Saintess Summons Skeletons - Chapter 411: Hidden in plain sight, from the beginning
The noise stopped, and a circle of mana formed in front of Sofia. The mana collapsed into a single point before extending into a circle again, forming a strange hole in reality, with a brightly lit corridor on the other side.
That’s the same space magic they used to open the room of artifacts in the second trial.
Sofia stepped in, and the hole closed right behind her. Leaving her stranded in a small corridor that was unlike anything she had seen before. If anything, it reminded her of Richard’s undersea base a bit.
[Entering private zone, you are now in Scribe Only mode]
Not a dungeon. No ambient mana here either.
Private zone? I’m not imagining things, this must really be a place left by the admins!
Before she could observe her surroundings much, the strange long tube of glass on the ceiling which was producing the bright white light illuminating the room started flickering.
Is something wrong?
Sofia took a step closer, and the flickering sped up, she could also feel that the tube was heating up. She hurriedly stepped back, and the flickering slowed back down.
Wait… The flickering… Like in the sun temple? Is this light using electricity?!
Sofia sent some of her mana in the direction of the tube of light, and it instantly started freaking out like when she approached.
That’s really it. Time to use an unlife rune to cut the mana emissions, then, I don’t want to break the place. Not so useless for the trial after all.
The glass tube light broke while Sofia was applying her rune, sending glass shards flying in the narrow corridor.
Yeah I think the rune is a good call. I’m scared to even probe beyond the door with my mana senses if things around here are going to be so sensitive to mana.
While Sofia channeled her rune, sitting in a corner of the room, she had ample time to look around. The corridor was about three meters long and one meter large, the walls and ceiling were unadorned flat surfaces painted in all white while the floor was made of black ceramic-looking tiles.
There was a large framed metallic panel on the opposite wall which looked like it was probably a door, behind Sofia was a small handprint lock like the one she had used to get in, and on the side were two wooden panels stuck together on the wall, also painted white.
Is it some kind of art piece?
Sofia tried to identify the wooden panels, but she got absolutely no result.
No data on these things, Mr Scribe? In Sun’s temple you still tried, at least… Or are you not allowed to do that here? Or is it because I dropped the skill?
Well…
While Sofia channeled her rune, she tried to understand what the wooden panels were about.
It feels a bit too weird to be just decoration.
Overcome by her curiosity, she extended her mana senses toward the wooden panels, taking the risk to potentially break something.
It’s… A shoe closet? I think these shapes are shoes, right? How does it open though?
After playing around with the wooden panels for a bit, she finally figured out that the panels opened by lightly pushing on them and letting go. What a convoluted way to open a door.
The reward for my efforts, two new pairs of leather shoes. And they’re too small for me. It’s not even magical items, literally just shoes…
For a second Sofia hesitated about taking them or not, thinking that they were useless and that nobody would be dumb enough to buy ‘definitely the admin’s shoes’ from her, but then she remembered Valeure’s obsession for weird items, and ended up pocketing the shoes anyway.
I feel a bit like a thief… But if it’s really the admin’s shoes, it’s not like they’re going to ask to get them back.
Finally the rune’s channeling was over, and Sofia could advance in the corridor without having to fear breaking more things. Broken glass crunched under her boots as she walked up to the metallic door, which opened by itself, sliding into the wall.
I didn’t feel any mana movement… This place really runs only on electricity I guess.
The next room was a relatively small room, about the size of the girls’ dorm in Verenha’s orphanage. There was a couch, a table with chairs, a few shelves and random furniture along the walls, as well as what Sofia guessed was some kind of kitchen area, since she could see something resembling a sink, though there was no fireplace.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
Something caught her eyes in the kitchen area. It’s a hero’s foodlocker like the one I have!
More cursory looking around revealed the presence of quite a few strange-looking things all around the room, along with more regular furnishings like books, an hourglass, and other daily-life knicknacks. There were no windows but the place was well lit thanks to more glowing tubes on the ceiling. Two more closed doors led to other rooms, one opposite to the entrance corridor and one in a corner.
Is this really like… A home?
Like that in the middle of nowhere behind a waterfall on a distant planet?
“Hello?” Sofia tried, “Is anyone here?”
Only the low droning noise of the ceiling lights answered her query.
I guess not, then. The place is tidy, no dust, but that doesn’t have to mean much, as I’ve learned in zangdar. Is this place in the margin too, like the dungeon? And is it really the admins’ home? It looks a bit strange but…
Hmm. I suppose this style of decoration must be from the heroes’ world judging from the foodlocker. It is really quite close to the look of Richard’s place.
Sofia took a few steps to one of the shelves and grabbed a rectangular wooden box with a slit on top, from which a white thing poked out.
Identify still not working at all… What’s this stuff? It feels like paper, kind of. Soft paper?
She pulled the white thing out of the box, and it ripped up in her hand as she pulled it out, but also revealed another sheet of the same stuff coming out of the box.
So it’s a box for dispensing soft paper. Why, though? This stuff is super flimsy, you can’t possibly write on it. Well, whatever.
Sofia put the box back down, and grabbed something else from another shelf. That shelf had a small handheld mirror circled in gold, and a few small golden cubes, along with a wooden hair brush.
The question is, if this is really an admin’s place, can wooden things really survive for three thousand years? Some things in the orphanage went bad after just a few years from the humidity… I guess it depends on the wood and how it’s treated? Sofia asked herself while looking at the clean hair brush, when she noticed something on it, a single hair. She stored her shield and freed her left hand from her armor to carefully untangle the hair strand from the brush and observe it.
Dark blue?
Not a very common color. I think I’ve seen some orcs with natural blue hair in the sect…
Sofia opened the small golden cubes, finding them full of colored powder. Makeup of some kind? That must be what the small paint brushes here are for.
If this place is from one of the admins, it must be the human one, clearly. This is without a doubt a Hero’s place. So the human admin being a hero is getting more and more certain. But I didn’t expect them to be a woman. It’s not the impression I got from them when I was reading the unique titles descriptions and the title booklet which they clearly wrote.
Or it’s a man with long hair who likes to use makeup… That could also be it, to be fair. Plenty of Exidian guys had long hair and used makeup.
Sofia left the makeup behind, though she stored the hair after rolling it around a small bone, and she next went to open the foodlocker. A wave of fresh air washed over her as she opened the large metallic thing’s door.
It really is a foodlocker. But this one glass bottle is all there’s left inside…
Sofia grabbed the bottle and uncorked it, giving it a good old smell test.
“Doesn’t smell like much, and it looks pretty clear. Probably just water.”
She stored the bottle and closed the foodlocker.
This place is decidedly not as exciting as I thought it would be.
“Maybe the books will be more interesting?”
Sofia started looking through the few books spread around the room. To her dismay, they were all just fictions, mostly romance, it seemed. She even stopped in shock, mouth agape, when she read one of the titles.
“Are you kidding me?”
‘The Dainty Vampire and her Seven Rich Wolvesmen’
“Astelia has the same one in her room. Literally the same, even the appearance is similar! How long has this one book been around?”
Sofia grabbed the book and skimmed through the pages, quickly reading through with [DODGE – ME]’s fast reading boost. The book was very sexually charged, to say the least. It would have made Sofia blush under her helmet if she could still do that. And the book was made using the system’s very elusive bright and smooth white paper, which Sofia found surprising. It comforted her in the idea of this place definitely being an admin’s house.
Asty’s been reading stuff like this?
I won’t judge but… Hoooly.
Sofia closed the book and grabbed another one. The style was very similar. Before she knew it, Sofia had read every book in the room.
I have to say, this author… They know their stuff…
Man…
Thinking this, she realized that she hadn’t even checked the author’s name, though it was clear from the writing style that all these books were likely from the same person. She brought one of the books back out of her storage, and checked for the author’s name. It was nowhere to be found in the usual spots, but upon closer inspection, Sofia found something weird with the book’s preface.
Is this – a ritual circle?!
Hidden in plain sight, a ritual circle was drawn by the negative spaces between the words on the book’s very first page.
Whoever did this was seriously deranged.
She took out the other books, and, checking the first page, despite boasting a relevant and different text every time, they all incorporated the same small hidden ritual circle.
Sofia sent a tiny bit of mana into the ritual circle, and under her eyes, most of the preface disappeared, leaving behind only a few letters which slid around on the page to form a single line.
‘With Love, By Anna <>
