“Key, huh…”
Ling Xiaoyou pinched her smooth little chin, mumbling thoughtfully.
“Could the key be hidden in the Demon Bishop’s office?”
“It’s not a key in the literal sense.”
Bai Shuanglian immediately understood that Ling Xiaoyou had misunderstood and explained,
“It’s something that can unlock the protection—could be a spell, a person, or anything else.”
“Ah, this…”
Ling Xiaoyou froze for a moment, then spoke with frustration.
“That makes the search range way too wide, doesn’t it?”
“And if this ‘key’ is the Demon Bishop himself, and he’s already been wiped out, doesn’t that mean we don’t have the key?”
“That’s possible.”
Bai Shuanglian thought for a moment but still tried to comfort Ling Xiaoyou.
“But it’s also possible the ‘key’ isn’t the Demon Bishop, but something else.”
“In any case, let’s try using other things first.”
“Mm… Can this work?”
Ling Xiaoyou pondered, then took out a round, lustrous… blood-red eye from her clothes pocket.
Bai Shuanglian: “?”
Bai Shuanglian looked at Ling Xiaoyou in confusion, then at her still-beautiful and lively crimson eyes, curious—weren’t her eyes still in their sockets?
Then where did this one come from?
“It’s not my eye, it’s from that Deity Statue.”
Ling Xiaoyou noticed Bai Shuanglian’s confusion, pointed to the half-collapsed Deity Statue nearby, and said,
“I thought this eye looked nice, so I pried it off to keep as a collectible.”
“Mm, this… it really is quite pretty.”
Bai Shuanglian was silent for a moment, then nodded as if agreeing with Ling Xiaoyou.
She accepted the eye from Ling Xiaoyou and tried it, but soon shook her head.
“This isn’t the key, either.”
“Mm, so the statue’s eye isn’t the key. To think that guy was a bishop but didn’t use the god’s eye of faith as a key.”
Ling Xiaoyou muttered, then put the eye back into her Spatial Artifact.
Bai Shuanglian ignored the oddity in that statement, recalled for a moment, then spoke.
“I remember I cut off the demon’s head several times before. Maybe we can try that…”
“You want the Demon Bishop’s head? I have it.”
Su Lihua didn’t know when she’d started listening in from the side, but upon hearing Bai Shuanglian needed the bishop’s head, she eagerly took out several heads from her Space Ring and handed them over.
Bai Shuanglian: “?”
She fell silent again, staring at the demon heads Su Lihua had brought out so enthusiastically, and for a moment couldn’t even process what was going on.
Maybe realizing how outrageous her action was, Su Lihua quickly explained,
“I didn’t bring these heads back because I thought they looked nice! I’m not like Ling Xiaoyou!”
“Hah? What’s wrong with bringing back a nice-looking eye!”
Upon hearing this, Ling Xiaoyou puffed her cheeks in protest.
“This thing isn’t even a real eye, it’s a part of a statue transformed by the Evil God’s aura!”
“So strictly speaking, I only took a stone sculpture!”
“And your act of bringing heads is even crazier than mine!”
Ling Xiaoyou pointed at the pile of heads, retorting.
“I have my reasons!”
Su Lihua also put her hands on her hips in defiance.
“Our family has a tradition of keeping the heads of defeated strong enemies as trophies!”
“So that’s why I brought these heads!”
“That’s not much better! What a barbaric tradition! And it’s not like you defeated the demon alone!”
“I don’t care, anyway, these heads are my trophies!”
Watching the two start bickering again, Bai Shuanglian sighed lightly, picked up a head, and tried to unlock it—
As expected, it didn’t work.
“Still useless?”
Ling Xiaoyou saw Bai Shuanglian return the head and understood immediately.
She asked.
“Mm, this isn’t the ‘key’ either.”
Bai Shuanglian nodded, deep in thought again.
Then, as if remembering something, she turned to the other two and asked,
“By the way, did either of you take the Demon Bishop’s book?”
“Book?”
Ling Xiaoyou froze, then recalled the blood-colored book the Demon Bishop had used as a weapon before, shaking her head.
“I didn’t take it.”
“What about you, Su Lihua?”
Ling Xiaoyou looked at Su Lihua and asked.
“Heh, um…”
Su Lihua scratched her head awkwardly, then pulled the book out of her Space Ring.
She hurriedly explained,
“I really wasn’t planning to keep it for myself! I just hadn’t had time to tell you guys yet.”
Ling Xiaoyou gave her a suspicious look, making Su Lihua feel a bit guilty.
“Forget it, I don’t feel like arguing right now.”
Ling Xiaoyou handed the blood-colored book to Bai Shuanglian, who took it, nodded to Ling Xiaoyou, and tried again.
Bai Shuanglian held the blood-colored book.
Now that the Demon Bishop was dead, the book seemed to have reverted to its original size.
She gently touched the book to the base of the Deity Statue.
A sensation of touching the Lock surfaced.
Unlike before, this time she wasn’t just staring at the Lock without a key—she could clearly feel that what she held in her hand was the Key that could open it.
Bai Shuanglian focused her mind, using the ‘Key’ to unlock the Lock.
Immediately, Ling Xiaoyou, who had been watching expectantly, seemed to sense something and looked toward the side of the Deity Statue.
Su Lihua was still confused about what Ling Xiaoyou was looking at, but soon, her eyes widened as she saw a pitch-black, illusory Portal appear beside the statue.
“So the ‘Key’ was the book the Demon Bishop carried all along.”
Ling Xiaoyou nodded her little head in a ‘just as I thought’ manner, then walked over to Bai Shuanglian, took her hand, and said,
“Let’s go, Bai Shuanglian. Let’s go inside together!”
“Mm.”
Bai Shuanglian nodded and entered the Secret Compartment together with Ling Xiaoyou.
“Hey! Wait for me!”
Su Lihua was still surprised that the book was actually the ‘Key’, but when she came to, she saw the two had already entered the Secret Compartment.
She called out and hurried after them.
As all three girls entered the Secret Compartment, the Ruins fell silent once again.
After a moment, a Mist Figure appeared, gazing at the surrounding Ruins with a sigh.
“Can’t people be a little kinder to the environment during a fight? Cleaning up afterward is such a pain.”
“But it did make things a lot easier for us, so we should be grateful to them.”
The Mist Figure faded like smoke, vanishing as if nothing had ever happened.
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