Chapter 447 Entering the Hidden Vaul
The next day.
As Daneel walked to the main entrance of the Central Tower, he saw many sect members whispering among themselves while looking at him.
The large, wooden double doors which were artfully ingrained with gilded patterns were open. The last time, when he had entered with the key that he had used 10,000 Ker gems to buy, he had only been able to use the back entrance, which was much less glamorous.
Using the system, Daneel eavesdropped on one of the conversations between two people who were shooting glances at him while talking between themselves with low voices.
"All those missing things from Alfonso's case still bug me. Who sent in the tip? Why hadn't that mine been found all this time? How did Alfonso not cause any suspicion over all this time? Why are all the regular humans claiming that he hasn't been mooching off of their income? And this mop-haired brat. I don't know. I just feel like he is at the center of it. And it's not just me, you know. The others let it go as he can't be touched according to the rules, but I'm not prepared to."
Daneel's heart skipped a beat as he heard this, but the reply from the other person calmed him down.
"Too bad the challenge for his post was taken just three days ago. We still have to wait 26 days to get someone to challenge him, so that we can beat him up to get answers. I already contacted some people who are interested in getting the post. Let's just wait. He'll definitely be careful, so it's not worth plotting against him. He can't run anywhere, anyway."
With this, the two stop looking at him and walked inside the Central tower, after shooting glances filled with derision, making it clear that they didn't believe that he deserved a place inside.
The reason behind Daneel calming down was that he was safe for almost a month.
He had no intention of staying that long, because if he did, he would have to either be beaten up to a pulp or reveal his power, and he was definitely not going to do the latter.
He hoped that a month was more than enough to finish everything he needed to do inside the sect, and he had no time to waste.
Just like they said, conversations like these were everywhere, and he had a large target painted on his back. After all, he was an Amateur Warrior who was in a post which paid enough to entice Exalted Warriors.
Getting to his office which was a small pie-shaped stone room with one window, he saw that all of Alphonso's things were still here, such as a few of his clothes and some trinkets.
Obviously, the man hadn't been given enough time to clean them out.
Claiming them all for his own shamelessly, Daneel sat down on the chair in front of the small desk in the room and first used the key he had been given after obtaining the official post to open a hidden compartment, in which there were pouches of Ker gem shavings.
These were all of the pending payments that Alphonso had been holding back, so the first thing he did was pick them all up and go to the Border Village.
As he saw each of the honest workers almost cry as they received what they were due, he truly felt glad from the bottom of his heart that he had targeted this bastard for his plan.
After being done with this and making sure not to visit places like the Red Herring again, he once again reached his office and set about his first task: to find the objects that Ashahell had taken from Lanthanor.
Instead of using the same method as before and risking being found out to be someone who was also present at a different place, Daneel did his homework and only chose the identities of those who were training.
Also, he tried to remain as inconspicuous as possible, so that his face wouldn't be remembered by anyone.
To this purpose, he used a Champion level spell which had been developed by the system to make a faint blur appear on his face.
It made it so that if he was viewed in a group, he wouldn't draw attention, but he also would not stand out.
It was similar to the effect that came over humans when their eyes glazed over due to seeing too many faces at once.
By using such a foolproof method, Daneel began a very thorough sweep of the entire central tower.
He had already guessed that these items were placed in the most secure location inside the tower, but the problem was that this location was also hidden.
Hence, his objective was to find out where it was, so that he could start to plan what he would do to get inside.
Right now, he had three things to accomplish in the Central Tower, and in the sect:
1. Get back the items that Ashahell had taken from Lanthanor and look for clues regarding the remaining parts of the inheritance and trinket left behind by the Empire of Angaria, so that he could try and obtain them himself.
2. Finalise and set in place the plan to show that Ashahell was guilty of aiding and abetting the Church.
3. Kill all the scum who were going to be sent after him soon for revenge.
He could only wait to accomplish the third and hope that an opportunity arose before he left, but the first two had to be finished ASAP.
Daneel also had to be quite covert during his operations, so that he wouldn't risk drawing too much attention to himself. It didn't help at all that he was in the spotlight right now, due to Alphonso's case.
Before, during his search, Daneel had only covered everything briefly, but now, he spent his time in each area, allowing the system to deeply analyze the formation while looking for clues regarding exactly what was inside, and whether there was a way for him to sneak inside without trying to controlling the Core of the formation.
Time passed in this way, with him spending most of the day loitering around different areas of the sect in different disguises, while collecting Ker gems for his post and training in the remaining time.
After reaching the warrior level, Daneel felt as if his progress had slowed down, and that was mainly due to the fact that Ker gems just weren't good enough resources anymore. He needed something of higher quality, but the only one available to him was the fish from the Endless Sea, but that cost too much.
His progress had really slowed down and this frustrated him, but he couldn't do anything about it and only resolved to find ways to solve it after all of his present predicaments were behind him.
One and a half weeks later, he finally got a break - the system had identified a method through careful analysis for Daneel to infiltrate the hidden, higher portion of the tower, where all of the important areas were.
The method was that these areas needed maintenance weekly, and when someone used teleportation to reach them, the core Hero level formation of the sect would allow it for a split second.
Using another Peak Champion level spell developed by the system which enabled him to follow that someone by fooling the Hero level formation to think that he was an insect on the man's skin, Daneel finally accomplished his first objective.
Apparently, the higher areas of the Tower were divided into sections, and this maintenance man was only here to service one.
He had teleported into a winding stone corridor with a single on one side, and luckily, he had teleported right behind the man.
His appearance was distraction enough, so using the "Mind Control" spell, Daneel made the man think that he had been mistaken, and that there was no one else here.
Shaking his head, the man, who was an Exalted Warrior, used his blood to open the door, and Daneel sneaked in behind him.
He had entered a large room which had many bookcases and podiums everywhere. There were at least 50 stone podiums, but the items on top of them were shrouded in white mist.
Sadly, these seemed to be the sect-preserving trinkets, which were being actively protected by the core formation.
It was the same with the bookshelves, which definitely must be holding the core inheritances of the sect.
Daneel was about to be disappointed, but to his surprise, he spied a section to the side which seemed forgotten.
There were multiple podiums here, too, but they were all empty.
Wait, no-one wasn't.
It contained the items Ashahell had taken from Lanthanor, and there wasn't even any white mist covering them!
Rejoicing, Daneel walked to that area silently and saw that there was also a single bookcase here, which were similarly not being treated with the same importance as the others, like in the case of the podium.
Clearly, the sect did not attach that much importance to just one part of that legendary inheritance and trinket, and had hence opted not to spend valuable Energy to actively guard this area.
After all, it was true that they had always known of the existence of these things, but they had allowed them to stay inside the core formations of the forces in the central continent, or in the other locations.
But why were there so many podiums here in the first place?
He was about to get more questions, but hearing the maintenance man finishing going about his work, Daneel realized that he had to hurry.
If he hadn't spent so much time to study each and every aspect of the Central tower, he would never have found this opening. Hence, satisfied that his hard work had paid off, Daneel completely utilized the opportunity and absorbed all of the books on the bookshelf, while staring fondly at the items from Lanthanor and wishing he could take them right now.
He had a few seconds, so Daneel took out one book and read the first page.
The information about the book recorded on the first page hit him like a lightning bolt, and almost made him drop the book.
It was a journal written by a scholar of the Sect of Hedon who had gone to all of the forces of the Central Continent to study the parts left behind and the Empire Spirits!
This meant that…he could finally find out just where the heck all the parts were!
However, a sentence written in large font on the second page stood out, and as Daneel read it, his eyebrows rose to the top of his head, while his hands started to shake.
"Beware of Empire Spirits! They are the remnant consciousnesses of Heros from the Empire of Angaria which want to revive themselves and their Empire by enticing people to train in their inheritances!"