Chapter 600 – Reverse-Spatial Shackle

This door served only to mark the location of the entrance. The door being open did not mean the entrance was also open.

The true entrance had always been under Mo Lan’s control, opening only for those she permitted.

For the Light-Shadow Sprites, even when this door stood open, the entrance remained closed — not only would it deny them passage, it would even trap them.

Mo Lan had turned a blind eye to the Light-Shadow Sprites that had fiddled with the candy machine all last night to no avail and left with only a few sample candies. She’d even been happy to let that happen. But the Gem Coin distribution room, which had been set up as a safe house, absolutely could not allow Light-Shadow Sprites to enter.

She would kill every single one that came, letting the Angels know that trying to break into this room using Light-Shadow Sprites was utterly impossible. If they wanted to come, they should come themselves.

What blocked the Light-Shadow Sprites was transparent magical energy. The witches already inside the room had also witnessed Mo Lan’s swift elimination of the Light-Shadow Sprite outside the door.

The moment Mo Lan stepped inside, they crowded around her, asking what kind of magic circle had captured the Light-Shadow Sprite.

“Light-Shadow Sprites are impossible to guard against. When they hide in light, unless they reveal themselves voluntarily, there’s absolutely no way to detect them. And yet they have terrible personalities, always causing destruction. From my very first day entering the Sacred Mountains, I’ve been sick of these little nuisances!

Back when I was a freshly graduated rookie Witch, I heard about the benefits of Holy Light, prepared my supplies, and dove headfirst into the Sacred Mountains.

On my very first day in the mountains, the Light-Shadow Sprites stole every last bit of my supplies.

If I hadn’t copied 《Encyclopedia of Sacred Creatures》 into my Grimoire and used it to identify which plants and magical beasts were edible, I would have had to fly to the Holy City on an empty stomach.

Even then, along the way, whether it was wild fruit I’d gathered or magical beast meat I’d hunted, if I didn’t keep my eyes on it constantly, it would vanish in the blink of an eye.

When I finally settled down in the Holy City, the Light-Shadow Sprites still came to harass me every few days.

Countless times they shattered my beloved tea sets, tore up my manuscripts, toppled bookshelves in my shop, and stained my carpets… If I weren’t skilled in Household Magic and could quickly restore broken or disordered things, even if I could withstand the influence of Holy Light, they would have driven me to the brink of madness.

Even now, my shop still loses the occasional teacup or blanket or something.”

Whenever Garona spoke of Light-Shadow Sprites, she gnashed her teeth with hatred:

“Honestly, the Light-Shadow Sprites’ mischief actually contributed greatly to my resistance against the assimilation of Holy Light. Every time I discovered they’d been causing havoc in my shop again, I wanted nothing more than to catch them and tear them limb from limb!”

The other witches had similar experiences.

After listening, Mo Lan was somewhat puzzled. “How come I’ve never encountered them?”

She had been in the Holy City for quite some time now, and before last night, no Light-Shadow Sprites had ever come to bother her.

“Probably because you look like you’re actively trying to embrace the light, unlike us rebellious types who resist Holy Light!” Garona said. “Light-Shadow Sprites have always only been this hostile toward those of us who don’t fit in with the Holy City’s Hermits. Among the Hermits, their reputation is actually quite good — apparently, Hermits even occasionally receive gifts from the Light-Shadow Sprites! They call them ‘spirits of the light.'”

Mo Lan understood. From the moment she entered the Sacred Mountains, she had styled her appearance to align with the Angels’ aesthetics.

The Angels’ aesthetics were the Hermits’ aesthetics.

Although she had always been close to the witches, in order to make contact with the Hermits, aside from reading a few novels from Garona’s collection, she had never employed the same methods as the witches — wearing vibrant clothes, trading barbs with the Hermits, and other such ways of amplifying her emotional fluctuations.

Instead, she would search through the Earth memories in her mind each day, finding a dramatic segment of a human life to review. It was fast-acting and discreet, more than enough to keep her unaffected by Holy Light. In the Light-Shadow Sprites’ eyes, she was probably a future Hermit — someone who would inevitably become one of them sooner or later.

“But you probably won’t enjoy that treatment anymore.” Garona glanced toward the doorway, where Mo Lan had just killed a Light-Shadow Sprite. That was surely enough to earn their hostility.

“…” Mo Lan said, “Let them come. If they get too annoying, I’ll just set up a Reverse-Spatial Shackle magic circle on the outer doors and windows too.”

“Reverse-Spatial Shackle magic circle?” Garona found the name somewhat unfamiliar.

Although she wasn’t skilled in Alchemy Magic, she was no stranger to Witch Magic items and magic circles.

After all, even if you couldn’t make them yourself, you still needed to know what was useful, right?

“It’s a spatial-type magic circle I developed by combining Witch Alchemy Magic with human Alchemy,” Mo Lan said.

This magic circle required a certain degree of Spatial Magic talent, as well as Peak level Alchemy Magic and Alchemy skills to produce.

The witches of the Eight-Times-Speed Gossip Alliance were all White Witches, with none skilled in Alchemy Magic. Even if she gave them the blueprints, they would have great difficulty crafting one.

At the moment, it was also inconvenient for Mo Lan to summon the Book of Cards to turn these magic circles into cards for sale.

However, she had originally crafted several extra sets of magic circles, intending to give them to the witches.

Although the Angels had withdrawn from the Holy City and relinquished its governance, they had been secretly monitoring the area through Light-Shadow Sprites. Additional protection would be better for everyone.

Mo Lan produced several magic Crystal plates and handed them over. “Place these in your homes. Anyone who isn’t permitted won’t be able to enter, and anyone who tries to force their way in will be captured by the magic circle. It can block any attack below Peak level.

However, it only has defensive and intruder-capture functions. It can’t block scrying magic that penetrates through solid matter. The phantom manifestation magic circle that prevents scrying in the safe house requires a mage’s psychic illusion magic to activate, so I won’t be giving you those.”

Although the witches had looked after her in every way during this time, the truth was that among them, Garona — the highest-ranked — was only at Peak level.

The others were only Advanced Witches, and Camilla and Evelyn were merely Intermediate.

Magic circles of this caliber were already extremely precious to them — more than sufficient to serve as a defensive magic formation for a Witch’s home.

For a moment, not a single person dared to accept.

It was no joke — their combined entire net worth probably couldn’t even afford one of these magic circles.

By now, Mo Lan was well acquainted with the witches’ habits, and she said directly, “Fifty thousand Gem Coins each. I’m selling them to you at cost. You can buy on credit.”

Fifty thousand Gem Coins was merely the material cost of the magic circle.

With that, the witches accepted without hesitation.

Even Camilla and Evelyn, through day after day of steady saving, had each accumulated over ten thousand Gem Coins.

Fifty thousand Gem Coins was more than they could produce at the moment, but they could pay it back in time. Buying on credit was no burden at all.