East Tivian, beneath the Boyle family mansion.
In the hidden chamber where the curse-repelling scepter was concealed, just as Nephthys was about to infuse the scepter with Revelation spirituality to reactivate it, a terrifying, withered mummy apparition suddenly appeared, accompanied by a piercing screech. Along with it came a powerful curse directed at Nephthys.
Affected by the curse, Nephthys collapsed weakly to the ground. The process of infusing the scepter with spirituality was forcibly interrupted. She lay on the floor, her face pale, her body completely immobilized, and her consciousness nearly fading. Seeing this, Nust, who was nearby, was horrified.
"Miss... Damn this evil spirit!!"
Gritting his teeth, Nust pulled out a sigil from his pocket, pressed it onto his palm, and activated it. The sigil burned, leaving behind a closed-eye Silence symbol on his palm.
"Spirit-Banishing Sigil... Get lost, evil spirit!"
With a roar, Nust charged at the mummy apparition, slamming his marked hand toward it. However, it was completely ineffective. Nust passed right through the apparition, just like the dagger he had thrown earlier.
"Evil spirit? Show some respect, mortal!"
The apparition hissed, its glowing green eyes glaring at Nust. Instantly, a wave of weakness washed over Nust’s body. The elderly butler, already frail, staggered under the weight of the curse, barely managing to stay upright by leaning against the wall. He began gasping for breath.
Looking at the old man struggling to breathe, the mummy apparition’s glowing eyes showed no emotion. It spoke coldly."An old mortal like you, and yet you’re still alive? Hmph... So you’re not blood-related to Davis Boyle, just someone close to him? And a Spiritualist at that. No wonder you can withstand this a little."
After muttering to itself, the mummy apparition turned its gaze back to Nephthys, who was lying in front of the scepter, and continued.
"Among Davis Boyle’s descendants, there’s actually one with Revelation spirituality. How surprising. But the surprises end here. Pity... I could have taken my time tormenting your family..."
As it spoke, the mummy apparition seemed to intensify the curse on Nephthys. Lying on the ground, Nephthys felt even worse. Her vision blurred, and her consciousness began to fade further. Seeing that Nephthys was still alive, the apparition seemed intent on killing her on the spot.
The mummy increased the intensity of the curse, causing Nephthys’ life to drain away rapidly. Just as she was about to lose consciousness completely, a surge of energy flowed into her body, reviving her spirits.
“This... this is... Miss Dorothy?”
In her semi-conscious state, Nephthys’ eyes widened slightly. She knew exactly where this power came from—it was Dorothy, far away.
…
At this moment, in her study at Green Shade Town, Dorothy was frowning deeply, her expression serious. Through the information channel, she was connected to Nephthys’ senses and could clearly see what was happening in the hidden chamber beneath the Boyle mansion. The sudden appearance of the mummy apparition had caught her off guard.
“A mummy-like apparition? It feels like an evil spirit, but not quite. The old black butler clearly used a sigil designed to deal with spirits, but it had no effect. It seems more like a projection or something similar…”
Dorothy thought to herself. Based on her observations, the mummy apparition seemed more like a manifestation of curse energy. The source of this curse was likely an ancient undead buried in a tomb beneath the sands of North Ufiga. The apparition in the chamber seemed to be a phantom created by the curse.
“If that’s the case, then the original undead must be incredibly powerful. To curse the Boyle family from thousands of kilometers away in North Ufiga, and to use the curse to sense the situation of the cursed... It even adjusted the curse’s target to focus on Nephthys when it saw her trying to reactivate the scepter. This level of control... is terrifying.”
Dorothy’s thoughts raced. The scenes she had just witnessed highlighted the immense power of the mummy’s true form. The curse’s long range, its ability to spread through bloodlines and even social connections, and its capacity to sense the surroundings of the cursed and adjust the curse’s intensity—all of this made Dorothy realize that the ancient undead was an extraordinarily powerful being.
"How on earth did Nephthys’ grandfather provoke something like this!?"
After analyzing the situation, Dorothy couldn’t help but exclaim. She suddenly became very curious about Nephthys’ grandfather, Davis Boyle, and what he had done in North Ufiga to anger such an ancient undead to the point of cursing his entire family.
“But the immediate priority is to save Nephthys. Right now, she’s barely holding on thanks to the Devouring Sigil, but we can’t keep this up forever. We need to do something.”
Dorothy thought quickly. The only reason Nephthys hadn’t been killed by the curse yet was because Dorothy had used the marionette mark on her to transfer the effects of the Devouring Sigil through the spiritual threads. This temporarily enhanced Nephthys’ constitution with Chalice spirituality, allowing her to withstand the curse. However, she was still immobilized and suppressed.
In reality, resolving the crisis was simple. All Nephthys needed to do was touch the scepter on the stone pedestal and continue infusing it with Revelation to reactivate it. Once the scepter was reactivated, its curse-repelling properties would return, and the undead’s curse would naturally dissipate.
The problem was that Nephthys needed to touch the scepter to do this. Right now, she was barely clinging to life thanks to the Devouring Sigil and couldn’t move at all. The old butler, Nust, was also in no condition to help, as he could barely stand.
The Silence curse was causing Nephthys’ body tissues and organs to become lethargic, slowing or even stopping their functions, leading to death. Currently, Nephthys was maintaining minimal vital signs thanks to the Devouring Sigil, but all other activities were suppressed. Under the curse’s influence, Dorothy couldn’t even use the spiritual threads to control Nephthys’ body.
“Ugh... I need to find a way to reactivate the scepter. But Nephthys can’t move at all, so she can’t infuse it with Revelation. Do I need to go to her house myself? Her house is in East Tivian, and it would take me several hours to get there by carriage. Vania is in the Cathedral District in North Tivian, and it would take just as long for her to get there. I don’t know if Nephthys can hold on that long.”
Faced with the current situation, Dorothy began to frantically think of a solution. After organizing her thoughts, she focused on how to get Nephthys moving again.
“Nephthys’ movements are suppressed by the curse, and I can’t even control her body with the spiritual threads. The Devouring Sigil is keeping her alive... To get her moving again, besides the Devouring Sigil, she’ll need some additional help…”
Dorothy thought to herself. Suddenly, she recalled what the mummy had said to the old butler earlier, and an idea flashed in her mind.
"When the old butler was cursed by that mummy... the mummy said that if the butler hadn’t been a Spiritualist and not blood-related to Nephthys’ grandfather, he would have died on the spot given his age. According to the mummy... Spiritualists seem to have some resistance to curses.”
Dorothy realized that "Spiritualist" referred to the Apprentice rank of the Silence path. Based on the mummy’s words, Silence Beyonders seemed to have some degree of resistance to Silence curses.
“So, what if Nephthys were to advance to Spiritualist right now...? How would that play out?”
Dorothy’s thoughts raced. She quickly realized that this might be feasible. First, the floor of the chamber was already inscribed with a Silence ritual circle, which could be used as an advancement circle.
Next, Dorothy recalled the mystical texts she had given Nephthys and realized that the two Silence texts she had—’Fouren’s Elegy’ and the shamanic knowledge from the New Continent—were both present.
Although Dorothy didn’t have physical copies of these texts, they were short enough that she had transcribed them. Fouren’s Elegy was just a few poems, and the shamanic knowledge was a few lines carved on a piece of bark. Dorothy had quickly copied these, along with other short texts like The Song of the Lamb, and given them to Nephthys to help her accumulate spirituality faster.
Currently, Nephthys had already read Fouren’s Elegy and the shamanic knowledge, accumulating 7 points of Silence. If she could gain just a little more Silence, she would meet the requirements for the advancement ritual.
But... where could she get more Silence right now? Dorothy only had those two Silence texts. There was no way to get more.
“Ugh... Is this really not going to work? Do I have to use Feast? This is my last Feast sigil, and it consumes 5 points of Chalice... Is it really worth wasting such a precious sigil and so much spirituality here?”
Dorothy was deeply conflicted. But at this moment, she wasn’t the only one struggling.
…
Beneath the Boyle mansion, in the hidden chamber, Nephthys still lay on the ground, her eyes wide open, her body completely immobilized. The curse had stripped her of all ability to move, and she couldn’t even speak.
However, thanks to the Devouring Sigil’s Chalice spirituality, Nephthys’ life was still barely sustained. Her heart continued to beat, and her breathing hadn’t stopped. The curse seemed unable to kill her outright.
This made the mummy apparition increasingly impatient.
"Why... why, as a blood descendant of Davis Boyle... as a mere mortal, are you still alive?"
The mummy apparition floated beside Nephthys, its eerie voice tinged with irritation.
Clearly, Nephthys, who could only move her eyes, couldn’t answer the mummy’s questions. After floating around her for a moment, the apparition spoke again.
"It seems... you have some interesting secrets, little Boyle... With the power I’ve regained... I should be able to kill you directly. But no matter. As a being who can project my voice and image here, I have more than just this one method."
The mummy apparition floated as it spoke. What was present here was merely a phantom, capable of guiding the curse already etched into the Boyle bloodline and transmitting information. It shouldn’t have been able to directly interfere in any other way.
But in this world, information itself could carry immense influence. Since the mummy apparition could transmit information, it could also transmit that influence.
"Be grateful. My teachings are not something just any mortal is fortunate enough to hear."
With these final words, the mummy apparition opened its mouth and began to utter a series of harsh, guttural syllables that echoed through the small chamber.
"Ah... Great Judge of the Heavens... Forgive our sins... Our fall is for survival... Our betrayal is for loyalty... Though we have fallen from the Revelation of the living to the Silence of the dead... Our kingdom shall rise again beneath the earth..."
The dry, rasping voice reverberated through the chamber. The mummy’s phantom seemed to be chanting some kind of poem, each syllable dripping with cognitive poison. Nust, struggling to breathe in the corner, immediately covered his ears with his trembling hands and looked desperately at Nephthys, who couldn’t move at all.
"Ugh... Cover your ears, don’t listen... Miss..."
Nust weakly called out. As a Beyonder himself, he knew exactly what the mummy apparition was chanting—it was a mystical knowledge, a forbidden knowledge filled with cognitive poison!
Realizing that its curse couldn’t kill Nephthys immediately, the mummy apparition, whose true body lay in an ancient tomb in North Ufiga, chose to directly recite an ancient mystical knowledge, hoping to overwhelm Nephthys with its potent cognitive poison.
Nust, covering his ears, called out in despair to Nephthys, but his weak voice was completely drowned out by the mummy’s chanting. The ancient syllables continued to flow unimpeded, one after another, into Nephthys’ ears. The toxic information was absorbed by her still-clear mind.
And so, the mummy apparition chanted its highly toxic poem, watching as Nephthys, lying helpless on the ground, was forced to listen to every word. It chanted with relish, waiting for Nephthys to succumb to the cognitive poison and mutate.
Poor Nephthys could only lie there, completely immobilized, passively absorbing the venomous poem. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t move... not even to clutch her stomach and laugh in relief.
…
"Damn... when you need something, it just shows up... When you need spirituality, it just gets delivered to your doorstep..."
At this moment, Dorothy sat in her study at Green Shade Town, helping Nephthys extract the cognitive poison while muttering to herself. The spirituality she extracted was, of course, Silence. She had been worrying about how to help Nephthys accumulate the 10 points of Silence needed for advancement, but she hadn’t expected the mummy to deliver it right to her.
Although Dorothy didn’t immediately understand what the mummy was thinking, she quickly got to work, extracting the cognitive poison from Nephthys.
Under Dorothy’s control, Nephthys listened to the mystical text while her Silence spirituality steadily increased. The cognitive poison in the undead’s poem was indeed as toxic as the mummy had claimed, and Nephthys’ Silence spirituality quickly reached the 10 points needed for advancement.