novelonline Chapter 3555 The Elder Who Lost the Game
Chapter 3555 The Elder Who Lost the Game
Chapter 3555 The Elder Who Lost the Game
Megan had said that the Church hadn't kept the news of "The Great Symphony of Destiny" a secret, so there was no fear of it being leaked. Shad wasn't worried that the elders' actions would betray Megan's friends. Therefore, after watching Elder Harald leave in a hurry, he pretended to ask Claire with concern:
"Haven't Megan and Audrey arrived yet?"
The platinum blonde girl smiled and asked in return:
"Are you that concerned about them?"
"If you're late, I'll be very concerned too."
"They're quite the talkers. They haven't arrived yet, but they left a letter in the council saying that they only realized the gas stove was still on after leaving Lake Green, so they turned back temporarily. They'll definitely arrive this morning."
That's a strange reason, but Megan and Audrey have always been eccentric, and compared to the Speaker's noticeably bad temper lately, they're actually quite normal.
She then said:
"Last night, the town received news that an item suspected to be the 'Infinite Serpent' was found in the city of Time Wheel, and it has now been taken into custody by the church."
"What item?"
"It is said to be a 5-foot square block of ice, discovered by a man who makes a living by retrieving corpses from the beach. The ice was constantly radiating a temperature roughly the temperature of hot tea. The finder retrieved the ice and sold it to a local merchant at a high price. When the merchant intended to transport it to the east coast of Carsonrick as a rare item, he was reported by a dockworker who was greedy for a tip-off fee."
It's winter now, and such large blocks of ice packed in boxes are incredibly hot; it's hard for movers not to notice the problem.
"Haven't you turned into a snake yet?"
Shad asked again, and Claire shook her head:
"Those who came into contact with that piece of ice were all ordinary people. The people who retrieved the corpses were very superstitious and thought it was a supernatural phenomenon, never imagining that anything was impossible; the merchant who wanted to sell the goods, on the other hand, firmly believed in science and thought it was a wonder formed by nature. He just didn't understand the principles and didn't think it was an impossible item."
As for the church's first group of contacts, upon discovering no elemental reaction on the ice, they immediately signaled to the church, then temporarily stunned themselves and the entire group. This is reportedly the first Infinite Serpent contained in an 'inactive state' since the snow mountain incident, making it of immense research value.
"Containing something like this must be very difficult, right? After all, once you become aware of it, you'll have thoughts about it, and once those thoughts are formed, the Infinite Serpent will appear."
Shad sighed, but Claire shook her head:
"The local church quickly found a solution: by reversing the polarity of the [Mind Blocking Alloy] and combining it with relics possessing powerful mental interference capabilities, they could block the inactive Infinite Serpent from detecting the thoughts of its surroundings. This was a hypothesis proposed by the Prophet Association during its early research on the Infinite Serpent, and it unexpectedly proved effective."
Although inactive Infinite Serpents are extremely rare, and placing relics together with such serpents is a dangerous act, this incident has nonetheless validated a new containment method.
She stood in front of the unicorn's den and glanced in the direction of the passage to make sure no other members of her tribe were there.
"So in my opinion, the Prophet's Association is quite capable."
The two chatted as they watched Ellie and little Leona eat breakfast. The two little unicorns had different diets. In addition to their main meals, Shad had prepared a variety of fresh fruits for little Leona according to Emilia's recipe, while Ellie only ate apples, which she really liked.
Claire then talked to Shad about the possibility of Ellie turning into a human, a novel idea that even the Great Witch had never heard of.
At 11:30 a.m. that day, Elder Harald and Elder Vilda returned from the city to find the elders still playing with the unicorns. Stella informed them of the elders' return and said with great concern:
"Elder Harald looked very angry, extremely angry."
Claire then took Shad to the banquet hall of the Snow Mountain Hall, where they saw Elder Vilda standing by the table, comforting his grandfather.
"What's going on? Are the negotiations with the Prophet's Association not going well?"
She said with great concern, "Shad observed the two elders carefully, and they didn't seem to have been in a fight with anyone."
Elder Vilda hurriedly shook his head:
"No, it went very smoothly. I first took Harald to the Church of the Sun, and after a few words with some old acquaintances, they told me about the 'Great Symphony of Destiny.' This ceremony was also to quell the failure of All Souls' Day, and the church promised to help us communicate with the prophets and prevent them from freely entering and leaving the snow mountain."
Afterwards, the church representatives and the two of us went to the Prophets' Association. The prophets were very sincere; you probably wouldn't believe it, but the president of the Prophets' Association, the thirteen-ring fortune teller 'Mr. Crystal' Adelaide Lenorman, was also at the local branch. With his promise, Harald and I had no objections, after all, it was for the sake of the island.”
"Well, if that's the case, why is Elder Harald still so angry?"
Shad helped Claire ask the question she wanted to ask. Elder Vilda was about to speak when Elder Harald, who was sitting down, tugged at her sleeve, but Elder Vilda still said:
"After we left the association, we each took care of some personal matters in the city. Harald saw some people gambling on special cards, so he went over and played a couple of rounds. As a result, he lost all four special cards in his deck. Yes, he lost them all."
He'd lost his bets and could only come back to me angrily. "Oh, don't glare at me, I'm trying to help you, aren't I?"
"Help me embarrass myself in front of Claire?"
Elder Harald asked dryly, Shad desperately suppressed a laugh, while Claire looked at her grandfather with some anger:
"Didn't you promise Mother you wouldn't gamble with others anymore?"
The old man wearing the horned hat lowered his head, while Elder Vilda smiled and looked at Shad:
“Don’t we have a master of Rhodes Cards here? Let him help you win the cards back, wouldn’t that be helping you? I’ve even seen your news in the newspaper, Shad Hamilton, the champion of the Big City players.”
Elder Harald looked up at Shad, which made Claire even angrier:
"Grandfather, you not only gamble yourself, but you also want him to gamble like you, is that right?"
"This"
The old man was very embarrassed, so Xia De took the initiative to say:
"It's alright, I'll go help Elder Harald win the cards back, it's nothing."
Claire looked at him suspiciously. Stella, who had been watching the scene without saying a word, thought that her teacher probably suspected that Shad was also like Elder Harald.
Xia De then said:
"You come with me, and we'll leave once we win back Elder Harald's cards, is that alright?"
Claire nodded slightly, but Shad added:
“If you want to gamble with others on special cards, you definitely need to place a bet. Although I have a lot of special cards in my deck, apart from the recently acquired [Ancient Fairy Tale: Snow White], the other special cards were all registered in the local tournament in Topsk before the year-end holiday, so it's not convenient to take them out again in Time Wheel City.”
Elder Harald immediately stated:
"It's alright, I'm not the only one in town with special cards, I'll borrow a few for you right away."
He stood up abruptly, but after seeing the look in his granddaughter's eyes, he slowly sat back down.
“I did make a mistake this time, but I’ve been busy with all sorts of things for the past month after the year-end holiday and haven’t had time to play cards. I will learn from this experience.”
"Tell me your name and address, and I'll go borrow a license plate for Harald."
Elder Vilda said with a smile, then gestured to Shad and Claire that there was no need to rush:
"You can go this afternoon. Let Harald experience what it's like to lose something important first, and then we'll get the cards back for him this afternoon."
Elder Harald considered his loss at the card game quite shameful, and indeed it was, so he forbade anyone to talk about it. Shad was certain he hadn't said a word, but somehow, by lunchtime, even people from other villages who had come to visit the town knew about it.
Shad suspected that Elder Vilda had revealed the matter when he borrowed the token, and also suspected that Claire had deliberately leaked the information to teach the elder a lesson, but he had no evidence.
Considering he hadn't yet made arrangements for Xiaomi's lunch, Shad went home before lunchtime to pick up the cat. But when he got home, he found Luvia preparing lunch in the kitchen. Seeing Shad return, she said:
"I'll take care of the cat for you, so you don't need to worry."
She guessed why Shad had returned at noon; Shad wanted to stay and have lunch with Luvia, but he had already promised to go back soon, so she said to Luvia:
"Don't cook, come eat with me at Claire's."
Luvia declined with a smile:
"The association has things to do this afternoon, so I won't go that far. You should go back quickly. I didn't prepare any food for you anyway, and if you stay, you'll just be competing with Xiaomia for food."
"Meow~"
The cat perched on the dining table meowed, and Shad stroked its little head before going to Luvia's side to watch her cook.
“I’ll go back later, there’s no rush. You know what? Yesterday morning I got some good stuff from the hermits in the forest. They even gave me a chess piece carved by an old god, which could very well come in handy when I face an evil god in the future.”
Luvia smiled as she looked at the food in the pot. She had been very worried about this, even believing that Shad's being targeted by the evil god was her fault.
"Perhaps the coin you received from the gift box yesterday was also a gift from the Old Gods."
Shad nodded, quietly watching Luvia prepare lunch for herself and Mia. He said goodbye to the girl and the cat while they ate, then went back to the basement.
Shad didn't let Luvia and Mia see him off, but Luvia remained seated at the table, gazing towards the stairs. Only after Shad's voice had completely faded did the purple-eyed girl whisper to Mia, "..."
"You know, even though I'm way past the age of dreaming about fairy tales, is Shad really the prince charming the world sent to me in response to my wishes?"
"Meow~"
The cat, who was eating lunch, responded to her briefly, but didn't even look up, its attitude quite perfunctory.
Luvia rested her chin on her hand, tilted her head, and continued to look at Mia:
"So how can I love him even more?"
"Meow~"
The cat swished its tail, circled its food bowl, and turned its back to Luvia. It was just a cat and didn't want to answer such questions.