Warlock Apprentice

Before going for Dark Castle, Angor first returned to Centenary Palace and put Fiona inside his space bracelet.

He didn't fully trust the Grand Priest. Leaving Fiona behind meant leaving an unwanted surprise.

With Fiona secured, Angor came to the altar again. But instead of heading to the portal, he first took Toby onto the holy mountain.

Soon, Toby was "dream walking" by fluttering along the mountain slope while sleeping.

Angor followed behind until they stopped in the middle of the hillside. From here, going up or down would cause Toby to struggle again. Angor tried walking at the same altitude until he saw a small path behind the mountain which was connected to the temple.

The other end of the path ended at a cliff.

Angor could sense that the cliff was actually created by an illusion, behind which lied a deep cave. He didn't need to approach the cave to sense a dangerous aura coming from it.

Toby was now trying to fly toward the cave. Angor quickly stopped him. If the Grand Priest was right, the cave led into the core of the mountain where Isabelle put her special Soul Orb.

Angor glanced at the cliff one last time and left.

He came here to check if the priest told him the truth. From what he saw… it was.

Nevertheless, he was going to explore Dark Castle right now. He activated Infinite Reticence and entered the passageway toward Otherworld.

Just as he left, a small door appeared inside Centenary Palace. The three Krakok brothers, Gummy, Gao, and Gamus stumbled outside while they giggled in their strange manner.

They were also carrying a piece of paper. They yelled around inside the palace as if looking for someone, only to get no response at all. Angor had left the palace together with Fiona.

In the end, the brothers returned to the center of the hall in a bad mood.

A gust of wind came and carried their paper into the air. The paper had some brief words written with blood—"Angor", "Leave", "Silent Hill", and "HELP".

…

The sky was fully covered by dark clouds which gave birth to endless lightning strikes.

"This is Otherworld?"

Everything was dark. Using the brief light provided by another lightning, Angor managed to see himself standing among some shrubs.

With all the clouds above, there was no way to tell day from night. He dared not cast Light as it might give his position away. Therefore, he waited for the next lightning while under the effect of Infinite Reticence.

Another flash revealed a small path leading away. Angor quickly registered what he saw into his memory before he slowly followed the path.

Using the lightning flashes, he saw rotten weed and stone debris around him. There were no man-made structures nearby apart from the small path created by many people walking on the same route.

A moment later, he suddenly smelled blood and heard a woman crying from somewhere.

The crying sounded distant, yet it lingered around his ears for a long time.

Instead of getting himself into trouble by checking the source of the sound, Angor kept walking along the path. But he then realized that the crying was getting louder, to the point that he could hear it coming from all directions as if countless women were crying in the woods.

As another lightning flash came, Angor briefly saw one bare-bodied woman crying while floating in the air.

She had her face covered behind her hands, but when Angor looked at her, she quickly sensed something and looked up.

It was a pale, white face decorated by stretching fangs and empty eye sockets.

As she looked around, strong energy of resentment which almost materialized in the air emerged from her body.

"Undead?" Angor carefully inspected the creature.

An undead was created by a fallen soul. Ordinary souls were made from pure energy, which wasn't affected by anti-undead means. Undead souls, however, were usually filled with negative emotions and power. They were always considered evil and filthy by everyone.

The female soul did not see through Angor's Infinite Reticence. After failing to sense anything, she slowly covered her face and wept once again.

Angor kept walking. Each lightning flash would expose several undead souls in his sight. There was one time when he actually saw a hundred female souls packed up together on top of a giant tree.

They were all crying. Naked.

Angor remembered Ness' Valley of Souls, where all the souls were naked as well. The only difference was that Ness kept some male ones in his valley, while there were only women here.

And there were so many of them. Angor was beginning to wonder what kind of disaster created so many female souls that were born from pure hatred.

Cold air suddenly invaded his body.

Angor looked carefully and saw an opening among the trees, through which he saw more dark clouds and snakes of lightning that assaulted the environment relentlessly.

He moved closer and noticed that he was standing on top of a cliff.

It wasn't a mountain peak. Rather, he was now in the middle of a hillside. The path had led him to a cut-off in the route.

Here, Angor could use the brief flashes to check the surrounding area.

There were more mountains nearby. A strange-shaped rock sat about a kilometer away from him, which served as the base of an even strangely shaped castle.

There were even more bolts of lightning that were striking around the castle, which occasionally revealed crawling vines and creepy decorations around the building. The sight immediately reminded Angor of certain ancient castles of vampire lords he read from stories. Just looking at it made him feel depressed and terrified.

But it was the only building in sight. His instinct told him that Dark Castle was right there.

He had no other choice.

He checked around and found two routes. One was to walk along the cliff, which would eventually take him to the castle. But he would need to travel through those woods again, which meant going near those crying women.

The other route looked shorter. There was a path right below the cliff which led toward the castle, but this one actually went through a graveyard at the bottom of the cliff. From Angor's position, he could see the scattered tombstones and floating will-o'-the-wisps in there.

Across the graveyard was a straight way toward Dark Castle.

Should he take the long way by going through the undead-possessed forest or explore the obviously death-related graves?

He didn't hesitate for very long. Angor jumped from the cliff swiftly.

Since both ways looked terrible, he might as well take the shorter one.

As he fell, the messy graveyard was becoming clear in his eyes. A good number of tombstones were broken, and some coffins even rested above the surface without a proper burial.

With a small tornado, Angor landed safely.

He landed not far from the graveyard gate. There was only a giant crater blocking his way.

The moment his feet touched the ground, endless moans and shrieks came about, accompanied by pairs of pale hands and undead woman spirits.

Angor jumped a little and quickly moved away from his position.

The undead creatures couldn't see through his Infinite Reticence, but they still sensed his landing movement. He had to make sure nothing paid him enough attention. Otherwise, it would render his invisibility effect useless.

With several jumps and rolls, he hid behind an opened coffin.

He peeked the corner and saw all the undead swarming to his landing point in search of human flesh.

His Purification Field prevented him from leaving any smell behind. When the creatures found nothing, they crawled back into their graves, disappointed.

Although Angor was beginning to wonder again.

Why only female souls?

And why would they put a graveyard on the path toward Dark Castle?

The undead creatures weren't strong, but Angor would have some trouble dealing with them without the right approaches.

Even wizards would avoid getting surrounded by undead.

Angor wished he still had the revolver he made for Prome, which was a weapon enchanted with Prelude to Elimination. The weapon would help him dispose of these souls fast and easy.

He crafted two revolvers, one for Prome and one for Vice. He never got the chance to make himself another one when the incident in Midnight Sovereign summoned him, which then brought him to Fairy World.

And he absolutely didn't have enough materials on him to perform alchemy work here.

After making sure all of the undead souls had returned to their pits, Angor quietly stood up.

Instead of heading to the crater, his attention was attracted by the opened coffin in front of him.