A few people sat in the rock basement. The King of Nightmares refused a chair by himself and instead went over to squeeze onto the same seat with Andrela. While they were both expressionless, one could easily sense the intimacy between the two.
He realized that everyone was puzzled, so he reached his hand to his face in a massaging gesture and very soon, a thin piece of human skin mask was torn off his face, revealing a beautiful feminine face.
He had suddenly went from a moustached gentleman, to a stunningly beautiful flat chested young lady.
Andrela reached his arm over around her waist, the two of them pecked each other like there was no one else in the room.
"Alright, let’s get talking. I heard from Garen that you said you know him?"
The old woman looked at Garen upon hearing this, and squinted her eyes at him.
"The truth is, I do know him, Mr. Garen Lombard."
She slowly lifted up the coffee and took a sip.
"The reason I invited the three of you over, is because I have news about the Argent Mirror that I wish to inform you all about."
The trio was silent, awaiting for her to continue.
The old woman stopped for a moment, and introduced herself.
"I am Zhaoxing Qin. Just like you guessed, I am from the east. My father and I are telekinetic experts from the east.
As for telekinesis, it is the manipulation of reality with one’s mind, it deals with the fundamental form of matter. To be able to wield it and master it, one must be one in a million possessing talents beyond logical comprehension."
"I have heard before that superpowers around the world tried researching something like this. They wanted to activate some inert human potential or something," the King of Nightmares said softly. At this point her voice was clear and high pitched.
"That was a long time ago, all they got out of it is a bunch of failures," Zhaoxing shook her head,"just as you’ve seen, the Immortal Palace’s elders: Flamingo, Sylphalan and all, are all masters in telekinesis. They were famous even at a young age, but as the years and decades passed they started to disappear into the shadows and eventually formed the Immortal Palace Alliance in hopes of absorbing the elites of every generation. However, nobody knows what their true intents are."
"Famous since many years ago? How old is Sylphalan anyways?" Garen cut her short and asked.
"He came here with my father, when my father arrived he was already 45 years old," Zhaoxing didn’t answer his question directly.
Garen frowned.
"I need to know if you knew a man named Gregor, he used to run an antique shop. What’s his relationship with Sylphalan.?"
Zhaoxing wasn’t surprised at all, it seemed like she was expecting Garen to ask that.
"We will discuss that in private later. That is related to one’s privacy, we can talk about the Argent Mirror first."
She reached out her index finger and used it to draw a small circle in the air.
An unknown invisible energy seemed to emanate in the air. From the mat on her knees, a thin thread floated up and started stitching itself in the air.
In less than ten seconds, it had formed a perfect copy of the Argent Mirror.
Andrela was shocked and sat stunned, squinting in disbelief.
The King of Nightmares however was plain faced, obviously she had experienced supernatural phenomena like this before.
As for Garen, he was totally unfazed.
"This is the so called Argent Mirror, I’ve made a copy to ease explanation." Zhaoxing looked at the copy in the air and sighed,"the Argent Mirror is a relic from ancient times designed for sealing. It is not a treasure, and it is definitely not a container of some secret technique. Instead…"
She stopped for a second,"...it is a tool for sealing willpower."
The trio was now incredibly engrossed.
"In ancient times, there were many telekinesis exper
ts. Some were good, some were bad. The Argent Mirror was made to seal off evil intent and the will of evil thoughts," Zhaoxing explained.
"What would happen if it is unsealed?" Garen asked.
"The evil intent and willpower will contaminate all living organisms within a one mile radius. The kind of thoughts and willpower stored within here can turn a normal man into a ruthless dictator, wielding absolute power but also insatiable greed for power and blood. A man contaminated by the Argent Mirror’s unsealed intent can only be killed, and not defeated," Zhaoxing sighed again."the evil intent within is ranked according to different levels, the highest of which we’ve named the Will of the Origin. Aside from that particular one, there are also the evil intents of many powerful telekinetic wielders from the past. Their greed, lust, and ruthlessness, even their perverted interests are stored inside. Should it be unsealed, the potential for harm is exponential!"
"We can’t just trust what you say at face value. For what it’s worth, the Immortal Palace really wants this mirror. I refuse to believe that they’re unaware of its secrets, in fact they might be after exactly that" Andrela shook his head.
Zhaoxing lightly poked the copy in the air, and the mirror suddenly broke into many pieces, revealing a small ball in its heart.
"The Immortal Palace Alliance is a bunch of madmen. They’re hell bent on pursuing the path of the Blood Warriors. In pursuit of immortality, they’ve spent billions of dollars and years on research. However the Blood Warriors have all disappeared in the last era. In the last era, the Blood Warriors were defeated by other practitioners, and the battle of which they lost were recorded as myths and legends in our culture."
Zhaoxing pointed at the small ball floating mid air and said,"but I’ve digressed. Now back to this ball, this is the heart of the Argent Mirror. It contains an extraordinary amount of contamination potential. If it were completely unsealed, it will affect the thoughts of organisms far and wide. The Immortal Palace plans to allow one man to control and absorb this thing."
"What’s the benefit in doing so?" Garen looked at Zhaoxing.
"The evil intent and memories of hundreds of incredibly power people are stored inside. If the person who absorbs it is able to put up with the immense stress, he will receive the experience of some of the greatest fighters of our time. He would even know how they trained, what they trained, where they kept their money, with all that he who absorbs it will have access to an unspeakable amount of power and influence. However, whoever tries to do so will surely lose their mind and also according to legends, he would have also lose a great amount of his potential and life. On a good day he will live on with just schizophrenia, on a severe hit something called a Time Scar could even appear on the user’s body. The Time Scar will show the remainder of one’s life, and the amount will definitely be a staggeringly low amount." Zhaoxing explained seriously.
"From what we know, Sylphalan already absorbed one of the Argent Mirrors about half a year ago."
"As long as one absorbs it, one will get schizophrenia?" the King of Nightmares asked curiously.
"This is definite. Whoever uses the Argent Mirror, regardless of their personal willpower, or how powerful their base is, they will all suffer from permanent brain damage and thus schizophrenia. Some even turn into a different person altogether, like their own personality’s been completely drowned by the Argent Mirror." Zhaoxing replied definitively.
"That’s a pity, I was going to ask you to let me try it," the King of Nightmares was visibly disappointed,"but screw it, I’d rather not turn into a schizo."
"Sadly, only masters in telekinesis are able to absorb the Argent Mirror. Perhaps the three of you might possess some hidden talent that I could help activate?" Zhaoxing shook her head.
She looked at the trio sitting before her.
"To be honest, I asked you three to come here in hopes of convincing you not to unseal the Argent Mirror."
"We took the mirror with the sole purpose of discovering the ancient secret technique, and now you want us to give it up? Do you actually think that’s possible?" Andrela smiled.
"I know this might be asking too much, but this is relative to the lives of hundreds of thousands of people, maybe even millions across the planet. If just a thousand people are contaminated by the fact that you unsealed that mirror, their ill intent paired with the experience of the evil within, they will definitely take over the whole planet."
"This means if we want to unseal it we should do in a place where there is nobody?" Garen frowned.
"It’s useless, without an organism as a bearer…" Zhaoxing didn’t even finish before Garen cut her off.
"What if I found a butchery then?"
"Oh..a living organism which is too low levelled will just expand and die, their pre-death struggles will just further enhance the evil intents inside the Argent Mirror. If it were so easy, I would’ve gotten rid of it long ago." Zhaoxing replied.
"It sure is a fuss," Garen nodded,"what if we took used prisoners then? Criminals on the verge of their death, instead of executing them we will just expose them to the Argent Mirror’s ill intent and then kill them after."
"If that’s the case, you will need to kill way too many people…" Zhaoxing squinted.
"But there is a chance of success right?" Garen squinted back at her and sat up straight,"this sounds like a potential plan. So how many criminals will we need?"
"That’ll depend on how powerful the Will of the Origin in this mirror is," Zhaoxing did some conservative calculations and was suddenly stunned,"...at least ten thousand people…"
Julie who stood at the side turned pale, visibly shocked as well.
"Let me settle it," the King of Nightmares snapped her finger,"I’ll make up some cover story about some chemical fallout. It will be easy. But of course this is all taking into account that what you’ve told us so far is the truth."
Her words sent shivers down every body’s spine. The way she held so little regard for human life made it no wonder why governments around the world treated them like terrorists.
"I have no reason to lie to you. Plus, you’re the ones who came up with this plan," Zhaoxing shook her head.
"Let’s set this aside for now. The Argent Mirror stays with us, as long as we don’t unseal it we will be fine," Garen rose his hand to stop this topic,"that’s it for the mirror, we will continue after we have validated your words. For now, we need to talk about my personal issues."