Lu Li chose a string of masks linked together. They were all plain white masks with round faces, nothing unusual about them. A rope passed through their eyeholes, stringing them together as they hung on the wall. Lu Li counted them absentmindedly: there were nine in all.
"If you want them, just take them!" The Mermaid Princess glanced at the masks, then said, "They don't have any function of their own. They can only store a little energy, and even that amount is pitifully small."
After hearing this, Lu Li took down a mask, turned it over in his hands, and put it on. He slowly guided the Shadow Magic inside him, though it didn't respond very well. But when it reached his face, he found it became much more nimble. With a thought, he sent it into the mask. Unfortunately, each mask could only hold a little magic. By his rough calculations, each one could store about one unit.
When he took the mask off, Lu Li felt it tugging at his face, though not very strongly. A slight pull was enough to remove it—but by then, it had changed.
The mask, once pure white, was now covered in black markings, and two small horns had grown from its forehead. A mouth that had originally been just a hole now bristled with savage teeth. Something seemed to stare out at him from its hollow eyes. It was a Demon Mask through and through, and Lu Li could faintly sense a connection to it.
Putting the mask on again, Lu Li sensed the Shadow Magic inside. Some had been used up, but most remained. Following that connection, he drew the magic back into himself and carefully gauged the amount. He had put in one unit of Shadow Magic and recovered about 0.6. Of course, some of it might have been spent transforming the mask.
Lu Li set the mask down. It didn't turn back to plain white; it kept its terrifying demon face. He could still feel that faint connection, too, as if he had already bound it to himself.
With that in mind, Lu Li decided to take all nine masks with him. They could greatly improve his ability to keep going, and might even let him realize some of his ideas. Back at the Ice Palace beneath the lake, the Mermaid Princess and the Witch went into the inner room to perform the ritual that would change her species. Xu Haoran was pacing back and forth, looking furious. Lu Li suddenly thought he resembled a father waiting outside a delivery room.
Lu Li picked up another blank mask and began feeding Shadow Magic into it. By the time he reached the seventh mask, he had run out of magic. He waited quietly for about an hour before filling the last two. But when he looked at the masks, his expression turned strange.
Though he had infused all nine with Shadow Magic, each had transformed differently. Some had horns, some had a single horn; some had teeth, others didn't. One had even grown so many teeth that it became a half-mask. In short, all nine masks had become completely different, and each was linked to Lu Li in a subtle way.
Lu Li stacked the nine masks together, tied them with the rope he had brought along with them, and hung them at his waist. They were a little inconvenient, but at least they wouldn't get in his way too much.
A sudden commotion came from inside. The Witch emerged first, followed by the maid. The Mermaid Princess came out last, walking slowly and awkwardly, as if a gust of wind might knock her over.
The Mermaid Princess kept her mouth shut and made no sound. Her expression was complicated: she was unused to walking, and felt both guilty and happy about her change of species. It meant there was one less obstacle between her and Prince William.
"Please come with me to the land and help me expose that impostor's scheme!"
The next moment, the Mermaid Princess's voice rang out in Lu Li's mind, as if she were speaking directly inside his head. It was a strange sensation; someone unused to it might become dizzy or even nauseated.
The Mermaid Princess moved with great difficulty. For the first time, she tried standing still, feeling what it was like to be motionless. The three faint lines on her face relaxed. Lost in a wonderful reverie, she smiled, revealing her sharp canine teeth.
The merfolk outside had already prepared the boats and everything else. This was the third time Lu Li and the others had taken a boat. Lu Li was already tired of it and hoped this would be the last time. Watching the sea, which kept changing yet somehow seemed never to change, he thought to himself.
On the other side, the Witch was sailing away with the maid. Notably, Xu Haoran had given up on the mission and chosen to stay with the Witch. He now stood on her boat, looking thoroughly content. Whatever awaited him, it probably wouldn't be anything good.
The people on the two boats looked at one another. The Witch seemed calm, as if she had accepted her fate. She touched the little box inside her wizard's robe. All the necessary elements were in place: the Deep One had provided the sex, the Mermaid Princess the voice, the Ghoul race the transformation of the mind, that woman the innards, and other items had already been collected.
All that remained was to perform the final ritual, draw every element into herself, and find a vessel for whatever was left over. Thinking of this, the Witch raised her head and glanced at Xu Haoran, who stood nearby looking utterly satisfied. She smiled. Struck by that smile, Xu Haoran blushed and lowered his head.
On the other boat, Lu Li asked, looking bored, "The mission difficulty should be directly proportional to the number of people, right? It'll really be fine with one less person?"
"I just regret losing his share of the goods..." Gao Xiaowen said with a cold laugh. "You may not be ordinary, but you clearly haven't been through many instances. You don't understand the ins and outs. You know, modules can come from clearing instances, mission rewards, and so on; they can be bought in the game shop; or they can be obtained by killing powerful monsters. There's actually another, easier way to get modules."
"That's by killing other players. When they die, their skill slots collapse, scattering the modules that make up their skills. If you interfere just a little, you may be able to snatch some of those modules..." Gao Xiaowen laid it all out. "In this game, the strong get stronger while the weak become nourishment for them. Everyone starts by testing each other's limits, doesn't that mean they're all just trying to reap the rewards in the end?"
"Then why are you telling me all this now?" Lu Li asked with great interest. This game was getting more and more interesting. Were multiplayer instances basically just a battle of raising venomous insects?
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