Card Apprentice Daily Log

Chapter 3096: The Audacity!

Date: Unspecified

Time: Unspecified

Location: Myriad Realms, Lil’ Red Storm Realm, Freedom Megalopolis

“Master spent considerable effort making him believe that he had found the truth,” Sansa looked at Dalia and said. “If we suddenly reveal strength beyond what he expects, the Snow Elven Crown Prince might realize that something is wrong.”

She glanced toward the frost-covered windows. “And if someone as cautious as him senses a trap before he commits to crossing over, he may abandon the Frost Elves rather than risk himself.”

“Don’t worry. I have studied the curse. He shouldn’t be able to sense the Celestial array formation,” Dalia said confidently. “I know what I’m doing.”

Then, after a brief pause, she added with unusual seriousness, “And I want this more than you or your Master.”

Despite her confidence, Dalia stopped operating the Celestial array formation. She had already achieved what she wanted.

The temperature of the realm had fallen low enough, and the environment surrounding Freedom City had changed sufficiently to encourage the Snow Elven Crown Prince to make his move. Continuing any further would only increase the chance of exposing something that her younger brother had worked hard to conceal.

Just as the last traces of the array’s fluctuations faded, the space above the Frost Elves began to vibrate violently. A loud tearing sound echoed through the hospital.

Riiip! Space split apart. A ten-foot spatial tear opened directly in the middle of the seventeen-foot-high hall, its edges twisting and distorting as an intense wave of frost energy poured out from the other side.

Then, a slender blue figure slowly stepped through. The moment he appeared, Sansa reacted and immediately relayed to Dalia, ‘That’s a clone of the Snow Elven Crown Prince putting on a show for us, the original is somewhere in the nearby void stalking us. Give me a few seconds, I will trace him, Your Highness.’

Dalia didn’t waste her time on the clone. The moment the Snow Elven Crown Prince’s duplicate fully entered the hospital, she activated the Celestial array formation again.

But this time, she didn’t alter the climate. The Frost Elves simply vanished. One moment, they were lying in their treatment chambers. The next, they had been transferred deep beneath the surface, into the crust of the Lil’ Red Storm Realm.

Dalia had placed an entire planet between the Crown Prince and the Frost Elves. If he wanted to reach them now, he would have to get through her first. If he wanted to leave, tough luck, he was trespassing. Her younger brother had paid a buttload to Demon Merchant Code to ensure that daring trespassers wouldn’t be able to use it to escape this part of the Myriad Realms easily.

Meanwhile, Sansa quietly disappeared into the background. Finding the original body was her responsibility. Dealing with the clone was Dalia’s.

The blue figure stepped onto the frost-covered floor. He didn’t even bother looking for the Half-Bloods. From the moment he arrived, his gaze had remained fixed on Dalia. His pale eyes slowly traveled across her body, carefully scrutinizing the mortal form standing before him.

“A Celestial manifesting in mortal form?” His expression carried more curiosity than fear. “Are you a newborn, or are you simply too bored?”

Dalia’s eyes narrowed. The clone continued as if completely unconcerned. “I was wondering how a couple of Ruler-class Devil Merchants managed to pull off something like this.”

His gaze sharpened as a faint smile appeared on his face. “Turns out an actual Celestial was backing and funding them.”

For the first time since stepping through the spatial tear, the clone glanced around the empty hospital.

His Frost Elves were gone. Yet he didn’t appear particularly concerned. Instead, his attention remained entirely on Dalia. It was as if confirming the existence of a Celestial was far more important to him than immediately recovering the experiment he had spent millennia creating.

Judging by the calculating look in his eyes, Dalia quickly realized that the clone wasn’t merely here as a distraction, nor had it crossed the Myriad Realms solely to gather information. It was here to determine exactly how much loot this trip could bring him. The audacity of it almost made her laugh.

The Snow Elven Crown Prince had apparently taken one look at her, judged her to be a newborn Celestial from some forgotten backwater of the Myriad Realms, and had already begun calculating how much he could gain from ending her.

He was completely disregarding her. The clone slowly looked around the hospital. Its gaze passed through the frost-covered walls and seemed to extend far beyond them, as though the physical barriers around it didn’t exist. It wasn’t searching for the Frost Elves.

It was inspecting the realm, evaluating its resources, its infrastructure, its inhabitants, and even its potential value. It couldn’t have been more obvious if he had taken out an appraisal sheet and started writing numbers. The Crown Prince was estimating the value of his loot before he had even secured victory.

Considering his strength and abilities, Dalia could understand why he wouldn’t put an average Celestial in his eyes. A Ruler-class existence capable of threatening and even killing Celestials had every reason to be confident.

But that didn’t make it any less irritating. Dalia’s lips twitched.

‘Fine.’ She thought. She could tolerate his arrogance for now.

After all, she couldn’t wait to see the expression on his face once she turned this arrogant son of a bitch into a Calamity Daughter Gem and started ordering him around.

The clone eventually finished inspecting its surroundings. Then it turned back toward Dalia, asking, “What have you been doing since your birth?”

Not waiting for Dalia’s reply, the clone looked at the barren state of the realm again before shaking its head. Having apparently finished judging the value of his future loot, the clone looked at Dalia with open disdain and remarked, “How can your realm be so barren? It’s my first time meeting a Celestial this lazy.”

For a moment, the hospital fell silent. Dalia stared at him. The clone stared back. Somewhere behind the walls, frost continued to spread. And Dalia found herself wondering whether turning him into a Calamity Daughter Gem would be enough.

Or whether she should first spend a little time teaching the Snow Elven Crown Prince exactly why a Celestial from a supposedly barren backwater was not something he should casually look down on.