"Let us leave this place first."
"It seems soone is coming?"
"No, it is already too late," Nemus quickly replied.
Soon after, a figure cloaked in black ca into view.
The black-robed figure wore a white grimace mask over their face.
Heavy black robes enveloped every inch of their body, concealing them completely.
"Is it truly wise for Your Excellency to poach mbers of my Floating World Society so brazenly?" The black-robed figure stood a short distance away. With their feet hidden from sight, they seed to drift forward like a ghost.
As he spoke, a faint, eerie power began to bloom bit by bit.
A shadow darker than the night writhed behind him. Using this shadow as an anchor, a Shadow Demon materialized onto the scene.
"A Demon Warlock?" Nemus raised an eyebrow.
A Demon Warlock was a type of spellcaster, a profession that had originally branched off from traditional Mages.
However, while Mages served demons to obtain their spell-like abilities, Demon Warlocks sought ways to cooperate with or even enslave demonic entities.
They greedily plundered power directly from the demons.
Using the cover of the night, the Shadow Demon flashed out of sight, instantly crossing the distance to appear right beside Nemus.
The shadows spread rapidly, threatening to completely engulf Nemus in the very next mont.
As the mastermind behind the Floating World Society, the black-robed man had founded the organization to exercise secret control over it and use it to refine the Golden Elixir.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, the Floating World Society had been exposed and the refinent of the Golden Elixir was halted. This alone had infuriated him enough.
And now, soone was actually targeting the ager family assets he had left behind.
"Die!" he spat coldly, the dark, demonic aura twisting violently around the Demon Warlock's body.
Yet in the next mont, a brilliant streak of light flashed through the air.
"Aaaaargh!" the Shadow Demon shrieked in agony. As the dark shadows dissipated, the demon hastily used the surrounding darkness to retreat.
Nemus rely pointed a finger forward, a radiant point of light blooming directly from his fingertip.
Divine Art: Finger of Divine Light!
Holy Affinity and Demonic Affinity inherently countered one another.
In this relationship of mutual restraint, dominance belonged to whichever side possessed the higher attribute value and stronger traits.
Nemus watched the Demon Warlock, who was preparing to summon even more demons, and then frowned slightly as he glanced into the distance.
The commotion here had grown too large. A substantial number of clerics were already rushing toward their location.
The Demon Warlock on the other side noticed this as well, sensing the impending arrival of the Church's personnel.
"I will let you off for today," the Demon Warlock declared. With that, he seamlessly lded into the shadows and instantly drifted far away.
Nemus tracked the departing Demon Warlock but chose not to pursue him. After all, he still had to protect his newly recruited subordinates.
If he gave chase, it would be far too easy for the Church to capture his people.
"Let us leave as well!" Nemus said, activating his trait: Occult Convergence (Old Bones Tavern). This trait ensured that he and his chosen personnel would beco hidden and difficult to detect during the gathering process.
As the trait took effect, Nemus led the group swiftly in a different direction, taking a roundabout path before slipping back into Tail Fin Town.
They stopped inside an abandoned Bell Tower in the South District. Nemus designated this place as their temporary gathering spot; once they developed further, he would find a way to secure a location with a better environnt.
The Watchman and Leah, who had been waiting here for quite so ti, had already tidied up the place a bit.
The mont Nemus returned, Leah abandoned her father and imdiately gravitated toward him. A brief test during their ti in the wilderness had revealed that if Leah stayed away from Angel A for too long, she would begin exhibiting signs of Whale-ification and revert into a Whale-person.
Nemus was now certain that what attracted Leah was not Angel A's brain-damaged soul, but rather his physical body, which had undergone an unknown transformation in the Astral Realm.
After all, Nemus was currently in control of that body.
At that mont, the Alchemist was entirely captivated by Leah.
"So perfect!" His eyes brimd with an intense, investigative fervor. He stared at Leah as if he wanted to dissect her right then and there.
This fanatical behavior triggered the Watchman's fierce vigilance. He quickly stepped in front of his daughter, glaring warily at the Alchemist.
"Hierarch," the Alchemist called out the title exceptionally smoothly. If he had known the Construct Protocol possessed such a perfectly integrated entity bridging the macrocosm and microcosm, why would he have ever resisted? He would have willingly followed Nemus from the start.
"I am Becky Maddux, at your service." Right now, the Alchemist only wanted to prove his loyalty as quickly as possible so he could participate in studying Leah.
"First, tell what exactly is going on with Leah right now," Nemus prompted. He did not rush to let Becky get his hands on her, opting instead to inquire about her specific condition.
As it stood, the Alchemist was the individual most likely to understand the reality of her situation.
Becky then proceeded to give a general explanation regarding the nature of Alchemists and Leah's unique traits.
An Alchemist was a spellcasting profession derived from the school of Transmutation.
However, relatively speaking, while the baseline for Transmutation spells was quite high, their absolute ceiling fell far short of what an Alchemist could achieve.
And in many endeavors, an Alchemist was truly indispensable.
They could assist in completing nurous rituals and refine all sorts of research.
It was safe to say that any Alchemist who managed to grow normally without courting death was a precious talent.
The starting baseline of an Alchemist made it one of the lowest of the supernatural professions.
Without a firm grasp of the world's underlying frawork, Alchemy was nothing more than a scam.
Terms like elents, the Aether Layer, and the Astral Realm required a perfectly accurate cognitive imagery to establish a connection.
Furthermore, re connection was not enough to obtain sufficient power. During this process, one also needed to construct a personal Cosmic Operating Model and perform a multitude of complex calculations to understand the operational trajectory of a specific elent.
For instance, when the Alchemist used the Giant Hand of Earth earlier, he had communicated with the Aether Layer, using it as a dium to link with the Earth Elental Plane.
Since the relative positions of the Elental Plane and the Material Plane were never static, and human capability could not observe such vast distances from the Material Plane, he had to rely on complex calculations based on external factors like astrology, ti, and geographical location to pinpoint the Elental Plane's exact coordinates.
During this process, if his calculations were off by even the slightest margin, the imagery he condensed with his ntal power would fail, and he would be unable to obtain power through the principle of "as above, so below."
Worse still, conflicting imagery could lead to a clash of powers, resulting in a deadly backlash that would amount to courting death.
Among the common folk, there was even a saying regarding Alchemy.
It was not feared if you understood nothing about Alchemy. If you knew nothing, Alchemy was just a facade that produced no effects whatsoever.
What was truly terrifying was the state of half-understanding, being able to connect with certain cosmic imageries but lacking the correct kinematic calculations.
In such hands, Alchemy would instead beco an utter disaster.
The more accurate one's cognition of the universe and the more precise the calculations, the milder the resulting backlash.
Even a Black Iron Rank Alchemist could invoke Iron Rank imagery and have their mind withstand the strain without taking any damage.
But if one could not achieve absolute correctness and precision, they would require a physical dium to shoulder the pressure.
Leah's current condition made her what could only be called the optimal dium.
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