Otherworld Advance Team
Chapter 173 - 169: The Exploding Magic Crystal

Chapter 173: Chapter 169: The Exploding Magic Crystal

Luo’er walked into the engine room, treading on the debris strewn across the floor. It was a sizeable room, big enough to accommodate four antigravity engines, which were placed in the four corners. In the middle stood a magic absorption and transformation device, crowned by four enormous magic crystals. The intense magic permeating the crystals made them shimmer with a dark purple hue.

The shock bomb’s power was tremendous, generating not only an earth-shattering noise but a dazzling light that disrupted one’s sight and hearing completely. As Luo’er charged in with his gun, three dwarf gunmen were lying in the spacious engine room, their eyes tightly shut, covering their ears and rolling on the floor screaming.

The flash and noise threw them off balance, leaving them unable to defend themselves efficiently. Luo’er didn’t hesitate; he seized this opportunity and fired at them repeatedly.

The pistol with a silencer made unpleasant "pfft" sounds. The bullets hit the three fellows, their bodies spasming instantly before life left them.

Luo’er didn’t dare to let his guard down. He continued to search the room. Suddenly, a dwarf hobbled out from behind the central input device. He wasn’t dressed like the other dwarves in tactical vests, nor did he carry a weapon. Instead, he was wearing a strange long robe and had a bag slung across his shoulder.

The shock bomb’s effect was significantly dimmed due to the device’s shielding, so he wasn’t as disoriented as the other three dwarves. Sensing Luo’er entering, he quickly pulled out a diamond-shaped magic crystal, the size of a chicken egg, from his bag, and immediately started muttering.

Due to the impairment to his hearing, the dwarf had no idea how loud he was. Hence, Luo’er easily heard him uttering words that were clearly spells!

Even though languages varied across the Otherworld, with each race having their own language or even dialects within the same race, there was one language that was universal among all races: spells.

Spells could be considered the magical rules of the Otherworld; hence, even though the races were different, anyone who wished to cast magic in the Otherworld had to chant the same spells. While the pronunciations might slightly vary among the different races and countries, the effect was pretty much the same and posed no problem.

As the dwarf began to chant, the runes engraved into the magic crystal in his hand suddenly emitted an intense light. After roughly estimating Luo’er’s position, he flung the crystal towards him.

Seeing the glowing crystal hurtling towards him, Luo’er felt a chill run down his spine. His instincts told him the object was dangerous. He reflexively threw himself backward and clumsily rolled behind an engine device.

"Boom!!"

Another brutal explosion. This time, not only Tangmo, but even Luo’er could feel a surge of potent magic rushing through their bodies. Luckily, his magic resistance was low; otherwise, his biological pathways would’ve been damaged due to overload.

Hearing the explosion, the dwarf covered his eyes and struggled to rise, fumbling in his pocket for another magic crystal. However, Luo’er wouldn’t give him another chance. He raised his gun and unleashed all the bullets in his magazine.

"Pfft! Pfft! Pfft! Pfft!"

The bullets hit the metallic wall behind him, creating a clear metallic collision sound and sparking. Two bullets struck the dwarf’s face. His head jerked back violently, and his body slumped backward out of control. The magic crystal he was clutching clattered onto the floor.

After taking out the dwarf, Luo’er swiftly replaced his magazine, then continued his search of the engine room. Only after confirming that everyone had been killed did he finally shout, "Clear!"

Upon hearing his shout, Tangmo entered the room. Luo’er handed her the gun and took the AK rifle she offered him.

"Moumou, guard the door," Luo’er ordered, pointing at the entrance.

"Got it!" Tangmo nodded, holding the pistol in one hand and gripping her magic wand in the other, keeping a vigilant eye on the door.

Luo’er slung his rifle over his shoulder and walked over to the dwarf he had killed. The dwarf’s head had been blown up by Luo’er’s bullets. It was a gory sight, blood pooling around the body.

Ignoring the disgusting scene, Luo’er stooped to pick up the magic crystal that had fallen. It was egg-sized and diamond-shaped. He noted the dense rune engravings on the crystal, but with his current knowledge, he couldn’t recognize what sort of runes they were. However, he was sure they were not output runes.

After carefully examining the magic crystal, Luo’er picked up the dwarf’s bag which contained several more crystal. After some thought, he decided to take them along. He took out the bag and securely fastened it into a magazine storage pouch around his waist.

"Engine room’s been conquered; I wonder how things are in the cockpit." Luo’er spoke to himself as he walked over to Tangmo. Suddenly, an antigravity engine in the corner of the room exploded, causing the airship to lurch dangerously to one side.

Luo’er quickly grasped whatever he could, and at the same time caught the stumbling Tangmo in the nick of time, pulling her to his side.

"Luo’er, what do we do now?" Tangmo, leaning against him, asked, her eyes wide with fear.

Luo’er glanced at the malfunctioning anti-gravity engine, which was marked with scratches and chisel marks, the damages probably done by the dwarves when they tried to open the engine just after they had seized this place.

Luo’er remembered that just before embarking on their journey, Wang Xu had mentioned during his intelligence analysis of the High-peak people’s airboat that their anti-gravity engines were considered their utmost secret. Thus, whether it was a commercial airboat or a military airship, the anti-gravity engines were completely sealed – only they knew how to repair them. However, if the engine was forced open, the self-destruction mechanism within the engine would kick in to ensure no leakage of their technology.

Judging from the current circumstances, likely, the Zhuyan People who occupied the engine room didn’t know this, so they hastily tried to open the engine, subsequently triggering the explosion.

"Damn, why did the anti-gravity engine self-destruct!" Luo’er couldn’t help but mutter.

Hearing this, Tangmo glanced at the rune patterns connecting the central magic input device to the engine, then at the hole caused by the explosion in the anti-gravity engine. He hesitated before saying, "It must have gone into disarray!"

"Disarray!" Luo’er was taken aback, and then turned to look at her.

Disarray of runes was a key point in their magic theory classes. Runes had some resemblances to circuits, with the magic flowing through the engraved pattern, reaching each node, and thus producing different effects.

Typically, the simpler the pattern of the rune, the longer the activation time. If the pattern had more branches, the rune’s activation would be faster. However, not all runes needed to have more branches engraved.

Because the more branches there were, the more unstable the rune became. If a rune had a simple pattern and it was damaged, then the entire rune would become ineffective, which would be the best outcome for the user.

However, if it had too many branches, it would lead to more routes for magic to flow. If any one of the routes was damaged, then the magic could not flow through it, causing very serious rune disarray.

As mentioned before, the principle of runes was to allow magic to flow through the pattern, passing through each node to perform different functions. Too many branches meant that when a route was blocked, magic could not reach the downstream nodes to perform its functions.

If a simple route was blocked, then the entire rune would malfunction. However, if a node in a multi-branch rune failed to activate, while other nodes continued to do so, then the nature of the rune would change.

Luo’er remembered when he explained to Hu Daoke during the college competition, that if a node in a multi-branch rune failed while others continued to activate. Then the defensive rune could instantly turn into an explosive rune, blasting the intended target to smithereens.

In the Otherworld, assassin organizations would specifically train their assassins to modify the target’s runes, thereby producing the results they wanted. There were even some mages who made a living out of this, dedicating themselves to such harmful deeds.

Apparently, the High-peak people must have tampered with the interior of the anti-gravity engine’s casing. Once the casing was damaged by outside forces, it would cause the runes to go into disarray, thereby destroying the engine.

While the pair were lost in thought, the engine exploded again. This time, the left-hand side engine was utterly destroyed, causing the entire airboat to lean towards the left.

Luo’er knew this airboat was doomed to reach Ronisca now. If another engine was damaged, the airboat would no doubt crash. The only option left was to abandon the ship and escape via parachute.

"Go rendezvous with the three in the cockpit, then parachute out of here." Luo’er held onto Tangmo’s hand and ran out of the engine room. Just as they left, another explosion sounded from inside the room, causing the airboat to start shaking violently.

He pulled Tangmo along as they dashed towards the cockpit. Obviously, the Zhuyan People had no idea what had transpired, and were holding their ground. Thus, their way was clear.

The distance from the engine room to the cockpit wasn’t far. When they arrived, the three others had already taken control of the situation.

"We’re abandoning the airboat, prepare to parachute!" Luo’er pulled Tangmo and signaled the three of them to leave the cockpit and prepare to parachute out.

"What happened?" Hu Daoke asked, seeing the frantic expressions on their faces.

"The engine room exploded, this airboat is going to crash!" Luo’er stated solemnly.

"Damn, let’s get out of here then!" As soon as Hu Daoke heard that the airboat would crash, he immediately took off.

The team of five left the cockpit and wound up in the hallway, which was situated on one side of the airboat. If they climbed over the railing of the hallway, they could leave the airboat floating several thousand meters above ground.

"Wait a moment, Luo’er, I need to go back once!" Just when everyone was ready to parachute, Tangmo suddenly remembers something. She pulled Luo’er’s hand and anxiously said.