Chapter 382: Chapter 382: Critical Situation
Within the civilian construction area surrounded by stone walls.

Han Dong had already fled with the severely injured Dumps.

Stricken directly by the forceful light, [Adelaide Rubble] knelt on one knee, gradually recovering from the pain.

Several stone eyeballs on her face had been completely burned.

Foul-smelling pus flocked out from the cracks in the eyeballs.

Pitter-patter!

Many stone eyeballs fell off, revealing a face woven from flesh. Even some of the red flesh was entirely charred.

Kinoshita Souichiro’s flashlight.

It wasn’t merely a tool for projecting strong light. When it was pointed at the common Strange Tales, it not only vaporized the body but also sucked all the spirits of the Strange Tales into it.

The projection just now was like that, almost pulling Adelaide’s spirit out…

The dumpling she was about to eat disappeared, and she herself got scalded, making her rage unstoppable.

Adelaide vented all her anger on the civilians residing in the current building.

Creeping stones began to move around in each household, forcibly drilling into their bodies and coerced control over them.

“The next time we meet, I will not consider catching you alive…I will take the corpse directly.”

…

[Underground Tavern]

The squad members have collected the cement delivery points in charge by different organizations, all gathered here.

When Han Dong returned with the severely injured Dumps.

In the squad, Mia was the only one who could be considered a medic.

What needed to be done here was emergency treatment, trying to prevent the injury from worsening as much as possible. Once the situation could be stabilized, then consider moving Dumps to the emergency room on the second level of the Holy City.

“What are these things!?”

Removing his outer clothes, she saw many small stones gnawing at Dumps’ inner soft armor…

“The attributes of the Demon…”

“You met with a [Demon]?!”

“We’ll talk about that later, let’s see how Dumps is doing first…”

Knight Vino, standing aside, directly targeted the stony area and cast a small-scale Holy Light Technique… All these little stones lost their activity instantly and fell to the ground.

Then Mia took over the treatment.

When they carefully removed Dumps’ inner soft armor.

A body full of wounds was revealed… which was completely inconsistent with Dumps’s fair and tender English brother appearance.

All sorts of burns, cuts, and even branding marks were on his body.

These were the permanent injuries Dumps used to leave on his body.

After a brief check, Mia said sternly, “The lower ribs are completely broken, the kidney is shattered, severe internal bleeding. But…”

“But what?”

“It’s strange, ordinary people would probably be in their dying breath by now… but Dumps’ vital signs showed no sign of decreasing.”

Mia had begun to grind the ointment synchronously.

The moment when the highly effective healing ointment was evenly smearing on Dumps’ body surface… a bizarre scene occurred.

Dumps’s skin ‘consumed’ the ointment that just touched his skin in an instant.

At the same time, his wounded area began to heal at an extremely high velocity.

Han Dong realized something, immediately said, “Mia… Pour all the ointment on his wounds.”

“Okay.”

Sure enough.

All the ointment was ‘eaten’ by Dumps’s body within a short time.

Less than five minutes have passed.

Dumps reopened his eyes, abruptly sitting up… the fire element ignited in his left hand, while his right hand gathered a chill, as if he still believed he was battling a [Demon].

“Hm? Escaped, huh… I was too careless; the stone walls distracted me.”

Dumps looked entirely unbothered, hurriedly putting on his coat.

His teammates could only look on in shock.

“Dumps, your body?”

“… The adaptive effect from spending three hours each day soaking in the enchanted pool. My body can automatically absorb potions.”

Dumps wore a casual expression, completely unconcerned about his severe injuries from earlier.

“By the way, did everyone manage to gather the ‘cement delivery points’?”

The topic was swiftly shifted. At Dumps’ suggestion, everyone marked the points on a map.

Knowing that the cement is used for ‘rebuilding walls’, they connected the nearby marked points in short straight lines.

Slowly…

A mark that everyone seemed to find familiar was drawn on the map.

“This is!”

The figure drawn on the map could almost perfectly overlap the mark on a coin’s surface.

“If all the stone walls were rebuilt, some large-scale, unknown formation would be activated… The consequences would be unimaginable.”

“We can’t handle this matter, we must report it immediately!”

Upon learning the truth, Knight Vino didn’t consider her self-interest any longer. Such a large-scale plot had to be dealt with by the Knight Regiment.

Wasting even a second was risky. Vino turned to leave right away.

“Hold on!”

Han Dong reached out and stopped Vino.

“What are you doing? This involves the basic safety of the Holy City. Stop thinking about personal gain. There’s no time to waste.” Vino interpreted Han Dong’s actions as an expression of personal desire.

Han Dong patiently explained:

“Vino.

When I took on the ‘Secret Stone incident’, I asked Mr. Black White straight up… His attitude was that we could handle it, but to be careful.

Mr. Black White’s astrology, no doubt, is very aware of what’s currently happening in the civilian district.

You get what I mean, right?

Also… I’m not stopping you from reporting it. There’s just a few things not fully discussed yet.”

Vino nodded. “You speak.”

“There’s one thing I can’t understand.

Why was it that in the area Dumps and I encountered the [Demon] earlier, not a single knight was patrolling?”

Vino immediately shook her head, “Impossible! The Secret Stone incident has officially been reported to the Knight Regiment. Should anyone manage to kill the invading demon, they’d get a sizable reward and a boost in their reputation.

Any knight who wasn’t currently assigned work would’ve taken their squire and gone patrolling in the civilian district… There shouldn’t be any ‘omissions’.”

“When we encountered the Demon, it activated the barrier.

There’s no way a Formal Knight wouldn’t notice a ‘barrier’ that covers at least a thousand square meters, right? Plus, we stayed inside the barrier for at least five minutes and caused quite a ruckus during the fight.

After I managed to escape, and carried Dumps across three streets, I didn’t spot a single patrolling knight in the whole neighborhood.”

Vino looked shocked, “Are you saying… Someone inside the Holy City is manipulating all this?”

“I’m afraid so. This ‘person’, who can control the Knight Regiment’s patrols, is probably the insider who led the Demon’s secret underground sewer invasion… I guess Mr. Black White wants to use this incident to investigate this behind-the-scenes insider.

Or maybe Mr. Black White already knows who it is, but given their status and identity, he needs reasonable and powerful evidence to shake things up.”

“Therefore… I suggest letting Abe report the situation directly to Captain Kaimon.

That way we can avoid any issues with the intermediary links.”