"Are you curious about the changes in your body? You absorbed my flesh and blood. If there is no change even this small, then wouldn't I be too weak?"
The head smiled and said:
"See, I really didn't play any tricks this time, did I?"
Xia De nodded and retracted the chain. However, the chain did not disappear out of thin air, but retracted into Xia De's sleeve, but he did not feel anything entering his sleeve.
"I can feel the flame of desire in your soul. It's pure."
The head continued to praise in a low voice. Xia De shook his head violently, took a deep breath to adjust his state, and after making sure that both his body and mind were fully recovered, he planned to leave.
The first ray of sunlight shone on Coldwater Harbor dozens of minutes ago, and he was still thinking about the red-haired princess.
Just thinking of Leicia, the distracting thoughts in his mind made him think of more things. This was the sequelae of that piece of flesh and blood. Of course, power has a price. Within a month, Xia De would always think about this strange thing.
"I... ... "
"You don't want to thank me, do you?"
The head in the pool continued to laugh.
"Of course not, I just want to ask, what do you want to do?"
Shade asked back as he stood in front of the door to leave.
"I was born from desire. As long as there is desire in this world, I will never disappear. All I want to do is to witness your desire and help you. I just want to see how far you can go."
That alluring laugh was exactly the same as when Shade came. It didn't seem disappointed at all that it failed to obtain Shade's soul:
"After this separation, we will definitely meet again. I hope you can give me new surprises when we meet face to face next time."
Shade opened his mouth but said nothing in the end. He knew that he couldn't trap this thing, and the ineffective seal couldn't trap it. The opponent's danger level was definitely not lower than the angel level. Although it didn't show any combat power in front of him, even if a thirteen-ring warlock encountered this thing, it was hard to say what the result would be.
You know, Shad, who had a drop of divinity in his soul, almost lost himself completely in desire.
"Goodbye, then."
He said it politely in a low voice, turned and left, walked through the open iron gate, and ran towards the direction where the sea breeze was blowing.
As the footsteps faded away, in the pool, dozens or hundreds of times more hands and legs than what Xia De had just seen appeared, like spread peacock feathers, extending out from under the water one after another and then retracting again.
The water splashed, but her head didn't move. Her chin rested on the ground beside the pool, and she looked in the direction where Xia De left with a smile:
"Do you really think that a mortal body can absorb my flesh and blood as perfectly as you do?"
With a soft hum, she sang an ancient ballad and returned underwater:
"It turns out that you don't even know what you are."
The passage behind the iron gate was very similar to the rugged narrow path of the damp chapel, but perhaps because of the obstruction of the dark room, it did not seem like the road had collapsed.
As Xia De moved forward, the humid sea breeze in front of him became stronger and stronger, and the sound of water splashing in his ears became clearer and clearer. However, the further he moved forward, the narrower the passage became.
Until Shad could almost see the light in the distance, the narrow passage could only allow him to pass sideways.
He was forced to use the Moonlight Greatsword to chop the rocks to clear a path. Under normal circumstances, the journey would only take a few minutes, but it took Shade twenty minutes to complete it.
Going up along the narrow cracks in the rocks, it was almost seven o'clock in the morning when Shade's hands, covered in dirt, finally touched the not-so-bright sunlight.
Xia De estimated his current location, which was probably behind the cliff on the side of Aurora Manor.
"It's finally coming out."
When he finally used the sword in his hand to break the last bit of stone barrier and climbed out of the gap with great effort, he realized that the dim light was due to his current position.
This is a pier that is sunken inward under the sea cliff. It seems as if a piece of the bottom of the sea cliff has been hollowed out. Sea water continuously flows into the bottom of the cliff and hits the ground, and the ground tilts upward until it reaches the rock wall that Shade broke through.
The rotten wooden pier and the wooden boat with only wreckage left on the ground all indicate that this place was once used as a dock. Thinking back to the predecessor of Aurora Manor, it was the base of the Scarlet Esoteric Cult, and the damp chapel and the dark room that sealed the relics were also built by the fishmen.
This is enough to infer that hundreds of years ago, the cultists in the manor used the wine cellar and the small dock at the bottom of the sea cliff to transport some dangerous goods and used this place as an escape route. However, as the relics were sealed inside the passage, this hidden small dock was also abandoned until Shade came here.
"Although the witch only comes to Coldwater Harbor occasionally and stays in the manor for only a few days a year, does she really know nothing about what's going on under the manor?"
Thinking about things, Xia De checked the ramp above the dock. Close to the wall, there was a skeleton. Due to the long-term wind and humidity, the clothes on the body had almost completely disappeared. There were only remnants of flesh and blood attached to the bones, but it was impossible to judge who it was based on this.
In addition, there are a lot of garbage and fish carcasses washed up by the sea. But there is no sign of recent human activity. It seems that the people of Aurora Manor really don't know that this place exists.
Going down the ramp, Shade prepared to enter the water directly and swim back to Coldwater Harbor. As Shade got closer to the outside of the sea cliff, the sound of the raging waves became louder and louder, and he finally saw the sky outside clearly.
It was a summer morning, but the sky was a pale yellow. Along with the surging waves, the raindrops that had been falling all night were blown by the strong wind towards Lengshui Port.
The water surface was not clearly visible in the darkness under the cliff, and when Shad's boots stepped into the water, he realized that the sea water was actually blood red.
It wasn't that something red was floating on the surface of the water, but that the water itself had turned red. Shade took the risk of dipping a little in the sea water and lightly touched the tip of his tongue. He knew there was a blasphemous element in the water without even the reminder of the voice in his ear.
This kind of water, if concentrated by chemical means, can even be used directly as a potion or ritual material.
"It seems that the Sea Return Ceremony has already begun. It's really punctual... ... Do large-scale ceremonies like this always come with free potion materials? It was the same at Lakeview Manor last time."
With his mind wandering, he entered the sea.