“A curse?” Roland repeated, finding the word ominous.
“Please, follow me.” Pasha turned and led the group into a cave beside the main hall. The stone walls inside were carved with even grooves, and the area was filled with all kinds of books and scrolls, even more numerous than the archives in the Sacred Hall. “Serene, His Majesty is here.”
“I know,” Serene's voice appeared in everyone's mind before she was even seen. Then, a tentacle dropped from the bottom of the cave, plopping down a pile of books, and quickly retracted into the darkness.
Before that, the tentacle symbolically bent towards Roland, as if to show respect.
“Ahem—sorry, she gets a little carried away when she encounters a new research subject.” Pasha said a little embarrassedly, “After all, few witches are as lucky as Lightning, bearing a curse without suffering fatal injuries.”
“She won’t do anything to Lightning, will she?” Whenever research subjects were mentioned, Roland couldn't help but think of the white mice that were manipulated into various poses.
“Please rest assured, the main methods of magic research are still observation and recording. However, with the help of the core, she can see the flow of every strand of magic more clearly.” As Pasha spoke, she rolled up a book from the ground and spread it out in front of everyone. “Look here… and here.”
Roland noticed that most of these pages were yellowed, obviously ancient books left over from the Taquila era. In addition to the original text recorded in witch script, there was also an attached translated note at the location she pointed out, undoubtedly a temporary excerpt for easy reading.
He looked carefully and found that it was a record of two wars.
“Once, during the siege of Dawn, famous injured witches were rescued by reinforcements and should have been able to save their lives, but in the end, they all died one by one. The cause of death was that all treatments were ineffective, the wounds could not heal, leading to excessive blood loss, and infection by evil diseases. Before they died, they suffered terrible torture, to the point that two of them chose to commit suicide.” Pasha said slowly, “Because the time is too long ago, the specific details of that battle are unknown, and the author only recorded this incredible scene. The Devil's Curse was first mentioned here.”
“The other time was closer to our era. A high-level devil, called Soul Snatcher by the Union, engaged in a fierce battle with the witch army at Thousand Lakes City on the edge of the Fertile Plains. This cruel monster could attach magic to black stone spears. Once hit, it would cause the body to decay continuously until it withered.” Pasha paused. “A total of three Extraordinary witches died at its hands, and the Exploration Society discovered a strange magic in the injured.”
Roland had already guessed the conclusion, “That magic came from the enemy?”
“That's right,” Pasha nodded to the tentacle, “So we speculate that these abilities may belong to the same type. It will remain in the target's body and cause continuous damage. Conventional medical treatments are ineffective, and it is difficult to eliminate it with external force.”
“It's really like a curse,” Wendy couldn't help but feel sad, “This is too terrible…”
Nightingale noticed the wording, “Difficult to eliminate with external force, does that mean… there is still a way to eliminate it?”
Pasha flipped to the next page, “Provided that we haven't made a wrong deduction.”
Roland quickly scanned the last paragraph of the record: When Thousand Lakes City was on the verge of collapse, a witch named Semanka stood up, awakened as an Extraordinary in a desperate struggle, and beheaded the Soul Snatcher. As the high-level devil was split in two, she, who was thought to follow in the footsteps of her companions, survived unscathed, as if the curse had never existed. Because it was too close to the Red Mist area, Thousand Lakes City was still lost a year later, but she had bought enough time for people to evacuate. Afterwards, Semanka, with an extremely strong will, got the Union to pass the Three Seats system and became the first of the Three Seats.
Seeing this, he immediately understood what she meant.
If Lightning was really affected by the magic curse, then killing the other party might be the only way to remove it—however, this is indeed "difficult" to do! The battle of Snow Mountain Camp and the battle of Wangbei Slope proved
The amazing mobility of the high-level devils. It would be better if they insisted on confronting the First Army head-on, but if they didn't intend to fight head-on, trying to chase and eliminate them would be too risky.
In the Taquila era, this was almost an impossible task.
High-level devils usually move with the army, like the core of the army. It is already extremely difficult to achieve victory, let alone annihilate the enemy?
Roland couldn't help but think of the nameless witch who wrote to Nataya.
Looking back now, she was probably also injured by a similar ability, which is why she left those last words.
A person who can correspond with the Three Seats will never be an ordinary person. Their ability and status should be at the Union level. However, even she can only silently accept the arrival of the final ending.
Just because wanting to find the powerful enemy who seriously injured her among thousands of devils and eliminate it would require more witches' lives. When weighing the two evils, what kind of choice to make is already very clear.
Nightingale probably thought of this too, and her hands clenched into fists unconsciously.
Roland thought for a moment before speaking, "The difficulty is indeed not small, but I will never give up on this possibility."
“…” Pasha was silent for a while, “If that's what you wish.”
“Before that, I still want to understand something—if the high-level devil that Lightning encountered has the ability to release a curse without contact, what will happen to ordinary people who are eroded?”
“It would be much worse than witches,” Serene's voice suddenly interrupted again, “Magic gives us greater recovery ability and resistance, making it difficult for conventional evil plagues—the tiny organisms you mentioned—to infect us. But mortals can't, as long as the wound doesn't heal, they are at risk of deterioration or even death at any time."
“Can God's Stone of Retaliation resist this ability?”
“Of course, in fact, if the Soul Snatcher mentioned in the ancient books didn't have a strength no less than that of an Extraordinary witch, it wouldn't have caused such a big loss to the Union. But—” Serene paused, “According to Lightning's information, we cannot rule out the possibility that the other party is also a Devil Slayer. In that case, the role of God's Stone of Retaliation will be very limited."
The more powerful the devils, the closer their appearance is to humans. This is the experience the Union summarized from the two Wars of Divine Will.
Roland took a deep breath.
Serene's reminder was not alarmist. According to Lightning's description, the newly emerged high-level devil is likely to be more difficult to deal with than all previous enemies.
There is no doubt that the expedition to Taquila must be planned carefully enough to achieve this goal.