Opal Magic Forest

I immediately removed the thought of the ancient monster from my mind. The more I thought about the ancient monster, the more unsettling it was to the mind.

"If you don’t want to die, tell me about the hegemonic forces who made the agreement," I said to him.

Elder Morris was obviously shocked. He didn’t underestimate the masked man. He thought it could be possible for the person to kill him.

There was also a terrifying power behind him. He believed a dangerous wizard was standing behind him.

So he decided to reveal what he knew. Morris began to talk.

He said, "The hegemonic forces are none other than the top wizard forces from the surrounding nations."

Hearing that, I nodded my head. They were certainly not stronger than the Mage Union.

"Each year, the wizard forces have agreed to send a wizard team led by a Magic Lord to the Opal Magic Forest. It was agreed upon that no Forbidden Wizard will enter."

"The number of team members will be the same. The team will be headed by a single Magic Lord. The wizard force who breaks the rules will be jointly punished by the rest of the forces."

"That’s why I thought you guys broke the rule," Morris said in a solemn tone.

"Who is the strongest person in the organization?" I asked again.

Morris was taken aback. Then he thought of the ancestors.

"The wizard forces have elders and ancestors. The ancestors are old, living fossils. They are half-step Elder Level Powerhouses. The elders are Forbidden Wizards or Magic Lords, depending upon the forces," Morris replied.

So far, there were no problems with the information. But I had another important question to ask.

"Why do you guys need the opal magic gemstones?" I asked.

Hearing that, the face of Magic Lord Morris changed drastically. It was top secret. He could not divulge the information. He had already pledged an oath using a secret magic scroll.

Even if he revealed a tiny bit of information, he would die miserably.

Seeing that the Magic Lord was not answering this particular question, my eyebrows furrowed. I had already gathered some information from the zero puppet earlier.

But I still wanted to know the exact information from the mouths of these people. They might know more important information.

"It appears you want to die badly," I said in a cold tone.

Then I signaled the zero puppet with my eyes. The red smoke acted. It touched the body of the Magic Lord.

Magic Lord Morris, who was fine a few seconds ago, froze in his smile. The next second, he felt terrifying mana affecting his body.

Before he could realize what was going on, he found he couldn’t lift his finger. The zero puppet began to corrupt the body of Magic Lord Morris.

Morris began to realize what was going on. If he didn’t tell them, he would die, but he would die faster if he told them the truth.

His body began to corrode. The dark mana entered the earth-element mana core and began to corrupt it. Morris felt terrible pain. His face contorted.

I saw his facial expression and realized that he was undergoing terrible pain. Mana core corruption causes unbearable pain. Yet this person was enduring it. What was the reason for it?

"Are you going to talk or not?" I asked.

"I’m bound by a magic scroll. I cannot reveal the information," Morris gasped out.

A look of understanding dawned on me. No wonder he was not ready to tell. He was going to die either way. It didn’t take long for the person’s breathing to stop.

His whole body looked white with black veins. The black veins were because of the corruption. It had reached his whole body.

Thud!

The lifeless body dropped dead on the ground. In the end, he didn’t reveal the use of the gemstones. The system said the gemstones were used for magic tech.

The Mage Union is the overlord of the wizard world. They have uses for the magic gemstones. They have dealings with outer space species. But what about the hegemonic forces?

Did they have any breakthroughs in magic tech? That was why they were not willing to share anything. Then I collected my thoughts and left the place with the zero puppet.

The body was already taken inside the system space. I’m going to experiment with it tonight. 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎

As time went on, we collected more gemstones. Before nighttime arrived, we found a place to rest. Then I placed the corpse of Elder Morris outside.

That night, we appeared inside the Gregor Mansion. The full day’s gathering of stones had crossed more than a thousand.

I wanted to continue to gather more. But the sense of crisis coming from the underground ancient monster had increased compared to yesterday.

I think tonight is going to be more dangerous. We appeared in front of the control mirror. We saw the corpse outside. So far, nothing has happened to the corpse. But I was sure something would happen soon.

Meanwhile,

The wizard members of Elder Morris’s team were terrified. They didn’t know where Elder Morris had gone. They had started looking for him everywhere.

But he was nowhere to be seen. The members were beginning to give up. They wanted to regroup before taking their next action. Only two members among them had suspicions about Elder Morris’s disappearance.

So they didn’t join the search. They stayed back at the entrance. Since it was nighttime, they were not ready to do anything inside the Opal Magic Forest right now.

From the beginning, they felt something was wrong with the forest. It didn’t take long for the screams to echo. Clearly, the screams were coming from the Supreme Wizards.

The burly man and the curly-haired wizard exchanged glances. They were right. There was some danger hidden inside the forest. They didn’t know what it was, but they were sure now that it could pose a threat to them.

They were now glad about their earlier decision. They didn’t wait for the others to come back. Both of them turned around and fled from the place. They were glad that something had happened to Morris.

Otherwise, they would have encountered a threat from him.