141: Chapter 141 Rat Hole Necklace

Half an hour later, Nie Ning returned with a large force from the City Lord's Mansion.

He even had Lida bring the Crimson Sun Rainbow Array, the same formation used at the Little Boy's place last time.

Its power was close to the limit of the Second Rank, making it extremely formidable.

However, when they stormed the building, they couldn't find a single soul inside.

"How did they run away so fast!"

Nie Ning couldn't help but curse those cowards in his heart; if he had known, he wouldn't have taken back the Jerky Bear Head.

He had previously been afraid of being detected by those cultists, and since it didn't take long to go back and call for reinforcements, he hadn't expected those people to actually slip away.

Though they were a bit crazy, they were certainly quite vigilant.

Nie Ning glanced at the knights who had followed him and had no choice but to pay out of his own pocket to treat them to a late-night snack.

A wizard's expenses were already high, and the money from selling weapons through Borton last time had long been spent.

He hadn't expected to come up empty-handed this time and even drive himself toward bankruptcy.

...

Time flew by, and in the blink of an eye, two months had passed.

Those cultists never came looking for him again, as if they had vanished; even with increased patrols in the city, no relevant clues were found.

During this time, Nie Ning immersed himself in the ocean of knowledge every day.

Aside from his cultivation, he spent his time learning things related to wizards.

As wizards are the spokespeople for rationality, Nie Ning naturally could not abandon this fine tradition.

Moreover, compared to his school days, interest can truly shift one's mindset, making even studying become enjoyable.

By now, his knight cultivation had reached the late stage of Great Knight, not far from its peak state.

Beyond that lay the Earth Knight.

Compared to wizards, an Earth Knight is equivalent to a Second Ring Wizard, with destructive power and defensive capabilities that increase manifold—it is quite exaggerated.

If encountering some Wild Wizards with no real skills, an Earth Knight's offense and defense are enough to contend with them; there are very few Earth Knights in the entire Wilbes Republic.

His progress as a wizard had slowed down; in all this time, he hadn't even advanced by a minor realm.

Compared to his previous heaven-defying speed, it was now comparable to a snail's crawl.

This was the area that had been troubling Nie Ning recently.

The reason was simple: he was different from ordinary wizards.

To some extent, Elemental Affinity isn't actually that important; at most, it increases the power of wizardry and provides the foundation for elemental fusion.

In terms of cultivation, Nie Ning relied more on his Strange Beast Body and the Power of a Hundred Beasts; his cultivation multiplier from Elemental Affinity was somewhat inferior.

Because compared to orthodox wizards, he was actually more similar to a Bloodline Wizard.

He primarily relied on Supernatural Adaptability to acquire strange beast genes, then focused on Spiritual Power to activate the potential within those genes.

But this presented a problem: the upper limit of the strange beast bloodline was equivalent to Nie Ning's own upper limit.

Among the strange beasts he had devoured, the one with the highest potential did not exceed the First Rank; it was only because of Supernatural Adaptability that he had gained a corresponding increase in his ceiling.

Now that those bloodline potentials were almost exhausted, his improvement speed had suddenly and drastically decreased.

Of course, compared to an ordinary wizard, it was still like riding a rocket; Nie Ning was just somewhat dissatisfied with his current rate of progress.

This was the most difficult part.

Nie Ning had checked the maps and records of the Wilbes Republic, and in reality, there weren't as many strange beasts as one might imagine.

In the early days, wizards and knights hunted strange beasts on a massive scale to obtain various materials for refining medicines and crafting equipment.

This caused the surviving strange beasts to hide deep in the mountains and old forests, rarely stepping into human territory.

So now Nie Ning was in a very awkward position.

If he went out to search for strange beasts, he didn't feel safe leaving Lilith here alone, not to mention that the sealing box lost last time had still not been found.

But if he didn't go out, his cultivation speed would only get slower and slower until it was no different from an ordinary wizard's.

The key was that even if he went out, he might not necessarily find a powerful strange beast, which was the most frustrating part for him.

For example, there were rumors of an Ancient Rhino-Crocodile with a crocodile's head and a rhino's body in the Wantai Forest; according to records, it should be a Third Rank strange beast, and even if its bloodline had declined, it should be at least Second Rank.

He had secretly entered the Wantai Forest twice recently.

Never mind the Ancient Rhino-Crocodile, he hadn't even seen many other types of strange beasts, and many of those he did see were ones he had already eaten.

Because he didn't want those strange beasts to go extinct, he didn't kill them.

And throughout the southern part of the Wilbes Republic—which is where he was currently located—the geographical conditions meant that the strange beasts here were basically all of similar types.

If he wanted to kill different strange beasts, he would have to go to more distant places, and he certainly wouldn't be able to return in the short term.

Furthermore, there was his duty as a guardian; it wasn't good to leave this place for too long.

Of course, Nie Ning did have an unorthodox method, which was to use the Black Tide.

Unfortunately, while it was fast, the side effects were a bit too much; Nie Ning really couldn't handle it, and even after promoting to the Second Ring, he didn't dare to casually try using this method to increase his strength.

Moreover, some things are so useful that even without side effects, they can cause one to lose their mind.

If anyone else had obtained the Black Tide, it would likely be no different from the apocalypse for ordinary people; plenty of people would use it even at the risk of becoming a Corruptor.

...

Hervais Manor.

At this moment, Nie Ning was in Lilith's room helping to move furniture.

In a few days, it would be the anniversary of the founding of the Wilbes Republic, so Matt, who had returned from his business trip, had them clean up the manor.

Originally, Nie Ning only needed to slack off, but Lilith's room was only accessible to maidservants; even Nie Ning had only entered a few times when Lilith needed him.

A spring cleaning naturally meant everything had to be cleaned, so the task of moving furniture fell upon him, the 'deaf-mute'.

In reality, this should have been Norma's job, but the problem was that Norma had taken Lilith out early in the morning, and no one knew when the two of them would return.

As Nie Ning was moving Lilith's dressing table, he suddenly noticed a piece of the wall had fallen off, and looking back, there was actually a hole under the dressing table.

"There are actually mice."

Nie Ning was quite surprised by this.

Although he had lived in the woodshed before and often ate and slept with rats.

But the castle was regularly pest-controlled, so the fact that there were mice in Lilith's room was indeed a bit unexpected.

And this was Lilith's favorite dressing table.

Thinking about how Lilith's mood had been very low lately, Nie Ning's lip twitched slightly.

He then crouched down to check; perhaps he could fix it.

But just then, Nie Ning's peripheral vision caught the wall cavity, and a glint of silver caught his attention.

'Lilith's jewelry?'

With that thought, Nie Ning reached in and pulled the object out.

It was a silver diamond-shaped pendant set with green, yellow, and blue gemstones in the middle.

Nie Ning thought back carefully; he didn't seem to recall seeing Lilith wear this necklace before. Could it be something she bought recently?

But Lilith had been in a bad mood lately and rarely went out shopping; besides, he was almost always with her, and the three of them hadn't visited a jewelry store.

...