The Cycle of Fate

Chapter 72: The Mother Tree

"Will the evil spirit really re-form?" the young man with the Sun emblem on his chest asked in surprise.

From his knowledge of the occult and his experience with case files, unless an evil spirit possesses a unique ability, purification generally means complete annihilation.

Such spirit-type entities are typically the result of powerful Extraordinary individuals' deaths or vengeful souls that have managed to break through their limitations. The strongest among them might even possess a hint of divinity, but resurrection and rebirth have never been their traits.

The blond man in the brown coat with double rows of golden buttons straightened up, gazing at the slowly dissipating twisted vines. He carefully explained, "Not all evil spirits are the same. Under certain special circumstances, an evil spirit might be born attached to an object, which is usually located at the core of its 'territory.'

"As long as this object remains intact, the evil spirit, even after being completely purified, can slowly re-form in the corresponding area."

Evil spirits assimilate the place of their birth, merging it with the spirit world or the underworld to draw the power they need to maintain their existence. Otherwise, they would gradually weaken and eventually vanish.

In other words, evil spirits have a fixed range of activity and cannot stray too far from their birthplace. This is what's known as their "territory."

The young man in the white robe trimmed with gold thread, wearing the Sun emblem, understood the reasoning. He frowned and said, "But we've been searching for days and haven't found the birthplace of Susanna Mattis, this evil spirit. Normally, she shouldn't be able to stray too far from her 'territory.' If the official Extraordinary investigators thoroughly search Chaos Street and the surrounding areas, they should be able to find the place where the evil spirit was born and destroy the object it depends on."

But this is Trier, with not only the surface but also the underground world, corresponding to another Chaos Street and another Honest Man's Market area, where many little-known pathways and voids exist.

More importantly, even deeper underground lies the Fourth Epoch Trier. Even for official Extraordinary investigators, that place is a largely unknown and perilous area.

As a Deacon of the Tribunal in the Honest Man's Market area, Angoulême de François could never understand why, during the late Fourth Epoch, when rebuilding Trier, they chose to construct it over the original site that had sunk into the earth.

Although the geographic conditions were indeed the best here, that decision had brought countless troubles over the past thousand years. Some Extraordinary events remained unsolved, not because the purifiers didn't want to resolve them, but because they couldn't. The root of these problems was hidden within the Fourth Epoch Trier, deep in the subterranean ruins.

It's said that even demigods hesitate or refuse to venture into certain underground regions.

Angoulême sheathed his golden longsword, which was both physical and seemingly condensed from light, into the top of a steam-driven humanoid mechanical construct, embedding it in what corresponded to its "spine," where it seemed to be filled with some dark liquid.

At this moment, a man dressed in a white suit, yellow vest, and light-colored shirt, also bearing the "Sun emblem," walked out of the Golden Rooster Hotel.

His light yellow hair was neatly combed, a skin-colored bandage covered the bridge of his nose, his lips were rather thick, and his skin was slightly brown, suggesting some indigenous ancestry from the Southern Continent.

"Deacon, I've questioned Charlie, it's clear," he reported to Angoulême de François.

Angoulême touched the golden buttons on his brown coat and asked, "Is he alright?"