Chapter 117: Complete Set

Chapter 117: Complete Set "Purple Vortex, you don’t need to hide and babysit them anymore. Get over here on the double!" Carlos had lost all interest in them now. Since he’d snagged one Silver Thornblade clan sword, the three people getting mauled by sand lizards naturally weren’t worth squat anymore. He needed Purple Vortex to hustle over and explore what was down below. ... On the other side, after Purple Vortex got Carlos’s order, it immediately started tearing with both hands. The Dark Purple Force Field wrapped around its body split apart like tissue paper. "Roar!" It let out several furious roars—these past few days had really gotten under its skin. ... Before long, Purple Vortex charged over and, under Carlos’s command, led the five Shield Guards into the pit without missing a beat... At the end of the underground passage, just like the black-robed figure had said, was an underground chamber. This chamber had no door. On the wall facing the Shield Guards was a greatsword-shaped groove—obviously where the Silver Thornblade clan sword had been sitting pretty. Not rushing to send the Shield Guards into the chamber, Carlos hadn’t forgotten about those rumbling sounds, which needed checking out thoroughly. "Look around from outside first." Several Glow Stones lit up everything inside the chamber. Suddenly, a huge rock by the chamber entrance caught Carlos’s eye. This boulder was over 10 feet tall, and its base seemed to have melted right into the ground—not a single crack to be found. Around the boulder were several deep claw marks, which was pretty darn strange. "Purple Vortex, take a swing at it." On command, a Dark Purple Force Field shot out from Purple Vortex’s body and slammed into the boulder with a bang. Right away, the boulder let out a blood-curdling screech: "Warning! Warning! Under attack!" A rumbling sound kicked up as the boulder shook like crazy and rapidly transformed. After a few moments, a lifelike stone sand lizard appeared! "So it’s a stone-type alchemical puppet." Stone-type alchemical puppets could suck energy from the earth to keep themselves running. Often, even years after their masters kicked the bucket, they still packed a serious punch. Because of this, they were the go-to choice for guarding underground chambers. "Go tear it apart." This alchemical puppet’s strength was about mid-tier level. For a low-tier black-robed figure, it was definitely something they couldn’t tangle with—no wonder he’d hightailed it out of there in such a panic. But for Purple Vortex and the other Shield Guards, it was a pushover... The Shield Guards surrounded and attacked it. Soon the stone sand lizard hit its breaking point and shattered with a thunderous crash. Among the scattered stone chunks was a dull, earth-brown triangular object. This was the alchemical puppet’s core, used to store energy and give the puppet its get-up-and-go. "Bring me the alchemical puppet core." Carlos wanted to use it to perform a secret technique to see if he could sniff out similar stone-type alchemical puppets nearby. Purple Vortex scooped up the puppet core while the Shield Guards began carefully combing through the chamber from top to bottom. They came up empty-handed. "Looks like this chamber really only had one Silver Thornblade clan sword." "Everyone come back." ... The Shield Guards returned to the surface, and Carlos took the earth-brown puppet core that Purple Vortex handed him. "First let’s use a kindred-seeking ritual to see if there are other alchemical puppets underground nearby." If there were similar alchemical puppet reactions, there would naturally be underground chambers and treasures they were babysitting. Carlos touched down and quickly drew a secret technique array. Then he placed the earth-brown alchemical puppet core inside. Psionic energy fired up the kindred-seeking secret array. The alchemical puppet core gradually dissolved, becoming a pool of earth-brown liquid. A few seconds later, the earth-brown liquid gave off a strange wave that kept spreading outward... Suddenly, it began trembling and changed into eleven small pointers, each floating toward eleven different directions... "Follow them." Carlos ordered the Shield Guards to each follow one pointer. He shot into the sky to keep an eye on things from above. "Eleven search pointers means we’ll find eleven alchemical puppets. Adding the original one, that’s twelve total." Such a familiar number—Carlos felt his pulse quicken. Could the other eleven Silver Thornblade clan swords be... ... The eleven search pointers stopped one by one. Their tips all pointed downward, then vanished after a few seconds. "Dig! Dig down!" Carlos immediately barked orders, deploying all the remaining Shield Guards to start digging together... "Thud!" "Rumble!" Purple Vortex’s team was first to break through underground. The alchemical puppet’s strength wasn’t worth worrying about. Without hesitation, Carlos ordered Purple Vortex’s group to go down directly. After they went down, rumbling sounds immediately echoed from underground. After a few moments, the sounds died down... Purple Vortex climbed back up looking pleased as punch, clutching a greatsword. "Hot damn, another Silver Thornblade clan sword!" Carlos took the greatsword and confirmed it was the real deal, his excitement growing even stronger. "Keep going! Step on it!" He urged the other Shield Guard teams to move faster. He couldn’t wait to get his hands on all the Silver Thornblades. ..... "Twelve Silver Thornblade clan swords—got the whole set." Throughout the entire process, nothing went sideways. Carlos very smoothly dug up all the remaining Silver Thornblade clan swords. "In the original timeline, why did only one Silver Thornblade clan sword slip out from the Golden Sand Society?" The distance between the twelve underground chambers wasn’t far. If an organization searched properly, they could definitely discover them all. After thinking it over, Carlos got it. The silent Silver Thornblade clan swords were nothing but blue quality. You could bet that if Carlos hadn’t butted in, when the Golden Sand Society bigwigs learned that after sacrificing over a dozen Psionics, they’d only gotten their hands on one piece of blue quality spirit gear... How crushed they’d be—they’d probably regret it till their dying day. But with Carlos’s meddling, though the people were still toast, they wouldn’t get word that the treasure was just blue quality spirit gear. Naturally, they wouldn’t have the same gut-wrenching regret as in the original timeline. This seemed like a lucky break for the Golden Sand Society leadership? "Are those three dead?" Carlos noticed sand lizards starting to show up around them. This meant the battle over there had wrapped up. "Boom!" Carlos called back Purple Vortex and the Shield Guards. His wings beat hard as he flew at breakneck speed to where the Golden Sand Society group had tangled with the sand lizards... Inside the white poplar forest, blood everywhere and sand lizard corpses scattered about told the story of the brutal battle that had just ended. Carlos slowly touched down. At his feet lay a greatsword and a bone staff, soaked in blood with some flesh scraps from their original owners still clinging to them. "If I remember right, these are the spirit gear of two of them." He collected these two pieces of spirit gear—even blue quality was worth a pretty penny. Not far away were some white quality spirit gear, potions, and other stuff left behind after the black-robed figures bit the dust. The sand lizards couldn’t care less about these, so most were still in one piece. "Go grab anything worth taking!" Carlos summoned Purple Vortex and the Shield Guards to start picking the battlefield clean...