The Clearstream River is a narrow river located in the northern part of Tivian. King’s Campus is built alongside Clearstream Lake, and the water flowing out of the lake forms the Clearstream River. This small river flows southward from Clearstream Lake, entering the urban area of Tivian and merging into the Moonflow River, eventually emptying into the sea.
Irrigation River Bridge is located not far from King’s Campus, a small bridge spanning the Clearstream River. A road passes over this bridge, connecting King’s Campus to the southern part of Tivian’s urban area.
At night, the Irrigation River Bridge is quiet, with the gentle sound of water flowing under the bridge. The river breeze rustles the trees on both banks, and the dim light from the street lamps casts a faint glow over the area.
"Brr..."
Standing at the bridge entrance, Nephthys shivers in the chilly river breeze, hugging herself tightly and glancing around at the deserted surroundings.
"It’s so cold... How long do I have to wait here?"
Nephthys murmurs to herself as she looks around. After seeing Dorothy’s instructions, she immediately came to the Irrigation River Bridge and has been waiting here as instructed.
Thinking this, Nephthys opens the book she’s holding and picks up a pen to write.
"Miss Dorothy, I’ve arrived at the Irrigation River Bridge. How long do I need to wait here?"
Her neat handwriting appears on the page, then fades away. Soon, a reply appears before her eyes."Just wait a little longer. The person coming to pick you up will be here soon."
“Someone is coming to pick me up? Miss Dorothy has already arranged for someone? Could it be someone from the Rose Cross Order? Maybe Mr. Brandon?”
Seeing the words on the page, Nephthys feels a bit more at ease.
And so, Nephthys continues to wait at the bridge entrance.
After a while, Nephthys still hasn’t seen anyone. Just as she’s about to write another message to Dorothy, she hears the rustling of grass behind her.
“Is that them?”
Thinking this, Nephthys quickly turns toward the sound, only for her expression to freeze.
She sees six figures slowly emerging from the woods behind her. The streetlights illuminate their faces, and Nephthys realizes she recognizes every single one of them.
Leading the group is the familiar masked figure of Thorn Velvet. Beside him are his subordinates, including both members of the Eight-Spired Nest and highly corrupted followers from the Scholarly Society of Mystical Knowledge, among them Eli, who is glaring at her with a dark expression. In Eli’s hand rests a furry spider.
"Finally found you, you little traitor... Boyle."
Thorn Velvet speaks slowly as he looks at Nephthys. Following the slowly crawling spider, they have finally tracked her down after a long time.
The moment Nephthys sees Thorn Velvet and the others, her face turns pale. She immediately turns to run, but Eli, with astonishing speed, catches up to her in an instant and slaps her to the ground. Nephthys cries out in pain.
"Ah!"
"Don’t even think about running, traitor."
Eli coldly says as he looks down at Nephthys, who is now lying on the ground. At this moment, Thorn Velvet and the others slowly close in, surrounding Nephthys in a circle. Nephthys shrinks back in fear, looking up at Eli.
"S-Senior Eli... wake up! Please wake up! You’re being deceived by Thorn Velvet! He’s just using us!"
In her desperation, Nephthys pleads with her former senior from the Scholarly Society. However, Eli remains completely unmoved. Thorn Velvet, standing nearby, speaks up instead.
"Shut up, traitor, or I’ll kill you right now!"
After saying this, Thorn Velvet turns to Eli and asks, "What do we do now?"
"We’ve caught her. Take her back for interrogation. We’ll see how much we can get out of her."
Eli replies, and two of the lackeys move to drag Nephthys away. Just as the terrified Nephthys is about to cry out again, a familiar voice suddenly echoes in her mind.
"Great Aka, I wish to inform Nephthys to be ready. When you hear gunfire, run immediately and hide in the grass on the riverbank below the embankment."
“Gunfire?”
Hearing this, Nephthys is momentarily stunned. Then, in the next moment, a deafening gunshot shatters the night sky over the riverbank.
Bang!!
The loud gunshot echoes, and a bullet flies across the river, precisely piercing the head of the masked figure in the crowd. Thorn Velvet’s brains splatter, and his lifeless body collapses to the ground.
At this moment, on the opposite bank of the Clearstream River, in a shadowy spot, Vania stands with her rifle aimed at the distant riverbank. The barrel of the gun still emits a faint wisp of smoke.
After arriving at the scene, Vania had immediately spotted the situation on the opposite bank. After briefly informing Dorothy of the situation, she took action.
On the riverbank, as Thorn Velvet’s body falls, everyone present is stunned by the scene. Nephthys, who had been warned and prepared, immediately gets up and runs, trying to climb down the embankment. One of the lackeys closest to her moves to stop her.
"Don’t even think about escaping!"
Bang!!
A second gunshot rings out, and the lackey who tried to stop Nephthys is shot and falls to the ground. Nephthys takes the opportunity to climb down the embankment and hide in the grass on the riverbank. Seeing this, Eli shouts.
"Sniper! Take cover!"
At Eli’s command, the remaining lackeys quickly scatter to find cover. Meanwhile, Eli, using the light from the riverbank, identifies the sniper’s position and dashes across the Irrigation River Bridge at incredible speed toward the opposite bank.
As he runs, Eli’s face begins to shift and change, eventually transforming into the face of a young man—the face that should have been hidden beneath Thorn Velvet’s mask.
“Hmph! I only prepared this as a precaution, but I never thought I’d actually need to use it!”
Eli—or rather, Thorn Velvet—thinks to himself. During the slow pursuit with the spider earlier, Thorn Velvet had considered the possibility of encountering other members of the Rose Cross Order at the end of the chase and getting into a fight. After the incident at North Pine Forest, he had become slightly more cautious and had swapped identities with Eli before setting out.
Thorn Velvet had Eli wear his mask, while he used his abilities to take on Eli’s appearance. As a Shadow Facade, a Shadow-path Beyonder with Chalice as an auxiliary spirituality at the Black Earth rank, Thorn Velvet possesses the ability to change his appearance at will, allowing him to easily disguise himself as others.
Thanks to this identity swap, Thorn Velvet successfully avoided being sniped and killed unprepared. Now, it’s time for him to counterattack. Based on what he saw earlier, there was only one source of gunfire on the opposite bank, meaning there likely aren’t many enemies.
On the opposite bank of the Clearstream River, Vania, who is holding her rifle and aiming at the rapidly approaching figure, feels a surge of anxiety.
“Ahhh... I clearly took out their leader, so why aren’t they scattering?”
Seeing the fast-approaching figure, Vania panics internally. Earlier, while communicating with Dorothy in the carriage, Dorothy had told her that if a fight broke out and the enemy had a leader, it would either be a bald man or someone wearing a mask. If it was a bald man, she should run immediately. If it was someone wearing a mask, she should snipe them first, and then the fight would be manageable.
But now, Vania had clearly killed the masked man, yet the enemy showed no signs of fleeing. Helpless, Vania fires another shot at the approaching figure but misses. She then throws the rifle aside, draws a sword from her waist, and attaches a Devouring Sigil to herself.
The Devouring Sigil was one of the spoils from the battle at Field Manor, which Vania had received during the division of loot.
By the time Vania finishes attaching the Devouring Sigil, Thorn Velvet has already closed the distance. He draws a short blade and slashes at Vania with incredible speed. Vania raises her sword to block, barely deflecting the attack.
Clang!
The sharp sound of clashing metal echoes through the night. Thorn Velvet is momentarily surprised that the hidden sniper was able to block his swift attack. He quickly shifts to Vania’s side and attacks from another angle, but Vania reacts in time to block again. She then twists her sword, deflecting the short blade, and counterattacks with a thrust aimed at Thorn Velvet’s throat. However, Thorn Velvet dodges with unnatural agility, only losing a small piece of fabric from his clothing.
"Such swordsmanship..."
Seeing Vania’s skill with the sword, Thorn Velvet begins to take his opponent more seriously. He focuses his mind and engages Vania in close combat, their blades clashing repeatedly.
For a moment, the battlefield is filled with the sounds of clashing metal as the two figures move rapidly.
Thorn Velvet is a Chalice auxiliary Beyonder, so his strength is not low. His physical power is on par with that of an Apprentice-rank Craver or Vania enhanced by the Devouring Sigil. Thus, their strength is roughly equal. However, Vania far surpasses Thorn Velvet in skill and experience. Yet, despite her superior technique, Vania cannot gain the upper hand because of the significant speed difference between them.
As a Black Earth Rank Shadow, Thorn Velvet’s agility and speed far exceed that of an ordinary Apprentice-rank Shader. The gap in speed between Vania and Thorn Velvet is so large that it cannot be bridged by skill alone.
Once Thorn Velvet focuses, Vania begins to fall into a more and more disadvantageous position in the fight. Her attacks cannot hit the agile Thorn Velvet, while he uses his speed to attack from various angles. After her initial attempts to counterattack fail, Vania is forced into a purely defensive stance, parrying Thorn Velvet’s rapid strikes.
Thorn Velvet’s attacks are fast and come from unpredictable angles. He can even temporarily disappear into the shadows, reducing his presence before launching a surprise attack. Many of his strikes come from Vania’s blind spots. If not for Vania’s Insight, which allows her to sense attacks from all directions and block them in time, and her master-level experience, which lets her predict Thorn Velvet’s movements and attacks, she would have died countless times already.
This is the absolute difference in ability caused by the rank gap. Unless Thorn Velvet’s speed is reduced by 40%, Vania has no chance of winning.
“Ah... I can’t hit him at all. I can only defend, and I won’t last long like this!”
Vania cries out internally. If this continues, she will soon be defeated.
Despite the enhancements from the Devouring Sigil and her Laurent Swordsmanship, Vania clearly cannot face a Black Earth Rank opponent head-on, especially one who combines the strengths of Shadow and Chalice.
“Lord... please help me!”
...
In the midst of this desperate battle, Vania prays in despair. Far below, in the underground chamber, Dorothy, who has been anxiously waiting for news, suddenly hears this prayer and frowns.
“Is that... Vania’s prayer? Is the situation above not going well?”
Hearing Vania’s prayer, Dorothy feels a surge of tension. She wants to help but has no way of knowing the situation above in real time. As she ponders, an idea suddenly occurs to her.
“System, can I use the information channel to access the visual information of those connected to me?”
Dorothy asks the system. Since the information channel can transmit various types of information, and visual signals are essentially a form of information, it should be possible. As expected, the system responds immediately.
“Yes, but transmitting complete visual information in real time requires widening the information channel. Doing so will consume additional Revelation, and the target must not resist.”
It really works! All I need to do is widen the channel! Hearing the system’s reply, Dorothy feels a surge of excitement. She immediately sends a prayer to Vania and Nephthys above.
"Great Aka, I will provide assistance to my comrades in battle. Please do not resist."
After sending the prayer, Dorothy’s expression hardens, and she speaks to the system again.
“System, prepare to connect me to Vania and Nephthys’s visual information.”
...
Above ground, on one side of the Clearstream River, Nephthys, who had fallen down the embankment, quietly moves through the grass on the riverbank. Hearing the continuous clashing of metal from the opposite bank, she feels a wave of anxiety.
“Is the person Miss Dorothy sent to help me fighting over there? I hope they win. It’s a pity I can’t help as an ordinary person.”
Thinking this, Nephthys makes her way to a set of stairs nearby and carefully climbs back up the embankment. She looks back toward the Irrigation River Bridge where she had been earlier.
Nephthys sees the remaining subordinates of Thorn Velvet emerging from their cover. They gather at the bridge entrance, looking toward the distant battlefield as if discussing something. At their feet lie the two bodies of those who had been shot earlier.
“Are those guys planning to go help? I don’t know how many people Miss Dorothy sent, but if those guys join the fight, things might not go well…”
As Nephthys watches the scene with concern, a familiar voice echoes in her mind once more.
“Great Aka, I will provide assistance to my comrades in battle. Please do not resist…”
"Is that... Miss Dorothy’s voice?"
Hearing this, Nephthys feels a slight sense of confusion, followed by a strange sensation in her mind. Remembering the earlier message, she hesitates but ultimately does not resist the feeling. Vania, in the midst of her battle, makes the same choice.
Then, the visual information from Nephthys and Vania begins to transmit through the information channel to Dorothy’s mind. At this moment, Dorothy can see everything they see. Their vision becomes her vision.
This feeling is not unfamiliar to Dorothy—it’s similar to how her corpse marionettes provide her with vision, except this time, the marionettes are replaced by living people.
After spending 2 points of Revelation to successfully connect to Vania and Nephthys’s vision, Dorothy, still in the underground chamber, immediately begins to observe the battlefield, searching for something.
Vania’s vision is chaotic, filled with scattered flashes of blades and rapidly moving shadows. Nephthys’s vision, however, is stable, and Dorothy quickly finds what she’s looking for—two corpses, the bodies of those Vania had shot earlier.
"Got it. If there’s a fight... there must be corpses..."
Looking at the corpses in Nephthys’s vision, Dorothy smiles slightly. She then activates her Corpse Marionette Ring and begins to remotely control the corpses from deep underground.
That’s right—Dorothy is using Nephthys and Vania’s vision as observation points to activate the Corpse Marionette Ring and manipulate the corpses on the battlefield.
The Corpse Marionette Ring has a maximum control range of three kilometers in radius. Although Dorothy is deep underground in the sixth level of the Star Numerology Scriptorium, the total depth of the six levels is less than sixty meters. This depth hardly affects Dorothy’s control range, and she can essentially be considered as being at a fixed point within King’s Campus.
A three-kilometer radius is enough to span some small towns in Dorothy’s previous life. The Star Numerology Scriptorium’s ruins are located beneath King’s Campus, and the battlefield is not far from King’s Campus—only about one kilometer away. This places it right at the edge of Dorothy’s control range from underground. As long as Dorothy can sense the area and has visual information from it, she can use the Corpse Marionette Ring to raise the corpses.
At the entrance of the Irrigation River Bridge, as an invisible force flows into them, the corpses of those Vania had killed earlier begin to twitch slightly. Then, with lifeless eyes, they slowly rise to their feet and silently gaze at their former companions and the intense battle on the opposite bank.