Chapter 72: Hidden Face

Plakaka felt like it had been having the worst luck lately.

Originally, living it up in the City of Courage, enjoying good food, listening to tunes, occasionally doing some simple tasks like catching petty thieves. Even if it couldn’t show its face often, this had been the best time since it was forced to join the Throne of Immortality over a hundred years ago and became what they call an immortal.

Unfortunately, the newly appointed queen of the United Kingdom was a doer who knew how to delegate. Anything valuable was to be put to good use, and this legendary master was not spared from the same fate.

What could it do? It was all thanks to its big shot, Miss Vilyric, who told it to stay in the City of Courage and obediently follow Queen Liliya’s orders. Naturally, the mouse-man had to comply with the new boss’s words.

Moreover, to be fair, despite being a bit troublesome, Queen Liliya treated Plakaka rather well. Aside from committing crimes or theft, almost everything else could be overlooked, and it would make an effort to satisfy its desires.

Therefore, as the sixth seat of the Throne of Immortality, this mouse-man was quite sincere in working there.

And the fate of a worker naturally involves unavoidable toil. Not long ago, Queen Liliya had given it a job, saying that things seemed a bit off in the Holy Empire and it was to go investigate the situation and report back after figuring it out.

When the boss gives an order, the subordinate runs until their legs break. Even though Plakaka was feeling down, it had no choice but to trudge through mountains and waters to quickly cross borders into the Holy Empire.

Fortunately, the Holy Nation was the domain of the Church of the Goddess, and they wouldn’t practice any racial discrimination. Even a mouse-man like it could freely run around the city without any issues. Life there was an entirely different experience from the United Kingdom and wasn’t boring at all.

However, as the saying goes, when you’re full and warm, you think of lust. And while Plakaka had no such lust, now that it had come to a foreign land, with no queen watching over it, its hands were starting to itch.

In fact, back when it was working for the Throne of Immortality, it had visited the Holy Empire more than once. Since it was engaged in all sorts of underhanded acts like petty theft or murder, it had inevitably attracted the pursuit of the Temple Knights, resulting in several confrontations, even suffering some minor losses.

Though it had turned over a new leaf now and couldn’t seek revenge, to be honest, seeing certain Temple Knights made Plakaka itch to mess with them.

That’s right, it wanted to use its specialty: sleight of hand.

Not long after arriving in one of the major towns in the Holy Nation, Holy Star City, it ran into an old rival.

The Summerfield Family, one of the three divine descendants of the Holy Empire, might seem ordinary at first glance, but after having faced off against their boss, the Saint of Bright Light, many times—usually getting beaten and fleeing—Plakaka was very familiar with this family’s unique traits.

Unlike the other two divine descendant families, which had human ancestors, the Summerfield Family was exceptionally rare, being a hybrid of the Light Tribe and the divine descendants, allowing them to wield the high-demand artifact, the Crown of Uncrowned.

Because of this, their average lifespan was slightly longer than the other two divine descendant families, and they displayed some unique characteristics of the Light Tribe.

That is—gem-like, light blue pupils.

So when it spotted that guy on the street, even though he was dressed casually and only pretending to wear a four-winged Holy Emblem, Plakaka recognized him as part of the Summerfield Family at first glance.

What surprised the mouse-man even more was that this divine descendant was actually hiding… an item faintly exuding a demonic aura?

The mouse folk had a gifted ability called Treasure Sensing. Though this ability wasn’t particularly useful in combat, when combined with their thievery skills, it produced exceptional results.

And Plakaka, being a rare occasion of a mouse-man who had witnessed top-tier legends through its own abilities, had naturally mastered this talent to perfection. Even if the opponent hid things well, they couldn’t hide from it.

The mouse-man came to investigate the demonic rampage in the eastern part of the Holy Empire and the rumors of the Judging Saintess supposedly going missing with an artifact in battle. Being part of the same branch as the Summerfield Family, it couldn’t just turn a blind eye to a demonic artifact appearing on one of them, especially given their past grievances.

Thus, Plakaka skillfully used its ability to reduce its presence and, with the aid of a cloak of invisibility, deliberately brushed past the Summerfield member on the street, smoothly stealing the item from him and slipping away before he noticed.

After pulling off such a stunt, there was no way it could stick around in Holy Star City. Who knows if those divine folks had any means of tracing back the stolen goods? So Plakaka promptly turned and left the city, heading deep into the Holy Nation before taking a moment to inspect the item it had lifted, which was rich with demonic energy.

It was a small wooden sculpture, with wings, four arms, a goat’s head, and each arm held a gem growing eyes, emanating an enchanting, sinister aura.

Plakaka instantly recognized the identity of the sculpture—the King of Corrosion, one of the four demon lords of the demon realm.

Demon-kind, well, it had encountered them during its time at the Throne of Immortality. Though the Holy Empire and the Church of the Goddess depicted them as utterly wicked, terrifying creatures, at the end of the day, they were just a type of race from another world.

Not particularly benevolent, but as long as interests aligned, they’d hardly be impossible to negotiate or even cooperate with. Simply put, it was a rather unique biological category.

And at the pinnacle of this were the four demon lords ruling over different regions of the demon realm.

Chaos, Killing, Corruption, and Impurity.

It’s said that the King of Chaos had no fixed abode and acted entirely irrational, having no subordinates. Yet in terms of single-unit strength, it was undoubtedly the strongest among the four lords, sitting atop the four thrones solely on its individual power.

The King of Killing was warlike, bloodthirsty, and perpetually seeking slaughter and conflict, with countless demon armies tirelessly attacking other realms. Most demons arriving in the world were likely under its command.

The King of Corrosion was a schemer, adept at psychological warfare, especially fond of manipulating enemies’ minds, spreading ideologies that can easily undermine an entire nation’s foundation. Even though it was rarely seen on the battlefield alongside its demonic forces, it remained a terrifying presence on par with the King of Killing.

Finally, the King of Impurity was born unclean, a harbinger of plagues and toxins, twisting flesh and becoming the direct opposite of pure light. It was the most loathed existence among the followers of the Goddess; its manifestation would instantly attract the most ruthless and determined ‘purification.’

The four demon lords were the strongest existence in the demon realm, embodiments of four concepts. It’s said they could even contend with the gods of ancient times. Yet, due to the world’s strong repulsion, they could not enter in their true forms, and at most, could only transmit a fraction of their power or items infused with their thoughts.

For example, this sculpture is evidently a conduit of the King of Corrosion’s power, termed a cursed artifact by the Church of the Goddess, while for demons and their worshippers, it would be deemed a so-called holy object.

Of course, Plakaka didn’t care about any of that. It was just curious where that Summerfield kid had obtained such an item and why he carried around something so “extremely blasphemous” in the eyes of the Church of the Goddess.

Could it be… that even the divine descendants of the Summerfield Family had been secretly corrupted by the King of Corrosion?

That seemed too absurd. If that were true, the Holy Nation would have crumbled under an invasion from demons long ago instead of thriving to this day!

However, no matter what, since it had acquired the item, Plakaka was definitely not going to hand it back. It had plans to go to the western capital and then venture further east for more investigation. This item might come in handy at some point.

Even if it turned out the investigation yielded no valuable results, bringing back something so obviously artifact-like to present to a certain queen could still be counted as a decent report, right?

Yet, bad luck soon arrived at Plakaka’s doorstep as a consequence.

   

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