Miss Samuel spread a blanket next to the campfire. After Shad carefully put Miss Orlanod down, he asked about the stone platform with five grooves.
"Yes, this is the altar that seals the "Nameless Sacrifice Book". After you left, Britney and I found a way to get it here."
The stone altar was about half a person's height, and its shape was somewhat similar to the courtyard fountain that Shade had seen at Miss Carina's manor.
There are five evenly spaced grooves around the circular altar, and in the middle of the altar is a raised square stone. The "Unnamed Sacrifice Book" should be inside it.
Miss Samuel handed the bottle of fire to Shad, then reached into her robe and handed him the relic, the corpse of the sunworm, as if she was really using it as a hot water bottle.
But Shade did not immediately take out the five items he had prepared. Instead, he took out Mia's doll from his pocket and used a handkerchief to restore it to a real cat:
"Meow!"
The cat squatting in Shade's palm tilted its head back to bathe in the firelight, made a gentle cry, then looked around with its amber eyes wide open with curiosity.
This made Shad feel relieved. He took the risk of bringing Mia into the Land of Death. Although Mia was in toy form, Shad was still worried that the cat would be affected. Now it seems that his worries were unnecessary.
Mia was carefully put on the ground. As expected, this timid cat did not dare to run around. Instead, it lay beside Shad's legs, observing everything around it timidly.
Miss Samuel was also spiritually healed by the appearance of this cute little creature, and she smiled and whispered:
"Is this your pet cat? Most witches in the academy keep pets, but we prefer magical creatures that can be used as combat pets, or birds like owls that can deliver messages. However, this cat is so cute that it is definitely more popular than those practical pets."
She reached out to touch Mia, but the frightened orange cat dodged her.
"It's not my cat yet, but I'm trying to claim it as my own."
Xia De said with a smile, his heavy mood improved a little after seeing Mia.
The orange cat Mia, who is less than one year old, is usually very afraid of unfamiliar environments, but then she shows the curiosity of a cat. After discovering that the only stranger here was the woman wearing glasses, she turned her attention to the two objects in front of Shade, the body of the sunworm and the glass bottle containing the fire.
It stretched out its claws to grab it, but Shade mistakenly thought that the cat wanted to touch the campfire, so he hurriedly hugged it with one hand.
"Miss Samuel, do you think there's something wrong with this cat?"
Amidst "her" laughter, Shad asked the question again.
The witch of Zaras chuckled:
"Why, are you like some of the witches of our time, who believe that your pet cat will turn into a beautiful girl one day in the future? This idea is not acceptable. Without magic potions or special relics, a cat is just a cat."
Although she asked this, she still adjusted her breathing and then gently sprinkled some gray light spots on the cat held by Shade. The light spots also touched Shade's arm, but because it was not a physical object, there was no sense of touch.
"A perfectly normal kittypet."
"That's good, let's get back to business. We need five items, I went back and collected some after I left."
He began to take things out of his pocket:
“This is definitely possible.”
The Sun Holy Emblem brooch made by Iluna was placed together with the two items prepared by the witches.
"Then here are these five things, we can try them one by one."
The five items are the "parchment with the sun rune" and the "antique badge that can slightly enhance the power of the sun" purchased from Mr. Edmund, the "heat-generating pebbles" and the "broken sword suspected to be the Sun Knight's sword" given by Miss Carina, and the "ruby with naturally formed sun pattern defects" obtained from Old John.
The ruby was the most expensive, and Miss Carina confiscated Shad's money for the two items.
He didn't have much time, so he didn't delay any longer. He stood up and took these items to the altar. Although Miss Samuel was in poor condition, she still tried to stand up and followed behind Xia De.
Xia De first stuffed the bottle containing the fire and the relic into two grooves on the altar. As the items were put in, dense warm yellow lines spread from the circular grooves to the square stone box in the center of the altar. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be two-fifths of the sun pattern.
"Meow!"
Mia seemed extremely excited and tried to break free from Shad's arms, but Shad held her very tightly.
"See, what Britney and I thought was right."
Miss Samuel said.
"And then..."
The brooch made by Iluna was placed in the third groove. More dense patterns covered the surface of the stone altar in front of him. Shade's guess was correct:
"Then it's two out of five. I hope my luck isn't that bad."
Shade said softly, first inserting the ruby into the groove, but it had no effect. Then he tried the hot pebble and the broken sword, but they also had no effect.
He immediately became nervous, and so did the witch behind him.
"Miss Samuel, you go next. I think my luck might be a little bad."
"Is this some ridiculous superstition?"
The witch asked, but she still picked up the parchment produced in the New World of the Sixth Epoch and placed it in the groove. The warm yellow lines slowly spread from around the groove to the center of the altar, making the sun pattern on the surface more obvious.
"You see, your luck is better."
Shade breathed a sigh of relief, and the witch picked up the last badge and placed it in the last groove. Both of them stared at it, but it was useless. Even though they waited for ten seconds without saying a word, nothing happened.
"Fortunately, there is a backup plan. Shade, call out that god and use my power to form a book."
Miss Samuel stumbled and tried to sit back by the campfire. Shad was worried that she would fall, so he reached out to hold her. This gave Mia an opportunity to jump out of Shad's arms.
"Ms. Samuel, we can try to think of other ways. If you use up your last wish here, how are you going to leave the Dead Valley?"
He supported the weak-looking High Ring Witch, and the scholar from the Zaras Academy said softly and helplessly:
"But do we have any other options? If we can't break the seal and get the Unknown Sacrifice Book, the gods won't allow us to make a wish to leave."
"Think of other ways. Maybe you have other..."
A burst of warm yellow light appeared behind Shade, and that light even instantly suppressed the light of the campfire. Warm and sacred, Shade couldn't use more precise words to describe the light behind him, but he really felt that for a moment, there was the sun behind him.
Turning around, I saw that the complete sun pattern had appeared on the surface of the altar. As the light subsided, cracks appeared on the surface of the stone box in the center of the altar. Finally, the square stone box completely cracked, revealing the stone slab inside.
You can see without getting too close that Mia is squatting quietly in the last groove, with her back to Shade and the witch, looking at the stone slab in the center of the altar.
Shad couldn't see the cat's front, only the hair on its back and the short tail that hung down from the edge of the altar.
"this... ... "
Before Shade could get close again, Mia ran towards the stone slab with her short legs. She sniffed it with her nose, then stepped on it, and finally sat down. Shade was very familiar with this posture. Every time she wanted to sleep, she would lie down in this posture.
"What's going on? Why is my cat...?"
Shade couldn't understand it at all and looked at the cat in surprise. Then he looked at Miss Samuel, who asked softly:
"Has this cat ever demonstrated extraordinary powers?"
Shade thought for a moment:
"There's nothing special about it except that it's exceptionally smart."
The exception was the power of absorbing a trace of divinity, but the divinity that Shade used at that time came from the Lord of the Blood Feast, and that god had nothing to do with the "sun". In fact, none of the divinity that Shade had absorbed so far had anything to do with the sun.
"Has it ever shown any abnormalities? For example, it occasionally disappears for a period of time, or uses potions related to the sun?"
Miss Samuel asked again.
"At least not during the time I adopted it. The cat was even a little timid and was very reluctant to follow me out. As for before I adopted it, its owner, Miss Mia Sang Gold, was an ordinary girl who returned to the countryside to inherit her ancestors' inheritance."
Miss Samuel nodded:
"Then there is only one possibility..."
Shad looked at her expectantly.
"This cat of yours has a special bloodline, a bloodline related to the sun, and it is a very noble bloodline."
Shade was disappointed, this conclusion was said by Miss Carina, and even by Luvia. They all believed that Mia's high intelligence came from a special bloodline of an unknown ancestor, and perhaps her paternal and maternal lines had never expressed this special feature, but in Mia's generation, the bloodline suddenly became dominant.
This is not impossible. The Sexes Higher School of Medicine has conducted relevant research.
So, why would you expect, there is anything else special about this cat
The voice beside him also sounded at this time. Xia De couldn't give an answer, so he didn't answer:
"I will investigate the matter of this cat later. We will hand it over to the old sage in gray robe as soon as possible."
Shade said, reaching out to pick Mia up from the stone slab, and then to pick up the stone slab. But unexpectedly, the cat rarely resisted Shade, lying on the stone slab and refusing to move. This reminded Shade of the scene of hens lying on their nests that he saw in the countryside of Midhill Castle.
After a long while, Mia reluctantly stood up, swept the surface of the stone slab with her tail, and then jumped into Shade's hand. Not sure if it was an illusion, Shade thought that the orange part of the cat's fur had become more shiny than before.
Shade stretched out his hand and pinched the cat in his arms, first the ears, then the belly, then the paws, then the tail, and then Mia pawed him. He hoped that he could squeeze out some new clues about the cat from Mia, but Mia probably didn't have the ability to make a small note drop when he pinched her.
Reaching out to take the stone slab, the altar immediately collapsed. The stone material scattered into a pile of dust, and the three items originally in the groove, except for the relic sunworm corpse, all turned into dust.
Shade once again lost the brooch made by Iluna.