Steampunk: Sixth Era Epic

Chapter 1927: The Witch’s Fear and Starlight Hues

Miss Aphrola sat to the side, while Shard held Miss Galina, waiting for them to prepare the magic potion. Suddenly, Luviya reached out her hand and placed it on Miss Galina’s forehead:

"Don’t worry, I’ll try to awaken her."

Shard didn’t remember Luviya having this ability, but since she said it, Shard believed her. A purple halo brightened in Luviya’s hand, and she closed her eyes, letting her spirit touch the illusionary realm enveloping the Grand Witch’s spiritual power.

Perhaps because the Red-Haired Duchess didn’t have strong wariness against Luviya, the process went very smoothly. Luviya quickly, with an unfamiliar connection to the Witch Power, "saw" the content within the illusion after closing her eyes in the dark.

The entire scene was quite simple. In a world of complete darkness, Galina Cavendish and Lecia Cavendish stood face to face. Both of them emitted a glimmer, preventing them from disappearing into the darkness.

At this moment, "Lecia" smiled gently, lightly stroking her belly:

"He won’t stay by your side forever, Galina. Shard belongs to me."

She paused slightly, looking at her belly:

"I’m already pregnant. And you are a witch, you don’t have the ability to bear children. Aunt, no matter how strong and beautiful you are, you’re just a——"

She raised her head, her face showing an expression Lecia would never have:

"Hen that can’t lay eggs."

The insulting phrase was repeated slowly by her, causing Miss Galina’s expression to lose control in an instant:

"You!"

She raised her hand intending to act, but a hand appearing from behind grabbed her wrist.

The Red-Haired Witch turned around with anger, and upon seeing those clear purple eyes, realized it was within her illusion at the moment.

"Did you hear what she just said!"

She broke free from Luviya’s hand, pointing at the "Lecia" who was smiling happily in front. Luviya shook her head, keeping her eyes on the belly of this "Lecia":

"Don’t worry, after Shard devoured the Earth Origin, his current life level only allows a normal Circle Sorcerer Lecia, with no ability to receive his strong life force. Or rather, it seems Shard’s life level has been higher than ordinary people from the beginning."

The witch snorted, having already noticed Shard’s body being abnormal, so she wasn’t surprised by Luviya’s words:

"Of course I know, I’m just annoyed by what she said... hen that can’t lay eggs..."

Even when she said this phrase herself, the anger in her heart surged uncontrollably:

"In the Astral Meteorite, I’ve never heard of any hallucinogenic gas! If it’s proven later that this is the handiwork of the island’s Diviner, I will personally kill him!"

It was real murderous intent, absolutely not the Duchess’s usual joke or threat. Luviya didn’t comment on these words because she could see that although the illusion was applied externally, the content of the illusion was actually the thing she feared most in her heart.

But now was not the time to discuss this:

"You should wake up now, Shard is still worried about you."

However, Miss Galina didn’t directly break free from the illusion but looked at her with her golden eyes:

"Does Shard care about this?"

For a moment, Luviya even wanted to laugh. She didn’t know these witches as well as Shard did, but she oddly felt she understood them very well. Luviya had always thought that Galina Cavendish was the kind of absolutely elegant and rational person, never expecting to hear her say such things.

"Why do I feel like I’ve known her for a long time, and I am very familiar with her?"

She thought to herself but instead asked in return:

"You’ve known Shard even longer than I have by a few days. Do you think he would care about this?"

The beautiful Red-Haired Witch nodded, taking a deep breath to calm herself down:

"I know he doesn’t care, but the way Lecia just said it was really too much!"

Luviya nodded understandingly, then she opened her eyes, seeing Miss Galina, who was held in Shard’s arms, also opened her eyes.

"Hallucinogenic Mist, I never thought you couldn’t resist that."

The voice of Miss Aphrola, who was waiting for the ladies to prepare the healing potion, came through. Seeing Shard’s worried expression and after just letting out a sigh of relief, Miss Galina coldly glanced at her:

"If you wish, after today’s events, I can share the memory and let you experience what the effect of that Hallucinogenic Mist is."

"Let’s not talk about this first."

Shard gently massaged the temples of the lady in his arms with his hand that shone with silvery moonlight:

"I have the [Water of Moonlight] here, it’s top-level spiritual healing..."

"No need, I’m fine."

Saying this while standing up, suppressing the anger in her heart and a slight fear she didn’t want to acknowledge, she directly walked towards the staircase:

"They still need me on the second floor, besides..."

She had already reached the stairs and said without turning her head:

"I have to go to the third floor first to spank Lecia and let her know what respect for elders means."

"What?"

Shard stood up, wanting to stop her, thinking she was still under the influence of an illusion. Unexpectedly, the Red-Haired Witch stopped voluntarily, turned around, and walked back. In front of Luviya and Miss Aphrola, she directly pressed her lips onto Shard’s, separating as quickly as they met:

"As long as you don’t abandon me, I won’t leave you."

Saying this, she ignored Shard, with a slight blush on her face, and marched up the stairs aggressively, seemingly really intending to find Lecia.

"What’s gotten into her?"

Shard wanted to chase after her, but was stopped by Luviya. The girl with purple eyes shook her head with a smile:

"Don’t worry, she’s just upset. She won’t really go after that princess. As for what’s gotten into her, it’s best you never ask."

A contempt for the witches rose in his heart but felt this emotion was off:

"Why do I instinctively feel that the witches of the Witch Council are actually insignificant?"

She was quite puzzled by this, just as Shard was at this moment.

Miss Aphrola’s injuries weren’t severe, and after drinking a prepared magic potion, she returned to health.

As for those astral meteorites falling towards the Green Lake Region due to the continuous weakening of the space barriers in the material world, eventually, with the cooperation of the Church’s many Twelve-Ring and Thirteen-Ring Sorcerers using a divine ritual, only two of them fell into the Green Lake Region.

One fell in the northwest of the City of Glass, causing another massive explosion and a mushroom cloud in the rainy night. The other fell into the Green Lake, which was entirely covered by white mist, but made no sound upon entry, believed to have been handled by Laplace Klein Howard, who guards the island.

The instability in space allowed these rare astral meteorites to directly invade the material world, and the appearance of those meteors bearing fragmented astral power further increased the instability in the area’s space.

From what Shard perceived, even Miss Sylvia cannot open a long-distance portal in the Green Lake region at this time. Meanwhile, tonight the entire Green Lake region has fallen into a "higher probability of failure in space-type arcane techniques and sorcery" special state. And this is just the beginning; it even seems like a natural phenomenon rather than an enemy conspiracy.

Soon after Miss Galina went upstairs, another letter arrived from the rainstorm. The witch followers monitoring the white mist by the lake informed the Grand Witch that the speed of the white mist’s expansion increased sharply after the astral meteorites exploded.

Now the entire edge of Green Lake has been completely swallowed by fog, and the white mist is rapidly approaching the cities on both shores of Green Lake.

The development of the situation was unexpected, as the real-world changes overwhelmed people before the diviners on the lake even made a clear move. After receiving news of the white mist, another message from the cruise confirmed that the monsters hidden within the explosion of the astral meteorites from outside the world had also appeared in the city.

According to Granny Cassandra’s letter, the most dangerous among them is the unnameable entity known as "Color Out of Space." They have been famous monsters from the starry sky since the ancient First Era.

"Those things have the colors of the stars, and just perceiving their existence in any way will stain you with their colors, irreversibly transforming you into a new Color Out of Space. They are creatures from the stars, and that color is the radiance of the stars. The oldest starlight forged these terrible things; they can infect life forms and even directly pollute the earth, making soil, water, and even crops grown from the earth contaminated until no one but madmen can survive in the entire region."

The witch with brown, wavy long hair said rather fearfully, and her niece handed her a bottle of dark blue magic potion with a silvery sheen, which she instinctively glanced at:

"Yes, it’s that kind of color."

She then drank the potion in one gulp.

"I originally thought that at least when the story of ’The Chosen One’ of ’Moon’ began, such monsters would appear."

Luviya, sitting at the table with Shard, also said worriedly. Seeing Shard’s puzzled look, she explained voluntarily:

"From the current situation, when the story of The Chosen One occurs, the disaster corresponding to The Chosen One’s power will also occur, and each influence will be more intense than the last. Both Color Out of Space and astral meteorites are related to the stars. Although there’s no ’God of the Stars’ among the Ancient Gods, the God of the Moon governs the starry sky."

Shard understood her meaning, though he really couldn’t guess what calamity corresponding to "Moon" would be when The Chosen of the Moon appeared, given dark corresponds to Dark Turmoil, death to life and death imbalance, and earth to earth pollution.

The voice in his ear chuckled lightly, as if mocking Shard for his wild thoughts, or as if reminding him that now wasn’t the time to ponder this.