Leaving the site, Shiro glanced back and saw the entire place collapsing on itself while the surrounding adventurers could only look on in confusion.
"I'm guessing you managed to get the information that you wanted otherwise you wouldn't destroy the anchor like that." Nan Tian chuckled as Shiro nodded her head.
"Yeah, and let's just say it's not exactly the best news. While I understand a bit of what's happening, I'm still confused about some parts." Shiro replied with a sigh.
"I'll tell you about what I know so far."
Explaining to them about how a queen is 'created', why they need anchors, the uses of the anchors and the goal of the age of demons and gods, Shiro watched as Nan Tian fell silent.
Scratching his head, he shrugged his shoulders.
"Seems like you got quite a few things laid out for you to do."
"Indeed. Say, do you think I need anchors myself? I know that the anchors are used as tickets for the queens but I'm already in this world so I don't need the ticket. At the same time, I need to dominate the world and the anchors are what I need to extend my 'influence'." Shiro frowned.
"Well you've just basically answered your own question then haven't you?" Nan Tian smiled.
"Let me rephrase then. How would I place down and anchor? All I know so far is that the queens are given a map by the system and wherever they choose on the map will become the location of their anchor. She didn't say anything about how to place one down manually." Shiro frowned.
"Hmm… that is a worry. Perhaps you'll get an option similar to that when the age starts? I mean, you're basically granted a free pass to enter the new age so I don't see why you need to place down anchors right now." Nan tian replied as Shiro nodded her head.
"I suppose being able to place anchors around all the major cities to increase my influence would be unfair. However, now that I think of it, I don't even know what it means by 'influence'. I should have asked her about that as well." Shiro frowned and sighed softly.
"There will probably be more chances for you to find more queens to question later. Let's not be too hasty now."
"Speaking of being hasty, I never figured out why the demons are coming here." Shiro said while turning her head towards the direction of where the demons are approaching from.
"Should we stick around for a bit more then?" Nan Tian asked.
Thinking about it for a moment, Shiro nodded her head.
"That would be good. Plus, I'm also curious about the guy that you met earlier. You said that since he is interfering with this, the site might have more dangers than what it seems. However, so far, there's been nothing of that kind."
"That's a good point. It's a bit too peaceful and it's not like that guy's style at all. If anything, we should have been surrounded by explosions and things trying to kill us right now but there��s nothing of the sort." Nan Tian frowned as Shiro nodded her head.
"In that case then how about this. I'll set down a few cameras around this area along with a teleport node so that we can get back quickly. The moment we detect anything that's 'off', we'll come back." Shiro suggested with a smile.
"sure, that sounds good." Nan Tian agreed.
Hearing this, Shiro started to make a few cameras along with some scanners to detect the average mana density. If the values suddenly increase, she'll know that something is up.
Creating a few drones that have the camouflage function, she had them carry the cameras across the current site. Once the cameras were in place, she snapped her finger and destroyed all the drones since she had no more use for them.
"Estrella." Shiro called out and summoned Estrella out from the mana realm.
"You called Empress?" Estrella bowed.
"I need you to make a teleport node in this current spot."
"Understood.��� Nodding her head, Estrella waved her hand and a tier 5 magic circle was once again branded into the air and faded away. Creating a second magic circle on a rock, she handed it to Shiro before disappearing back into her mana realm.
After all, she had already explained to Shiro how to use the teleport node.
"Right then, shall we go to where the demons are?" Shiro smiled.
"Sure. Though we do need to 'report' back to the guild with what we found." Nan Tian chuckled since he doubted that Shiro would even bother.
"They got other people to report back their findings." Shiro waved her hand nonchalantly. There's no point in giving the guild of this city the information about the anchors since there's nothing that they can do to begin with.
If anything, she would rather tell her parents about this when she meets them since she could at least guarantee that people would take the information seriously. Hell, even having Keomi know about this would work since she's publicly known as a hero. Compared to what her parents or her cousin could do with this information, the guild of this city would just be a waste of effort.
"Fair enough." Nan Tian smiled.
Putting the stone in her inventory for now, the trio started to make their way towards where the demons are.
###
"Hou… They actually destroyed the anchor. Well, that certainly makes things easier for me." A figure chuckled as he watched the anchor site collapse in on itself.
Should Nan Tian be here, he'd recognise this man to be the owner of the avatar that he had killed earlier.
"Without a queen and an anchor, this is a perfect spot for her majesty." He smiled and pulled out a small crystal from his hands.
He wasn't going to make a new anchor immediately since Nan Tian was still close by. He was going to wait a while so that he could achieve his secondary goal of the operation. After all, the demons were here for a reason,
###
Making their way across the wasteland, the city slowly disappeared in the distance.
Looking down on her phone, Shiro wondered how far away the battlefield was since they've been travelling for quite a while.
However, her question was soon answered when she came across a field of corpses. Furrowing her brows, Shiro couldn't help but notice that it was similar to a mutual destruction.
There were no survivors on either side.
"That's odd…" Shiro muttered while landing on the ground.
Crouching near a corpse, she started to examine their wounds and compare it to the corpses around it to see if they match.
Immediately, she realised that the wounds were strange. There were puncture holes all over the adventurer's body and parts of him seem to have been drained of its contents.
Bones and organs were liquified partially. It was almost as if it was done to make it easier for something to drink out of them like a juice carton.
Narrowing her eyes, Shiro started to compare this type of wound with the monsters that she remembers in her database.
A few similar records could be found but there was nothing that matched as she would have hoped.
"I don't know what kind of monster could do something like this. Do you know?" Shiro asked.
"I got a few ideas and I don't like any of them. Considering the background of the guy I mentioned, this could become a national disaster if left unattended." He replied with a serious frown.
"Wait what?" Shiro paused in surprise. While she didn't know exactly what a national disaster contained, just the name itself gave her an idea.
As she was still only a level 200, despite having the power to fight against some A class beings, she wasn't too excited about facing something that could become a national disaster.
"Don't worry about it too much though. If it was indeed national disaster level, we wouldn't even see corpses right now. It should still just be a juvenile if I'm not wrong." Nan Tian smiled and pressed his hand against the ground.
Closing his eyes, he sent out a pulse of mana.
Suddenly, hundreds upon hundreds of glowing spots could be seen far below the ground.
"Well… this is certainly out of expectations. I thought I'd see one or two but instead, we have an entire hive. The man must have really put an emphasis on this location." Nan Tian narrowed his eyes.
"What are they?" Shiro asked curiously.
"Vampiric Death Worms."
Upon hearing the name, Shiro's pupils constricted since she remembered the appearance of one in Japan when she was still Kuromi.