Stagnant Space and Time

Almost instinctively, he reached out and touched the wall.

Suddenly, the ground beneath my feet trembled.

Just as Xiao Yu was filled with doubt and uncertainty, the Earl of Monte Cristo suddenly exclaimed, "Look! There's a control panel here!"

It was a small stone platform that resembled a lecture hall, with strange runes arranged on it. It seemed that the tremor just now was caused by the stone platform rising from the ground.

Xiao Yu ran over quickly and looked at the stone platform.

This is it— Xiao Yu suddenly recognized it. It was a runic word from the Council of Sages. Shen Yuan had introduced this runic word to Xiao Yu when he first joined the Council of Sages.

This runic word is actually the access code to the Council of Sages headquarters, and only members of the Council of Sages know it.

"I see," Xiao Yu thought to himself. "This control panel is probably used to open this wall, but to prevent accidents, they designed this combination lock. They hope that members of the Council of Sages can open this wall."

Fortunately, I was once a member of the Council of Sages.

"What does this rune mean? Everyone come and see, does anyone know how to read this thing?" the Count of Earl of Monte Cristo exclaimed. The crowd gathered around, marveling at the rune-covered lock.

However, no one could identify what it was.

"It must be some kind of password, shall I try it?"

"What if we fail? This stone gate must have some kind of restriction, right?"

The crowd was buzzing with discussion.

The Earl of Monte Cristo smiled and looked at Xiao Yu: "What impression does the President of The King's Return have of this?"

Xiao Yu was torn, unsure whether or not to open it.

However, curiosity ultimately prevailed.

I know a little about it; this is Rokhan runes, a hieroglyphic script used by the ancient Maya for divination and astrology.

Xiao Yu casually remarked, "Perhaps I could give it a try."

As Xiao Yu spoke, he gently adjusted the order of the runes, and soon, a spell was formed.

The people around them all wore expressions of bewilderment and awe, thinking to themselves, "Wow, they even know such ancient characters!" Chenghong Moli looked even more incredulous.

"Hey, how do you know about the ancient Mayan runes?" Chenghong Moli asked in a private message.

"Of course I was just making that up," Xiao Yu replied.

With a deafening roar, the stone wall collapsed amidst a series of rumbling tremors, revealing the scene behind it like a shattered mirror.

This scene surprised everyone present, except for Xiao Yu, who wore an expression of "I knew it."

Before me was a long conference table, but most of the seats were empty, with three people sitting on each side of the table.

Seated at the head of the meeting was an elf, with golden hair and golden eyes, dressed in a magnificent golden robe; who else could it be but Kairoz?

Sitting on the left was a man in black robes, wearing a crown on his head; who else could it be but Ner'zhul?

To the right was an old man dressed in a blue mage's robe, with snow-white hair and beard, and wearing a topknot hat; who else could it be but Alodi?

They turned out to be three members of the Council of Sages.

The space they were in, which appeared to be part of the Council of Sages's meeting hall, was now enveloped by a golden bubble-like object; the rest of the Council of Sages's hall had completely disappeared.

Recalling the murals he had seen before, Xiao Yu could almost imagine what had happened back then.

Clearly, when the apocalypse came, the three of them gathered together and did everything in their power to protect themselves. As members of the Council of Sages, having been with Shen Yuan for so long, and with Alodi being known as Sage of Wisdom, he must know the truth about this game.

Therefore, they were able to protect themselves at the last moment.

As for how to preserve them, it was obviously related to the bronze dragon. Xiao Yu saw something that looked like an hourglass on the table between the three of them.

Did they actually get their hands on the Hourglass of Time? No, this hourglass looks slightly different from the Hourglass of Time.

But whatever happened, there's no doubt they survived. The strange thing is that they're now completely still, as if frozen in time.

One of the team members instinctively tried to go in, but was immediately stopped by Xiao Yu.

"Watch out! There seems to be some kind of barrier ahead," Xiao Yu said. "Sword of the Fallen Angel, throw a fireball into it."

"Understood," said the Sword of the Fallen Angel, and a fireball shot in.

Surprisingly, the fireball froze and stopped mid-air as soon as it flew past and entered the bubble's range. The flames remained burning and even retained their flight trajectory, yet it simply stopped.

"Holy crap, what's going on? Who are these people?"

"It must be really awesome."

The players were all discussing it animatedly.

The Earl of Monte Cristo suddenly looked at Xiao Yu, a faint smile on his face, "Your Excellency, the King's Return, do you know what's really going on here?"

"How would I know? Didn't you see it in Andrew's memory?"

The Earl of Monte Cristo shook his head. "I only know that this ruin is very important to God of Death, but I don't know exactly how."

"What do we do now? Did we come all this way for nothing?"

The Earl of Monte Cristo shrugged. "What else can we do? I don't think breaking this barrier will be of much use. These three guys look pretty tough. Are we supposed to fight them?"

"Of course, if we manage to free them from their current state of confinement, they might give us a small reward."

Xiao Yu thought to himself, "Forget it, I don't want to free these three people. I'd rather they be sealed here forever."

He was also a little guilty, afraid of being recognized by these three people, which might cause some trouble. Now that he had seen what he wanted to see, he decided it was time to leave.

"There might be other valuable things in this ruin. We don't need to hang ourselves here. Let's go."

As Xiao Yu spoke, he led his men away, while the Earl of Monte Cristo and his men remained behind.

"Boss, are you just leaving like that?"

"Of course, what else can we do?" After the group had walked quite a distance, Xiao Yu suddenly stopped.

"Come out, there's no one else here."

In the darkness, a translucent shadow revealed its shape in the air.

However, he was one of the first Undead players Xiao Yu knew, 'You Can't See Me'.

"Can I trust you?" Xiao Yu asked in a deep voice.

"Of course, President. What's up?"

"I need you to keep an eye on the Earl of Monte Cristo for me. Remember, you must never be seen by them."

"Don't worry, leave this to me. But don't forget to give me six points when there are equipment points later."

"What's equipment?" Xiao Yu said, directly implying that You Can't See Me account.

"Do a good job, and you'll be richly rewarded."

When You Can't See Me, I was overjoyed and quickly made promises before leaving.

At the same time--

"Hmph, feeling guilty? Afraid to see old friends? Heh, I knew it was you."

Watching Xiao Yu's departing figure, the Count of Earl of Monte Cristo revealed a cold smile.

"Boss, aren't we leaving?" Several subordinates behind him asked nervously. Originally there were twenty people, but now there are only seven left. In this underground ruin full of dangers, ordinary adventurers would be a little nervous.

"Of course we're not leaving. We still have things to do. I've already figured out how to break this barrier."

"This is Time Stop, one of the forbidden spells in the Sky World. However, this spell can only last for a few seconds; it's impossible to preserve it for such a long time. They must have used the Hourglass of Time to create an absolutely static space to maintain this state. Yes, they must have cast Time Stop on each other. As a result, both of them will remain in the state of Time Stop, forever imprisoned. This was a bug that appeared during the game's closed beta, but because this bug requires two mages capable of casting forbidden spells to trigger, very few people know about it."

"Fortunately, I do have some understanding of the Time Stop magic. The power of this frozen space must have been stretched to allow the three of them to survive the game storm. However, they can't preserve too much, so as long as we keep throwing things into this barrier, it will naturally disappear when the barrier's power can't hold up."

At this point, he turned to the crowd and said, "Alright, everyone, start throwing things in. Anything is fine."

The group exchanged glances, but still complied, throwing all sorts of junk from their packages into the barrier. As soon as these things entered the barrier, they froze in mid-air.

After throwing away the trash, they threw in less important things like food and water, followed by some junk equipment.

"President, my bag is empty, I have nothing left to throw away."

"Throw your equipment in too."

"Oh no! This won't do. We worked so hard to collect all this equipment."

Without a word, the Count of Earl of Monte Cristo immediately transferred 10,000 points to each person. After that, everyone stripped off all their equipment and threw it in.

In the end, only the Earl of Monte Cristo remained fully clothed, followed by a naked man.

Finally, the barrier began to become unstable, flickering constantly. With a silent explosion, the golden barrier suddenly vanished.

With a loud thud, the fireball that the Sword of the Fallen Angel had fired earlier struck Kairoz squarely in the face.

The pile of trash and all sorts of random things suddenly fell on the three of them.

However, due to the protective spells, it naturally did not cause them any harm.

Who goes there!

The three people stood up at the same time.

Everyone was stunned, especially the naked man behind the Earl of Monte Cristo, who looked particularly conspicuous.

"Chain Lightning!" Alodi pointed casually, and a bolt of lightning instantly killed the naked man, while the Earl of Monte Cristo remained completely unharmed.

This move stunned everyone, even Ner'zhul and Kairoz were caught off guard.

"What are you doing?! Why did you kill these people?"

"These people aren't important; the only important person is the one in front of you," Alodi said with a smile.

The Earl of Monte Cristo bowed slightly. "I am Nai--"

"Wait!" Ner'zhul suddenly shouted. He reached out and grabbed, and a semi-transparent shadow appeared in the darkness, struggling incessantly but unable to break free from Ner'zhul's control.

Was it with you?

The Earl of Monte Cristo shook his head. "No."

"Then it's alright." Ner'zhul said, clenching his fist tightly, and the shadow let out a scream before vanishing into thin air.

"Alright, now you can speak— Naiser."

How did you know I was Naiser?

"Because I am Sage of Wisdom, and that title isn't given lightly. How did you end up looking like this?"

"That's a long story," said the Count of Earl of Monte Cristo —or rather, Naiser.