In the suburbs of Glamorgan, on a hilltop near Dazzle Star Lake, at this very moment, an old man stood alone in the breeze blowing over the lake.
This old man had thinning hair, bulging eyes, deep wrinkles, and a pale complexion. His whole body was thin and stooped, wrapped in a loose, dark robe embroidered with patterns of thorns and spiders. He leaned on a staff of rotten wood with his dry, thin hand, and his cloudy eyes gazed out at the vast lake before him.
This old man was one of the high-ranking members of the Eight Point Nest, a being known as the Spiderfang Priest. He was now standing on one of the hills beside Dazzle Star Lake, overlooking the entire lake surface with a solemn expression, concentrating as if trying to find some precious treasure within it.
He stood there alone on the barren hilltop, looking out for dozens of minutes without the slightest movement, no matter how the wind on the hilltop blew him, he did not waver in the slightest, as if he had turned into a piece of rotten wood.
"Heh... still working hard here. What can you see by just staring here in broad daylight? You might as well save your energy for the night."
At this moment, behind the Spiderfang Priest, a female voice came. Hearing this voice, the Spiderfang Priest, who had been motionless like rotten wood, slowly turned his head and looked in the direction of the sound. Then he saw a tall woman slowly walking towards him.
This was a woman with long black curly hair, dark red eyes, wearing a wide-brimmed woven hat, dressed in a dark dress embroidered with spider web patterns, with bright red lips and thick eyeliner, and a beautiful face.
This woman looked to be around twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. Compared to ordinary women, she was tall, almost a third of a body taller than the stooped old man, measuring close to 1.8 meters in height. When she walked up to the Spiderfang Priest, the Spiderfang Priest turned his gaze from the woman back to the vast lake before him.
"We have been searching here for several days now, and we still haven't found the entrance. We have always focused our search on the night, but there have been no results. I am wondering if we should change our approach and try some things during the day." Continuing to look at the lake before him, the Spiderfang Priest said slowly, and listening to the Spiderfang Priest's words, the woman beside him sneered and spoke.
"Try some things during the day? Don't be ridiculous. How could that moon bitch's secret appear during the day, under the radiance of the Light source? Deploying actions during the day is purely a waste of energy. If we also cover such a large lake with blood mist during the day, I'm afraid our Spirituality and bodies won't be able to handle it in the end, and recovery clearly can't keep up with the consumption. If we also have no results for several consecutive days and instead exhaust our Spirituality, what should we do if we encounter any unexpected situations?"
Saying that, the woman slightly narrowed her eyes, and a hint of danger was revealed in her dark red pupils.
"Don't forget, according to Tivian's intelligence, we are not the only ones who know about this place. The Royal Family and the vigilant faction within the Black Dog Bureau, or that mysterious Judge of Heaven, could all have learned about this place. Once they take action by taking advantage of our weakness, the consequences would be unimaginable... Bo Ade..."
The woman said slowly, with a hint of warning in her words. Listening to the woman's words, the Spiderfang Priest was startled, and then recalled the lightning that struck down from the sky that he witnessed in Tivian more than half a year ago. At first, he didn't know what kind of extraordinary power could cause such lightning, until a few months later, news of the Judge of Heaven reappearing and rising came from Adus in North Wu.
"Judge of Heaven... Why would an organization whose activity range should clearly be in North Wu suddenly interfere with Prit's affairs? Those undead of the First Dynasty aren't busy with internal strife, but instead have the leisure to meddle in the affairs of this Stone Country..."
The Spiderfang Priest named Bo Ade muttered as he spoke. Listening to Bo Ade's words, the woman continued to speak leisurely.
"Most of those thousands-year-old undead are lunatics whose brains have long gone bad, and it's not strange for them to do anything. The key now is not to figure out their motives, but to get the current matter done well, and find that moon bitch's temple from this damned lake, without any mishaps in between."
"According to you, we also deploy blood mist during the day. There are many boats and people on the lake during the day, which increases the difficulty of control. Not to mention, if we still can't find the entrance in a short time and our Spirituality is severely damaged, our control over the lake surface at night will decrease, but we will be taken advantage of by those hiding in the dark. According to Nightmare's intelligence, compared to that organization, it is much more likely that those people are from the vigilant faction within the Royal Family. If that group hides themselves and infiltrates with all their might, we won't be able to defend against them at all if we don't monitor the lake with blood mist..."
Staring at Bo Ade beside her, the woman spoke with a very serious expression. Listening to the woman's words, Bo Ade couldn't help but pause, then sighed slightly and spoke.
"You have a point, Gothsmore. It is indeed not advisable to waste Spirituality covering the blood mist during the day... However, this does not mean that we should completely give up on daytime exploration. We can still send a few people to go around the lake more. Perhaps we might find something."
"Suit yourself. Just send your own people. Anyway, I can't control you. Just don't think about touching anything on my side." Listening to Bo Ade's words, the one called Gothsmore waved her hand casually, and then spoke with a rather disdainful expression. Seeing the other party's attitude, Bo Ade couldn't help but frown.
"Gothsmore, the Eight-Pointed Nest sent the two of us here to carry out such an important task. We should cooperate fully. What's wrong with having your people put in more effort?" Bo Ade said in a deep voice to the woman beside him. Listening to Bo Ade's words, Gothsmore didn't appreciate it much.
"Cooperate fully? You seem to have misunderstood something. I'm not here to cooperate with you and be ordered around by you. My mission here is to back you up. To prevent you from messing things up again like you did at the beginning of the year, which caused the Eight-Pointed Nest a lot of trouble this year. Don't forget my identity. You are a priest, and I am a 'Witch' (Imperial Shaman). I have already given you a lot of face by cooperating with your actions at night. Are you actually trying to order me around now?"
With a slightly arrogant posture, Gothsmore slightly squinted her eyes, looking at Bo Ade with the corner of her eye in disdain. Hearing her companion's words, Bo Ade's hand holding the staff tightened slightly. After seemingly suppressing some surging emotions, he spoke.
"I admit your identity is noble, Gothsmore, but you also need to be aware that if this mission goes wrong, your identity won't exempt you from much punishment..."
"Go wrong? Heh... As long as I maintain my Spirituality and don't listen to your silly suggestions like deploying blood mist during the day, there will definitely be no problems. I said, my main responsibility for being here is to back up this entire operation. As long as I'm here, even if there are two or three Scarlet from those hidden vigilant factions, there's no need to fear...
"So, even if this operation has the possibility of going wrong, it will definitely not go wrong on my side. It can only be because you are too useless and ultimately cannot find a door, causing everything to fall into a stalemate... In that case, everything will be your responsibility in the end, after all, finding that moon bitch's temple is your task..."
With a hint of provocation in her tone, Gothsmore spoke to Bo Ade. In her words, she pointed out the difference in their responsibilities in the current mission. Hearing Gothsmore's words, Bo Ade fell silent. He stared at the tall woman before him with a solemn gaze, without saying another word, as if he couldn't find any reason to refute her.
"I'll go plan tonight's search first..."
After simply saying a word to Gothsmore, Bo Ade turned and transformed into a cloud of blood mist, dispersing into the air. In just a moment, he completely disappeared into the air.
Watching Bo Ade disappear, Gothsmore nodded in satisfaction, then scanned the vast lake surface before her, looking at the many small boats sailing on the lake, and the inverted sun and mountains.
"To actually think of looking for that moon bitch's secret in broad daylight, I really don't know what's wrong with that guy..."
After speaking, Gothsmore also transformed into a cloud of blood mist and dissipated into the air. The small hill by the lake returned to complete tranquility.
...
At this moment, on the wide surface of Dazzle Star Lake, among the pleasure boats and fishing boats, a small boat was slowly sailing on the water. On this seemingly ordinary pleasure boat, there was only a man wearing a trench coat and a short top hat sitting on it. He was Ed, Dorothy's Corpse Puppet.
Sitting on the grass in a forest near the lake shore, Dorothy was controlling her Corpse Puppets to explore various parts of Dazzle Star Lake, searching for traces of the so-called invisible door. She disguised her Corpse Puppets as tourists and anglers, paddling small boats and drifting forward on the wide lake surface.
Dorothy sat on the grass, her mind observing the situation of Dazzle Star Lake and its surroundings through the multiple perspectives provided by multiple Corpse Puppets.
According to Dorothy's previous calculations, the gate of the Mirror Moon Temple exists in the reflections of different moon phases on Dazzle Star Lake. Since Dazzle Star Lake at night is completely controlled by the Eight-Pointed Nest people, Dorothy could only choose the invisible moon phase that only appears during the day, the invisible door corresponding to the new moon, to possibly enter the Mirror Moon Temple.
Just a few days ago, the crescent moon in the night sky had completely disappeared, and the conjunction moment had arrived. Today was the new moon day, the only chance Dorothy had to find the invisible door in a month.
If Dorothy wanted to find the invisible door, she had to find the new moon projection on Dazzle Star Lake. However, since the new moon appears completely during the day, it is covered by intense sunlight and the reflection is impossible to see, so Dorothy could not use direct observation to find the location of the new moon reflection. Fortunately, in addition to seeing, Dorothy had other methods to find shadows, which was calculation.
Although Dorothy could not see where the new moon shadow was reflected in the lake, she could calculate it. By combining the positions of other moon phase shadows seen on Observation Lake Mountain before, and the position where the moon should be in the sky, Dorothy could calculate where the hidden new moon shadow should be in the lake? Moreover, this calculation process was not difficult, and Dorothy had already calculated the position of the new moon reflection and had Ed paddle the small boat closer to that place.
Not long after, the Corpse Puppet Ed, controlled by Dorothy, finally paddled the small boat to the fixed point and stopped there. She controlled Ed to look around at the lake scenery and the dazzling sunlight in the sky, and then had Ed start checking the situation in the water around. After looking around, she did not find any abnormal situation, and the water around Ed's boat was clear lake water.
Seeing this situation, Dorothy immediately controlled her fish Corpse Puppets scattered in the lake to swim towards the location of the new moon reflection. In a short while, they swam under the small boat Ed was in. Dorothy had the fish Corpse Puppets search the area underwater as well, but she did not find any strange points, which made Dorothy frown slightly.
'Nothing? Did I miscalculate the position, and the door is not here?'
Dorothy thought anxiously in her heart, and then she recalled when she tried to enter Qiwen Temple in Adis, she did not use puppets to enter the semi-boundary domain of the temple at that time.
"It seems... some things must be done in person..."
Thinking this, Dorothy murmured, and then she made up her mind to stand up from the grass and walk towards the lake.
After a while, Dorothy, pretending to be on a boat trip with her father, and a Corpse Puppet playing the role of her father, paddled a small boat to the projection point she had calculated. Here, Dorothy, holding a parasol, began to explore the lake surface around, searching for traces of the so-called "door" again. However, in her first attempt, she did not find anything unusual. Just as Dorothy was thinking about how to proceed with the search, she suddenly had a strange feeling.
Sitting on the slightly swaying small boat, Dorothy reached into her small bag and took out her magic box. After opening the magic box, Dorothy took out something from it, which was the trophy she had taken from Ku Chi in Moncarlo before, a broken piece of black jade!
At this moment, the piece of black jade in Dorothy's hand was emitting a faint silver light, and as if resonating with this black jade, the Shadow Barrier Ring on Dorothy's finger, left by her mother, was also emitting a similar faint light.
Seeing this scene, Dorothy suddenly remembered another part of the riddle prayer, which was that crossing the mirror door required a key.