[Zhongyingmei] Goblin Detective

In the absence of new information, even though everyone was preoccupied, the battle plan was still pushed forward according to the original arrangement.

Lindell arranged the delayed bomb. After firing the signal flare, he joined Steve and the others. Amidst the hail of bullets, the boy with golden eyes appeared behind the enemy like a ghost, swinging a series of bullets behind him.As if the law of gravity had no effect on him, Lindell fought back with his gun with superb gymnastics movements. Originally, his movements were extremely smooth, but after he emptied the bullet, he suddenly paused, and even retched a bit.

Steve kicked over an enemy who wanted to sneak attack: "Lindell, what's wrong?"

"Many people died here."

Lindell frowned and said: "There are a lot of people, although it is impossible to identify where those people come from..."

In the air, the smell of broken souls made him even choke. Obviously, this is one of the important sources of magic power for goblins, but if the dose of this kind of thing is too large, it is as if humans were drinking water desperately and caused water poisoning.

"Is it a human experiment?"

Bucky asked: "But according to our information, this place does not have the conditions to conduct relevant research... Whether it is from the analysis of power supply, or the deployment of those necessary research facilities, or the geographical environment of this place... ... No matter from that angle, it is impossible for Hydra to set up a test base here."

He himself was once captured by the other party, so he knows better what kind of consumables are needed to drive those devices. The place for this kind of human experiment is usually disguised as a military factory or built as a large underground facility, and it will never appear in the same place as here. Rugged mountains, but also very simple.

In the eyes of ordinary people who have nothing to do with magic power, there is nothing special in the air except for the smell of gunfire brought by the bullets and the dust caused by the battle.

There aren't even any by-products of those experiments here - like the destructive wendigo, and the Hydra garrison soldiers don't seem to have a clue what's hidden here.Lindell grabbed a soldier who hadn't been shot but had his weapon removed, and pressed his sharp nails against the other's neck: "What is the purpose of your stationing here?"

"I... I don't know! I just obey the order and stay here!"

The other party replied nervously, and then received Dugan's heavy gun butt in the abdomen: "Be honest!"

"He didn't lie, if it was a lie I could feel it."

Lindell shook his head: "But I don't know if memory is involved. There are too many things that can do memory manipulation in magic, and it can even be set to 'delete all related memories if this place is attacked'." A trigger-like level...tsk."

He looked around a little irritably: "This place makes me feel uncomfortable."

"There have been a few times before when Lindell was particularly aggressive during the mission, but at that time I thought it was because he hadn't adapted to teamwork..."

Bucky pressed his temples, and suddenly said in a heartfelt way: "Could it be that those places are the same as here—"

In the middle of speaking, he suddenly fell silent.

"But what does Hydra want so many dead people for?"

Dugan hasn't reacted yet: "Aren't they going to do human experiments to make humans live longer? Or is there something wrong with our previous cognition?"

"Anyway, retreat first."

Steve glanced at Lindell, and the face of the other party was already very bad. The physical features of the goblin and the appearance of the human overlapped each other, and the transparent thin scales on the back of the neck appeared and disappeared: "Your state is not suitable for staying here any longer. Already... the next question seems to need to be consulted with Mr. Crowley."

Lindell nodded, and did not refuse this kindness. Even the oxygen that human beings rely on for survival will cause drunken oxygen if they live in places with too high oxygen content, not to mention that what is diffused in the air is not Ava at all. It is not pure magical power like Long, but with all kinds of biased, human soul fragments.

It was overwhelming "death", and it was hard to imagine what kind of tragedy had happened here to form such a rich soul grave that could not be melted away.

"Hey, this..."

After returning to the camp, Crowley also felt a little unbelievable after hearing such a description: "Lindell, do you mean that you dare to say that more than tens of thousands of humans were killed in such a small area?"

"Correct."

The goblin boy nodded resolutely: "In the place where we broke into the last mission, the corpse was probably buried or burned, but no matter how the corpse is treated, the feeling of the soul will not change to me."

"That's weird, not like in the previous concentration camps, killing 'defectives' because they can no longer be used as tools in the arsenal, it feels like..."

The devil's golden vertical pupils glanced at everyone who was waiting for him to announce the answer: "It seems that their purpose is only to construct 'death'. Death with faith, death with despair, death full of hope... Death itself is no longer a result, but a process."

"What does it mean?"

Steve asked, "You mean, there's something else that HYDRA wants so badly...that requires a lot of death to make it happen?"

"That's right. Although this inference is very groundless, the absurdity of human beings is worthy of my thinking."

Crowley said: "This is not a problem that I can solve alone... I have to ask Aziraphale to come along, involving things like Miracles, and he knows more human classics than I do. "

The red-haired demon picked up a leaf from the ground and snapped his fingers. Soon the leaf was burnt by the fire of hell and turned into flying ash. Mr. Angel, buttoning up the windbreaker, appeared here in a hurry.

"What happened to Crowley? It's worth you using this encrypted communication to find me..."

Aziraphale paused, and turned to look at Steve and the others: "Oh, yes—Mr. Rogers! I'm glad to see you again, my God, you have grown so tall, and James and Lindell ... are you all here?"

"Although this has become your habit, I don't think you should even report this kid's height to the person above."

Crowley rolled his eyes: "Humanity has done something crazy this time... I want to seek some professional advice from you."

"Oh, professional advice, that really doesn't seem like something you'd say...well, I mean, I'd love to."

Aziraphale said, "So, what's going on?"

"Let's line up the strongholds that you solved before on the map."

Crowley ordered the members of the commando: "I hope my inference is wrong, this idea is too outrageous."

"This is the map."

Bucky spread out the huge battle contour map on the table, and then Crowley spread his huge wings, plucked a black feather and slashed across the air, the feather turned into a quill, and he handed the pen to In the hands of Lindell: "I'm not used to this kind of map of human beings, you can draw out the spiritual veins here."

"Ah."

The goblin itself is a creature with a keen sense of the earth's veins, and he has undergone systematic education-although the process is not so serious, but after Steve has repeatedly instilled it several times recently, the result is still passable-and he is good at this job .

Dugan held the chess pieces collected from the dormitory in his hand, and listed them one by one on the contour map.

"These are the strongholds we have destroyed."

Damm Duggan put down six of the black pieces: "The area is in this position... Oh, I guess it's not a coincidence?"

The falling position of the chess pieces overlapped with the direction of the leylines drawn by Lindell, and each piece landed precisely on the intersection point of the leylines. Even if Dugan had no knowledge of mysticism, he could learn from this From the analysis of the straightforward scene, these strongholds of Hydra have special meanings from the time they are set.

"But I remember that there is no special connection and commonality between these strongholds?"

Bucky crossed his arms and was a little puzzled: "There are not even communication equipment such as high-power antennas, and they are all built in relatively remote places."

"The special in the sense of mysticism has nothing in common with the strategic meaning in war. These places are all places where you can easily pry the leylines. If the places you break through are used as fortifications or military fortresses, there may be nothing special about them. But if the purpose of this place itself is not to be used for military affairs, but to be temporary magic workshops one after another..."

Crowley hissed and put on his big black sunglasses again: "Damn it, I don't know enough about human spells to figure out what it's for, I guess Lucifer can understand it , but there is a high probability that he is too lazy to talk to humans."

"That shouldn't be all."

Aziraphale analyzed: "You need to place all the remaining chess pieces."

"The remaining locations are not very sure, but according to intelligence, it should be these few."

Steve started to place the white chess pieces one by one on the contour map: "From the calculation in the report, if the direction of the ley lines drawn by Lindell is added to correct it, the remaining locations should be here, here And here..."

After the arrangement was complete, everyone fell into silence. This time, without Aziraphale's reminder, these soldiers were able to see what was on the map.

This is a black and white interlaced hexagram composed of twelve points.

"It may be more efficient if I can call other angels to help..."

Aziraphale thought for a while, and quickly cleared himself after meeting Crowley's gaze: "Of course, I should be able to do it alone, I just think this pattern is more like Metatron's category... Look, hexagram or something."

The hexagram is a characteristic pattern of Judaism, and it is also widely used in the field of occultism. Most magic circles have such elements in it, and even the logo "Star of David" used by the Nazis to distinguish Jews is also adopted. Hexagonal format.In the field of religion, Metatron is the secretary of the kingdom of heaven in the cognition of the Jewish mystical sect. Among the various religious explanations, it is said that he is responsible for teaching the souls of dead children.

Therefore, in addition to the King David, the six-pointed star is also one of the symbolic images of Metatron.

"Of course, we don't need to directly discuss Metatron itself, but focus on these locations..."

Aziraphale scratched his hair, the well-known symbol has this kind of problem, because it can be used in any field: "What used to flow in the leylines was pure magic (Mana), and so many corpses were suddenly buried It is difficult not to pollute the souls of unnatural deaths, so that kind of particularly delicate magic can basically be excluded, and to achieve this level, it must be a very rough method of use."

Even with 6000 years of divine experience, he is not a human magician after all.

"To change the way of thinking, maybe these souls themselves are only used as fuel or consumables. Think about whether there are any spells involving souls in large quantities-I know it's evil to say so, and you can't imagine it, but I personally suggest that you Don't make too many beautiful presuppositions for human beings."

Crowley spread his hands: "The more evil, reckless and chaotic the better, especially the kind of dangerous tricks that are not rich in magic but insist on achieving their goals. I guess they can't do without this idea."

"Chaos."

The Indian soldier with oil paint on his face first thought hard, and then raised his hand anxiously to ask: "If you say that, I know one... Although I don't have the magical power they said, but In our tribe, the inheritance of knowledge and traditions does not distinguish between people, but shamans can learn further, while ordinary people like us can only listen to some trivial legends."

As long as you promise to donate your soul after death, you will be able to obtain majestic magic power for use in life - this is the only information he has learned from legends. As for what kind of ceremony to use and how to sacrifice the soul According to the sacrifice, this Indian soldier is not a shaman in the tribe, so he knows nothing about it.

"It's just that the human body can't bear too much magic power, so this method will only bite back on yourself in the end. Most people who seek power from the sea of ​​​​chaos will end up with no good end."

The soldier shrugged and looked at the map full of chess pieces: "But since these people are all dead, there is no point in talking about the cost."

"The way to get a lot of magic power..."

Steve was lost in thought.

"Anything like this?"

Lindell thought about it for a second, and held his chin: "Then if I don't die... is this ritual applicable to creatures other than humans?"

"Lindell, don't say such worrying things."

Steve looked at him with a worried expression: "This doesn't sound like a safe and reliable method."

"..."

The other party's worries were genuine, so Lindell could only shake his head, saying that the soul form of goblins is different from that of humans, and there is a high probability that spells cannot be mixed.

"But if you think about it from the perspective of chaos magic, the technique is a hexagram..."

Aziraphale continued to think along this line of thought: "When you mention 'Chaos' (Chaos), what is your first reaction?"

"Hmm... the beginning of the universe?"

Bucky guessed.

"The first god in Greek mythology."

This is Duggan's inference.

"The Sea of ​​Chaos, this can be regarded as a source of magic power, but like Emperor Weishan, I am not familiar with those."

Crowley raised his eyebrows: "This should be the closest to the truth, right?"

"Well...well, Crowley's deduction is indeed the closest."

Aziraphale nodded approvingly: "But not enough."

When talking about the meaning of the word "Chaos", people in modern society often think of descriptions such as "chaos theory" or "chaos", but the root of the word χανω, which means cracks and gaps, tends to be more mysterious The scientific expression is "a hole in the void".

"Chaos magic—the way it provides magic power is also very simple. The essence is to drill a hole in the human soul. The hole connects to the sea of ​​chaos, and the high concentration of magic power will naturally penetrate into the human body with a lower concentration of magic power. To achieve the effect of providing magic power."

Aziraphale continued the analysis just now: "This kind of process cannot be controlled, and there is no way to adjust the threshold of magic power subjectively, so some people will die because they cannot bear too much force... But this only happens in What happens to a single human individual is very different from what happened in the Hydra base..."

He swallowed the word "massacre" with difficulty.

"Although I don't know how many humans they have killed, the number of souls that have increased exponentially is definitely not a simple ritual. Humans have a long-standing cultural tradition of using their lives as sacrifices. Most of them use livestock such as cattle and sheep, of course, it is not uncommon to consume living people..."

Crowley followed Aziraphale's words and continued to infer: "Connecting the leylines and consuming souls, this level of ritual, they want..."

"—open a hole?"

Steve said suddenly.

"Steve, honestly, this is not the time to do errands..."

Just as James was about to interrupt him, Crowley jumped up: "That's right, human boy! Your inference is very likely, those guys, Hydra... Maybe they plan to use the power of these souls , to open a hole in the concept of the world."

This was such an absurd and crazy plan that Crowley himself seemed dubious.

If the existing three-dimensional universe is regarded as a balloon, human beings can be said to live on the surface side of the world, while concepts such as "Sea of ​​Stars", "Fairy Township" or "Avalon" are located on the inside side of the world.The world on the surface has a low concentration of magic power, highly developed industries, and is suitable for human habitation, while the world on the inside is a place where the concentration of magic power is so high that humans cannot survive.

According to Fick's first law of diffusion, the determinant of diffusion is the concentration gradient, and the flow of magic power also follows a similar law, and if the barrier between the surface and the inside is rashly broken down, it will be useless for human beings. Doubt is an unwarranted disaster.

"That's impossible, Crowley!"

Aziraphale exclaimed, "That would take a very, very large amount of magic to do—"

"How many people do you think they killed in this war?"

Crowley folded his arms and squinted back.

Everyone fell silent.