Book 5: Chapter 223: The Cursed Benedict Manor

According to the “Midnight Unbelievable Tales,” one of the four forbidden books once sealed up by Olsylvia Academy, there were several places where strange things happened in the middle of the night. Before that, Bella had already explored two of the sites, McPherson Monastery and Scripps Cemetery.

The problem at Scripps Cemetery was too difficult to handle. Bella decided to postpone it for the moment. The structure of the McPherson Monastery made it unsuitable to be converted into a shop, so she could only think of some other place.

Early morning the next day, Bella took Princess Kriss and Knight King Liath out. They were going to explore a new letter-writing place. There were still two or three days before Olsylvia Academy resumed classes, so they happened to be free.

Knight King Liath was dressed in pure gold armor and a golden face mask. This way, outsiders couldn’t see her face. After all, Liath looked equally as beautiful as Kriss, so it wasn’t right for her to be seen.

The place they were visiting this time was the Benedict Manor, the only abandoned campus in the Filomena Nobility Academy. It was said to be a cursed place. It had existed long before Olsylvia Academy was even founded. More than ten thousand years later, the manor was still mysteriously operating.

The Benedict Manor had a large garden outside, which was just right for the Elven Race to carry out transformations. The place didn’t require rent. As for the curse, Bella knew the top echelons of the Radiant Church, so removing the curse wasn’t an issue.

Along the way, Bella and the others also met many students. Although many boys were interested in Kriss, no one dared to come up and make small talk. Most students at the Olsylvia Academy knew that Bella, the vice president of the Rose Society, didn’t like men.

Her other roommates would be busy over the next few days. Ariel and Elaine had to finish their vacation homework and couldn’t come out, which resulted in Bella’s adventure team to not have someone from the mage profession. Bella was going to take a gamble and grab any girl from the mage department on the street.

However, Bella now realized that it was too hard to find students from the mage department. She couldn’t even find a boy from the mage department, let alone girls. Only after asking a passer-by did she know that all the students from the mage department went to an activity with the other academies today, just like Bella and the knight department did a few days ago.

“Bella… What are you doing walking around aimlessly here? We can’t enter up ahead. Outsiders are not allowed to go there.”

On a deserted road, Bella and the others met President Isaman. The beautiful young girl with long violet hair held a prayer book in her hand. It seemed that she was going to take part in a sacrificial ceremony.

“Hey, Isaman! Just right! We’re short of a mage. Come with us!”

“What… I am a priestess, not a mage…”

“Then forget it. If you don’t come over, then we’ll go to you.”

Bella didn’t take Isaman’s dissuasion seriously. She had a black Warrior and the Knight King’s martyr spirit; she was fully prepared. Isaman saw that her dissuasion didn’t work, and after a little thought, she chose to follow Bella and the others.

Benedict Manor was at the end of the path. According to the records in the Olsylvia Academy’s Midnight Unbelievable Tales, the former owner of the manor, Grand Duke Benedict, was mysteriously cursed and died. After his death, he turned into a demon and wandered around the manor.

Every night since then, the Grand Duke Benedict would appear and wander around the manor at midnight. However, this was only a legend. In theory, a place haunted by a departed spirit wasn’t uncommon in this Other World.

But the horror of the Benedict Manor lay in the fact that many of the people who were said to have gone in to explore had mysteriously disappeared. In those days, the Radiant Church sent people to explore the entire manor, but the thousands who went never came back.

Since the mysterious incident only occurred in the manor, and there was nothing unusual outside the manor, the Radiant Church adopted the solution of closing up the manor. They didn’t use powerful magic to destroy the manor because Benedict was one of the richest nobles of the Human Race ten thousand years ago. After his death, his riches and treasure were all hidden in the manor.

Bella walked while listening to Isaman talk about the legend of the estate. At the end of the road, Bella and the others saw the entrance to the Benedict Manor. The walls around the manor were five meters tall, almost the same as the city walls.

“That’s strange… The guards are guarding the gate. This smell is…”

Olsylvia Academy had hired special guards to guard the manor. Outside Benedict Manor was a sentry post, but now, the sentry post is empty, which alerted Isaman.

There was a faint smell of blood in the air. Bella was very sensitive to the smell of blood. She told Isaman and Kriss, the two “delicate” professionals, to stay behind her first and be ready to support her at any moment. She and Knight King Liath, the two heavily armored knights, went forward to probe the sentry.

There was no one at the sentry post. Except for the dry blood on the ground, there wasn’t even the body of the guard. The guards’ temporary camp behind the sentry post was also a mess. There was blood everywhere in the tents in the camp, but no bodies were found.

More than twenty guards were guarding Benedict Manor. They were replaced every other month. It was only half a month before the last change of guard, but the regiment had all disappeared.

Looking at the air-dried blood on the ground, Bella figured that the guard regiment had met a disaster. To her dismay, the door of the Benedict Manor was open, and the lock on the door had been damaged.

Bella looked at the damaged lock. The technique used was similar to that of an assassin. Among Bella’s close friends were many assassins, including Lola, President Ivy, and Princess Noreya. They had all performed the skills of picking locks for Bella. It was a work by an assassin.

“Bella, it looks like someone went in. I think we better close the gate and inform the academy.”

Isaman came over and looked at the ground, finding many footprints heading for the Benedict Manor. The legend of Benedict’s treasure had been circulating the whole time, and every year there were many cases of thieves sneaking into the Benedict Manor.

Every time this sort of thing happened, the Olsylvia Academy would choose to close the door and ignore it. There were basically no thieves who could leave alive. This time it was no exception. The footprints all headed in, but none appeared to have left.

In the past, most thieves climbed the wall. This time, they had gone through the main entrance, which was rather rare. Bella looked at the shaded manor behind the door and felt a little nervous.

The Benedict Manor was the same as any other manor, with a garden outside and the manor building inside. These trees, which have not grown much over ten thousand years, were definitely suspicious.

Although it was daytime now, Bella still felt a little uncomfortable because of the cold draft coming from Benedict Manor’s main door.

“Isaman, I want to go in and have a look. If you are afraid of dying, then don’t go. Liath, Kriss, wear this. With this, we’ll be fine.”

“This is… the Tears of the Goddess. This is the first time I have seen a necklace with such pure Goddess’ tears. Bella, do you have any more?”

Bella took out several necklaces of the “Tears of the Goddess” and gave Knight King Liath and Princess Kriss one each but not to the envious Isaman. These “Tears of the Goddess” necklaces hadn’t been diluted. They were 100% full of the power of Creator of Light Vianne. Bella didn’t have so many of them.

“Isaman, this is only for my girlfriends. Please be my girlfriend if you want it…”

“You problem student! You’re trying to take advantage of me again. If you don’t want to give it, then don’t. Be careful that I’ll report your bad behavior to Miss Ingrid.”

Isaman didn’t know that Miss Ingrid was already Bella’s girl, and Bella didn’t explain either. She brought Knight King Liath and Princess Kriss into the Benedict Manor and left Princess Isaman, who was still unsure of what to do, behind.

At that time, a group of black shadows rushed up from the path. They were new thieves. Isaman stepped back, and her whole body disappeared into thin air. The group of thieves didn’t see Isaman and went directly to the door of the Benedict Manor.

“Someone has already taken the lead. Brothers, let’s hurry up. We can’t let others snatch all the treasures inside.”

“Boss… isn’t it safer for us to dig up a grave?! Coming here is a little…”

“What are you afraid of? The curse is just scary nonsense. The cemetery is on the site of the church. It’s not deserted like this place. Let’s go, hurry up. Don’t you want to be rich?!”

The bandit group also headed for the Benedict Manor. They were so busy that they accidentally left a drawing on the ground. After they had left, Isaman appeared again. She picked up the drawing and looked at it carefully.

“A treasure map… This drawing is correct, but the person who drew it… isn’t of the Human Race.”

By this time, Bella, Kriss, and Knight King Liath had entered the outer garden of the Benedict Manor. It was daytime, but because there was too much shade, there was no sunlight coming through.

Because of the protection of the “Tears of the Goddess,” Bella and the others didn’t encounter any evil thing along the way, so it was fine that Isaman wasn’t there. When Bella invited her to form a team, she was more afraid that she would interfere with her plan.

No bodies were found in the dense forest, but there was blood everywhere, and remnants of darts commonly used by thieves were scattered all over. She couldn’t be sure how many batches of thieves had come here. Normal people hadn’t visited the Benedict Manor for many years since the Radiant Church’s exploration team had disappeared.

The last church exploration team probably came thousands of years ago. No one knew what happened in the middle. Just because they weren’t attacked didn’t mean that the others were okay. Right then, they heard a sound not far behind them.

“Monster… Run…”

“My feet, my…”

They turned around and rushed over in the direction of the noise with caution. When they got there, they only saw blood all over the place, but they didn’t see anyone. The monster that attacked the group of thieves didn’t leave at once, so Bella happened to spot one.

The horror of this monster was beyond Bella’s expectation. It was a bloody humanoid monster that seemed to crawl on all fours. Its mouth was gnawing at half of a thief’s head. At one glance, she could tell it wasn’t anything good.

After seeing Bella and the others, the monster turned around and pounced on them. The power of the “Tears of the Goddess” merely repelled them but wasn’t harmful to them.

Because of professional instinct, Bella and Knight King Liath took their shields to block the impact of the thing. Its brute force was so great that Bella was almost knocked down. Knight King Liath was directly knocked down because she hadn’t recovered her peak strength.

The monster responded very quickly. Two claws grabbed Liath’s shield. Its claws were made of some unknown material and directly penetrated Liath’s shield. Seeing that the situation wasn’t good, Kriss caught up with them and cut off the monster’s head with her sword.

When the monster’s head was cut off, green blood spattered out. The blood was very corrosive. Wherever it landed, it gave off a foul smell, like being corroded by sulfuric acid.

Although it had been beheaded, the monster still continued to move, which surprised them all. Fortunately, Isaman arrived at this critical moment. She held out her hand and sent several light balls to repel the mysterious monster.

“This guy isn’t afraid of light magic. Let’s quickly retreat…”

They snapped out of their surprise and quickly retreated. If they weren’t afraid of light magic, then these guys would definitely pose a huge problem.

The demon didn’t pursue them either. It merely groped around on the ground for a while, found its own head, and screwed it back on its body. Eerily enough, the head severed by Kriss actually healed. Bella, who was in charge of the back, saw all this clearly.

They retreated outside of the gates and closed the door of the Benedict Manor again. Knight King Liath’s expression was a bit ugly. The mysterious monster had almost cut her pure gold armor, and her snow-white skin under the armor could be seen.

“Liath, are you okay? Thank you. Also, President Isaman, thank you for your help.”

“No need to thank me. This manor… I think you should give up. I think it’s better to wait until the mage department students come back!”

Isaman handed over the treasure map, which she had found from the group of thieves who had infiltrated the Benedict Manor. The treasure map showed a detailed location of the treasure in the Benedict Manor.

This map had been circulated in the underground trading market near Olsylvia City for more than a month now. Its source was unknown, and its authenticity was uncertain, but its credibility was still pretty good.

Bella felt that the map had been deliberately released. Perhaps only the Grand Duke Benedict knew all about the Benedict Manor’s layout. The problem was that Benedict didn’t have an heir after his death. It was doubtful whether the creator of the map was human.

After parting with Isaman, Bella and the others rushed back to the dormitory building “Pure White Heaven” because she wanted to find a professional to prove her speculation.

“This smell… These traces seemed to have been caused by something similar to my kind!”

Unsurprisingly, Betty, the “origin of the infection” from the Chaos camp, concluded that this was made from some mysterious poison after carefully testing the traces of magic left on Knight King Liath’s armor.

Because the students of the magic department were still attending an off-campus event, the students of the St. Louis Church Academy hadn’t returned from the Day of Blessing organized by the Radiant Church. Olsylvia Academy currently only had students from the military combat professions. Isaman suggested keeping it a secret for the time being before considering whether to destroy the Benedict Manor with magic when the students came back.

“If we wait until then, things will be bad. I’m guessing there is a madman over there who’s about to succeed. You’d better deal with it as soon as possible. When that guy succeeds, perhaps the academy will turn into a terrifying place.”

Bella listened to Betty’s advice and decided to handle it herself. In this operation, Bella brought only Evil Dragon Lolita and Princess Kriss, and none of the other girls. She felt that there were too many things in Benedict Manor, so it was better not to show them to the other girls.

Bella had only brought Kriss after her repeated requests. Lolita was Bella’s strongest teammate at present, so it wasn’t a problem for her to come along.

That night, a group of uninvited guests appeared at the gates of the Benedict Manor. After Interdimensional Demon Noesha opened a teleportation door, groups of skeleton soldiers exited the portal.

These skeleton soldiers did not carry swords, but arquebus and copper guns brought from the Sarnia Duchy. They carefully infiltrated the Benedict Manor.

Bella and the others stood at the entrance of the Benedict Manor. From time to time, there were gunshots and shrieks from the monsters inside the manor. Bella couldn’t see what was going on inside due to lighting problems.

“Older sister Bella, I have already arranged the sound isolation barrier. You girls can go. By the way, this is a potion from Betty. You should keep this carefully. This potion can dissolve all sorts of substances.”

“All right, Noesha. Help me guard this place and don’t let those ignorant thieves and robbers dig their own graves.”

After putting away the mysterious potion given by Betty, Bella held Kriss’ hand and walked into the Benedict Manor again. Lolita was dressed in a black gothic loli outfit, walking behind them with a small black parasol, looking like a little maid.

This time, Bella brought them to look for the “venue.” Now, only a quarter of the students at Olsylvia Academy had returned to school. If they wanted to take action, then tonight was the night. Once the students come back, they couldn’t call on the demonic skeleton soldiers to help.

They were surrounded by skeleton soldiers armed with arquebus and copper guns. The skeleton soldiers wore barrel-shaped iron armor similar to a “chemsuit” and looked very similar to human soldiers who were infiltrating a biochemical scene.

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