Unlike the Mist, which created scenes according to memories, the Peerless Flavor Mushroom and the Despair Mushroom were both guided by emotions, utilizing high-concentration mana to manifest a realistic illusion. However, just like Dylan's illusion of deep father-daughter affection couldn't affect Piggy and the others, the illusion created by the Despair Mushroom similarly required emotional resonance to take effect.
Fear and despair were considered the emotions most prone to resonance, and the stronger the resonance, the more it attracted the attacks of the illusion monsters.
This was also the reason why Lin Jun wanted to knock out the slaves before moving them away. Before those blood extractors and soldiers—who were deeply mired in chaos and fear—were taken out, the comatose slaves were relatively safe.
These were all precious experiences left for Lin Jun by the D-class researchers of the Mushroom Garden.
Unfortunately, monsters composed entirely of mana were truly not much of a threat to genuine experts. Coupled with the fact that the illusion's duration was limited, basically possessing Diamond-tier strength was sufficient to protect oneself in the black mist illusions created by others.
That massive Puchi walking on the seabed by the port hadn't gone far yet. Its huge and clumsy body meant it didn't move very fast; if he wanted to, the Demon King could quickly catch up to it.
However, remembering the warning Tanaka had relayed, the Demon King ultimately did not enter the sea.
After handing over the mind-sealed man to be guarded by the relatively organized soldiers of the military camp, the Demon King teleported again to another city in Eleanor's territory that possessed a teleportation magic array.
The moment he arrived, the Demon King once again felt the dense extreme emotions in the air—this city was similarly shrouded in black mist.
The difference was that the monster in this illusion was somewhat different. It was a behemoth coiled above the city, stretching out countless withered, long arms to violently wring dry each person it grabbed.
Skillfully using magic to protect his mental strength, ensuring he wouldn't be affected by the extreme emotions within the illusion and lose his rationality, the Demon King set off once again to search for the source of the illusion.
Like a fire brigade, the Demon King went from one city to another to perform rescues.
But just as that slave man had said, how many could he save?
Not every city had a teleportation magic array. Relying on the convenience of teleportation, the Demon King ultimately only resolved the black mist in three cities.
By the time he relied on flying to rush to another factory city, the black mist here had naturally dissipated, leaving behind only bloodstains covering the streets and half a city in ruins.
Correspondingly, however, Lin Jun's side hadn't achieved complete success either.
Initiating things in such a hurry, the slaves close to the ports were easy to handle; once loaded up and diving into the sea, they were safe. But in the cities located further inland, when the black mist dissipated, the Puchis transporting slaves might have been caught up to before reaching the coast, and even taking underground tunnels wasn't absolutely safe.
Not to mention, there were some places where, due to various accidents, the source of the illusion was stopped or even killed prematurely. In the end, the number of slaves successfully transported away was only slightly more than half.
However, what Lin Jun focused on the most at this moment was still the Demon King himself.
More of them!
Compared to the status panel he saw last time, there were now [Envy] and [Immortality]!
[Envy] obviously belonged to Mortis. The Demon King could also seize skills?
And what was the deal with an unfair, standard protagonist skill like [Immortality]?
Was it something he managed to get recently, or did he always have it? If it was the former, Lin Jun would feel a bit more at ease. If it was the latter... surely there weren't other skills, right?
Looking at the information on the Demon King's panel that still remained in a blurred state, even Lin Jun felt a bit fearful. How exactly did the previous Hero defeat a complete Demon King?
Regardless, Lin Jun realized one thing: he absolutely must not let the Demon King become complete!!!
Meanwhile, in the Night Lily Manor, Eleanor was already in a state of driving herself crazy.
Watching the countless urgent reports teleported over like snowflakes, she had thoroughly plunged into a state of utter helplessness.
Her own manor hadn't been attacked by Lin Jun's Despair Mushrooms. Although there were also quite a few Blood Livestock Factories nearby, no matter how weak Eleanor was, she was still a Duke. Using a despair illusion to steal slaves right under her nose was still not very realistic.
And because of this, she still hadn't fully figured out exactly what kind of thing the other factory cities had been attacked by.
The reports were filled with divergent opinions, describing completely different monsters, and everyone had their own guesses. Mixed with truth and falsehood, Eleanor simply couldn't analyze the truth from the reports alone.
But there was one thing she was clear about—the territory she had operated for many years had been more than half destroyed!
If she had encountered this kind of blow in the past, she would feel a heartache, she would be furious, she would swear to find the culprit and cut them into a thousand pieces.
However, right now, she had no time to think about those things.
Mortis was dead, and the Demon King had ascended the throne.
For some lords, it might just mean a change in leadership, and life would go on as usual. However, for Eleanor, that wasn't the case.
Although she had only had a brief exchange with the Demon King through the Crystal Council and hadn't truly met him face-to-face yet, Eleanor still sensed that the Demon King and she were not the same kind of people.
To put it more severely, she felt the Demon King despised her, just like how the Demon King had personally come over this time to operate on her factories and the Puchis. If her territory was still stable, Eleanor would still hold out a fluke of hope that the Demon King, considering the overall stability, would somewhat turn a blind eye to her. But now, more than half of her bargaining capital had been destroyed. With that little bit left over, could she really protect herself?
She even had an excuse handed to him—improper territory management, resulting in a great disaster and causing massive losses to the Empire.
Since she couldn't protect herself, what should she do? She couldn't exactly rebel, right? Her, fighting the Demon King?
Eleanor felt that even seeking death shouldn't be sought like this.
It seemed the only option was to flee, but where could she flee to? Thanks to her many years of running the blood business, she didn't have a good reputation even within the Empire, and the humans, dwarves, and elves wished they could swallow her alive and skin her.
For a moment, Eleanor only felt that she had plunged into a desperate situation.
The only possibility seemed to be kneeling on the ground, weeping bitterly, and begging for leniency after the Demon King arrived?
Thinking of herself in such a situation, Eleanor could no longer suppress her emotions. She hysterically destroyed everything in sight within the manor. Her blood descendants were so frightened they only dared to hide far away, terrified of becoming targets for her venting.
Right at this moment, Thirteen—with a Slave Crest Curse Band, a high-tier contract item, tied beneath its mushroom cap—came running in pu-ji, pu-ji, bringing along its two lackeys, Mengya and Stinky Fish. As soon as it entered, Thirteen wrapped its tentacles around the Telepathy Stone and coiled around Eleanor's hand.
"Master, what happened to you?"
The instant she saw Thirteen, Eleanor recalled the parts of the reports mentioning Puchis moving slaves away. However, looking at the Slave Crest Curse Band wrapped around Thirteen's body, Eleanor let go of that suspicion.
In the end, anyone could manipulate a Puchi to do anything. Compared to those fragmented pieces of intelligence, she placed more trust in the high-tier contract item she had spent a heavy price to obtain.
After some exchange, Thirteen wrapped its tentacles around its mushroom cap and rolled back and forth on the ground. A long while later:
"Master, what about the North? Maybe I can beg my second brother to take us in! After all, we are fellow mushrooms, so at least he won't harm us. It's bound to be better than facing the Demon King, right!"
Upon hearing "the North," Eleanor was about to reject it the next instant, but thinking further down the line, she paused.
Speaking of outside the Empire, the place with the most Demon-kin seemed to be that Mushroom Fortress in the North. Although there were definitely many former slaves in the Mushroom Fortress who might hate her, they were only a portion. Ultimately, the Mushroom Fortress as a whole wasn't like the deep-seated blood feud with the humans and dwarves; the two sides had no fundamental conflicts.
Eleanor felt that as long as she could demonstrate sufficient value, she could gain a certain status even over there. She was a Duke no matter what, and Lord-tier strength was valuable anywhere.
Nowadays, the Mushroom Fortress also had quite a lot of momentum, seemingly capable of resisting the Empire to a certain degree to shelter her.
Looking at it this way, the Mushroom Fortress actually seemed to be a pretty good choice. The only slightly troublesome part was her former subordinate, Louisa, who now held a high position in the Mushroom Fortress.
However, from what Eleanor knew, Louisa seemed to have used some unknown method to forcefully elevate her strength; just thinking about it, one could guess it was likely some crooked path. As long as she used bloodline advancement as a condition for exchange, it shouldn't be difficult to gain the support of this former subordinate.
It wasn't even impossible to bring Louisa back under her command after she gained a firm foothold!
Thinking of this, she confirmed the feasibility of the matter with Thirteen again. Thirteen patted its fungal body and guaranteed that it could persuade its second brother to take them in and shelter them, but as for what happened after that, it couldn't say for sure either.
Eleanor nodded. In the end, this was already the best choice. At the very least, Thirteen, bound by a high-tier contract, couldn't possibly scam her. Having made her decision, Eleanor immediately began to collect her valuables. A massive amount of gold, silver, jewelry, rare materials, and high-tier items were brought out from the treasury beneath the manor and piled up like trash, leaving the two demons, Mengya and Stinky Fish, staring in shock.
Say what you will, while Eleanor might be lacking in other aspects, her wealth-gathering ability was top-notch. These rare treasures, exchanged for the wealth accumulated over years of the blood business, would make anyone's eyes turn red with envy.
Eleanor naturally couldn't choose to fly to the North; she would likely be intercepted halfway. Besides, with so many dragons in the sky recently, it inherently wasn't safe. The only way to escape was teleportation.
However, the North was extremely far from Eleanor's territory. Even with the coordinates provided by Thirteen, starting up the teleportation magic array required an immense amount of mana. Fortunately, Eleanor didn't have to consider the issue of the city falling into chaos due to a lack of mana anymore; this was a one-way ticket.
On the teleportation magic array, Eleanor held Thirteen. The surrounding space was completely filled with her belongings, so much so that there was no more room to bring anyone else. Small fries like Mengya and Stinky Fish were naturally ruthlessly abandoned by Eleanor.
However, unlike other blood descendants who realized they might have lost their hopes of advancement and looked as if they were mourning a deceased parent, Mengya was a Succubus and Stinky Fish was a Goblin; neither demon needed to rely on Eleanor for bloodline advancement.
On the contrary, because they finally didn't have to follow Thirteen around anymore, they had, to some extent, regained their freedom! Therefore, although Mengya and Stinky Fish had faces full of sadness, they were actually rejoicing secretly in their hearts.
"You two, see you later, don't run around recklessly."
Thirteen's voice in the mycelial network made both demons freeze simultaneously. Looking up, Thirteen waved its tentacles at them and disappeared into the teleportation array. The Succubus and the old Goblin exchanged a glance, and before they could react, they heard a loud explosion.
After Eleanor left, a Puchi standing nearby fired a mana cannon, blasting the teleportation array into smithereens. No one was clear exactly who among those present was controlling this Puchi. Only Mengya and Stinky Fish had some guesses in their hearts, but they didn't dare say them out loud.
After Eleanor left, the manor and the surrounding area quickly plunged into chaos—looting, fleeing, and even seeking revenge amidst the disorder. Conversely, the slaves in the nearby factories were left completely unattended, and were gradually tied up and taken away one after another by Puchis popping up from who knows where.
By the time the Demon King—who, unable to teleport directly, had to forcibly fly over—arrived, the extent of the destruction here was even more severe than in those cities that had been attacked by the Despair Mushrooms.
And upon learning that Eleanor had teleported and fled to an unknown location, the Demon King, who had been putting out fires for the better part of the day and had witnessed the miserable states of the various cities attacked by Despair Mushrooms, finally couldn't help but curse in a low voice:
"How could there be such... a stupid fool!"
The distortion of teleportation struck. Eleanor felt that this time seemed exceptionally intense and chaotic, but thinking that this was an ultra-long-distance teleportation she had never experienced before, she felt this should be a normal phenomenon.
The distortion receded. The post-teleportation dizziness made Eleanor lose her footing, crashing into the treasure chests behind her.
Crash—clatter—
Treasures spilled all over the ground.
"So dark..."
Right at this moment, the glowing mushrooms around her lit up one by one, illuminating what seemed to be a meticulously decorated giant cave.
On the distant stone wall, there was even a location name pieced together using glowing mushrooms—Happy Paradise?
What kind of place name was this?
Eleanor felt this seemed somewhat different from the North she had anticipated. She subconsciously looked at Thirteen beside her. And then she saw Thirteen, who had been sliced into three pieces and was completely dead.
"A teleportation accident?" Eleanor reached out, wanting to check on Thirteen's condition; after all, this was her introducer and stepping stone for mingling in the North.
However, what she stretched out was a severed hand, the cross-section still sizzling as it bled.
"Huh?"
The teleportation dizziness receded, and the delayed pain flooded into her brain.
Only then did Eleanor discover in terror that both her hands and her right leg had been severed by space during the teleportation. The initial fall wasn't due to dizziness at all, but because she was missing a leg.
"So painful! Damn it, aahhh, what... kind of teleportation array is this?"
Screaming miserably, Eleanor looked down, but she didn't see any magic array at all.
Right at this moment, in the darkness behind her, a pale and powerful large hand seized the opportunity while Eleanor was panicked and at a loss, grabbing the long hair on top of her head and pulling it violently backward!
At the same time, a somewhat familiar voice, suppressing a tone of delight, spoke softly by her ear:
"Look who's here? Isn't this Lady Eleanor?"
"Lou... Louisa?" Amidst her shock and doubt, Eleanor secretly exerted strength, only to discover that she actually couldn't break free from the other party's hand!
Piggy grabbed Eleanor's head with one hand, and gently lifted her severed arm with the other, sticking out her tongue to lick it. After savoring it carefully for a moment:
"Lord Duke, before today, not even in my dreams did I expect we would meet again under these circumstances. What a blissful moment! Unfortunately, your fresh blood is not as full of power as I imagined."
Circumstances dictate actions. Eleanor forcefully suppressed her pain and humiliation, speaking nicely: "Louisa! I am not an enemy, I came to seek refuge with the Mushroom Fortress! Let me go, let me talk to your Boss! Think carefully, I can still help you continue to advance!"
"Cough, ho ho ho ho!" Louisa couldn't help but start laughing. That laughter made Eleanor shudder.
Amidst Louisa's laughter, several Puchis pieced Thirteen together. After piecing it back somewhat crookedly, Lin Jun stuffed Thirteen back in. Thirteen, having climbed back up, easily untied the Slave Crest Curse Band from beneath its mushroom cap under Eleanor's terrified gaze, as if it weren't a powerful contract item but an ordinary scarf.
It pulled out a recording crystal, seemingly documenting Eleanor's wretched state.
"You... you guys..." Eleanor's voice began to tremble.
"Lady Eleanor, of course you are not an enemy, you are merely prey!"
The fresh blood flowing from Eleanor suddenly surged, but Piggy was already prepared. Grabbing Eleanor's head, she violently smashed it into the ground!
The massive impact caused the entire cave to shake for a moment, and the surrounding treasures were scattered even further, destroying quite a few.
A Puchi popped up from the fungal mat on the side and slapped Piggy on the back of the head with its tentacle.
This prevented Piggy from smashing down a second time, and also gave Eleanor the chance to speak again.
"Louisa, no, Lady Louisa, wait, don't kill me! All this money and these treasures can be yours! You have no need to kill me, think about advancement! I can still advance for you!" While tearfully begging for mercy, Eleanor didn't forget to bring out her final bargaining chip.
Lifting Eleanor's head up, Piggy's other hand also cupped her face, which was covered in mycelium and mud: "Indeed, my advancement still requires the help of the dear Lady Eleanor."
"Yes! Yes! I'll help you, I'll help you!" Eleanor nodded vigorously as if trying to curry favor, a delicious light called hope rising in her eyes.
(End of Chapter)
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