Chapter Ninety-Three

Denos scratched his head; he also had a headache because he had said a lot of things he shouldn't have not said not long ago.

It was indeed something I shouldn't have said, mainly because I realized that I was almost at retirement age.

Although I'm not very old, I've been exposed to the chaotic realm for too long. My body has many problems, even if I don't say it, such as being invaded by chaotic elements. Even with drugs and spells, there are other ways to deal with this.

As long as he is exposed to the chaotic realm, he will be eroded every moment. No matter how much protection he takes, over the years, anyone will show symptoms of erosion.

He already had his symptoms, and although he had been using jokes and other methods to keep them from Ark's notice, he knew he couldn't hide it from that guy any longer when he added extra ingredients to his medication while entering certain areas.

The last time Ark acted recklessly, it resulted in the death of Raven, a girl who had followed him since she was twenty-five and stayed with him until she was old. Ark found out about it later, and although he didn't express it directly, he felt very guilty.

He felt extremely guilty; he felt guilty for agreeing to the crow's whims.

It's easy to tell what this guy will do next, since he's the only human in the team.

Therefore, he will definitely choose to have Denos retire early, no question about it.

Denos walked at the back of the group, and in the sewer he carefully pinched the bones in his wrist.

The bones in this area have been infiltrated by magic, and they have begun to soften. Even if I give up business now, they will break in about twenty years.

Giving up now would cripple me, so why keep going?

Denos didn't want to think about it anymore, but he just felt inexplicably lonely.

If I leave here, then... oh, I'm getting too sentimental. There are so many places I can go. Actually, I'm quite capable. Even if I don't go back to my family, I can settle down anywhere.

But I feel inexplicably lonely... because I'm getting old, aren't I? Only I am getting old. Even Deedris, who is ahead of me, will have to wait hundreds of years to grow old.

Perhaps he was indeed a little tired, Denos sighed helplessly.

"Denos? Are you alright?"

Suddenly, Deedley turned around, looked at Denos for a moment, and said, "Your expression looks strange. Is there a tear in the back of my clothes?"

"Is that a lame joke?" Denos chuckled awkwardly twice, then looked at Deedri's smug, white smile.

Then his attention shifted from normal thinking and he began to notice his surroundings.

Careful observation reveals that this city is far from peaceful; a closer listen reveals a pervasive sense of danger.

“This sewer needs cleaning,” Denos whistled, looking at Chullier walking ahead. “Do you need us to help you clean it up?”

The "cleaning" here refers to the potential presence of monsters within the city, which is far too normal. There are two reasons for this. The first is an ideal scenario where none of these strange creatures exist. The other, also relatively normal scenario, is that they are hidden, and the city's administrators can only maintain order on the surface, sometimes even secretly moving unseen elements to unseen locations.

It's like cleaning. Towards the end, there are always some hard-to-clean things. You usually just use the mop to move them to a corner where they can't be seen.

However, when enough garbage accumulates inside, I will still be determined to clean it out.

"There are only rats here, what else do you want to clean up?" Chullier said, looking a little strange. "The magic here is very stable."

"Stable? Are you serious?" Denos was taken aback and listened carefully to the voice.

Sure enough, there was nothing there except rats.

So where did this chaotic magic go? There has to be something here that can handle those elements.

“Perhaps it’s spawned some kind of big guy.” Chullier roughly understood Denos’s expression: “The fact that the guy hasn’t shown up yet suggests that he’s a somewhat intelligent creature. He’s not a completely out-of-control monster. I’m a demon, and I’m on the side of demons, so I have a bit of a soft spot for demons that don’t necessarily need to be eliminated.”

“Is that so?” Denos shrugged. “That’s quite a friendly place for monsters.”

“Although this place is considered a human settlement, it’s managed by demons,” Chullier said. “I don’t know why the church agreed to it. Maybe it’s because of Apari. She seems to be quite important to the church.”

"I've heard rumors for a long time that the church uses demons to supply metals to all parts of the world. But because the secrets have been kept so tightly sealed, we don't know who these demons are. But we probably do know who they are now."

“Right, after all, obtaining metal time through normal channels is very costly. So when the Church learned of Apari’s abilities, they didn’t intend to eliminate her immediately,” Chullier said. “She rarely tells me about the past either; everything had stabilized when I arrived here. The only difference is that she is the patron here.”

"Then why did you become a patron?"

“She said she was disabled and that handling documents was too tiring for her. So she taught me how to do these things and also taught me how to deal with the church.” Culliton paused and said, “That’s why I’ve been able to survive until now.”

"Crippled?"

“She always called herself that, completely unconcerned that she was frozen from the neck down. She often said it was fine this way, no need to go to the toilet, and even eating wasn’t really necessary. She just lived day after day because her soul was marked by the demon god. I’ve never understood, never understood why she just sat there and didn’t want to rebel against the church.” Chullier’s voice was soft, but you could feel the disgust in it: “Living meaninglessly, as long as the church exists, we have to live in constant fear. We are created beings, we should be free, but we are bound by shackles all over our bodies.”

"Actually, I've always wanted to know the Church's criteria for defining you demons. After all, it seems much more peaceful here, and the Church hasn't sent many high-ranking clergy here."

"It's very simple; it's about the level of harm it poses to the world. Besides causing harm, it also has the ability to provide help." Chullett paused and said, "We do have two demons here, but our abilities can be countered and dealt with in essence. The Church has a whole set of plans to deal with us. At the same time, I can create places similar to the entire safe zone by altering the energy field. And Apari can continuously generate metal without any prerequisites. As you can see, we are much wealthier here compared to other cities."

"You've made this safe zone exceptionally large by altering the energy distribution here, so that even in a no-life zone, you can maintain its stability. Therefore, you will regularly contribute food and metals to the church to make yourself more useful."

"Yes, there are only two ways for a demon to be preserved: prove that it is harmless, or prove that it is useful. If it cannot prove that it is harmful, it will be eliminated."

......

"Hey, can you hide for a couple more days?" Ghost Duke paused and said, "At least when you're hiding, you're still a living person who makes me feel warm inside... Hey, hey, hey, once the knife's in, don't twist it anymore, it hurts!"

"Why?"

"Are you asking why I suddenly came in? I'm so sorry, it's all my fault. I thought you weren't awake yet and I wanted to sneak you breakfast. It really hurts! I really didn't have any more daring ideas!"

Why can't you die?

"Believe me, I really don't know, that's just who I am," Ghost Duke said, on the verge of tears.

I was really just delivering breakfast, and I never fantasized about bumping into a cute girl in her pajamas... Well, actually I was a little bit looking forward to it.

Everyone should look forward to it, right? Besides, there's no such thing as underwear in this world.

And after this girl washed herself clean, her excessively long hair and slender body were really adorable. The way she ate after being hungry for a long time was also cute.

To be honest, despite what Ghost Duke said, he still really hoped to find a cute girl to travel with. So he was indeed a bit interested in this kid, otherwise he wouldn't be so eager to please him now.

However, he came in at the wrong time, because he happened to see her talking to the snake and the rat.

It was basically a huge green thing and a bunch of rats in the room, and then Ghost Lord saw it.

Then the scene unfolded before him: snakes coiled around him, rats tried to eat him alive, and the woman was inflicting wounds on his body with a knife.

Anyone else would have died long ago, it's just a pity that the guy here is Ghost Lord.

Finally, having exhausted all other options, Ghost Duke looked at the girl who was cowering in the corner in fear and hesitated before speaking.

"Don't worry, it's fine. I won't tell them these things." Ghost Duke looked at the rats entangled around him and scurrying about: "Are they your friends?"

The girl didn't answer; she just hugged herself and huddled in the corner.

"This is a bit of a hassle, but I'll take care of it for you." Ghost Duke looked at the rat biting him. "Could you tell him to stop biting? It hurts."

"What exactly are you?" the girl asked, looking at Ghost Duke. "You're a really strange guy."

"Please look at the situation before you say that. I'm just not going to die, what's this all about?" Ghost Duke looked at the giant snake coiled around him: "How did you manage to hide this thing?"

"Then why... why aren't you dead yet?"

"Ha, I don't know either." Ghost Duke shook his head: "If I knew the reason, I would have killed myself long ago."

"I'm sorry," the girl said softly. "I was about to kill you, and I'm so sorry about that."

"Don't worry, don't worry, it's nothing. I was just startled." Ghost Duke sat down next to her as if nothing had happened, leaning against the corner of the wall as well. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone about this. Nothing happened just now. I just accidentally spilled my breakfast on the floor when I came in. Then you wanted to help me clean it up, but because you haven't used our cleaning tools much, it made a mess everywhere."

She didn't speak, but just silently watched the snake.

The green snake slowly shrank until it became a normal-sized snake. Then, it coiled around the girl's ankle in front of Ghost Duke and disappeared under the cover of her clothes.

The rats were eliminated from the room at an incomprehensible speed, leaving nothing but a mess in the end.

“These are all my friends,” she said softly, hesitating over her words as she looked at Ghost Duke’s stunned expression.

Ghost Duke was dumbfounded because he suddenly realized that there was a very long snake wrapped around the girl's body.

He couldn't help but notice her slender body and her beautiful skin.

An interesting image involuntarily popped into his mind: a small green snake coiled around the girl's body. A rather erotic scene appeared in his mind, making him want to pat his head to keep himself from having impure thoughts.

"I really didn't mean it..." she explained softly.

It's probably the idea that if you're caught secretly meeting these little guys, you should kill them to cover it up.

“I’ve already said it once, there’s no need to repeat myself.” Ghost Duke snapped out of his reverie. “Interested in coming with me around? I’m here to extend the invitation. Everyone else in the team is busy, and I’m the only one free here right now.”

"Mmm," she replied softly as she stood up.

"But speaking of which, what type of monster are you? Are you a zombie?" Ghost Duke looked at her hesitantly and asked, "You really look like a human."

The air grew cold again, and she stared at Ghost Duke in disbelief.

“It’s not hard to guess. With that snake, you could easily have gotten out of there. But you didn’t. Instead, you stayed in the basement for a long time. This can only mean that the original mistress was replaced, and her body decomposed and became a rational monster.” Ghost Duke shrugged helplessly: “But none of that matters. I don’t hate monsters, so even if you’re not a living person, you don’t need to worry about how we look at you.”

“Is that so?” she said softly. “You’re right. It seems you really are a monster.”