Pillar of Yita

Fang Hong hurried to support her. Atira hastily spoke from the side, ”Gita, don’t push yourself so hard, we can always go to Dolifen later. What you need to focus on now is healing your wounds.”

But Gita shook her head, a flush of red appearing on her pale face. ”I’m fine, Miss Atira. Brother Ade, would you mind continuing to support me like this? I still have some things I’d like to say.”

Atira looked at her and then at Fang Hong. Seeing the latter nod his head, she reminded, ”Be mindful of your limits.”

The young girl smiled warmly and slightly.

”The third item of Dolifen, or rather, the three items of Dolifen, are the Martyr’s Mark of the Steadfast at Lady Tengye’s inn, the Phantom Blade of Victory at Grey Oak Square... and, the Scepter of Pride of the Ignorant at City Hall.”

”Phantom Blade of Victory?” Fang Hong was a bit stunned and asked, ”It sounds familiar.”

”It is a very famous weapon, the best two-handed sword style Magic Guided Conductor below Level Seventeen, with a quality rating of C++. Brother Ade, you must have seen this name in the community’s trade market. It is actually produced right here—in the abandoned town of Dolifen.”

She smiled a bit mysteriously, that dimpled smile of hers catching Fang Hong’s eyes, so very much like Hilveld’s smile. It was like seeing a smaller version of a noble lady—just with an added touch of smugness.

And such an expression of smugness would certainly never be found on Hilveld’s face—

”You all must be surprised, why would a place that produces a C++ grade Magic Guided Conductor be an abandoned town?”

”That’s normal,” Parker casually responded, ”from defeating monsters, right? There must be some kind of BOSS here—ahh!”

He was cut off mid-sentence by Tianlan delivering a swift hit. The French girl angrily said, ”Miss Atira said not to interrupt Gita. Also, are you dizzy from gaming too much? Since when do equipment drops exist in Eteliria?”

The poor Papalarian cried out in pain, clutching a large bump on his forehead, daring not to voice his anger.

Fang Hong glared at the two of them before continuing to ask, ”Can this Magic Guided Conductor also be bought at this ’market’ here?”

”No, sir,” Chris intervened. ”The three items of Dolifen, and other things here, appear always in fixed locations. The Martyr’s Mark is in a chest of drawers next to the bed in a certain room on the third floor of Lady Tengye’s inn, the Phantom Blade of Victory is embedded beneath the broken base of a statue in Grey Oak Square—as for the Scepter of Pride of the Ignorant, it currently lies in the hands of a ghost at City Hall. It will only drop...it can only be obtained by killing that ghost...”

As he spoke, he cautiously glanced at Tianlan, as if afraid that he too might end up with a bump on his forehead after these last words.

Luckily, Tianlan wasn’t that unreasonable, she simply rolled her eyes disapprovingly. ”Dropping from humanoid creatures doesn’t count as dropping, that’s called exploding equipment—”

She critiqued professionally, using gaming jargon.

Gita looked amusedly at Tianlan before continuing, ”In fact, every time these three items are taken by adventurers, all the illusions of Dolifen disappear into thin air, reverting to a dead town. It’s only on the night of a full moon three months later, when the moonlight breaks through the clouds and shines upon this land again, that the phantom reemerges—”

”The three items of Dolifen?” Fang Hong realized something and asked.

Gita nodded.

”Yes, the three items will also reenact themselves. In fact, over the years, almost all the Phantom Blades of Victory have been produced in this manner from this abandoned town.”

Tianlan listened as if it was something miraculous. ”Every three months, these equipment pieces keep reappearing? But how is that possible? Aren’t Magic Guided Conductors artificially made? Could it be that someone is deliberately placing them there as a prank?”

”It’s likely not a prank,” Fang Hong shook his head, ”Who could consistently pull off such a prank for decades? Besides, a prank doesn’t explain the other strange phenomena surrounding these three items.”

”That’s also true,” Tianlan realized.

”This place sounds exactly like a ’replica.’” the Papalarian couldn’t help but interject after hearing the conversation.

”Replica?”

”That’s an early gaming term, used to describe multiple mirrored versions of an area, like parallel realities, where events and objects reappear within a certain time frame,” Fang Hong explained.

”Huh, how would Brother Ade know such obscure knowledge?” Tianlan asked curiously.

Fang Hong touched his nose sheepishly—it was just that he had hung around in virtual communities in the past and knew more about these things. In some old-school games, such settings still existed today.

Yet Gita nodded and answered, ”Parker’s right; some even speculate that Eteliria is a game left by a higher dimensional civilization. It’s said that such places exist not only here in this world. Dolifen is just one of the more famous ones.”

”Now that you mention it, I seem to recall hearing about this place before, I just never thought it was located in Elpaxin. I hadn’t expected that the theory of Eteliria being a game left by a high-dimensional civilization actually originated from here—if I’m not mistaken, there’s also such a place in the Second World, Mount Holy Pact.” Fang Hong replied, slightly astonished.