This necromancer is going to seduce the beautiful girls who are already dead.

After Nicola left, Abyss and his group read the biography of this visitor from another world who was using the alias Riki.

As Nicola had arranged, she indeed forged a Hay-Tverian identity for herself and used it to marry into the Bald family, where she married and had children. The biography also details this Lady Riki's special talents—she was very good at calculation and interpersonal relationships, personally led her family in business, making a lot of money, and always saw through the tricks of unscrupulous merchants who would shortchange her.

Now, it's pretty much confirmed. This Riki seems to really possess special abilities like Sheila. She probably really can see through disguises.

Finally, the biography mentions that Lady Riki always wore a piece of jewelry, which was buried with her after her death. This item is clearly the "Eganda," a tool used by people from that other world.

So now all we need to do is find Ms. Riki to get the Oganda and how to use it.

Chapter 163 Leona, whose Words Can Be Made Law

"Found it, it's right here."

Abyss walked to a grave, turned to Sheila and the others who were still reading epitaphs elsewhere, and spoke. The tombstone before him bore the name Riki Issenia Gulliverbald.

Everyone gathered around, and the search for Sheila's ancestors went exceptionally smoothly. After investigating the name and other information of the visitor from another world in the morning, they arrived at Sheila's family cemetery early at noon and found Lady Riki's grave in a very short time.

Since this is Sheila's territory, Abyss doesn't need to hide anything, unlike when he went to the graves of other Moon Knights before, where he had to sneak in to avoid causing a disturbance.

“Oh, it really is Lady Riki’s grave.” Leona looked at the tombstone in front of her and read the epitaph, “Here lies a man who was never defeated by adversity.”

"Perhaps this is referring to how she never gave up even when she was tortured by necromancers as a research subject?" Sheila looked at the words with great admiration and said, "Back then, she also experienced several major setbacks in her business, but she always managed to turn adversity into opportunity and ultimately achieve success."

“This is someone you should learn from; you have the same abilities as her,” Abis said to Sheila with a smile.

Sheila nodded solemnly, "I will try my best!"

Throughout her journey with the Abyss, the Abyss rarely preached any grand principles to her. Instead, he gradually revealed the infinite possibilities of the world to Sheila through his experiences and the people she met along the way.

This is more impressive than any course. When a person has seen the vast world and met all sorts of admirable people, they grow up quickly.

Abyss is not an educator; this is based on his own experience. The reason why he, only seventeen years old this year, is able to understand so much and deal with all kinds of things and challenges from evil gods whose power far exceeds his own with reason and firm belief is actually largely related to the undead he has encountered before.

“Let’s open Lady Riki’s grave,” Leona said.

Abyss nodded, gathered his magic, and slowly opened the lid of Lady Riki's grave.

Watching Abyss's actions, Leona stood to the side with her arms crossed and suddenly muttered to herself.

"Our search for Ms. Riki seems to be going a little too smoothly. That delusional lord has been obstructing us the whole time, but then he just visited ABC yesterday. I have a feeling that something else might go wrong after we open Ms. Riki's tomb..."

While Leona was muttering to herself, the Abyss had already opened Riki's grave. The falling dust was magically dispersed to the side, revealing a dusty but relatively clean tomb chamber.

Ms. Riki's body lay in the tomb chamber, on a bed in a replica of a normal bedroom. Ms. Riki was quite old when she died; there she was, with white hair and a wrinkled face, somewhat different from the young and beautiful portrait passed down in her family.

She looked very peaceful, her hands clasped over her abdomen, lying there quietly. Apart from her slightly pale complexion and a thin layer of dust covering her body, this ancient woman from over a thousand years ago was not much different from someone who was sleeping.

At that time, embalming techniques were quite common on the mainland. Prominent families would typically perform embalming on the deceased to prevent the bodies from decomposing and becoming unsightly. Ms. Riki was no exception.

“This is Lady Riki…” Sheila gazed at her ancestor, who had passed on her special bloodline, with a touch of emotion. Riki’s appearance matched some features in the portrait; in other words, she had the face of an outsider.

"Should we wake up Lady Riki?" Edvina had never worked with necromancers before, and she was curious about Abyss's actions.

“No rush, let’s first find out where the Eganda that Lady Riki brought from the other world is,” Abyss said, shaking his head.

He used wind magic and nimbly leaped down into the tomb chamber first. The others followed him into Lady Riki's tomb.

Abyss bowed to Riki's remains as a sign of respect before beginning his search of the tomb.

Leona was naturally eager to help search, but at that moment, Edvina suddenly let out a soft exclamation.

"Something seems off about this tomb."

Abyss, who was just about to search for the burial goods next to Lady Riki, straightened up at this moment, looking at Edvina with a slight frown: "You found it too?"

"What's wrong?" Sheila opened her eyes wide; she didn't find anything unusual about the place.

“It seems like someone has been in this tomb,” Edvina said, pointing to the ground. “The dust on the ground here isn’t a thousand years old. It looks like someone deliberately re-covered the dust…”

Abyss crouched down, gently ran his finger across the ground, collected a bit of dust on his fingertip, then brought it to his nose and sniffed it, nodding slightly: "Hmm, indeed, this dust is definitely not over a thousand years old, it's probably only a dozen or so years old."

"As expected of Master Bellator, he was able to determine the age of the dust so accurately."

Edvina, an assassin and a master of tracking, and the Abyss simultaneously determined that the dust in the tomb was fresh. The Abyss, a seasoned grave robber, could even determine the age of the dust simply by smell.

"Huh?" Sheila was taken aback. She had never imagined that not only the two tomb raiders from before, but others had come here before them and successfully entered Lady Riki's tomb.

Leona immediately became anxious: "Ah...this...it's not my fault, is it? I have such a bad mouth..."

As she spoke, Leona patted her lips with extreme guilt, as if the grave robbers who had entered Lady Riki's tomb were caused by her words.

“It has nothing to do with you, but now… I have to wonder if there are any Eganda that Lady Riki brought from another world in this tomb…” Abyss patted Leona’s head to comfort her, then closed his eyes, chanted a prayer, and when he opened his eyes again, a golden light burst out from his eye sockets, quickly scanning the tomb.

He scanned it once, but then, seemingly distrusting the results, he scanned it again.

The golden light vanished, and Abyss's eyes returned to their bluish-green hue. He turned to look at Sheila, who was clenching her fists with some concern behind him, sighed, and said:

"The Lord of Delusion has once again predicted our actions. There are no jewelry pieces resembling mirrors in this tomb. 'Eganda' must have been taken beforehand. It seems we need to find the tomb raider who sneaked in earlier."

Chapter 164 The Best Eyewitness

To avoid misjudging the situation, Abyss had scanned the tomb twice with the Eye of Truth, and the results were exactly as he expected: the "Eganda" that was supposed to be buried with Lady Riki, as recorded in the family genealogy, had long since disappeared and was no longer in the tomb.

“Sure enough, tomb raiders had entered here before and stolen Lady Riki’s Eganda…” Abyss paced slowly inside the tomb. “And their methods were quite sophisticated. We didn’t even notice that the place had been disturbed before we came in. There were no signs that the outer covers had been pried open. It seems that this was not something an ordinary person could do.”

“Could this Lord of Delusion really predict the future?” Leona grew increasingly worried as she listened to the Abyss’s account. “How did He know so many years ago that we would come to retrieve that artifact called Eganda?”

Edvina frowned and said, "Back then, we were tricked by the Lord of Delusion's ability to foresee the future, which is why my three companions became puppets."

"Can the future really be predicted?" Sheila murmured. "Was our fate predetermined from the very beginning?"

"It seems He can't predict everything, at least not on the surface." Abyss, however, didn't show any pessimism. He analyzed seriously, "Although the Lord of Delusion has been hindering us, he hasn't truly stopped my actions. I haven't found his weakness yet, so I can't launch a counterattack, but I think it won't be long before we regain the initiative. Don't worry about the Lord of Delusion's threat. If He could really calculate everything, why didn't He just kill me from the start—or at least not hinder me in the first place?"

“ABC is right, now is not the time to be afraid.” Leona surprisingly agreed with Abyss’s statement this time.

After hearing Abyss's words, Sheila and Edvina realized that now was not the time to back down because of the troublesome nature of the Lord of Delusion; it was just that things seemed to have reached a stalemate.

“The tomb raiders carefully erased all traces inside the tomb. Although we found the dust to be fresh, I still couldn’t find any trace of them here,” Edvina sighed.

Indeed, that was the case. The dust that the tomb robbers re-laid wasn't meant to prevent the Abyss and their companions from discovering that "Eganda" had been stolen; that would be utterly self-deceptive. Their real purpose was to erase all traces they had left behind, making it impossible for the Abyss to track them down and thus preventing them from retrieving "Eganda."

"Mr. Abyss, can you glean anything from this scene?" Sheila asked Abyss with a hint of hope.

Abyss shrugged: "No, the tomb raiders did a pretty good job. All traces in this tomb have been covered up. Although I can use magic to examine this place very carefully, I still can't find out where the tomb raiders went."

"Ah...is that so..."

“...But, it’s not entirely impossible.” Abis suddenly shrugged again.

Leona smacked Abyss in the back with a single finger strike: "Don't talk so loudly!"

Abyss rubbed his back, which was sore from Leona's poking, smiled apologetically, and said, "Although I have no way of knowing where that tomb raider went, there are indeed quite a few witnesses around here."

“Shouldn’t the souls nearby be at rest? Can souls see what’s happening around them while they’re at rest?” Leona immediately asked. “Then why didn’t I feel any changes in the outside environment in the forty years after my death? I don’t even know how my body was preserved.”

“Not the dead, but the living.” Abis pointed upwards. “The landscaping in this cemetery is quite good. Although it hasn’t been meticulously trimmed, it’s still quite beautiful and lush. It’s surrounded by trees, which are actually the best eyewitnesses.”

"Trees?" Sheila didn't react for a moment.

"You mean you want Agnes to help?" Leona immediately realized what Abyss was talking about.

Although Agnes wasn't good with words, she was sincere, easy-going, and very approachable. Leona had become quite familiar with her. Having eaten, slept, and even bathed with Agnes several times in the City of Eternal Night, Leona knew Agnes's abilities intimately.

For a powerful druid like Agnes, making a few trees speak is a piece of cake.

The trees surrounding this cemetery are all very old, with some particularly large ones appearing to be over a thousand years old. Any grave robber who has ever been in the cemetery will inevitably be sensed by these trees.

“Agnes…you mean that great druid?” Edvina looked at Abyss.

The Abyss had kept Agnes's identity a closely guarded secret; few knew she had been resurrected, and Edvina, of course, couldn't glean from intelligence reports from her subordinates that Agnes was now under the Abyss's protection. But upon hearing Leona mention the name, she immediately realized that the Abyss had also brought Agnes into its ranks.

She and Agnes were contemporaries, so she naturally knew how powerful Agnes was.

“Yes, I’ve already let her out.” Abyss smiled slightly and casually pulled out a spatial rift beside him. “She said she would be out soon.”

As soon as the spatial rift opened, a fair leg stepped out from it.

"Agnes is so fast... Holy crap!"

Leona was just about to praise Agnes's efficiency when she suddenly noticed that Agnes, who had emerged from the spatial rift, was soaking wet...

That's not the most important thing. The biggest problem is that she wasn't wearing anything!

Without hesitation, she jumped onto the Abyss, covered his eyes firmly with her hands, and said to Agnes, "Agnes! You're not wearing anything!"

Agnes looked a little dazed. She took a moment to process what she was seeing, looked down at her still-dampened body, and thought for a moment before realizing that it was rather impolite to come out naked.

"Sorry, I was taking a shower and forgot to put on clothes." She bent down to apologize to Sheila and Edvina before casting a spell to make some mushroom spores floating in the air grow into a fungal coat on her body. "Let me help."

Chapter 165 Asking for Directions

Agnes walked barefoot through the cemetery.

The magic of nature emanated from her like morning mist, influencing the surrounding trees. Those ancient trees, steeped in history, began to sway slowly under Agnes's magic.

Agnes briefly awakened the trees' intelligence, and their bodies became able to sway freely.

The scene left Sheila utterly stunned. She had never seen Agnes cast such magic before; the sight before her was like a work of art. Agnes, dressed in a light and colorful fungal gown, walked slowly through the air, utterly beautiful. Sheila couldn't believe that the petite, seemingly dazed elf girl she had met earlier possessed such a divine side.

As the saying goes, the layman sees the spectacle, while the expert sees the details. Edvina, as the leader of the Shadow Sisters, who had seen a lot and dealt with people from all walks of life, had naturally seen druids use this kind of magic that empowers plants to temporarily give them intelligence. However, she had never seen a druid use what could be called the most advanced nature magic so casually. She had only heard about Agnes's deeds in the legends of the past. Now that she saw it for herself, she was indeed extraordinary.

quack quack...

Soon, all the trees around the cemetery swayed their branches, and the shapes of faces appeared on their bark, bowing to Agnes. They had all been imbued with intelligence by Agnes and could now answer her questions.

“That’s enough.” Agnes turned around briefly, nodded to the Abyss, and her cat ears twitched.

Abyss smiled and patted Agnes's warm cat ears, saying, "Thank you for your hard work, Agnes."

He walked directly to the trees and asked them his question as they swayed their branches as if dancing.

"Hello, I'd like to ask if you saw anyone enter that tomb and take anything from it a year or two ago?"

Abyss knew that these tree-people, who had been briefly endowed with intelligence by Agnes, only possessed basic thinking abilities, and it was more reasonable to communicate with them in a straightforward manner.

The tree people were slow to react. After thinking for a while, they began to scratch their heads and try to remember.