Chapter 1614: There Are Sprites Here Too!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
After hearing Hao Ren’s murmur, Nangong Wuyue who was healing Rollie’s bruised arm was shocked. “Aside from us? In this godforsaken den of monsters?”
“That monster tried to sound the alarm but an energy field had disrupted it.” Hao Ren nodded. “Our senses may get muddled, but the MDT’s sensors and storage system won’t, it had determined that the energy was different from the tainted monsters.”
“Wait up, silence…” Nangong Sanba gestured for everyone to pipe down as he looked around watchfully. “I can feel it… just when we entered this place… there’s something around us!”
This unnatural feeling was very pronounced that even Rollie sensed it. The catgirl got on all fours and held her hip high. Her tail stood as straight as a pole while her fur bristled. “Meeeeoooowwww!”
Just right after they had killed the brain monster, and had escaped from the danger of being discovered, now they found themselves being watched by an unknown being. Everyone was extremely twitchy now, but Vivian was the first and the quickest to calm down as she said with a low voice while a lightning orb formed in her palm, “Come out, we can sense you already. If you insist on such unclear intentions, then we can only treat you as a hostile.”
A few seconds after Vivian spoke, the tunnel was still silent, as Lily was losing her patience and was just about to open her mouth, a little ball of lightning suddenly appeared in the air around the team.
The ball of lightning was blue and white in color, with a tinge of black and red, it bounced twice in the air as it appeared and quickly formed into a tiny humanoid form.
It was a sprite clad in a short blue skirt with very big eyes.
Hao Ren and the sprite were both lost for words.
“It’s… a sprite!” The first to break the silence was Lily after all, and the werehusky immediately bounced up as she pointed in shock at the glowing light. “Why are there sprites here! Where did she come from!”
The little sprite hissed back, “This is Amantir! The sprites live in Amantir! Of course, there will be sprites on Amantir!”
The sprites of Amantir?! They actually exist here, and had actually survived until today?!
Hao Ren was overwhelmed by the sudden revelation and a series of questions and guesses started appearing in his mind, and at the same time, he also noticed some special features on the sprite before him. While she may look like the sprites on Naqdal or the core planet, there was a particularly glaring difference.
There was an ahoge on the tiny sprite’s head and that tuft of hair had a very obvious black-red tint to it, much like the tainted lands of the corrupted monsters.
And if Hao Ren was not wrong, this black-red tint is a sign of the Mad Lord’s taint, and that means.. that the sprite before him is actually corrupted?
But after seeing the tiny being glaring back at Lily with her arms forked against her waist, angry but yet too scared to hit back, Hao Ren felt that if the Mad Lord minions included these sprites, their entire combat prowess average would’ve been dragged through the mud…
“Alright, alright, calm down you two,” Vivian too had noticed the black-red ahoge on the little sprite’s head, but she did not seem to react to it, and got in between the tiny tot and Lily, “A sprite.. right? Are you the survivors of Amantir? And did you help us just now?”
“What else can I be if I’m not a sprite?” The little one declared proudly, “You are all dum-dums, just a few of you and you actually dare to run about here. If I didn’t help you’d been attacked by maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaany (she purposely dragged it out) monsters and die! Hurry up and thank me!”
“So that was you?” Hao Ren was surprised, and his initial caution against that black-red ahoge was reduced, “So that means you are against the tainted army?”
“The sprites will of course fight against those monsters!” The tiny one said with her arms on her waist again, her cowlick sprung up as if provoked. “If not for this sprite, you would’ve been discovered a long time ago!”
Hao Ren and Vivian exchanged glances before the latter turned towards the tiny sprite, “How many sprites are there? There’re still surviving sprite sanctuaries on Amantir?”
The little sprite pondered for a bit, “This sprite still has many friends, our sanctuary… Wait up, why must I tell you these? You haven’t told me who you are! What if you are the baddies?”
This was not the first time Hao Ren encountered once of them and had by now gotten a grasp on how their thought process work and simply said, “Will a baddie fight tooth and nail against the monsters? We have been wreaking havoc all the way here so we must be the good guys.”
The little one nodded immediately, “Oh, you’re right. Those who fight the monsters must be good guys…”
“You said that there are many more of you in this place?” Vivian continued her question. “How did you all survived?”
“Tell me who you are first,” The tiny one was surprisingly stubborn, and her memory seemed to be far better than her kind as she actually remembered the earlier topic, “Why did you guys come here? This sprite doesn’t remember your kind existing around here.”
The surviving sprite clearly did not know what went on the world outside, so mentioning the droid swarms or their position as observers would be pointless, so Hao Ren could only drag Salaman’s name out, “We are allies of the Guardian Army’s commander Salaman, and have infiltrated this planet with a mission.”
“Salaman? That biggie?” the sprite yelped in surprise, “He’s alive? Still defending the core?”
“You thought the core had already fallen?” Hao Ren was befuddled for a moment before turning on the communicator, and after confirming the signal was secure he activated the connection with Salaman, “If you don’t believe me, you can speak to him directly,”
The tiny sprite immediately looked at the communicator anxiously. The image on the screen was extremely blurry and even the voice channel suffered intermittent distortion: As to keep their cover on Amantir, the enemy’s base camp, all communication channels were highly encrypted and processed, plus the distortion all across Amantir, trying to establish connection was already difficult in itself, much less a quality one.
But from the blurry image they could still make out Salaman’s distinct bearded look, and the old giant’s voice rang after a two-second delay, “Observer, Lady of the Throne, is everything alright? Why the sudden communication?”
As per their agreement security protocols, they would keep all contact at a minimal to avoid being detected, and to establish contact means there’s a unique situation that demands it, hence Salaman’s question.
“Salaman? Biggieeee?!” the little sprite exclaimed in shock as she saw the commander of the Guardians on the screen. “You’re alive! It’s really you!”
“This…” The Guardian commander too did not expect to see the tiny one on the communicator screen and was dumbfounded himself. “A sprite?! Where are you at? Why are there sprites?!”
“We are in an underground facility beneath the command temple complex, we are close to Amantir’s crystal storage hub.” Hao Ren briefly explained his current situation. “… Then this tiny one appeared, she said that there are more sprites around.”
“The sprites of Amantir actually survived…” The commander’s voice sounded like he was amazed. “Unbelievable… how did you lot survive? And it seems you are not tainted by the powers of the Mad Lord? Did those monsters not attack the crystal prism array in the fortress?”
“We ran away much earlier.” The sprite did a somersault in mid-air, “Those monsters dug out the crystals as fuel, and many sprites did not manage to escape in time, but the remaining ones had sense danger and had cut our connection to the crystal before moving deeper. The goddess had used the crystals as the planet’s core when she made this planet, while they are unrefined and not that powerful, but we can still go into them!”
Salaman was amazed, “You can do that? Hiding in the planet’s core? And those monsters did not pursue you?”
“No, because we are just too weak, they assumed the sprites to be wiped out when they tore the crystals down!” the tiny sprite said with a proud grin (although there was nothing to be proud of), “Even when we pop out now, those monsters won’t pay us much attention…”
Hao Ren looked on, slightly speechless at the seemingly all-over-the-place sprite before finding an opportunity to pull the MDT to a side and whispered at Salaman, “Did you notice that ahoge on her head?”
“Ahoge?”
“…That cowlick on her head. The sprite seemed to have a trace of the Mad Lord’s taint, but…”
“Her mind is perfectly normal, and she is even fighting against the minions of the Mad Lord.” Salaman continued where Hao Ren left off, “You even said it yourself, that sprite actually saved you.”
“Will such a thing actually happen? Being tainted by the powers of the Mad Lord but not being affected at all, with just a hair dye for the trouble?”
“Never seen that before but for the sprites, anything is possible.” Salaman said, slightly whimsically, “Mother had designed many… ‘features’ beyond our comprehension when she created them. I believe that one of the many features was for the fight against the Mad Lord, as once the Creation’s Engine has been activated she can wipe out all of the taints of madness, but before that, she needs to ensure that the Weaves of Destiny can survive, and the sprites are one of their processing units, so they are equipped with the ability to survive and retain their sanity even under the influence of the Mad Lord.”
Hao Ren nodded at Salaman’s assessment before continuing, “Then our plans must be amended. Amantir has a large amount of surviving sprites, so I guess we have an additional mission now.”
“… You plan to move the entire core away?” Salaman looked at Hao Ren, astounded, “Remember, those surviving sprites are inhabiting the core of Amantir!”
“I don’t necessarily need to pull that stunt,” Hao Ren pondered, “I’ll need to speak with the sprite, there gotta be another way.”