Wizard: Starting from the Skill Tree-Chapter 581: Traces

The Duke carefully sprinkled the dust of the astral realm along certain critical energy nodes of the residual array, pure spirit as a stable helm, cautiously touching and guiding the remnants of dormant nightmare power within the array.

A barely audible low hum echoed within the stone chamber, the symbols of the residual array on the ground seemed to come alive, beginning to flicker with an ominous, intermittent dark red glow.

The cold, nihilistic, and corrosive spirit remnants suddenly became active, like deep-sea creatures disturbed, beginning to entwine with the Duke’s spiritual power.

The light in the stone chamber began to distort, walls and floor rippling as if in water waves.

The musty smell in the air was replaced by a more bizarre, empty scent mixed with old dust and some non-existent substance.

The Duke felt a strong pull from the center of the residual array, trying to yank his consciousness out.

He did not resist, instead focusing his spirit, aligning with this force while firmly guarding his own spiritual power mind.

The scene before his eyes began to change and fade rapidly, the passage guarded by Butler Ossen, the stone chamber piled with clutter, the cold ground...everything peeled away and dissipated like a fading oil painting.

In its place was the familiar silhouette covered in thick gray-white dust, namely the interior structure of Red Rock Castle.

Yet the place where he stood now, likewise the stone chamber in the basement, was already a ruin, clay pots turned to powder, tools rusted into twisted metal blocks, eternal silence permeating the air.

The Duke closed his eyes and felt for a moment; he arrived here with his real body rather than merely with spiritual power like Hans and the others.

This was because his own life level was not very low, having reached the threshold required to enter here.

He stepped out of the stone chamber of the basement, the projection space within Red Rock Castle being drastically different from the grandeur and solidity in reality.

Treading in real form here felt more genuine.

Underfoot was thick gray-white dust accumulated as if over centuries, soft and sound-absorbing, each step sinking into silence.

Eternal silence suffused the air, even his own breathing sounding especially clear, yet seems consumed by boundless quietness.

The red rock walls became mottled and brittle; touching them, one felt a cold, near powdery texture, seemingly ready to collapse the next moment.

The once luxurious tapestries now left only a few ragged strips, color faded, turning to ashes at a gentle touch.

Light’s source was unclear, the whole space filled with a uniform, oppressive gray-white glow, devoid of shadows or bright areas, everything seeming flat and lifeless like a faded old photograph. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

The Duke advanced slowly along familiar corridors, his spiritual power cautiously extending outward, exploring comprehensively.

Castle interior structure showed unnatural distortion, corridors that should be straight inexplicably bending, walking upon them elicited spatial dislocation sensation.

A door opened might not lead to a room but rather to a solid wall covered in dust, cold and hard to the touch.

The staircase steps sometimes varied in number; stepping on them required extra caution, as if space itself subtly squirmed and deceived the senses.

This distortion directly impacted perception, compelling him to constantly adjust balance and directional sense.

Passing through the wide space originally a banquet hall, the Duke’s sharp gaze caught an anomaly on the floor.

It was not footprints, but a viscous, translucent slime path dried in winding trails, standing out starkly on gray-white dust.

Dust around the trails seemed licked by some force, unusually clean, even revealing deeper, more dilapidated coloration of the floor beneath.

The Duke crouched down, fingertips of his custom gloves gently grazed the slime traces.

A cold, faintly spiritually polluting sensation immediately traveled along his fingertips, attempting to penetrate his skin, yet was effortlessly blocked by magic power flowing within him.

This substance was clearly not produced by the projection space here but left by some other existence, and the traces looked fresh.

The Duke became more vigilant, associating it with castle’s death events, he had a rough idea.

Most likely, during that ritual’s execution, some entity was born into this space, then fed on souls and spiritual power of castle’s people, resulting in these death events.

Since the slime contains the effect of devouring spiritual power, the entity leaving the slime probably has similar abilities.

The Duke retrieved a special vial, carefully collecting some slime as a sample, planning to investigate it thoroughly when time permits.

More cautiously, he continued forward along intermittent traces, muscles slightly tense, ready to explode at any moment.

The traces ultimately vanished at the end of a peculiarly twisted corridor, where a decorative wall should be, now presenting an unnatural inward sunken dark entrance, edges indistinct as though space was corroded by some force making a breach.

A more pronounced suction mixed with numerous subtle spiritual shrieks emanated from within the hole, pulling on his clothes and edge of spiritual power.

The Duke did not rashly enter, steadied his stance, concentrated his spiritual power into a beam, sweeping inward like a spotlight.

At the moment his spiritual power reached inside, an ear-piercing, directly soul-affecting screech burst forth from the darkness.

The sound seemed to penetrate eardrums, reaching his mind, causing a slight dizziness, spiritual power fiercely tugged.

Next, a creature enough to cause extreme physical discomfort to ordinary people abruptly rolled out from the darkness.

It was an irregular spherical object about half man’s height; its body wasn’t flesh, but composed of a translucent membrane akin to solidified pus or gel, beneath which countless varied-sized, differently colored pupiled eyes crowded layer upon layer.

The eyes simultaneously rotated, pupils contracting and expanding, fixedly staring at the intruder Duke, reflecting his serious silhouette, exuding a pure nauseating greed and hunger.

In the instant locked by those countless eyes, the Duke felt his spiritual power violently sucked as if by countless invisible straws, transmitting obvious weakness and stinging sensation.

This creature could directly devour living beings’ spiritual power, and its efficiency was very high.

"Judging by aura, it shouldn’t have reached Level 2 Life standard yet, but it’s very close, considered a rather troublesome character within Level 1 Life." The Duke swiftly assessed the demon’s strength before him.