Cthulhu Gonfalon

Translator: Sigma Editor: Sigma

In the thick woods, disorderly sounds could be constantly heard.

One moment it was the sound of trees being broken, and the next, it was the the collision of gold and iron. Then it was a fierce crash, followed by the sound of flowing water.

In the dim light, there were three figures, one big and two small, busy fighting. The big one was naturally the horrible serpent, while the small ones were Ray and Steele.

Ray was in charge of the fight, while Steele only assisted him.

Steele hurried back immediately after sensing there was a fight beneath her, but she struggled to help. She soon found out that with her lack of fighting skills, not only was she unable to offer help in the battle between Ray and the huge serpent, but she also was only getting in the way.

So she stepped aside and kept a relatively safe distance, using her heaven-sent skill of casting spells to assist Ray.

As a semi-holy spirit who had failed to complete the transformation, she was able to make use of many heaven-sent spellcasting skills. Although there were few that could be used for direct assaults, she was able to assist Ray with many of them. Coincidentally, what she needed right now was the Spell of Assistance.

Assisted by Steele's spells, Ray became spirited and his fighting ability increased tremendously. He rejected the awakened Sui Xiong's proposal of help and wielded his spear and sword as if they'd become two beams of white light, so the battle was quite even.

Over time, Ray gradually gained the upper hand.

He found that although this huge serpent had a huge body, amazing strength, and stunning defensive capacity, it wasn't particularly clever.

This lack of fighting intelligence meant that the snake's combat skills were poor. With his rich experience accumulated from many battles, Ray gradually understood the fighting habits of this serpent. When the rhythm of the fight completely fell into his control, there was no longer any suspense as to the outcome of this battle.

Even so, killing a giant snake was a very difficult thing. Ray struggled for a long time and finally killed the huge serpent as twilight approached.

With a final cry, the huge serpent slumped to the ground and finally ceased moving. By this time, Ray was also exhausted and could barely stand. Even Steele, who had only assisted him by casting spells, was also quite fatigued. She flapped her wings feebly and could not fly anymore.

"Thank you," Sui Xiong said as he cast a spell that froze the skeleton of the serpent together with its blood, preserving its precious materials as much as possible. This was the loot that Ray and Steele gained after fighting for an entire afternoon. It might not be priceless, but it was certainly very rare.

"How to deal with this stuff?" he asked, "How about we save it in the storage space that I made and sell it after we reach the Commonwealth of Mifata?"

"Deal with it as you wish," Ray said faintly. "I have to find a place to camp because I feel as if every bone in my body is going to fall apart."

"Me too," said Steele, finally recovering a bit strength after resting for awhile. She flapped her wings and began to fly. "There is a rocky hill up ahead. Although it isn't high, it is barren and not occupied by any beasts. It is the best place for us to camp.

Hearing that they could finally sleep on solid ground, the already exhausted Ray again became spirited. He used his long spear as a cane and climbed up on another floating disk (the one that Sui Xiong originally used to test the duration of his spell). Because it had been kept far away from the battle, it was not destroyed in the fight, and now it came in handy once again.

"It's good to take a rest!" Steele sighed, flying slowly in the air and leading the way.

Fortunately, the place was not far. It took them about ten minutes to arrive at the barren rocky hill.

The rocks in this hill were quite hard, and the mountaintop was very smooth, making it a good campsite. However, everyone's current state made camping in the wild again very unattractive, so Sui Xiong searched in his documents, found a spell for shelter that was commonly used by travelers, and cast this spell.

From nothing, this spell could create a room with beds, fireplaces, and simple toiletries. For travelers away from home, it was indeed a very convenient spell.

But the disadvantage of this spell was also obvious. First of all, it was a made-up place, and it was difficult to get an adequate night's rest by sleeping in it. Also because this was an isolated place, people couldn't effectively pray here. This meant that neither mages nor priests could recover their abilities to cast spells by resting in the shelter.

If this problem was only secondary, then the main problem was truly terrible. In the shelter, no one could keep watch of their surroundings outside.

And although the house could keep out wind and rain, this seemingly solid house offered basically no defense at all. It could be damaged by even just a few wolves.

What did this mean? It meant that resting in the shelter made you completely defenseless! Was there even a difference between resting in the wild without proper defenses and asking for death?

So unless it was a last resort, adventurers would not use this spell for shelter. Even if they had to use it, they would make arrangements so that people kept watch outside in turns. This way they avoided being caught defenseless by monsters or enemies.

Of course, there were also advanced spells that could solve these problems. For example, a man named Sacred Dwelling could build a stone room with considerable defenses and people could pray therein.

However, that was something exclusively owned by gods whose positions were about traveling. Except for priests who were authorized by them, even Sui Xiong, also a god, couldn't cast that spell.

There was a mage's spell called Mage's Villa, which not only provided a very high level of accommodation and food but also had a few magic statues responsible for guarding. There were even maids.

However, that spell was so subtle that even the God of Redemption only knew of its existence and knew nothing of its principles. Perhaps among the deities, no one knew how to cast it…

"I'll keep watch tonight, and you guys can sleep well," Sui Xiong said to Ray and Steele, who were still unable to recover their spirit. "Rest assured and sleep well because I will keep us safe."

With a god keeping vigil, of course, it was extremely safe. Ray and Steele, though somewhat embarrassed, ended up accepting his kindness and entered the room for rest, weary with fatigue.

The two of them took a shower simply, ate and drank, and fell onto the bed and immediately went to sleep. They were really tired.

Sui Xiong, while guarding them outside, changed into a huge floating jellyfish even larger than the shelter. He hovered in the sky over the room, watching carefully.

He let out a sigh and then dispersed some of his floating weight in all directions. Then he only heard the sound of turmoil without knowing how many monsters, big or small, fled quickly and didn't dare to stay nearby.

After dispersing anything that could threaten Ray and Steele, he could rest assured and immersed himself in his studies again.

This time his research objective was that serpent. This serpent had a low IQ and no ability to cast spells. It seemed that it was just an ordinary low-level poisonous snake. It was unknown how it had grown to such a big size.

If it had grown to such a size, how long had it lived?

All things on earth had life, and snakes were no exception. This world did not seem to have legends about things like turning into elves or demons, but any creature that could be born and grow was either strong enough to combat the passage of time or had noble blood and exceptional talent.

However, this serpent was neither strong enough nor had any noble blood, so what was the secret of its longevity? Sui Xiong was very curious about this.

He was not a heartless absentee leader. He also wanted to contribute more to the construction of the church and the holy places —he disagreed with the custom that required believers to work hard while gods sat idly and enjoyed the fruits of their labor.

After some consideration, he felt he was a senior intellectual who deserved to contribute his wisdom and effort to his religion. It was just…how to contribute with his intelligence? He had not yet found a clue.

The planned holy place would be built in the frigid northern part of the country. Even if it could depend on his strength to make farmlands, it would be self-sufficient at most. It was unrealistic to expect to sell surplus grains. It would be excessively cruel to ask the followers to make money by mining, logging, and quarrying in an extremely cold place. Manufacturing and the like were unlikely industries to get rich from in a place with such inconvenient transportation. As for the service industry… He-he…Drop it…Why even mention this boring joke!

If he wanted to arrange for the holy place to have an industry that could support his believers and provided extra money to run the church, he had to take into account the following points: First, the work involved in the industry had better not be outside, or people would freeze to death; second, it was better that the industry didn't use too many raw materials, or either collection or acquisition would be unreliable; third, it would be best if this industry was as exclusive as possible, so that even if someone was jealous they couldn't copy or mock it…These were what Sui Xiong thought of for now, and the rest would be supplemented later.

But with these three ideas, he could only frown because he couldn't think of any other reliable ideas. Although he was powerful and had learned many things from both the gods and his original world of advanced science and technology, it was still too hard to find a suitable industry based on these requirements!

After all, before coming to this world, he was just an art student good at painting, rather than an engineering student familiar with a variety of materials, various kinds of mechanical drawing, and a variety of mechanical processes!

But now, he had inspiration.

Health and longevity were clearly best welcomed by the rich in this world. Although in this world people could go to the Holy Kingdom after death, the threshold for entering the kingdom was extremely high. Most rich people believed that they would not find a kingdom willing to accept them. And they certainly didn't want to go obediently to the netherworld after death like poor people, without caring what happened next…

Therefore, under such circumstances, if he could launch a life-prolonging medicine with small side-effects and good results, he would definitely earn lots of money. There wouldn't be any problem supporting a church whose power was spread across the entire continent, not to mention his followers located in only one holy place!

Creating this medicine relied on the giant serpent that had just met its demise…