Chapter 293: Chapter 292: This is an Unexpected Development Chapter 293: Chapter 292: This is an Unexpected Development Fang Zheng finally realized why everyone liked to be a member of the righteous faction.
As soon as you shout a slogan, you find that whatever you do is right.
Originally, Fang Zheng was hesitant about taking this strange magic item, but now, after seeing the Main World mission given by Sister Goddess, his determination solidified. Indeed, he was a Paladin blessed by deities. What was killing someone or stealing a treasure? All of this was to liberate these suffering souls, shatter the evil Demon’s schemes, and for the sake of the world!
Ah, Fang Zheng suddenly felt that if he did not take this damn thing, he would be letting down the people, the party, and socialist New China… As a young man born and raised under the red flag in a new society, how could he allow such trivial matters to stop his progress?
Finding that magic item was not difficult for Fang Zheng, or perhaps the mastermind behind everything had never considered that someone could stealthily break through the barriers into this inner world. Thus, it did not take much effort for Fang Zheng to locate the magic item—it was just floating directly in the center of the square.
“That is a… scepter?”
With his transcendent vision, Fang Zheng almost instantly recognized that the object suspended in the center of the square was a black scepter about the length of a forearm. Its design appeared quite unique, with a large eye embedded at its top. At the moment, that eye was wide open, staring at the world in front of it. For some reason, Fang Zheng always felt as though the eye didn’t appear to be a crystal sculpture, but rather a truly living thing…
“This behind-the-scenes boss has quite the nerve…”
Muttering to himself, Fang Zheng took out his detector, put it on, and once again locked onto the strange scepter to begin his investigation. As expected, the system’s products were of high quality. The moment Fang Zheng looked toward the scepter, his detector beeped, and right away, a line of information appeared in front of him.
[Divine Artifact: Eye of All Phenomena]
[Rank: Lesser Divine Artifact]
[Effect: The world is filled with illusions and fog, where truth and lies are indistinguishable. Only the self is the constant existence in the multiverse (can summon the time image of a specified target from the void for manipulation, the image’s strength is half of the target’s, cannot designate targets above demigod strength)]
This thing… is quite interesting…
Looking at the information that appeared before him, Fang Zheng stroked his chin. The appraisal result of the item was almost the same as described by Nymph Little Angel, but what Fang Zheng had not expected was that this item summoned dimensional images through the power of time, rather than just from parallel worlds… But that also made sense, even parallel worlds are theoretically supported.
Wait, something’s not right!
With that thought, Fang Zheng suddenly shivered. According to the description of the scepter, was it using the power of time?!
Wow, isn’t that just perfect for me?
Currently, Fang Zheng’s development of his Time Manipulation ability was only at the most superficial level; at most, he knew how to initiate a Time Stop or cast a Future Sight to play the mystic. But as for other uses of time, Fang Zheng hadn’t figured them out.
But now, he had discovered a divine artifact here that could create illusions based on the power of time?
This wonderful item, he definitely needed to take it back and study it thoroughly!
Fang Zheng had never thought that the power of time could also be used to create illusions! No, based on everything he had experienced, what he had seen so far were not illusions but rather “projections from different time planes of this world,” which explained why his Prophecy Spells were so difficult to see through since they weren’t entirely illusory.
Fang Zheng was sure that if he could get his hands on this scepter, then his development of time abilities might just reach a new level!
So, the next question was… how to acquire it?
Fang Zheng carefully scanned his surroundings, the entire square was deserted except for the occasional undead creature passing by. The scepter floated motionless in the air, seemingly within easy reach. However, the easier it seemed, the more cautious Fang Zheng became—darn it, in all the games in the world, whenever the protagonist went to retrieve a key item, something was bound to go wrong, either a boss lurking in ambush or a trap being triggered. Given that he himself was an expert in designing such plots, it would be a joke if he were to be fooled.
Although by now, Fang Zheng still didn’t know who exactly was behind this, since the Goddess had issued the quest, it was clear that the mastermind was probably related to the group that had tried to sneak through the Dark Marsh before. Since the enemy had painstakingly built a secret underground hive here, it was certain to be thoroughly secured.
Umbrella Corporation manufactured the T-virus and even had laser corridors.
“True Knowledge Technique!”
Out of caution, Fang Zheng still cast the True Knowledge Technique on himself first. Although the scepter was definitely real, who knew if everything else around it was? If this square was fake and he stepped into it only to sink to the ocean floor, what then?
Fortunately, under the scrutiny of True Knowledge Technique, Fang Zheng could be certain that there were no illusions here; both the scepter and the square beside it were indeed real. However, another puzzling issue emerged—by all logic, there should be thousands of necromancers here, so where were all these undead creatures?
However, Fang Zheng’s question was soon answered.
“…these guys are building ships?”
Observing the dock at a distance that shone as bright as a nocturnal city, Fang Zheng was momentarily dumbfounded. He could definitely feel an overwhelming surge of life signals there. To tell the truth, at first, Fang Zheng had not recognized what that place was, because when they had arrived, it was nothing but ruins. If not for Captain Fox, Fang Zheng would never have connected those ruins to shipbuilding.
But now, Fang Zheng saw clearly.
On the dock, a fleet of massive warships was neatly lined up, with skeletons clambering up and down, bustling about. What Fang Zheng couldn’t understand was, although the fleet was impressively large, comprising over a hundred vessels, they looked terribly dilapidated, each ship more broken than the next. Not only were there large holes all over the hulls, but even the sails were mostly just a few strips of cloth. Fang Zheng was really curious about how these undead creatures had managed ship repairs over so many years.
Or rather, with the entire port burning in raging flames, what did they use for ship repairs?
Never mind, that’s not important. Let’s get to work.
Looking at the quest prompt in front of him, Fang Zheng put his curiosity aside. The main quest was clear—just decipher this demi-plane space. Nymph had also told him that the purpose of that magical item—oh, the Eye of All Phenomena—was to support and isolate these two planes. Which meant that as long as Fang Zheng followed his original goal and seized the scepter, the barrier between the two planes would disappear, then they would begin to merge, and once the protective barrier was gone, the vengeful spirits would be liberated, completing his main world task… well, that sounded simple.
“Tilia, you take care of things here, I’ll try see if I can get that scepter directly.”
Although theoretically, Fang Zheng could have simply sent Tilia to scout, considering she addressed him as ‘Elder Brother,’ Fang Zheng naturally took the lead. Luckily, he had trained in the Protection Magic Class, so immediately he cast a plethora of protection spells on himself. From the Anti-Magic Barrier to Exceptional Resistance, from High Magic Teleportation Alarm to Stone Skin Technique, he applied a full array of physical, elemental, and curse protection barriers. Only then did Fang Zheng glance around and with a swift dash from the ruins, landed neatly on the ground.
Of course, if possible, the safest option for Fang Zheng would have been Future Sight, but for some reason, when he used Future Sight to look at the scepter, he could not see what he was about to encounter. The Prophecy Spell yielded no results, so reluctantly, Fang Zheng had to go headlong.
Then, Fang Zheng looked forward and in the next moment, his figure vanished, reappearing in front of the scepter suspended in mid-air. He then reached out his right hand and grabbed the scepter!
And then… he was left hanging there.
Holding the scepter in one hand, Fang Zheng looked down at the ground in surprise. He had mentally prepared for it all—guardian demon beasts, triggered traps—but he would never have imagined ending up .
He actually couldn’t take this darn scepter away?