Chapter 126

Chapter 126

"It's me."

Damien's low, slightly cold voice made Kaida feel dazed for a moment.

She cleared her throat before speaking. "I heard you were looking for me. You want to know how to activate the Celestial Stone?"

"That's right."

"Well, there's nothing I can do about that. I don't know how to activate it either. Why don't you ask my uncle?" Kaida's playful voice came through.

Damien rubbed his temples in resignation. Finding Harold wasn't much easier than finding the Celestial Stone.

After hanging up on Kaida, Damien had no choice but to put the Celestial Stone away for now.

At the same time, he asked Mostad to look into whether there was any way to activate it.

Still, what Damien was actually more curious about was what the people from Celestial Temple had done to those bodies.

He had buried the Mordell family members himself and hadn't noticed anything suspicious on the bodies. He couldn't figure out why Celestial Temple had felt the need to go there at all.

Damien reached out to Eloise again and asked her to help confirm who had gone to the Mordell family's location this time.

Eloise sent over a photo shortly after.

It was Mia.

Damien's first thought was that she had to be using her poison insects for something. This woman had mastered the use of poison insects to a degree that rivaled even Mostad.

He had someone bring Verity in, then shot Mostad a look. "Check her over. See if anyone's planted poison insects in her."

Mostad took Verity to his office.

"There are no poison insects in her body, but there are signs that insects did enter her at some point. They were memory insects, nothing more."

"These creatures are incredibly hard to keep alive. To cultivate the strongest memory insects, you have to let them fight each other to the death. The last one standing absorbs all the others. Whoever raised these insects is no amateur."

As Mostad explained the origins of memory insects, Verity's skin crawled at the thought that such creatures had once been inside her body.

Damien, meanwhile, was starting to piece things together. Celestial Temple had managed to locate the Mordell family before him — clearly because they had extracted Verity's memories. Now that Mia had shown up again, she was probably trying to use the insects to pull information about the Celestial Stone from the corpses.

But could memories really be extracted from a dead body? Damien had his doubts.

"This is terrifying. It's absolutely terrifying."

Verity wrapped her arms tightly around herself, once again struck by just how dangerous the outside world was.

"Don't worry. They'll leave you alone now. They've probably already gotten everything they needed from you — you're no use to them anymore." Mostad gave her a reassuring smile.

Damien ignored the two of them and walked out, turning his next move over in his mind.

Mona happened to be coming his way and asked what he was planning to do.

"I'll probably head to Crescent City. That's where most of the rare herbs are."

Ghosthand had mentioned before that Wraith Grass only grew in Crescent City, so he had to make the trip.

"Then I'm coming with you," Mona said.

"I'm going there to get things done. I can't be looking out for you the whole time."

Damien glanced at her, and remembering Eloise's warning, he advised her to stay put.

"I can take care of myself. And if you won't take me, I'll just go on my own. Crescent City doesn't belong to you."

With that, Mona rolled her eyes and turned to leave. Damien gave in — going with him was still a lot safer than her going alone.

Over at Celestial Temple, they had already tracked down Crescent City. White sent people ahead, ordering them to get the Wraith Grass before Damien did.

"We still don't know where the Celestial Stone is. We absolutely cannot let Damien get his hands on the Wraith Grass too." White said through gritted teeth.

"Bavich, I'm giving you one more chance. If you mess this up again..."

Before White could finish, Bavich dropped to one knee. "I accept whatever punishment the Divine King sees fit!"

"Then go put that newly modified brain of yours to good use." White looked at Bavich with a cold smile.

Bavich was desperate to redeem himself. When he left, his face carried the look of someone who had nothing left to lose.

Meanwhile, Mia had finally tracked down a lead on the Celestial Stone through her insects.

Just as Verity had told Damien, the Celestial Stone had been taken by Selena, the Mordell family's sacred maiden, twenty years ago. Its current whereabouts were unknown.

Mia was furious. After all that digging, she hadn't found any of the Mordell family members who had escaped, and the one lead she'd managed to get on the Celestial Stone turned out to be completely useless. It was enough to make anyone's blood boil.

She had nowhere to direct her anger when Monty walked back in.

He had spent this whole time trying to get close to Damien or someone in his circle. From the look on his face, he had clearly failed.

"That poison insect master of Damien's is something else. I'm no match for him." Monty said, deflated.

Mia's expression went cold. "Useless. Go back to Celestial Temple and report to the Divine King."

On the other side, Damien was getting ready to leave for Crescent City.

"I could bring Faye and come with you. You wouldn't have to worry about us." Damien had just come back and was already leaving again. Sophia hated to see him go and wanted to come along.

"Be good. This trip could get dangerous, and I'll feel better knowing you're both safe in New York. Besides, someone has to keep Lucky Company running."

At the mention of Lucky Company, Sophia knew she couldn't be away for too long. But seeing Mona standing at Damien's side still left a bitter feeling in her chest.

"I'll come straight back once I find the Wraith Grass. It won't take long. You and Faye stay home and wait for me."

With that, Damien pressed a kiss to both Sophia's and Faye's foreheads.

Just then, Mostad quickly slipped a note into Damien's hand.

"Since you're making the trip anyway, bring back as many rare herbs as you can. A lot of them can only be found in Crescent City."

Mostad said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Damien shook his head and tucked the note into his pocket.

"In the meantime, try to bring on more help. The Electromagnetic Shield works well, but it doesn't last long enough. If we could upgrade it and develop more advanced tech weapons, we'd have nothing to fear from Celestial Temple." Damien turned to Ghosthand and said.

"Don't worry, boss. I'll handle it." Ghosthand replied.

"One more thing — be careful. Crescent City doesn't let outsiders in freely. Anyone who wants to enter has to take a special drug they've developed."

"Apparently it makes you lose control of your body, which is why most people don't even bother trying to get in."

Ghosthand shared everything he had dug up over the past while.

"That actually sounds a bit like something Celestial Temple would come up with." Damien said with an amused smile, though his expression quickly turned serious again.

"I won't just walk in without a plan. I'll find a way to get a sample first and send it back. Mostad, you can start working on an antidote now."

With that, Damien looked over at Mostad.

He wasn't about to take any unnecessary risks.

Mostad gave a firm nod, and with that, Damien boarded the plane with his people.

At the same time, on a cruise ship, a thin man lay slumped on the deck, soaking wet, coughing violently.