89: Chapter 89 Discovering Clues

After a brief moment of playfulness, Nie Ning fell into deep thought.

There had been a lot going on lately, and it didn't seem like a good time to go out.

After all, Lilith had just been kidnapped, and no one knew if it would happen again.

His control over the soul of corruption was limited by distance.

If the distance was too great, he could only force it into a deep sleep to prevent the soul of corruption from losing control and causing an irreversible disaster.

So, it was fine while in the city; he could have the soul of corruption help protect Lilith.

But once he left Ska City, he would either have to take the soul of corruption with him or force it into a deep sleep, and he wouldn't be able to return in time to protect Lilith either.

"How about we wait a while? I still have some things to handle recently,"

Nie Ning thought for a moment, then looked at Ivy and said.

Protecting Lilith's safety was his top priority; nothing could change that.

Ivy nodded. "I'm not in a rush. After all, the Blood Flame Knights Association isn't that simple. Perhaps we should wait until our strength improves a bit more."

None of those organized factions were easy to mess with. Even if the Blood Flame Knights Association had already perished, no one knew if they had left behind any traps.

After all, she just didn't like studying; she wasn't actually brainless.

Compared to her own life, she could still tell what was more important.

Seeing that Ivy agreed, Nie Ning breathed a sigh of relief.

Although the Knight ruins had been a bit of a disappointment, that didn't mean there weren't good things inside.

If he couldn't make a trip there, and he happened to come across something he needed, he would have to pay other prices to obtain it.

...

Nie Ning and Ivy chatted as they walked toward the entrance of the mansion.

Just as they were passing through a long, narrow indoor corridor, Nie Ning was suddenly drawn to several oil portraits on the wall.

"These are the founders of the Wilbes Republic, and some of them were wizards,"

Seeing Nie Ning looking at the oil paintings, Ivy immediately began to introduce them.

But Nie Ning's gaze fell on the portrait of a middle-aged man, or more accurately, the bottom-left corner of the portrait, where a bird-shaped pattern was engraved.

Yes, it was the same pattern as on the handkerchief!

"Who is this?"

Nie Ning pointed at the portrait of the middle-aged man and asked.

"Oh, him? That is the founding general, Lawrence Bright. He was a legendary figure who surpassed ordinary knights."

Ivy said, a look of admiration appearing in her eyes.

It was rumored that his strength had already surpassed that of a Great Knight, and he was even a match for wizards; he was one of the few super-powerful individuals in the Wilbes Republic.

"A founding general?"

Nie Ning frowned, feeling that things had become quite serious.

Originally, he had thought it was Bunir's enemy, or perhaps Matt had offended someone at some point without knowing it.

But now it seemed things were not that simple.

Involving a founding general of the Wilbes Republic—even if the old guy was already dead, the family he left behind could not be underestimated.

No wonder they could send a Great Knight assassin, and even make them willingly go to their death; it all made sense now.

But why was the item in Lilith's possession?

And to deal with such a small family, they could probably wipe them out in the blink of an eye; why go to all this trouble?

Clearly, those people were wary of something, which was why they hadn't made a big move and could only act in secret.

Ivy nudged the dazed Nie Ning. "Hey, what are you thinking about?"

"Nothing, just curious about what happened to those founding generals."

Nie Ning shook his head, not mentioning anything about the assassin.

He was afraid that the City Lord's Mansion might also be involved, and if so, that would be a huge problem.

"The Wilbes Republic was established a thousand years ago; they should all be gone by now, right?"

Ivy said, somewhat unsure.

As one's strength increases, their lifespan also increases, but it seemed there were no knights who could live for a thousand years.

Hearing this, Nie Ning did not continue the topic.

He needed to go back and organize his thoughts; it would be best to figure out what exactly the item in Lilith's possession was, so he could formulate subsequent plans.

...

After saying goodbye to Ivy, Nie Ning went to the agency.

Recently, Borton had hired a helper with superb deductive skills, and the agency's performance had been skyrocketing.

Although Nie Ning hadn't done any work, he still received a share of the money.

After all, his strength was there. Even if Nie Ning did nothing, if there was ever a time when he was needed, that money would prove useful.

Nie Ning did not refuse this.

He wouldn't be leaving the city for a short time, so he needed money to buy the things he needed.

Nie Ning also asked if anything had happened in the city recently.

As a local veteran, Borton's information was much more well-informed than his.

If it weren't for the fact that the Federation was too dangerous, Nie Ning would have wanted to recruit Borton to be in charge of information processing.

However, nothing major had happened in the city recently; the only thing worth noting was that there had been some unusual activity among the churches in the city recently.

Especially the Moon Orchid Sect; they seemed to be looking for someone and would take people around the city every day.

Nie Ning already had some guesses about this news.

Norma's phenomenon from last time was still vivid in his mind, and he had even secretly gone to the Moon Orchid Church to check, wanting to report Norma's abnormal phenomenon.

But thinking about it carefully, this was someone else's business; everyone had their own path to walk.

Norma wasn't a fool; she must be clear about her own situation. If she wasn't willing, Nie Ning didn't want to over-interfere.

In the end, the matter of reporting had to be dropped.

Perhaps Norma thought the same as him, wanting to wait until Lilith stabilized, ideally after she was settled down, before thinking about other things.

...

In the following days, Nie Ning entered another phase of crazy cultivation.

Every day, besides cultivation, the remaining time was used to study various wizard knowledge and spells.

However, compared to before, now that his strength had reached this level, his rate of improvement had slowed down significantly.

That is to say, his knight cultivation was improving relatively quickly.

Ever since the crystal core evolved, relying on the blood energy conversion of the crystal core, he had now reached the late stage of a knight.

But as a wizard using the magic power of a crystal core, Nie Ning encountered a problem again.

Although the Qiongguang Meditation Method could be cultivated, the crystal core that stored magic power could not grow on its own.

Previously, when the crystal core evolved, the total amount of magic power decreased after compression, so his cultivation during this period had been very smooth.

But as time passed, the drawbacks of using a magic core appeared again: the magic core still could not grow on its own!

He had originally thought about doing the same as before and bought a crystal core from Ivy.

But unexpectedly, whether it was because the crystal core's grade was too low or some other reason, that crystal core simply could not store higher-order magic power.

It actually shattered directly!

Nie Ning was also stunned by this sudden change.

There was an even more worrying problem: the shattered crystal core was rejected by the magic power in his body and actually fused into the crystal formed by elemental erosion!