn to keep watch.

"..."

Eric sat there for a long time, staring blankly at the nearly extinguished campfire, before his consciousness returned.

He rubbed his face, then stood up and walked around, yawning constantly.

The ancient battlefield was fraught with danger, and the undead and skeletons didn't need to sleep; someone had to be awake at night. Several people took turns on watch, and he was the second to last; it was probably three or four in the morning.

Back by the campfire, Eric added another piece of specially made charcoal.

Unlike the wilderness, fuel for starting a fire is hard to find in ancient battlefields, so these charcoal pieces were brought in from outside.

Eric glanced to the side; the rest of the squad were fast asleep on the mats, and the wood elf who had just relieved him was also asleep. Their weapons were all within easy reach, ready to deal with any emergencies.

Hopefully nothing unexpected will happen... Eric yawned to himself.

All around was silent, not a sound could be heard, darkness and mist continued to shroud the area, with only a ring of light around the campfire.

Eric stared blankly at a corner of the ruins for a while, then glanced down at the campfire in a daze, before quickly looking up again, only to find another figure in the corner.

"Hold!"

He almost bit his tongue off.

The thing had a humanoid shape, only the size of a human child, covered in rotten flesh, with an ugly head, but its eyes were quite large, looking this way, reflecting the light of the campfire. Seeing Eric staring at it, it stopped moving again.

Eric drew his sword and charged forward.

It stopped pretending to be dead and quickly climbed along the broken walls and ruins, but it was still a step too slow and was cut in half by Eric and fell down.

The severed body twitched a few more times before finally becoming still. Eric kicked the upper half far away.

He had seen this thing many times. It was a small ghoul, a common wild monster that was quite common on ancient battlefields. However, seeing its ugly face and disproportionately large eyes in the middle of the night was enough to give one a feeling of sudden cardiac arrest.

This scare, however, completely jolted him awake.

Returning to the campfire, Eric lit a torch and carefully inspected the surroundings, making sure to look around every corner to prevent any unseen ghouls from sneaking up on him.

After going around in circles, he actually found several small ghouls gathered together on the other side of the corner he had just seen.

"..."

The sight of several little ghouls turning their heads together was truly terrifying; Eric's heart skipped a beat.

Perhaps because they outnumbered him, instead of fleeing, they pounced on him like disturbed bats, emitting hoarse, strange cries.

Eric cleaved them in two with a single sword stroke.

A wisp of experience flew into his body, and he walked to the corner of the outer wall to take a look, but he didn't find anything like bones or human flesh that could attract ghouls.

He guessed that these little ghouls were with the one he had first discovered, but the latter had moved faster and flipped over, so he had discovered it earlier.

But if that's the case, why didn't the ones outside run away?

Eric stretched the torch around the corner of the outer wall, then went back inside. But before he could even get the torch into the corner, it was blocked by an invisible force.

"..."

He paused for a moment, then continued to exert force with his hand, extending the torch forward a little further before it suddenly went out.

Eric released the torch, quickly retreated, and fired an instantaneous illuminating ball.

Apart from the torch lying on the ground, there was nothing in the corner.

Magic Barrier...

Eric immediately guessed what was blocking the torch, and then guessed its source—the owner of another magnet.

Yesterday, the mage Hodge said that the two magnets belonged to a mage couple. He guessed that they might have encountered some kind of danger, and one of them was unable to move and stayed here, while the other went to seek help. As a result, neither of them survived. One magnet eventually ended up outside the ancient battlefield, while the other was only discovered by the crows now.

Eric snapped his fingers, extinguishing the light orb, then picked up the torch and returned to the campfire to relight it.

He thought for a moment, let out a breath, and decided to wake up his teammates and tell them what he had discovered.

“Impossible…” The mage Hodge, who had been woken up, rubbed his eyes and glanced at the corner Eric was pointing to. “I didn’t sense any magical fluctuations at all.”

"Maybe you're not very good at it."

"..."

Leonard strode over and tried it with his hand, and sure enough, he encountered resistance.

"Hodge! Come here!"

The monk ran over and touched the barrier as well, so surprised that he could hardly speak.

"Why...why is there no fluctuation at all..."

"It's probably the effect of some kind of magical item," Eric reminded him. "Otherwise, with so many adventurers resting here, they would have been discovered long ago."

Hodge slapped his forehead. "Right, each of those people was carrying some strange gadgets."

"Do you have a way to remove the barrier here?" Leonard asked, as he was unable to break through the barrier even with his strength, and the further he reached in, the greater the resistance he encountered.

The monk nodded, "I'll give it a try."

He chanted a string of incantations in ancient language, which Eric listened to. It was something like, "God of Truth, please break down the barrier here and reveal your true nature," and so on.

"break!"

The staff pointed at the barrier, and they saw the scene inside visibly tremble, as if covered by a layer of water.

But it only trembled slightly.

"It doesn't seem to work?" Leonard looked at his mage companion again.

"Don't rush..." The mage wiped the sweat from his forehead. "The spellcaster's magic is much stronger than mine. I'll have to try a few more times."

It was still past midnight, but no one could sleep. They all huddled around the corner, waiting for the monk to break the barrier.

"break!"

"break!"

"break!"

Hodge continued casting spells, and the barrier's weakening became increasingly apparent, but it never reached the point of qualitative change.

Even though the people surrounding him didn't say anything, they put a lot of pressure on him, and in the end, they were all sent to check other corners.

This ruin is full of broken walls and rubble, and there are naturally many corners. Judging by sight alone is not enough; you have to go to the corners and touch them yourself.

Eric naturally followed along, and when the wood elf asked him how he discovered that something was wrong with that corner, he answered truthfully.

“It seems there’s a corpse inside the barrier,” the wood elf said. “But the tiger-men didn’t smell it.”

“This place is full of corpses. He may have smelled them, but he didn’t take it seriously.”

"Too……"

The group carefully checked the area but found nothing else amiss. When they returned to Hodge, he was sitting on the ground, completely exhausted.

"No... I need to rest."

Hodge was hunched over, his magic power greatly depleted, and his head was starting to ache.

“This barrier is practically at the level of a Grand Mage caster,” Hodge said, looking at Leonard. “Do that mage couple have that kind of power?”

"Are you kidding me? A great mage comes here to collect scraps?"

“Yes…then there’s only one possibility: the people inside used a spell scroll made by an archmage.” Hodge muttered. “They must be students of some archmage, maybe they came from the Star Origin Academy.”

However, apart from him, the spellcaster, no one else present was interested in the source of the spell barrier. He rolled his eyes, took out a bottle of blue potion from his backpack, hesitated for a moment, and then gulped down half of it.

"Hmm... This is a potion made from magic stone powder. It can greatly increase the speed of magic recovery, but it has many side effects. Afterwards, I will have to find a way to remove the impurities left in my body... I risked my life this time. When I break through the barrier later, I will pick out the first thing inside."

Seeing his eyes rolling back in his head from the stimulation of the magic potion, none of them objected.

Although Eric thought that his rolling eyes and hiccups were more like signs of drinking too much soda.

Once his magic had mostly recovered, Hodge continued to cast the dispelling spell, trying four or five more times, and finally broke through the barrier.

"Break!" The barrier shattered in response, and the space in the corner, like a deflated balloon, quickly twisted, collapsed into a small piece, and then disappeared into nothingness, revealing a nearly completely rotten corpse inside.

A putrid stench immediately filled the air.

“Those crows might have been attracted by the scent first, and then discovered the magnet,” Eric heard the wood elf whisper, but by then no one cared about this detail anymore.

"That's her! This is Eunice's body!"

Hodge practically pounced on the corpse, instantly recognizing the person. "I remember her hair ornament! She once walked past me, her long, black hair emitting a faint, sweet fragrance. I turned my head and saw this blue hair ornament..."

Several people glanced at them.

Leonard, who knew a little about the inside story, coughed lightly and said, "Let's see what else she has that we can use."

Hodge ran his fingers through the withered hair, raised the blue mage, and said, "I never thought you would die here so quietly."

"Damn it, stop reminiscing. If you like it, just take the hair accessory and this skeleton back with you!"

Hodge sighed, took the hair ornament, and stepped aside. "You guys handle it as you see fit, just don't disturb her body."

Leonard was still very respectful to his mage brother, carefully lifting the mutilated body and removing the bag, staff, rings, pendants, and other items one by one. Finally, he tugged at her robe, saying, "It's not rotten at all. This robe is also magical equipment... Let's leave it with Hodge along with the body."

None of them had any objections.

Although it was previously agreed that the profits would be split equally based on value, that was when everyone was still relatively unfamiliar with each other. Now, everything is open to discussion.

"And that's all."

Leonard placed the equipment and items he found on the mage's remains on the ground. "Although I don't know why, Eunice has obviously separated from the others. There might have been infighting within the team... It's probably impossible to find the other people's belongings."

He surveyed the items on the ground. "If anyone sees something they like, they can make an offer. If two people are interested, they can bid against each other, and the money will be split equally. If no one wants it, we'll keep it and sell it outside, then split the profits. How about that?"

This is the best way, so naturally no one objects.

The group began to pick and choose, with Eric being the first to pick up the purple-quality staff.

Eunice's Energizing Staff

He searched his memory but had never heard of the item before. However, looking at the stats and the effect of enhancing the next spell cast after charging, the staff was quite similar to another staff he remembered. It was probably just the same template with a different name.

Weapons are always the most valuable equipment. When the others saw Eric pick up the staff, they were all waiting for him to make an offer, but he quickly let go of it again.

Eric also noticed their gazes.

Just kidding, if he buys this staff, he won't need to look at anything else.

Even if he had enough money, there was no need to buy the staff—he wouldn't need it himself. He could either give it to Eileen and Molly or resell it, but neither of them lacked staffs, and he didn't know when he could sell it anyway, so there was no need for it.

After the tiger-man put down one of the rings, Eric picked it up and looked at it.

【Water Ripple Amber Ring】

In addition to boosting basic attributes like spirit, it also has the effect of storing magic power, essentially giving you a built-in magic potion without any side effects.

These attributes are pretty good; Molly can borrow them. Eric said he wanted the ring for himself.

Leonard asked him how much he was willing to pay, and Eric countered by asking about the market price.

Leonard took the ring, examined it, and quoted a price based on his intuition: "Around twenty gold coins."

This is cheaper than Eric expected. "Then I'll offer twenty gold coins. Is anyone else interested?"

Everyone took the rings and examined them. The mage Hodge raised the price to thirty gold coins, and Eric followed suit by raising it by five gold coins, after which he gave up.

Eric received the ring, counted out thirty-five gold coins, and handed them to Leonard, who then divided them equally among the others.

Besides the equipment and jewelry, the female mage's inventory also contained several magical items, including several high-quality magic stones, a gem-engraved dagger, and two unused spell scrolls, such as the "Advanced Barrier".

Hodge bought a magic stone and two spell scrolls, and gave each person ten gold coins.

The effects of the advanced barrier spell were obvious to everyone, but because the spell was too advanced, using the scroll also required a certain amount of mental strength, so Eric and the others had to give up.

The remaining items went unsold, so Leonard kept them to sell later.

“Um…” He gestured to the remains leaning against the side, “What do you plan to do with them?”

Hodge stared blankly for a moment before speaking: "We can't take it out anyway, let's burn it."

"If you want to take it out, I can help you carry it."

"And then, do you keep it as a collection in the hotel?"

Leonard shrugged, indicating that it wasn't a big problem.

"forget it."

After all that commotion, no one was sleepy and they sat up until dawn.

At dawn, Hodge unleashed flames that burned the sorceress's body and her robes to ashes.

"Finding Eunice's belongings would have already fulfilled my expectations before I came in. As for the remains of the remaining members of that adventure team, I have little hope."

Leonard looked at the teammates he had gathered and asked, "But it's only the second day. What do you guys think? Should we continue searching around here, or just go out?"

Eric preferred to wander around here a bit more, since he had come here in the first place to grind monsters and improve his strength. He wasn't so concerned about what he could find. After he made his first statement, the others, who were still eager to continue, all echoed his sentiment.

"Alright, let's use this place as a center and spread outwards to see if we can find the remaining bodies. But as I said before, safety first. Money spent while alive is the only money that truly matters."

So the two formed a small team and explored in different directions.

Eric teamed up with the Wood Elves, and along the way, he relied on his exceptional hearing to venture out into the mist, actively seeking out and fighting the undead.

Storm footwork!

Using the momentum of the instantaneous close-range attack, Eric lightly touched the ground with his feet, swung his sword in a spinning slash, and used a nearly 360-degree sweep to shatter the two skeletons.

Once he was in position, he quickly lunged at the ghoul that was more than two meters tall next to him, thrusting twice, followed by a left slash and a right slash, then adding an upward slash that wasn't very effective, and finally delivering a heavy slash to the head.

A phantom emerged from his body, wielding an invisible heavy sword, and slashed down simultaneously with him.

The ghoul crashed to the ground, and a sliver of golden light emerged from its body, flying towards Eric.

The wood elf beside him put down his longbow and, without waiting for him to ask, told him the location of the next undead.

Eric hurried in that direction, with the wood elves close behind.

"I have a feeling you came here specifically to wipe out the undead."

"More or less." He glanced back. "Are you still thinking about the remaining belongings?"

The wood elf shook his head. "I am thinking about it, but I don't have high hopes. The earnings from this adventure are enough for me to live on outside for a long time."

“I heard that wood elves who stay outside for too long are unwilling to return to their tribe.”

He paused for a moment, then said, “This is just a misunderstanding by humans. Your lifespan is only half or even less than ours, and your understanding of time is very different from ours. Even if we spend fifty years in a human city, it is just a slightly long journey for us, not the depravity and decadence you think it is.”

Eric smiled. "I see."

They were both silent for a short while.

"But living in a city must be really convenient for humans."

"You'll understand once you stay in our tribe for a few days; they really don't want to go back."

"Um...by the way, how old are you this year?"

"Only in his early seventies."

"..."

As the day came to an end, the group returned one after another to the ruins where they had rested the night before, finding almost nothing. Eric and the Wood Elf, who were the last to return, looked particularly exhausted.

"Are you in danger?" Leonard asked.

Eric shook his head and pointed behind him. "We've cleared all the dangers in this direction. I suggest you look in that direction tomorrow if you're still searching; we haven't checked it thoroughly."

"...So what did you do all day?"

“Fight. Fight non-stop.” Eric slumped in front of the campfire, holding up two fingers. “Two bars of experience, maxed out.”

(End of this chapter)