join the Church of MissRaven and become a Sequence 9: Reader p atreon.com/KeyofStars for more chapters
Again, it was late at night, and Hobert picked up Audrey as promised, and they arrived at the villa in the suburbs of Backlund.
However, this time the dining table was filled with many delicacies, many of which Audrey had never seen before.
Audrey was still wearing the long dress that looked rather ordinary but was made exceptionally beautiful by her perfect figure. She smiled and said, "Is this a Cygnus waffle? I've only seen it in magazines."
The small country of Cygnus in the Northern Continent has not yet established diplomatic relations with the Kingdom of Loen, so there is almost no trade between the two sides, and Cygnus's cuisine has basically never appeared in Backlund.
She picked up a string of small, ball-like foods again: "What is this?"
"Purple sweet potato balls," Hobert said with a smile. "A specialty of the Rorsted Archipelago, well, it's quite niche."
Audrey glanced at the other delicacies: "These don't seem to be the kind of foods you can buy at the night market."
"Indeed," Hobert said with a smile. "I opened a food street in South Colson, and these were brought from there. Try them, they are very unique."
Audrey took a small bite of the purple sweet potato ball, which was sweet and had a hint of purple sweet potato fragrance. She nodded repeatedly: "It's really good!"
She ate while smiling sweetly: "I haven't even seen some of these before."
Hobert explained the delicacies on the table, started a fire for grilling, and poured beer. The two ate and chatted.
Audrey asked curiously: "Hobert, why did you publicize the manufacturing process of light bulbs and wires? And why have you been rejecting all invitations recently? I heard you haven't been going to work lately?"
"I've been busy with other things recently, and of course, I must admit that it's mostly because I don't want to see those idiots," Hobert said with a smile. "As for why I made those processes public, of course, it's to use other people's money to expand the production capacity of electric lights."
Audrey didn't understand: "Are you going to borrow money from others? I heard my father say that 'Earl's Light' is making very considerable profits!"
"It's a business strategy, it doesn't mean borrowing money," Hobert explained.
Audrey was very interested in this: "My father said you must have your own ideas!"
"Your father is a visionary nobleman," Hobert said with a smile. "Let's make an assumption, everyone knows that light bulbs and wires are profitable. After I publicize the process, there will definitely be many capitalists, um, or rather, wealthy people who want to produce these two products, right?"
Audrey was stunned. It was the first time she had heard the term "capitalist."
Hobert: "At this time, they will find that there are no production lines for electric lights or wires on the market at all. If they want to invest in production, they will find that they need to purchase equipment from me.
"This is creating the first part of the revenue for 'Earl's Light'."
Hobert took a sip of beer and continued: "After they start production, they will find that I have not publicized the key battery technology.
"So, do they need to buy batteries from me to form a complete set of usable products?
"Even if they have channels to obtain the battery technology, they will find that the quality of the batteries they produce is far inferior to the quality of 'Earl's Light' batteries because we have the latest hard rubber technology.
"In the near future, the battery casing will also be replaced with hard plastic.
"Even if they develop hard rubber technology themselves... after all, this technology only requires an investment of a few thousand or tens of thousands of pounds, and they should be able to master it.
"But at this time, they will find that they also need to buy electricity from me to make the lights turn on."
Audrey was a little shocked: "Are lawyers so good at doing business?"
This industry cannot escape Hobert's control at all!
Hobert laughed heartily: "Not every lawyer is so good at doing business."
Then he asked: "When are you likely to advance to Sequence 6?"
At a previous ball, Audrey had mentioned that her potion was almost digested, and she was preparing to advance in the near future.
Audrey was about to answer, but Hobert suddenly held out his hand, making a gesture not to speak.
He looked solemnly in the direction of the village, and suddenly a white figure appeared out of thin air over there.
Audrey was startled, and Hobert, as if facing a formidable enemy, "distorted" the distance and stood in front of Audrey.
Then the space beside him and Audrey became illusory, but before they could enter the spirit world, they heard a solemn female voice from over there: "Establishing a connection with the spirit world is prohibited here."
The illusory space immediately shrank and soon disappeared.
Hobert did not rush to escape in other ways, but asked with a smile: "Does Your Excellency have any business?"
As soon as the other party spoke, Hobert recognized who she was.
When the other party got closer, it was indeed the elegant woman wearing a veil, with thin gauze hanging down, making it impossible to see her face clearly.
During the Backlund Great Smog incident, it was she and the "Frenzied Mage" who died in the Foggy Town who stopped Hobert from taking down the "Demoness of Despair" who was "creating poison."
At the same time, Hobert also knew that this was a Sequence 3 "Chaos Hunter."
What Hobert didn't know was that after he "defected" and returned to Backlund to go on a killing spree, catching the Tamara family's forces in Backlund off guard, she had also appeared on the battlefield.
The other party smiled: "Don't you know what I'm looking for you for?"
Hobert answered unhurriedly: "I don't know."
The other party came to the gate of the courtyard and glanced at the delicacies on the table: "What a sumptuous midnight snack, are nobles so extravagant?"
As she spoke, she sat in Audrey's original seat, picked up a piece of grilled meat, lifted her veil and tasted it: "The taste is good."
Hobert gave Audrey a look, telling her to stay as far away from the dining table as possible.
Audrey roughly interpreted the implicit hostility of the woman in front of her, so she took a few steps back according to Hobert's eyes.
Hobert stepped forward and sat opposite the "Chaos Hunter": "Speak, do you want money or power? If you just want to come for a midnight snack, then please help yourself, and we are willing to make friends with you."
The "Chaos Hunter" smiled: "You are quite calm!"
She said: "Let me introduce myself, Orseya Tamara."
Hobert nodded: "I've heard of this family."
"Just heard of it?" Orseya stared at Hobert: "My student died in your hands, and the Tamara family's power in Backlund was also severely damaged by you, right?"
At this time, Hobert was still very calm on the surface: "Finish this glass of wine and continue to look for your enemies. You have the wrong target."
Orseya took out a wooden stick, which was the "Order Wood" that had been used once. When Hobert was Sequence 8, he encountered "Vice Admiral Hurricane" Qilangos, whose grave was now covered with grass, in the East Borough. He had used a piece of "Order Wood."
At that time, he didn't have time to recover it because he left in a hurry. Later, when he went back to look for it, he couldn't find it. He didn't expect that it was taken away by Orseya.
Although this wooden stick no longer had the "Power of Order", Orseya could still feel that it was very special. The council members of the family attached more importance to this wooden stick after checking it than she had imagined.
The council entrusted her to fully investigate the owner of this wooden stick, so she had been in Backlund for most of the year.
At the scene where the family's power in Backlund was severely damaged, she also found that the power contained in the wooden stick in her hand seemed to have appeared there.
So at that time, she had already determined that finding the owner of this wooden stick was like finding the murderer who attacked the family members.
Orseya smiled: "According to my observation, the material of your cane is the same as it, right!"
Hobert picked up the cane beside the table: "It's handed down from my ancestors, and I have a lot more at home. If you want it, I'll give you a bundle."
Orseya said again: "I used mystical items to divine just now, and I can't divine any information about you. The murderer who killed my student and severely damaged the power of Backlund is the same as this divination result."
Hobert took out a "Crystal of Order": "It's also handed down from my ancestors!"
"Haha!" Orseya didn't expect Hobert to deny everything so cleanly: "Then I have to start 'interrogating' you."
What she meant was to use Beyonder abilities to create pain to force a confession.
Hobert looked at the thin gauze hanging down from the other party: "Are you so sure it's me?"
He knew that he couldn't resist the "Mental Whip" at the Sequence 3 level, and the other party had corresponding Beyonder abilities to distinguish whether he was lying.
"I wasn't very sure at first," Orseya said: "But seeing you so calm, I can be completely sure of my guess."
Hobert asked again: "Then how did you find me?"
"When I passed by here before, my spirituality felt a familiar smell," Orseya said: "And I don't have any acquaintances in Backlund, so I often come over to take a look, and I happened to meet you today."
"Then why don't you just kill me?" Hobert asked finally: "As far as I know, you should also need the Beyonder characteristics of the 'Lawyer' pathway, right?"
"I want to ask you a few questions, because I'm afraid that I won't be able to communicate with you after killing you," Orseya replied in a flat tone.
Audrey on the side was very worried. According to the other party's meaning, she was here to seek revenge on Hobert, and Hobert was obviously not a match for this Orseya.
But Audrey also knew that she couldn't help at all, so she felt a little anxious.
Hobert seemed to weigh it for a while before saying: "Okay, I can answer your questions, but you have to let my companion leave."
Orseya glanced at Audrey: "What a beautiful little girl, if I were a man, I would definitely be very willing to give her the chance to live!"
Then she said solemnly: "Okay, little girl, you can go."
Audrey looked at Hobert, and immediately interpreted from the other party's eyes and expression that her staying here would be a burden.
Hobert said: "Miss Justice, go quickly."
Audrey immediately understood what Hobert meant and quickly left the yard.
Orseya was a little strange: "She's called Justice?"
"That's her pen name," Hobert said with a smile. "We are pen pals."
Orseya sneered: "Nobles really know how to play."
She said: "Okay, let's start. Why did you kill the members of the Tamara family!"
Orseya warned: "I will notice if you lie next."
Hobert said: "Because I need their Beyonder characteristics."
After being with Audrey for a long time, Hobert has developed very good lying skills. What he said was the truth, but he didn't tell all the truth.
So the meaning conveyed to Orseya was simply for Beyonder characteristics, or simply for killing for pounds.
Orseya asked again: "Then why did you kill my student?"
"May I ask, does your student have a pair of big ears?" Because of the other party's strange appearance, Hobert was very impressed with this Tamara family member.
"Yes!"
Hobert said: "He offered a reward to assassinate me, and I chased after him and killed him."
This is also the truth.
Orseya was slightly stunned, this answer was different from what she had imagined.
Then she asked again: "Where did the wood for your cane come from?"
"It was given by a great existence."
"Which one?"
"I can't say, I will die if I say it. If you communicate with my spirit body in this regard, you will definitely lose control."
"You are lying."
"That's right," Hobert said with a smile: "Because I don't know how miserably you can die."
Orseya realized that it might be dangerous to continue asking.
And the answer given by Hobert was very different from what Orseya had imagined. There was no conspiracy between organizations, no tricks of secret organizations, only the killing that occurred because of the competition for Beyonder characteristics and because of coincidence.
So she stood up and said: "Are you ready?"
Hobert also stood up: "You don't think I will just be captured like this, do you?"
Orseya "hehe" smiled: "Futile resistance."
Then she smiled: "Ah ha, look who's back, isn't this the little girl who just left? Little girl, are you lost?"
It was Audrey who came to the gate of the yard. She was a little out of breath: "The surrounding, the surrounding roads are repeating. I always run for a distance, and then inexplicably return to the starting point."
Hobert seemed to realize belatedly: "You never intended to let any of us go?"
"Of course not," Orseya said seriously.
Hobert smiled: "You shouldn't have let her leave here!"
Orseya was slightly stunned and looked at the sky, as if realizing something.
Crack~
A lightning bolt struck Orseya, and she jumped away suddenly.
Crack crack~
The lightning that even the saints were afraid of fell one by one.
Orseya had no time to care about Hobert and tried her best to avoid the lightning strikes.
These lightning bolts were of course the masterpiece of "The Fool". When Audrey left just now, Hobert knew that the other party could not let Audrey go, so he called her "Miss Justice" and asked her to be sure to ask "The Fool" for help if she had the opportunity.
Hobert took this opportunity to come close to Audrey by "distorting" space, picked up Audrey, whose hair was standing on end because of the lightning, and left by "distorting", preparing to run for a distance before trying to leave by "traveling".
But soon Hobert found that he had only left the yard by three or four meters after using "distorting" three times.
After a moment's thought, he understood. Having reached Sequence 3 of the "Arbiter" pathway, she could now "arbitrate" natural rules within a certain range.
The reason this Sequence was called "Chaos Hunter" was probably because it indicated the ability to achieve an effect similar to "chaos" by "arbitrating" normal natural laws.
For example, if he "arbitrated" a distance of ten meters to be "invalid," then if Hobert ran ten meters, it would be as if he hadn't run at all.
So, Hobert stopped using "Distortion" and simply used "Disorder" continuously, plunging the surrounding space into "chaos," while also running as hard as he could, and sure enough, he quickly left the villa's yard.
This was equivalent to Orseya constantly "arbitrating" the surrounding natural laws, saying: that ten-meter distance is "invalid."
Now, Hobert was making the surrounding space chaotic, which was like confusing the surrounding natural laws: ten meters? How long is ten meters? This long, or that long?
"Chaos Hunter" Orseya, while dodging the lightning, said, "Running is prohibited here!"
Hobert felt as if his legs were shackled, and he had to use all his strength to take a step, making him run slower than a snail.
He took a deep breath, put his feet together, and jumped forward suddenly. Without any obstacles, he jumped seven or eight meters at once. Jumping forward like this was not slower than running at full speed.
Audrey, in his arms, held onto Hobert's clothes tightly and smiled: It's much more exciting than riding a horse!
Orseya couldn't escape the lightning forest and could only continue, "Big jumps are prohibited here!"
Immediately, Hobert's legs felt as if they were wrapped in iron chains, and at the end of the chains was a large iron ball. As soon as his feet left the ground, they were pulled back.
He was stunned for about half a second, then immediately put Audrey on his back, lay down, and crawled forward quickly. His speed was even a little faster than running.
Audrey suddenly began to doubt herself: Am I in A Beyonder battle right now? Why do I feel like I'm participating in a circus performance?
This operation left Orseya somewhat dumbfounded: It's still not "prohibited"?
Then, while dodging the lightning, she said again, "Crawling is prohibited here!"
So Hobert started doing frog jumps with Audrey on his back.
"Frog jumps are prohibited here!"
So Hobert sat cross-legged upside down, letting Audrey sit on his legs, and he used his arms to escape upside down.
"This place prohibits..." Orseya discovered that Hobert had almost run out of her prohibited range.
Seeing that Hobert hadn't noticed and was still running upside down, she quickly chanted:
"The symbol of chaos,
"The embodiment of entropy,
The source of turmoil and strife,
"The terminator of all laws!
Your faithful servant requests your help, requests to capture the man the council is looking for!"
…
Hobert ran upside down for a while. Not hearing the other party continue to "prohibit," he ran a few steps backward and, sure enough, he could run normally now.
He picked up Audrey again, but as soon as he ran a few steps, his spirituality sensed extreme danger.
A tall figure seemed to appear in front of him, but he couldn't see what it looked like, or even whether it was male or female, as if a force "distorted" his vision.
Then came immense pressure, as if it was suffocating Hobert and Audrey.
Hobert desperately spat out an ancient Hermes syllable: "Messenger!"
A heavy, classical coffin floated out of the void and stood in front of Hobert and Audrey.
The two of them immediately breathed heavily, like drowning people rescued from the water.
The coffin lid of the Messenger, Beverly, slid open, and she was slightly stunned when she saw the person in front of her: "Pedi? You've advanced?"
The angel blocking Hobert was none other than Pedi Tamara, who had caused the Tamara family civil war.
Hobert had heard of this "Duke of Entropy" from the Tamara family's undead in "1-107."
Beverly, who wasn't in good shape, didn't travel much in the real world before becoming Hobert's Messenger, and didn't know that Pedi had advanced to "Duke of Entropy" more than a thousand years ago.
Pedi was also stunned: "Your Highness, you, no, you're resurrected?"
The Tamara family used to be great nobles of the Tudor Empire, and the two of them had known each other for a long time.
Hobert certainly didn't have time to listen to them reminisce, and immediately used "Travel" to leave.
In the instant he entered the spirit world, he decided to find a relatively desolate place in the north to take refuge.
He didn't know if that angel named Pedi had a way to catch up. If he went to Longtail Island or South Colson, and a conflict occurred with the other party, his territory would suffer considerable losses.
If he returned to Backlund and Pedi followed, it would attract the attention of the royal family's angels, and Pedi would definitely be driven away soon, but that wouldn't be in Hobert's interest.
He planned to wait in the wilderness in the "Nation of Disorder." If the other party came after him, he would immediately have the "Hundred-Eyed Devil Monarch" and the "Holy Infant King" gang up on Him. At worst, he would ask the Messenger for help, plus the "Creator," to directly cripple this guy!
After all, he had seen Hobert's true face. This was equivalent to the Tamara family knowing that Hobert had killed many of their members, and that Hobert had the "Order Wood" in his hands.
Then there was no need to be soft. It would be best to cripple the other party's high-end combat power right from the start, making them unable to take care of themselves.
Killing them was temporarily too much to hope for, after all, that was an angel!
Just now, Hobert was short two or three seconds. If he had that time, he could enter the "Nation of Disorder" and use some of the "Creator's" abilities to counterattack.
One was that he lacked time, and the other was that he was afraid that "The Fool" would see something, so he simply chose to escape.
After arriving in the wilderness, Hobert first hid Audrey in a forest, then came to a small hill and prayed to himself.
Just as he was about to enter the "Nation of Disorder," a picture suddenly appeared in Hobert's mind.
It was "The Fool's" perspective. From afar, he could see Beverly and Pedi seeming to chat for a few words, reminiscing about the past, and then leaving separately.
"The Fool" also stopped the lightning attacks, and Orseya fled in a somewhat disheveled manner. She fled towards Backlund.
Hobert sincerely thanked Mr. Fool. Today was the first time he had enjoyed the benefits of being a Tarot Club member.
After waiting for a little while, he felt that "The Fool" should be "offline" and back to sleep, and then entered the "Nation of Disorder," using his stars to observe the hills nearby, but didn't see the Tamara family's angel coming after him.
More than ten minutes later, the other party still hadn't come after him. Hobert then sighed. It seemed that the other party hadn't had time to leave any marks on him.
It's just that Orseya was still in Backlund. Hobert pondered for a moment, and now he had no choice but to return to the Earl's mansion to meet Dophis. A "Earl of the Fallen" plus an "Undying" could probably fight a "Chaos Hunter."
Moreover, Hobert believed that unless the other party was crazy, they wouldn't attack an Earl in the Empress Borough.
After confirming that there was no danger, he would send Audrey back.
So Hobert returned to the real world and found Audrey. When she saw Hobert, she quickly said, "Just now, did the picture given by Mr. Fool appear in your mind?"
"It appeared." Hobert first pretended to praise "The Fool" for a moment, and then briefly explained his plan.
Audrey certainly wouldn't object, so the two of them used "Travel" to return to Hobert's Earl's mansion's hall.
Hobert was just about to go find Dophis when he saw Selena hurriedly come in from outside: "Thank goodness, teacher, it's a good thing you're in Backlund!"
Seeing the other party's flustered expression, Hobert first asked, "What's wrong?"
"My sister-in-law gave birth!"
Hobert looked in the direction of Dophis's room and said somewhat insincerely, "Congratulations, congratulations, is it a boy or a girl?"
Selena's voice trembled slightly: "It's an egg!"
"Ah?" Hobert thought he heard wrong: "An egg?"
He suddenly recalled Selena's brother and sister-in-law's habit of sticking out their tongues.
join the Church of MissRaven and become a Sequence 9: Reader p atreon.com/KeyofStars for more chapters