Wizard: Starting from Escape from the Thorn Garden

Chapter 87 Chloe

The light source inside the tower comes from deep within the skeletons on the inner wall—pale crystals forcibly embedded in the crevices of the skeletons, resembling the eyeballs of giant creatures.

These "eye stones" emitted a cold, deathly glow, barely illuminating this hell of bones.

Wherever the light reaches, one can see countless enormous platforms, spiral staircases, and corridors made of skeletons, crisscrossing like a spider web and connecting different heights of the tower walls.

The air was filled with an indescribable odor—a strong preservative, old parchment, rusted metal, and a cloying, fishy smell—similar to the mixture of countless dried flowers and rotting marrow.

Silence is the dominant theme here, but if you listen carefully, you can almost hear the endless, silent wails of millions of souls deep within the walls of bones.

The spatial structure here is also extremely bizarre.

The perception of the Seed of Origin was greatly suppressed and distorted here.

Gravity seemed uneven; in some areas, the body felt several times heavier, while in others, it felt light and weightless.

The space itself is like solidified grease, moving around much more sluggishly than the outside world.

"Truly one of the necromancer's ultimate masterpieces—" Kate thought with a chill. She activated the Spacetime Nursery at full power to stabilize her spatial perception, while her life core emitted a faint purifying aura, dispelling the death energy and soul fragments that were trying to erode her body.

Like a tiny tomb raider who had stumbled into a giant's tomb, he cautiously explored the upper levels of the tower along a spiral staircase made of enormous leg bones.

The tower is not empty.

Kate soon encountered the guards—or rather, the former “creations” and failures of this undead laboratory.

In some areas, there are twisted, stitched-together undead, forcibly pieced together from different biological parts, moving stiffly but with immense strength;

Some "wailing shadows" floating in mid-air, composed of pure resentment and fragments of the soul, can emit shrieks that directly attack the core of the spirit.

Some "carrion fungus carpets" that covered the entire corridor and were constantly wriggling and multiplying emitted a strong smell of decay and parasites;

There were also some experimental remains imprisoned in the skeletal walls. Although they had long since lost the ability to move, their empty eye sockets seemed to still be staring at the intruders, radiating a chilling resentment.

Kate, with her powerful spatial awareness and the domain advantage of the spacetime nursery, either hides and avoids danger, or uses the Spirit Pivot Seed to precisely interfere with the core and then quickly devours it with the Bloodthirsty Vine, or uses spatial teleportation to escape the danger zone.

He tried to avoid large-scale battles and conserve his strength, aiming directly at the core area that might exist at the top of the tower.

Upon exploring a massive circular platform in the middle layer, Kate keenly detected a surge of intense energy and a familiar aura of stellar power—though it was suppressed to an extremely faint degree by the dense deathly energy of the undead.

In the center of the platform stand dozens of enormous "soul cages" formed by twisted and intertwined vertebrae.

Inside one of the cages, a figure is locked in a fierce struggle!

It is Chloe of the Star Tower!

Her situation is quite bad right now.

She was enveloped in a dim starlight shield, but the surface of the shield was covered with spiderweb-like cracks, constantly being eroded and whipped by the thick gray mist around her and countless pale tentacles made of soul fragments that stretched out from the cracks in the cage.

The star-blue crystal staff in her hand flickered with light, constantly shooting out condensed starlight rays in an attempt to repel the tentacles or bombard the bone pillars of the cage, but with little effect.

Starlight shone on those pale bone pillars that seemed to absorb energy, but it was like a mud ox entering the sea, only causing a small ripple.

Once those soul tentacles are shattered, they will quickly absorb soul fragments from the surrounding gray mist and reassemble themselves endlessly!

What's more troublesome is that on the ground of the cage, there is a slowly rotating dark purple magic circle. Several energy chains, like blood vessels, extend from the magic circle, wrapping around Chloe's ankles and wrists, constantly draining her star magic power!

Her face was as pale as paper, and her breath was constantly declining. She had obviously been trapped for quite some time, and her magic power was about to be exhausted!

"Chloe!" Kate's voice rang out in the silent tower, tinged with surprise.

Chloe looked up abruptly and saw Kate at the edge of the platform. A look of disbelief and a glimmer of hope flashed in her grey-blue eyes.

"Kate?! Run! This cage and magic circle will absorb energy, becoming stronger the more you attack!" Her words were interrupted by another violent lash of tentacles. The Starshine Shield fluctuated violently, the cracks widened, and it was almost shattered!

Kate instantly understood her predicament.

This soul cage and magic circle form a vicious energy cycle. Attacking the cage will absorb energy to strengthen the magic circle and tentacles, while not attacking it will slowly drain the magic power of the tentacles and magic circle until the soul collapses.

Although the power of the stars in the Star Tower is strong, it is completely suppressed here by the death energy of the undead and this strange magic array.

"Don't resist, I'll break it open." Kate whispered, and her figure vanished instantly.

"Spatial flicker!"

The next instant, Kate appeared inside the cage, right next to Chloe!

This movement, which disregarded spatial barriers, seemed to freeze Chloe and the frantically surging soul tentacles for a moment!

"Time-Space Nursery: The Realm of Life Purification!"

Kate no longer held back, and the miniature "garden" in her mind burst forth with unprecedented brilliance.

The Void Serenity Lotus stabilizes the space, isolating the area from the erosion of the domain by external death energy.

The veins of the Void Vine extend, bringing the entire interior space of the cage under its control;

At its core, the fragments of the Root of Immortality pulsated violently, and the vast and pure life force, imbued with a strong will to order, mixed with the purifying aura of the holy spring water, erupted like a flood bursting its banks.

Om-!

A five-meter-diameter sphere of light, interwoven with pale silver and emerald green, instantly expanded outwards from Kate, enveloping him and Chloe within it.

Inside the sphere of light, the space was stable, and the deathly aura dissipated.

The pale, soul tentacles that frantically lashed and coiled around the area, upon touching the light barrier containing the rules of life and the power of purification, sizzled as if they had encountered a scorching hot iron.

The fragments of soul that make up the tentacles are forcibly purified and disintegrated, turning into wisps of blue smoke and dissipating.

It can never be rebuilt!

At the same time, the dark purple absorption array on the ground suddenly became extremely sluggish the moment it came into contact with the bottom of the domain sphere.

The energy chains extending from the magic circle fluctuated violently and became illusory, like a faulty circuit, forcibly interrupting the absorption of Chloe's magic power.

"This—this is—" Chloe felt the chains binding her weaken sharply, her nearly depleted magic power stopped flowing out, and even her spirit was invigorated by the nourishment of that pure life force!

She stared in shock at the magical light barrier surrounding her, then looked at Kate beside her, whose aura was as deep and unfathomable, her eyes filled with disbelief.

Her desperate, almost hopeless situation was so easily overcome by Kate.

Kate ignored her shock and focused her gaze on the joints of the bone pillars in the cage.

Within the realm of the Spacetime Nursery, the analytical power of the Seed of Origin has reached its peak.

The seemingly indestructible, energy-absorbing pale bone structure was clearly visible to Kate.

"Found it, the energy node core." A sharp glint flashed in Kate's eyes.

"Bloodthirsty Poison Ivy, go."

He swung his right arm out suddenly, and several highly condensed vines, wrapped with dark gold spatial cutting force fields and soul-devouring purple light, pierced with unparalleled precision at several extremely hidden nodes at the joint of the bone pillar, where dark purple energy flowed.

Chi Chi Chi!

Within the spacetime nursery, the energy absorption properties of bone pillars are significantly weakened by the life purification force field.

The highly concentrated spatial annihilation power at the tips of the vines sliced ​​through those nodes like a hot knife through butter.

Click!Click!

A sickening sound of bones cracking rang out, and several key bone pillars that made up the cage shattered instantly.

Boom!

The entire soul cage shook violently, and without the support of the energy nodes, it collapsed like a tent with its frame removed.

The energy chains binding Chloe instantly collapsed and disappeared.

Kate grabbed Chloe, who was falling due to exhaustion, and with another flash, she instantly left the collapsing cage area and landed steadily on the edge of the platform in a safe zone.

The entire process of breaking through the cage, from entering the domain to destroying the node, took only 10 seconds.

The radiance of the domain faded, and Kate released Chloe.

Chloe stumbled a step before regaining her balance. Looking behind her at the ruins of the cage and the gray mist and soul fragments that were temporarily dispersed by the purification field, she looked at Kate in front of her, whose aura was steady and who seemed to have only done a trivial thing. Her gray-blue eyes were filled with complex emotions: the relief of surviving a disaster, a deep shock, and a trace of indescribable frustration.

"Th-thank you." Chloe's voice was a little hoarse. She quickly took out several magic stones specially made by the Starry Sky Tower, held them in her hand and absorbed them rapidly to restore her nearly depleted magic power. Her complexion improved slightly.

"If it weren't for you—I'm afraid—" She glanced at the pile of bones and ruins with lingering fear.

"It was no trouble at all." Kate nodded calmly, her eyes scanning her surroundings, wary of any other potential threats.

"How did you end up trapped here all by yourself? Where are your teammates?"

Chloe's face showed a hint of bitterness and anger: "Our team was ambushed by Thorn Garden and Shadow Keep while exploring an ancient observatory ruin."

In the chaos of battle, I was swept away by a spatial turbulence and woke up trapped in that damned cage—the others were probably in grave danger.

She gripped the magic stone tightly, her knuckles turning white.

Kate paused for a moment; the alliance between Thorn Garden and Shadow Keep was not unexpected.

"It's dangerous here. Recover quickly and then leave."

Chloe took a deep breath, suppressing the turmoil in her heart.

She looked at Kate's calm yet powerful face, hesitated for a moment, and then took out a small prism made of star blue crystal from her inner pocket.

"Kate, you saved my life, and I, Chloe Star Orbit, will forever remember this kindness. I know you are powerful, and your goals are different from ours. This Star Mark Prism contains information about several energy nodes that might contain valuable treasures, which I barely managed to capture using my Star Prophecy Technique while exploring the tower before I was trapped."

She handed the prism to Kate: "The information is vague, and the predictions here are heavily distorted, so accuracy cannot be guaranteed."

However, two of these locations emitted extremely ancient and unique energy fluctuations. One carried a strong sense of spatial tearing, while the other exuded a strange aura reminiscent of the reversal of the rules of life.

There's another location, near the top of the tower, whose energy resembles the cold core of a star, and may be related to the tower's ultimate secret. Hope this helps.

Her eyes were sincere; this was the most precious gift she could offer in gratitude—information obtained at the risk of her life.

Kate took the warm, star-blue prism and probed it with her mental energy. Sure enough, several blurry, flickering images and fragmented spatial coordinates flooded her mind:

Image 1: A distorted and fragmented spatial fault, like solidified black lightning, with a dark purple crystalline fragment seemingly suspended at its center, constantly tearing apart the surrounding space. The coordinates point to an area in the upper-middle level riddled with spatial cracks. Energy characteristics: High-level spatial tearing and destruction.

Image Two: A massive, nest-like structure composed of countless withered, twisted plant roots, its center seemingly enveloping a ball of light, a mixture of vibrant green and deathly gray, constantly struggling between decay and budding. The coordinates point to a lower level, near the base of the tower, an area densely populated with death energy. Energy Characteristics: A clash between highly condensed life force and death force.

reverse.

Image 3 (most blurry): Beneath the dome of the tower, a gigantic structure, supported by pale skeletal hands...

A slowly rotating dark gray sphere of light emanates a vast and silent deathly aura, like a cold sun. The coordinates point to the core area at the top of the tower. Energy characteristics: Ultimate Death, Silence, Core.

Although the information was vague, it was of great value to Kate, who possessed the Seed of Origin and the Time-Space Nursery!

The second and third locations are particularly noteworthy. The former may contain the secrets of life reversal and offer great inspiration for understanding the absorption of the essence of death by the root of immortality. The latter is likely the core of the Pale Tower and may even be related to the Heart of the Dead or a more advanced necromantic treasure!

"This intelligence is very valuable to me."

Kate put away the prism and nodded solemnly to Chloe. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it, you deserve it." Chloe's magic had recovered somewhat, and her complexion had improved a lot.

"I'll get out of here as soon as possible. Kate—be careful. This tower is far more eerie than it appears."

She gave Kate a deep look, then turned and transformed into a dim starlight, cautiously exploring the area below the tower.

Kate watched her disappear into the gray mist, her gaze returning to the spiral staircase that stretched upwards, made of endless skeletons.

The information within the Star Prism was like a guiding light. He clenched his fist, feeling the surging power of the Spacetime Nursery within his body.

The core secrets of the Pale Tower, clues to the Heart of the Dead, and even possible fragments of necromancy rules—all lie beneath the cold "sun" atop that tower.

A new goal is within reach.

Without further hesitation, he blended into the shadows of the skeletal staircase and ascended into the deeper silence of death on the next level.