Strength 99999 but the Holy Sister

"An envoy from the Kingdom of Levis?"

Elsa didn't see Tricia, she frowned slightly and glanced at Count Abru, who was immediately startled.

"Don't let him go. If he has anything to say, let him come to see me."

Those people are all involved. If we let them go now, the evidence will be gone.

After saying that, Elsa looked down at the hourglass in her hand. About a minute had passed since Tricia left, and a small amount of sand had accumulated in the hourglass.

……

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415. Damaged Hourglass (3K)

At the same time, Tricia had just stepped into the forest when she immediately noticed that the magic power around her was changing rapidly.

She knew that she had now stepped into the "tunnel" connecting the two spaces - or in other words, she had entered the range affected by the ruins. From here on, she had already left her original space, so everything that was originally impossible to perceive with the naked eye or magic due to the barriers of space and time became clearly visible here.

When I was outside the forest, it was an ordinary forest shrouded in sunlight, but now a hazy white mist was rising.

Tricia looked into the depths of the forest. The fog in front seemed to be even thicker. Tricia turned her head and looked behind her. The figures of the people outside had become very blurry, swaying in the surging fog, like candles swaying in the wind and rain, which might go out at any time.

Tricia mobilized her magical vision, and the surrounding scenery became distorted - she was like standing in a thick glass ball, and everything around her became a distorted arc, changing as her vision moved.

This is the original appearance of this place. The distorted space cannot be seen through the naked eye because the light itself has also been distorted, but a different view can be seen through magical vision.

"It is indeed the breath of the ruins."

Tricia glanced at the hourglass in her hand. Without hesitation, she continued to walk inside. With every step she took, the light around her became dimmer. It was completely different from the scenery she saw from the outside. The light in the forest became dimmer and there was no wind. The air was mixed with complex and chaotic magic power, but when it flowed towards Tricia, it was blocked by Tricia's magic barrier.

After walking a few more steps forward, the fog around her became thicker and thicker. When Tricia walked about a hundred meters, she realized that the fog around her had completely stabilized. She then tried to communicate with the magic elements here and expand her magical vision to several thousand meters away.

But apart from a small number of monsters, Tricia didn't see any other figures.

She did not continue to walk inside. She observed silently for a while, and then released her familiars one by one. Although the crow had been left by Tricia with Charlie to protect Charlie's safety, Tricia could summon other familiars besides the crow, some were eagles, some were sparrows, and most of them were birds. The appearance of the familiar depended on the personal preference of the summoner, and there was actually no difference in essence.

They were all ordered by Tricia to fly towards the river valley and canyon for reconnaissance.

However, unlike crows, these familiars are very dull and can only execute some simple commands. This is the difference between the natal familiar and the subordinate familiar. The familiar is the product of a contract signed between the summoner and the devil or elf. In fact, most of these immature magical life forms have no intelligence and cannot control too much magic power. Only familiars that have evolved many times like crows can obtain sufficiently powerful strength through Tricia's magic - this is the category of advanced summoning.

Even on this continent, Crow is an outstanding familiar.

After taking another look at the hourglass, Tricia turned around and walked in the direction she came from. Soon she left the forest easily. As soon as she came out, she saw Elsa looking at her. She seemed relieved to see her appear, and her eyes drooped slightly with a smile.

The bright sunshine shone again, reflecting on Elsa's soft and shiny hair, and the depression brought by the dark white fog in the forest was swept away.

"Elsa."

Tricia walked over quickly.

They compared the hourglasses in their hands, and Tricia was almost sure of one thing: the flow of time in the forest was more than three times faster than outside, which was inconsistent with the description of the soldiers of the first battalion.

Tricia frowned slightly.

"This is not good news. The 'ripped' space is moving away—normally, this shouldn't happen. But no matter what, Aisha, I have to go in again. Either find the hero as soon as possible, or repair the 'space rip' in the ruins and get time back on track."

Tricia said.

From last night until now, according to the time in the forest, at least more than a day has passed, and as time passes faster, perhaps this time will be extended again, which means that the possibility of the brave man encountering danger has been greatly increased.

There are not only those white-clothed pursuers in the forest, but also many dangerous monsters. These monsters live outside the border areas and no one hunts them regularly, so there will definitely be many powerful individuals.

"Maybe we can try starting from somewhere else."

Aisha said.

"The envoys from the Kingdom of Levis came just now. They asked Earl Abru to release the people, but I refused."

Elsa simply relayed the news brought by Count Abru, causing Tricia to frown slightly.

Aisha said: "This incident is probably related to the Kingdom of Levis, so we can also try to get their commander to give up the action against the hero."

“But we may not find the right person.”

Even if she uses hypnosis to screen through layer by layer, it will take quite a while - even Tricia would have a headache facing a country's intelligence agency. Hypnosis is not omnipotent, and any organization must take precautions against it. Sometimes it would be easier for her to directly destroy a country's army, but she would never do such a thing.

"That's true."

In fact, Elsa's idea was a little simpler and more crude. She wanted to directly warn the king and ministers of the Kingdom of Levis that if the hero died, they would be buried with him - this first required establishing a sufficiently evil image. Elsa thought her acting skills were enough, such as destroying the other party's castle, catching a few high-level monsters and throwing them into other people's homes, or digging a "moat" about a kilometer wide outside the other party's city, doing some infrastructure construction, repairing water conservancy projects, etc., or even taking the king to get an IronMan one-day experience card. Even Tricia couldn't stand it, let alone those people.

If she really wanted to torture someone, Elsa thought she had some way to do it, as long as it didn't kill them.

Her past life experience told her that although this approach was stupid, it was very effective. There would always be people who were afraid of intimidation, and just one would be enough. No matter how solid the defense line was, once a gap appeared, the rest would be easy - after all, Elsa also had the leverage over the Kingdom of Levis, and those men in white had attacked the North first, so Elsa could do it with complete peace of mind.

Although it is a bit unreasonable, Elsa doesn't mind being a villain.

However, considering the impact on Tricia if she really did this, Elsa thought about it and gave up the idea. Unless there was really no other way out, Elsa didn't want to ruin Tricia's image. Besides, it wasn't the worst time yet. It wouldn't be too late to try this method when even Tricia felt embarrassed.

"Come to think of it, I seemed to be able to see the white mist in the forest just now."

Aisha said, causing Tricia to let out a confused "hmm."

"Can you see the white fog?"

Tricia looked back at the forest. In her opinion, if she didn't know in advance that there was a problem here, even she wouldn't be able to see anything - after all, the real world was in the forest, which was already another space. Her magical perception was of little use here, and she couldn't see the magic of the "future".

Elsa described everything she saw to Tricia, but Elsa couldn't accurately describe what it felt like, which made Tricia fall into deep thought.

She thought about it, raised her hand, and a ball of deep magic slowly wrapped around the hourglass in her hand. The magic circle in the palm of her hand became blurred and then transparent, but the hourglass in Tricia's hand seemed to be still and no longer moved.

"I've stripped away its 'space'. Although its time still flows, I deliberately adjusted the direction of its 'deviance' so that it appears to be stationary to us. Aisha, can you see through this?"

Elsa nodded.

"can."

In Elsa's eyes, the hourglass was both flowing and not flowing.

The more Elsa looked, the more confused she became. After all, if the time in the hourglass was still relative to her, then her time should behave normally. But she could see the sand flowing normally, which proved that her time should be still relative to Tricia's. However, this was a contradiction. It couldn't be said that Elsa's time was both still and flowing, right?

At this moment, Elsa suddenly remembered the old priest.

The old priest said that her appearance had hardly changed in the past two years.

Is that so?

"Elsa?" Tricia's voice brought Elsa back to her senses. "What did you see?"

Elsa didn't think twice and described what she saw.

Tricia was immediately surprised.

"Then... can you try to take out the hourglass without destroying my magic?"

But as Elsa stretched out her hand, and as it approached Tricia's palm, the magic circle collapsed. Tricia was not surprised by this scene at all - any magic that directly affected Elsa would be dispelled by her, this had long been proven. Unless it was magic that did not directly affect Elsa, Elsa could restrain it, but this would not solve the current problem.

As the blurry light curtain dissipated, the hourglass in Tricia's hand was revealed, but the hourglass became riddled with holes, and fine sand slowly flowed down from the broken glass.

"Huh?" Elsa was a little surprised that the hourglass was broken.

"Part of it has been taken away by the 'space' I stripped away."

Tricia looked at the hourglass in her hand and explained. As she spoke, the formation in her hand appeared again. This time, Elsa saw a pile of fine sand and broken wood chips appear in Tricia's hand.

"Space is very precious. If you lose an inch, you lose an inch, so I took it back."

Tricia closed the magic circle in her palm.

"However, the damage to the hourglass cannot be repaired unless I can restore the space to its original state without any errors. I don't think anyone can do that."

Elsa looked at the broken hourglass in Tricia's hand and roughly understood why Tricia didn't let her get close to the forest - otherwise, it would be the forest and the people in it that would become devastated.

Tricia put the damaged hourglass back into the space ring, seeming to be lost in thought.

"Of course, I have a way to keep it intact, but this requires finding its exact location..."

"Unfortunately, the white fog in the forest is too thick. I can't see clearly what's going on inside even though I'm standing outside."

"Then leave it to me. I have a way to clear the white mist in the forest. That mist is essentially magic element. My familiar can temporarily absorb it all. Although it can't clear the white mist in the forest all at once, for you, Elsa, a moment's gap should be enough, right?"

"I can't promise," Elsa said, "but I can try."

……

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416. Grey Wind Swordsman (4K)

Madeleine had spent two days in the forest, during which time her distress signals received no response.

She had already noticed the strangeness of this forest, but she still sent messages regularly.

but……

"This is the last one..."

Madeleine held the Philosopher's Stone in her hand and sat against a tall tree. The Holy Sword: Throne of Light, Gramer, was placed on her knees and wrapped in a blood-stained cloth.

The touch of her palm had long since gone from ice-cold to unchanged. She hesitated for a long time, but finally injected magic power into the magic stone. With the surge of magic power, the final message was sent out.

Madeleine raised her head and looked into the distance of the forest, but the surroundings were still foggy. She couldn't see what was deep in the white fog. She only felt that the place was unusually quiet. In the past two days, Madeleine had encountered no less than forty high-level monsters in the forest, but rarely saw any traces of birds or beasts.

Although the monsters in the forest posed no threat to her who held the holy sword, they did cause her a lot of trouble - the sound of fighting was too harsh in the quiet forest, which was not good news for them, because the real threat came from the pursuers in white.

Those men in white kept chasing her relentlessly. At first, Madeleine could still handle it, but then a strong man appeared among the men in white - a strong man from the Southwestern Federation, who was known as the "Eight Swordsmen". From then on, Madeleine had no choice but to escape.

For her as a brave warrior, all this was too embarrassing.

"Your Highness the Brave One."

Timmer came to Madeleine holding a piece of simply cleaned and processed animal meat.

"Please eat something. We've run out of rations. I used my familiar to get this."

Although Madeleine had always told Timmer, the only wizard, to conserve his magic power, the current situation no longer allowed them to do so. Even so, the meat was still half-cooked. After all, they did not dare to light a fire here, let alone use precious magic power and magic stones to cook a piece of food.

It's just raw meat. They don't care about that much at this time as long as they can fill their stomachs.

"Thank you, have you eaten yet?"

"We've all eaten it," Timmer said, sticking out his tongue, "but... it's a bit unpalatable... Your Highness, please be patient."

Upon hearing this, Madeleine took the meat, cut off a piece with a knife and stuffed it into her mouth. After just a slight chew, the fishy smell of blood filled her nasal cavity. Madeleine frowned, resisted the urge to vomit, clenched her fists, and swallowed the tough meat bit by bit.

"No wonder the forest is getting quieter," Madeleine put down her knife and closed her eyes. She looked as if she was savoring a strong drink. She seemed to be forcing the food in her esophagus into her stomach. After a while, she spoke, "There's an abnormal amount of magic here. Even these animals are slowly becoming monsters."

The taste of raw animal meat and raw monster meat is completely different. The former is still tolerable. They are the elite soldiers of the empire, and their willpower will naturally not compromise with a piece of raw meat. But if it is the latter, even they will find it extremely fishy and difficult to swallow.

No one would be willing to eat the raw flesh of a monster, and most monster meat contains a small amount of alienated magic elements, which are toxic to the human body. Only professional chefs can cook it into a delicacy, otherwise it will become an extremely unpalatable chronic poison.

But now everyone has no choice.

"As expected of you, Your Highness the Brave. You're truly amazing! You actually ate it..."

Timmer looked at Madeleine in surprise. Madeleine's eyes narrowed, "You didn't eat?"

"Oh, I really can't eat this... I choose this!"

Timmer then took out two rose-red berries from behind his back and chuckled as if his trick had succeeded.

Only now can one find joy in suffering, which made Madeleine smile.

"I told you to save your magic power."

"It only took a little bit—really just a little bit. It healed quickly!"

Timmer quickly waved his hands to defend himself.

"But this one is so sour it's teeth-breaking, and so bitter it's astringent. No one else can eat it. After taking a bite, they start crying for water... I used a little trick—at least it's less sour. There are only four of them, and I ate two myself. These two are for you!"

As he spoke, Timmer pressed the berries into Madeleine's hands.

Madeleine looked at the berries in her hand. The berries were only the size of a baby's fist. The rough surface looked like it had been wiped, and it was translucent red, emitting a sweet fragrance that was a million times more tempting than the smell of raw meat.

She knew that Timmer must have used magic to make the originally sour fruit slightly more palatable.

"Timmer, you are obviously a battle mage, but you have unique research in these areas."

"You don't even sound like you're complimenting me... Anyway, just try it, it's delicious!"

Madeleine glanced at Timmer again, and when her gaze dropped, she saw anticipation in Timmer's eyes.

"You eat it, or you give it to them."