Duoluolisi kicked the Blood Chicken into the cave.
“Squawk—oh—ah—squawk—uh…”
The sound of the Blood Chicken colliding with the cave wall came from inside, followed by a “thud” as if it had hit something and fell to the ground.
[EXP +0.1]
‘Ah, I accidentally kicked it to death.’
Duoluolisi felt that wasn’t enough insurance, so she cast an Illumination Spell inside while also releasing her perception again to repeatedly confirm whether the magic circle inside had activated.
After waiting a while, the magic circle showed no signs of activation, so she finally stepped forward and entered the cave.
This cave wasn’t as deep as she had imagined.
After just a dozen steps, she reached a fairly spacious cavern.
By the faint light of the Illumination Spell’s orb, she noticed there seemed to be an inner chamber, but it was blocked by a wooden plank, preventing her from seeing inside.
In the center of the cave was a large stone platform.
A black cloth covered the platform, with one side bulging as if something was underneath.
‘What is this?’
Duoluolisi walked over, pinched the corner of the black cloth, and gently lifted it.
Upon seeing a charred black foot bone, she immediately let go and covered it back.
She seemed to know what this was.
If she wasn’t mistaken, this was likely the woman burned to death at the village entrance.
‘What does the vampire want with her remains?’
As Duoluolisi thought this, her eyes caught sight of dark red patterns revealed at the edge of the black cloth.
She walked to the other side of the stone platform and lifted half of the cloth.
On the stone platform was a magic circle drawn with blood.
The bloodstains had long dried and turned dark brown.
The outer ring of the circle was inscribed with many incomprehensible symbols.
Several thick lines spread from this half and converged beneath the corpse.
From the patterns, it looked very much like a Magic Transfer Array.
A Magic Transfer Array combined with Blood Magic—Duoluolisi guessed this might be some kind of Blood Sacrifice Ritual.
Duoluolisi was about to lift the rest of the black cloth to observe the patterns on the other half, but her foot kicked something.
Looking down, she found a book lying face down on the ground.
She picked up the book, dusted it off, and flipped through a few pages.
The text was the same as the symbols carved on the magic circle—completely incomprehensible.
‘What script is this?’
“Heh, you don’t even recognize this? This is the language of the Ancient Blood Clan.”
A voice suddenly rang out in her mind.
Duoluolisi quickly raised her sword and looked around warily.
“Who’s there? Who’s speaking?”
“It is I, you brat.”
Duoluolisi was taken aback.
She had been wondering why she was hearing a voice in her head, but upon hearing that address, she understood—it was Meiluodi.
She had thought that after Meiluodi stormed off that day, she wouldn’t show herself again, but unexpectedly, she had spoken up on her own.
“Oh~ So it’s Lord Demon God. Haven’t seen you in a few days…”
“Shut up!”
Before Duoluolisi could finish, Meiluodi hurriedly interrupted her.
She regretted it.
She shouldn’t have spoken up to remind this brat.
This brat, just like that stinky white-haired one, never had a good word to say once she opened her mouth.
“As you wish, Lord Demon God~”
Duoluolisi didn’t know what was wrong with her.
Whenever she talked to Meiluodi, it was as if she automatically switched into snotty brat mode, unable to resist provoking Meiluodi.
“Tsk…”
Meiluodi had originally intended to use this opportunity to make Duoluolisi beg her for a translation.
She had even planned how to propose conditions step by step, tempting Duoluolisi to unlock her seal.
But now, as soon as she saw Duoluolisi’s punchable expression, she instantly didn’t want to say anything.
“Does Lord Demon God have something to say~?”
Duoluolisi said with a grin.
Meiluodi didn’t reply.
She told herself not to fall for this brat’s tricks.
What did she care whether this brat could read it or not?
But she still couldn’t help herself, and spoke in a deliberately cold tone:
“Brat, do you even know what you’re looking at?”
“I don’t know~ What is this?”
Duoluolisi pretended to be curious.
“This is a book about the Blood Sacrifice Ritual.”
“Is that so…”
Seeing Meiluodi suddenly become so calm, Duoluolisi knew she must have an ulterior motive—she wanted to bait Duoluolisi into asking about the book’s content, then propose some condition to make things difficult for her.
Although she was indeed curious about what was written on it, but…
‘Hehe~’
Duoluolisi didn’t press further.
Instead, she lowered her head, flipped a page, and pretended to continue reading.
Meiluodi waited a few seconds and realized this brat really wasn’t going to ask.
“Aren’t you curious about what’s written on it?”
Meiluodi couldn’t hold back her impatience and grew a bit anxious.
“I am curious~”
Duoluolisi stopped flipping and looked up.
“Does Lord Demon God know?”
“Hmph, of course. The book exactly describes the ritual content of this magic circle.”
Meiluodi blurted out instinctively, her tone a little smug.
“I see. So what kind of ritual is this? Please tell me~”
Duoluolisi asked with an expectant look.
“This ritual is called ‘Blood Soul Transfer.’ It completely extracts a person’s life force and pours it into another body to resurrect the dead. Simply put, it sacrifices one person to revive another…”
Meiluodi stopped halfway through, suddenly realizing something.
“And then? And then?”
“Lord Demon God, why did you stop?”
Silence reigned in her mind for several seconds.
“You little brat, you dared to trick me?”
“Hmm? No, I didn’t. Didn’t Lord Demon God want to tell me yourself?”
Duoluolisi blinked twice, looking innocent.
“Read it yourself then. I’ll see how you manage to understand this book!”
Meiluodi, furious, threw down those words and fell silent.
Seeing that Meiluodi wouldn’t translate anymore, Duoluolisi wasn’t worried.
She had already gotten the information she needed.
Since she knew what kind of magic circle this was, she could deduce the general meaning of the symbols based on similar magic circle structures.
Duoluolisi crouched down and began studying the symbols on the edge of the magic circle.
She first picked out the symbols that appeared most frequently, translated their meanings, then substituted them into the book, slowly deducing the meanings of the other symbols.
Gradually, Duoluolisi translated most of the text.
When she opened the book again, she could roughly understand it.
Meiluodi didn’t make a sound the whole time, but Duoluolisi could feel her temperature rising.
‘Heh heh, didn’t expect that, did you? She’s an Academic Prodigy.’
‘Trying to stump her? No way!’
Duoluolisi smugly flipped a few pages, wanting to continue learning about the ritual content, but when she reached a crucial passage, she got stuck.
‘What’s going on? I recognize every word in this passage, so why can’t I understand it when put together?’
She read it several times over, but still couldn’t grasp its meaning.
Seeing Duoluolisi stuck on that passage, Meiluodi didn’t miss the chance and promptly mocked:
“Oh dear~ Brat, why aren’t you reading? Could it be that you can’t understand? Do you want to ask me for help? If you kneel and beg, I might be willing to lend you a hand~”
‘Is the grammar of this Ancient Blood Clan language problematic?’
‘Words like stamen, purity, sacred… can these form a sentence when put together?’
Duoluolisi flipped back and forth, trying to understand the passage through other parts, but no matter what, she couldn’t comprehend it.
‘She refused to believe it!’
Duoluolisi was about to read from the beginning again, but when she flipped back to the cover, her peripheral vision caught sight of another small notebook by her feet.
“Eh?”