At this moment, however, Natalia had no mind to pay attention to the condition of the Bloodline Spider Mother, because she suddenly realized that the enemy opposite was already approaching within just ten meters of her.

As a transcendent high-tier Drow priestess with rich battle experience, Natalia almost raised her finger and instantly cast the fifth-level spell Plague Swarm in response to the situation.

"What? This is impossible?!"

Natalia’s eyes widened, her red lips slightly parted as she exclaimed in surprise!

Thousands and thousands of fist-sized, ferociously germ-laden locusts had just rushed out from the array when an extremely cold wind blew from the opposite direction. In an instant, the locusts were covered in white ice crystals, turned into solid ice sculptures.

As a result, the plague locusts had just emerged, only to fall from the sky like hailstones.

All in less than a second.

It was as if the enemy had already predicted her prediction!

How is this possible?

What shocked Natalia even more was that the enemy she initially presumed to be a combat professional was capable of instantly casting a fifth-level spell, and it was a rare frost spell!

In reality, Raine’s ability to respond wasn’t yet at the level of seeing and immediately knowing what spell the opponent was going to cast.

But it couldn’t be helped since Raine had inherited the bloodline of Rovnia, also a high-tier Drow priestess.

Among high-tier priestesses, while the subjects they minor in may vary, their main magic like Shadow Magic, Rose’s Prayer Spell, etc., wouldn’t differ greatly.

This is also why Raine could counter Natalia’s spell so quickly.

"Boom!!"

As Raine’s warhammer struck heavily, an invisible force of shock extended towards Natalia.

This forced Natalia to instantly cast a teleportation spell to evade the attack.

Leaving a cloud of black mist in her place, Natalia disappeared before Raine, yet Raine showed no surprise.

Without even looking.

He stepped with his right leg, spun his body!

With powerful waist force driving the back and shoulder muscles, up to his right-hand warhammer, suddenly, Raine hurled the Counterattacker behind him.

"Hammer of Anger!"

The not-so-spacious aisle, although limiting the number of enemies that could squeeze in during infiltration or attack, similarly restricted Natalia’s mist step at this moment.

Because the surrounding aisles and vault doors were covered with complex protective arrays, instead of ordinary rock or metal, she could only move towards the passageway.

Facing the incoming silver meteor, Natalia’s pupils shrank to needlepoint size, her red lips opened widely, and a sound wave similar to a banshee’s wail erupted!

"Puff puff!"

The Counterattacker, after piercing through two defensive spells, was firmly blocked by an invisible sound wave less than half an inch before Natalia.

The warhammer continued to emit a buzzing sound, and in the next instant, it reluctantly circled back towards Raine.

Meanwhile, Raine charged towards Natalia once more, catching the returning warhammer mid-air and simultaneously performing a barbaric charge to rapidly close the distance to Natalia.

At this time, the triple-layered shield on Natalia was already broken through two layers, leaving only the most basic mana shield, and her teleportation spell ’Mist Step’ prevented her from casting again for another seven seconds.

Normally, in most battles, seven seconds could be considered an almost negligible amount of time.

If it were in the expansive Mushroom Forest or the alleys of Eres City, Natalia would have at least three or more ways to handle Raine’s current approach.

But now, in a passage that could only accommodate three people walking side by side, with reinforced walls on both sides that neither could be broken nor penetrated, she had no choice but to hope that the enhanced Spider Web Spell could hold Raine off for a little while.

Three puffy white spider webs overlapped, rushing towards Raine from mid-air!

"Whoosh~~~"

As Raine exhaled a heavy breath of white chill, resembling a smaller version of a White Dragon’s breath, the sticky and immensely resilient spider webs were instantly frozen into white umbrella-like ice webs.

Natalia hadn’t yet had time to cast Rose’s Prayer Spell when, with a "bang", the fine, cold, and sharply edged spider web fragments swept towards her like shrapnel.

Amidst the sky full of white fragments, a silver meteor abruptly hurled out, striking down towards her head with lightning speed!

"Crack!"

Natalia’s eyes widened, and the energy from the spider pendant on her chest was released all at once, cracking open directly.

A shield as thick as silvery mercury encircled her body.

This was one of her extremely precious life-saving measures.

"Splatter!"

The overlapping double hammer shadows broke through the silver shield’s obstruction in an instant, landing on Natalia’s face in disbelief.

"Bang-Pow!"

The Drow High Priestess’s body, having undergone the head disappearance spell, collapsed softy to the ground.

"Whew~~~"

Raine let out a heavy breath!

No pause at all.

No rest.

Nor did he pick up any items from her.

Instead, he quickly dashed towards the treasure vault door!

As Raine sped forward, a thought flickered in his mind, as if he remembered something.

As he quickly glanced at the new icon in his sixteen-slot bag, he saw that there were already two Drow High-tier Priestess icons.

That meant if he collected two more, he could synthesize something even higher tier.

’If four High-tier Priestesses are synthesized, can they become a Matron?’

This thought quickly passed through Raine’s mind.

Only now, he did not have the mindset or time to contemplate this question. At this moment, Raine had already taken out two treasure vault keys, inserting them into the upper and lower lock holes of the circular, thick vault door.

....

Meanwhile.

Inside a luxurious mansion in the noble district of Eres City.

After enjoying a delicate dinner, High Priestess Siriel slowly returned to her room.

Just as she entered the room, a group of small spiders rushed over, rubbing their pincers rapidly to signal something. As Siriel bent down to hold several small spiders in her hands, her expression changed dramatically within seconds! 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

The next moment, she flashed to the side of the Curtain Ring.

"Damn, it really was stolen!" Upon opening the spider web-covered Curtain Ring and seeing the treasure vault key missing, Siriel exclaimed in shock.

"No good, it’s already been nearly half an hour since it happened."

Realizing the seriousness of the situation, Siriel didn’t have the mind to think about how the intruder did it but immediately drew a complex symbol in the air with her slender fingers.

She then began speaking: "Narrell, my treasure vault key has been stolen!"

This was clearly a transmission magic.

"What? You say your treasure vault key was stolen?"

Hearing this news, Narrell, the captain of the guards currently detaining the Empire’s spy, widened his eyes instantly, looking at the Empire spy under his control, suddenly finding it distasteful.

He tossed Benjamin into the hands of the guards, himself darting like an arrow from a bow, leaving multiple afterimages, swiftly heading towards the second floor of the main building where his own room was located.

But just as he was about to reach the main building, a thought seemed to strike him, causing Narrell to make a sharp turn, almost at a ninety-degree angle, heading for the Hernet Family vault!

Hernet Family vault entrance.

Following two crisp locking sounds, the heavy, intricately enchanted vault door interior echoed with the dense sound of gears grinding.

And when the extremely thick vault door was opened, what met Raine’s eyes was a dazzling array of colorful lights.

The floor of the vault, covering dozens of square meters, was piled with high-purity mithril, adamantine, and other rare metal ingots, while on the racks on both sides, neatly arranged various high-tier magic equipment emitting colorful light.

Even an ordinary person, standing amid the brilliance of the treasures, could tell that anything on the racks must surely be of Epic Level magic equipment or higher.

As Raine quickly scanned around, he noticed at least seven special treasure boxes placed in the most prominent position, possibly containing magic equipment even beyond Epic Level!

Just as Raine reached for a treasure box, he immediately shook his head.

’If you only take the Counterattacker, the Hernet Family might not deploy legendary powerhouses, but if a piece of legendary magic equipment is taken, they’ll almost certainly deploy them....’

’This time, the target is very clear: the Emperor’s Defender hammers.’

Quickly scanning the area, Raine’s gaze soon locked onto a corner almost unnoticed, where a hammer identical to the Counterattacker drew his sight.

.....