Chapter 366: Who Said That Fakes Can't Surpass The Genuine?

Although the hidden hand was supposed to react to Edward’s theory, nothing actually happened after Edward’s loud declaration.

The air turned awkward at once.

But just as Joe and the others assumed that he had it wrong, Edward continued, “You’re not showing up, huh? That’s expected. If that’s the case…”

Grinning, he turned and started walking, telling his party members when he passed them, “Let’s return to the entrance and leave this place.”

The others first did a double take, but the smarter ones such as Jessica and Princess Leah quickly caught on to Edward’s idea and followed him quietly.

While Joe and Gou Dan found Edward’s words rather bizarre just then, they did not ask questions after having built a bond of absolute trust with him and immediately kept up with Edward.

In truth, it was a test of logic that was not quite hard.

Since Edward and the others arrived at the Steel Earth Stratum with the Steel Earth Key, there should not be an entrance reasonably speaking. If they want to leave, they only need to teleport back to their respawn point, and would not have to go through the entrance.

Although that was common sense for the Players, the hidden hand did not know that!

Therefore, when Edward and the others pretended as if they were about to leave to put his theory into the test, the air around them changed.

Unwittingly, a flock of teapots slowly encircled them, although the names over their heads were still yellow in color, and had not changed to the red that indicates them as an enemy.

Then, a humanlike figure several screens that resembled billboards hanging over buildings, but the person’s face can’t be seen because the light of the background was too bright. “¥% @#&*…”

The figure then began to speak in a language Edward and the others could not understand -it sounded like elven but had a completely different rhythm to it, and was mystically beautiful as if it was a song sung by the children of a sacred choir.

“Could it be high elven? We can’t communicate with the language barrier…”

Joe scratched his head, realizing that they had a problem—they could not communicate with the figure even though Edward had managed to trick them into revealing themselves.

“No, it understands human language, although it could not speak it because it lacks the ability.” Princess Leah quickly picked up on what was unusual about the matter.

After all, if the figure could not understand human language, it would not have known what Edward and the others were doing when he pretended that they were about to leave, and would instead choose to keep hiding.

And since it revealed itself, it was clear that the figure could understand human language but could not speak it for some reason.

“Probably because of discrimination.” Edward hit the nail on the head immediately. “The Elven Synchronized Intellect Nation (SIN) is made at the height of the high elves’ power, and being an extremely ethnocentric race, they would belittle everyone, even other supernatural species, let alone a weak mortal race like humans. Since that thing is a creation or consciousness that the high elves left behind before their extinction, it wouldn’t surprising if it behaves in the same stinking way like the high elves.”

And as if on cue, once Edward had a dig at the high elves, the figure in the screens spoke again.

This time, it was no longer using its singsong language, but a jerky, unusual accent of the human tongue.

“The high elves… are extinct?” “Their whole race had been dead for over a thousand years. Don’t you even know that?” Joe replied. “I see. To think that something actually happened.” The figure sighed heavily. “…And here I thought that they had merely abandoned me.”

“And what does that have to do with not letting us leave?” Gou Dan asked in confusion. “Instead of stopping invaders like us from departing, shouldn’t you be attacking us from the start?”

Jessica punched Gou Dan just then, since his words were aimed straight at a sore spot for the figure—what if the other side was provoked and they immediately started fighting? They did not even know where the true form of the figure was…

“While your group are not the high elves who were my masters, you hold their scent and are therefore guests, not enemies.” The figure said calmly, before realizing with a start and introduced itself. “My Name is Iron Commandment. I am the guardian and overseer of this stratum, in service of the high elves and their guests.”

Although Edward’s group certainly had no idea why they would have the scent of the high elves, we would have to rewind time, and return to the moment when they obtained the Steel Earth Key in the Dark Sky Stratum to talk about it.

At the time, Xi Wei had promptly taken away their key, studied it and made them a counterfeit.

While many would feel that fake would not match the real, the key that Xi Wei confiscated was definitely better than the fake one he made.Well, fine-it was actually true that the real key was much stronger than the weak one Xi Wei made.

That being said, the problem here was that the real key was useless for Edward and the others, who were humans and did not have any high-elf blood in them. They would never activate it or use its power to open the ‘door’ in Dark Sky that was connected to Steel Earth.

Instead, Xi Wei had adapted the fake key so that it would verify faith instead of bloodline, and any Player of his church would be able to use the key and enter Steel Earth.

Be that as it may, while Xi Wei could use brute force to break the safety measures that the high elves kept between Dark Sky and Steel Earth, he quickly picked the simpler way after deciding that brute force would consume his divine power: by adding the scent of high elves on the Players’ body, fooling the safety measures and allowing them to enter Steel Earth directly.

That was why Iron Commandment, overseer of the fourth stratum identified Edward’s group as guests when they should have been enemies. It afforded them food and water and did not attack them at all, even protecting them secretly.

Naturally, Edward and the others were not aware of that fact, although they more or less had a hunch that it was thanks to the protection of Xi Wei, God of Games, and naturally admired their own patron deity even more.

Still, they could have had a good talk with Iron Commandment and clear the fourth stratum without a fight.

However, after it had survived through untold centuries in eternal solitude, Iron Commandment had developed a few bugs, and didn’t seem too keen about letting such rare guests to leave…