Chapter 431 - 425 : The Secret Of The Temple

*Creak* 

*Bang*

The old wooden door was forced open as a ray of light shone in from the other side.

"Another dud." Sato sighed as he glanced at the interior to witness an empty room.

Of the 16 pathways present in the large hall, Sato had already been in 13 of them, including the one he came from. If this one were to be counted, it would be 14 different doors.

Apart from some of them being empty, like this one, the rest either had random items -like furniture, scrolls, candlesticks, and other ritual items- or had brown coloured treasure chests which signified the Mortal rank.

Usually, a player would be happy at the sight of a treasure chest but that only depends on the quality and items within the said chest. But the same didn't hold true here. 

For the ones Sato had found, they were either filled with low-level items and equipment that was barely of any use to him, or they contained a few silver coins. While all the items were of monetary value, Sato was hoping to find something that would be particularly useful to him, like a forging material or maybe another blueprint. The only exception to the repetitive rewards was a certain object Sato had obtained that seemed to have a specific value here.

[[ System interface :

Cross-Dimensional Barrier Breaking Shard (Incomplete)

System description : An Appraiser would be needed for more information. ]]

That was the special object he had obtained from some of the treasure chests in the rooms. Compared to the title of the item, the form of the object was very deceiving. It had the appearance of a ripped piece of navy blue paper but much larger in size. At a closer look, what seemed to be coloured ink would be spotted on the piece of paper. This made Sato think that it was a part of a painting, and if not for the description, he would have taken it as such and sold it once he returned to the city.

Of the [Cross-Dimensional Barrier Breaking Shard (Incomplete)], Sato had managed to collect 5 parts and as he brought them together, he realized that they came from the source. In other words, they were one and the same object, just torn into different parts and distributed into the different rooms. As for why this was done, Sato didn't know. All he managed to figure out was that there were 2 more pieces remaining for the "painting" to be completed. 

From the ones he had managed to piece together so far, Sato realised that it wasn't a painting of any lifeform or object, but an abstract painting with no solid reference.

'The name sounds cool but I don't even know what use this is.' Sato glanced into his space ring as he walked towards the 15th door.

The last two doors were located in opposite directions, with one being by the left and the other by the right. Since Sato had started with the door closest to the statue, he ended up reaching the doors closest to the odious mural, specifically the one by the right.

"Alright. Hopefully, I will find something here." Sato sighed.

He proceeded to open the door and was greeted with the sight of a silver coloured chest.

"At least it's a Rare-Steel ranked chest." Sato cheered himself up as he approached the chest.

It didn't have a magic lock so he was able to open it using the normal method most common amongst players, which was the [Unlock] basic skill.

*Click*

Once the timer for the chest was down, the lock opened up with a click and Sato was able to view its contents.

"A spell scroll, a level 10 Low-tier Mortal rank cloth armour, 3,4 silver coins, and the usual piece of paper. The gains this time around are a lot better than the others." 

After emptying the chest and storing its contents into his ring, Sato left the room and headed for the last one. Similar to the rest, he found a Mortal rank chest in the last room which only contained a few random items that were useless to him as well as the last remaining shard.

'It seems like there's really nothing special about this place.' Sato sighed as he departed from the last room.

'I wonder what these are though.' 

Extracting the 7 torn pieces, Sato began arranging them in the right order till he was able to produce the complete masterpiece.

Just as Sato was about to take a proper glance at the end product, the painting suddenly glowed azure before it dashed out of his hands towards the mural on the wall.

'The heck?' 

Confused, Sato turned behind to glance at the strangely acting painting.

Suspended in mid-air was the complete 'painting', hovering just in front of the huge mural. It was as if the painting was weightless at that moment and impetuous to the law known as gravity.

*Whoosh*

Suddenly, a suction force appeared from behind the painting, or to be exact, the fiend in the mural. The exact point f the suction force was the fiend's mouth, which at an unknown point in time, had opened wide to reveal a 'blackhole'. 

The painting in front was unaffected by the suction force but the same couldn't be said about Sato.

"Shit." 

Cursing his luck, Sato hurriedly retreated away from the range of the suction force as he felt it become more powerful. It was only until he was at a distance of about 5 metres that he became unaffected by the force.

"What the heck was that?"

Ever since the painting was completed, Sato had been receiving one shock after the other. First was the painting suddenly approaching the mural of its own volition, then the suction force, and finally, the fact that the mural of a demonic figure with a closed mouth suddenly happened to open its mouth to suck in the surrounding mana and air towards the mural. All of these, if told in the real world, would make him sound like a psycho. Luckily, this was a VR world so anything was possible.

'Still, this should be beyond some of the natural rules.' Sato couldn't help but complain.

*Phew*

A sharp sound drew his attention as a white bean appeared out of nowhere and struck the painting in mid-air.

'No, it's not out of nowhere.' 

Sato abruptly turned behind and discovered that the source of the white beam was actually the black statue at the other end of the hall. At some point in time, its eyes had begun glowing white as a white ray of light streamed from it, towards the painting.

The painting absorbed the ray and began to liquify in a strange manner, such that its physical state became stuck in between a solid-state and a liquid state, or in simpler terms, it became a semi-solid.

Slowly, the 'melted' painting began to enlarge in size as it absorbed more of the white ray streaming in alongside the mana being sent into it by the suction force from the demonic head. Only when it became 6 metres in both length and height did the painting stop enlarging. At the same time, the suction force from the mural disappeared while the white ray from the black statue dispersed.

'Looks like, it's done.' Sato remained away from the painting as he scrutinized it for any further changes.

The painting wasn't like it was before; it looked more like a condensed black nebula but also like a plate that was formed from a black glossy jelly. It remained motionless in mid-air as it gave off a mysterious sensation and a strange sense of beauty at first glance.

*Crack*

Just as Sato was considering approaching it, a crack formed on the 'plate' and an unimaginable event, something that Sato would never have expected, took place.