OBS Chapter 4265 The Heart of Guardianship
Chapter 4265 The Heart of Guardianship
Chapter 4265 The Heart of Guardianship
Years of court life have taught Adelina how to deal with strangers, and these children, who are already somewhat mentally unstable, seem to instinctively believe that everyone is a mother's child, so there is no need to be wary of each other.
Since Adelina appeared to be the oldest, the children told her about their experiences. These "mothers'" children all came from the Arcadia region, and the first children to arrive had come with their mothers yesterday morning.
But the child who calls herself Little Marika is certain that she was not the first child brought by her "mother," because when she arrived, there were already many children there.
"And what about the children who arrived here before you?"
Adelina asked.
"They were called away by their mother and returned to her embrace. I envy them; I don't know how much longer I have to wait."
The girl, who looked to be about twelve years old, answered. She was wearing patched old clothes, and there was a small bamboo basket beside her. The basket contained a few wilted flowers, and she seemed to have been found by her "mother" while selling flowers.
"After Mother called them away, did she not let them come back?"
Adelina sensed something was wrong, but the girl shook her head:
"Now that we have happily returned to our mother's embrace, where we don't need to think or work, and we don't need to worry about not having enough to eat or wear, why should we come back? Our mother will protect us all; that place is the final destination for all children who yearn for love and protection."
Adelina blinked. The words the other girl was saying didn't sound like something a flower girl on the street would say. She felt something was increasingly wrong, but she also thought the girl's logic was sound; that's how selfless and great a "mother" could be.
Two different lines of logic clashed in her head, but then little Marika's stomach suddenly growled, and she said embarrassedly:
"Mother should bring us food soon. She's very good to us. Even though the water is polluted, we can drink it as much as we want. We get meat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I wonder if lunch today will be rat meat or gecko meat."
Although Adelina wasn't afraid of mice and geckos, a princess of royal birth would definitely not like to eat such things. She frowned deeply, turning to look at the children around her and her surroundings, feeling as if she were about to uncover some truth. But she shook her head, unable to break through the powerful spiritual influence of the relic.
However, Adelina was not an ordinary child who had never been exposed to the extraordinary world. She not only studied under the Great Witch, but was also a correspondence student at the Zarathian Academy, and was taught by her older sister, Shad, her great-aunt, and other very powerful people.
So Adelina began a "mental self-examination" based on the textbooks at Zalas College:
"Do I still clearly remember who I am? Yes, absolutely no problem."
Can I still clearly describe my entire itinerary over the past 48 hours, with a coherent and uninterrupted memory—the memory is coherent, and any sense of incongruity only appeared after I left home;
Can I know why I am where I am now? Yes, but because of the sense of incongruity, my understanding of why I am here is probably questionable.
Can I clearly recall my own 'mental anchor'? Yes, the anchor is my sister and Shad; I can explain their identities and how important they are to me.
After a simple mental self-examination, although she didn't know why she felt this place was strange, Adelina managed to figure out through logical analysis that her "mother" was probably problematic.
"Could it be because I sensed my mother's favoritism? I remember I was my mother's favorite child. After bringing me here, why did she leave me here?"
Adelina felt she needed "groundbreaking wisdom" to take effect, but unfortunately it was a passive effect that she couldn't actively activate.
As time went on, the other children's stomachs began to rumble. Adelina, who had learned "divine strawberry magic" from her older sister, wanted to make food for her younger siblings, but just then, the door to the moldy, dilapidated room opened.
All the conscious children looked toward the doorway, beyond which lay an impenetrable, thick darkness. From the darkness, several dirty plates were pushed in by a withered hand onto the floor, followed by a hoarse voice saying:
"Little Marika, it's time for you to return to your mother's embrace."
The flower girl next to Adelina immediately smiled with delight:
"Okay, it's finally my turn! I'm going to see my mother now!"
After saying that, she waved goodbye to her new friend, Adelina.
"Then I'm leaving, and I wish you a speedy return to your mother's embrace! I'll be waiting for you in your mother's arms!"
She stood up from the floor and immediately felt dizzy due to low blood sugar. Adelina, who was next to her, quickly helped her up.
"I'm fine, I'm fine, I'll be back in my mother's arms soon!"
The girl broke free from Adelina's grasp and staggered towards the darkness by the door. The other children planned to wait for her to leave before having lunch, so no one moved.
Adelina was initially happy that her younger sister could return to her "mother's" embrace, but watching her walk into the darkness by the door, an instinctive unease and the doubts about her "mother" that arose after her mental self-examination gave Adelina a very bad feeling.
The joy she felt for her younger sister vanished instantly. The red butterfly on her shoulder stopped flapping its wings, because before the little girl, known as "Marika," stepped out of the room into the darkness, Adelina finally realized that the bad feeling was extremely dangerous.
Although she still didn't understand what was happening, Adelina knew very well that as the elder, she should protect her younger siblings, just as Lacey had always been protecting her.
She wanted to say the words of dissuasion, but as she opened her mouth, a strong sense of guilt towards her "mother" welled up inside her. Two completely opposite thoughts clashed within her, and then, somehow, Iluna's past teachings suddenly surfaced in her mind—
"When faced with uncertainty, don't overthink it. Protect what you can protect first, so that at least there's still a chance to avert a tragedy—that's a cool line, isn't it? It was written by Dorothy in 'The Hamilton Detective Stories'."
"Can we not go out for now?"
Adelina's voice rang out in the room. As soon as she spoke, the strange filter that had been covering her eyes completely disappeared. Adelina's eyes widened, and in an instant she understood everything. The expression on her face changed from firmness to surprise, and then to horror.
"Ok?"
The girl with the dry, yellowish hair turned to look at Adelina, not quite understanding why this kind older sister was preventing her from returning to her mother's embrace.
Seeing that she had indeed stopped, the withered gray hand from the darkness outside the door reached in and grabbed the little girl's arm. But before it pulled the girl into the darkness, Adelina had already completed her spell:
"Turbulent Magic Gravel!"
This is the most basic attack technique in the Chaos series. It fires an unstable beam of energy that causes extremely strong damage. One of the strongest attack techniques in the Chaos series, "Chaos Tide," is based on this technique.
Although it is the simplest offensive arcane technique in the Chaos system, it is extremely difficult to learn, and Adelina unfortunately possesses great talent.
The chaotic light struck the arm that was extending from the darkness outside the door. There was no explosion or strange light or shadow. The arm was vaporized by the extremely unstable energy, leaving only the severed hand that fell to the ground and knocked over the plate containing the dead rat.
After a brief silence, screams erupted one after another from the filthy, dilapidated room. The children were terrified by Adelina, and Adelina, realizing what had happened, finally understood that she had encountered some kind of relic with a powerful influence:
“Miss Rowling is a follower of the High Ring Witch; even she is unaware of 'Mother's' strangeness.”
And when she thought of that tall figure draped in black robes, Adelina immediately felt guilty for disobeying her "mother's" orders:
"No, no, that's not my mother, that's not my mother."
She immediately thought about it in her mind, and then, following the procedure taught at the Zarathian Academy for encountering similar situations, she began to meditate on an anchor point in her mind that would keep her alert.
Generally, meditating on the holy symbol of one's own deity is most effective, but Adelina did not do so because she had actually seen the deity:
"Shad, Shad, Shad."
First, she conjured up the image of the flawless silver moon in her mind, then imagined Shad's figure in his divine state from her own perspective, and finally had Mia appear on Shad's shoulder. Adelina immediately felt much more energetic.
"Be quiet."
She first grabbed little Marika's hand and pulled her away from the door, then cast a spell to amplify the sound, instantly drowning out all the children's voices.
Adelina knew that taking them with her would put her in more danger, but she would never abandon the children she had just taken in as her younger siblings.
"Now I'll take you home."
"But isn't Mother right here?"
A boy who looked about seven or eight years old asked, and Adelina shook her head:
“I received orders from my mother to take you home. You can trust me, after all, my mother is the most powerful. I just severed the arm of that thing, which proves that I am the one who received my mother’s orders.”
Adelina's words successfully convinced most of the children to accept the idea, while those who didn't accept it, seeing everyone else leaving, were also unwilling to stay due to herd mentality.