Struggle in the Steam Age

According to the location detected just now, Lawrence went down the creaking wooden stairs to the first floor, and then walked through a dim corridor to the door of the room closest to the outer wall.

This is too dirty. Lawrence frowned after arriving at the destination. He found that the wooden door in front of him was greasy and dirty, with thick dust accumulated in the cracks of the door, and some dusty spider webs Glue on top. It looked like the door hadn't been opened in a long time.

Enduring the nausea in his heart, Lawrence kicked open the door in front of him. What I didn't expect was that the hinge of the door was completely rusted due to long-term inactivity, so the whole door fell into the room after stepping down.

Bang. After the door panel fell to the ground, a lot of dust was stirred up. Lawrence quickly ducked to the side to avoid the dust pouring out of the room. Because the whole room was not ventilated, it took five or six minutes for most of the dust in the room to fall on the ground. Only then did he walk to the door and see the situation in the room clearly through the light outside the door.

The room seemed to be a storage room. There were several empty wooden shelves in the room. One of the legs of one of the shelves was damaged by insects or rats, and the whole fell to the ground. Other than that, the whole house was empty, with nothing but dust all over the floor.

It feels like no one has come to this place for a long time. Who would put things here? Lawrence thought about releasing the [Detection Magic] magic again.

In an instant, a dim magical aura appeared in the dusty clearing. After seeing the light, Lawrence quickly walked a few steps to the front of it, and then used his feet to push away the thick dust covering the ground.

Below the dust was a floor made of red tiles, but Lawrence didn't notice any difference between the glowing floor and the surrounding floors.

Do you want to dig it down? Lawrence thought about unloading a piece of wood from the broken shelf next to him, and then began to pry up the bricks at the place where the magical aura appeared just now.

He first pried open the bricks on the ground, then knelt on the ground and began to use the thin wooden boards on the broken shelf as a shovel to clean the layer of cinders under the bricks to prevent moisture.

After more than an hour, Lawrence, who had been dug up, sat down on the ground regardless of the surrounding dust. After cleaning up the cinders just now, he opened a washbasin-sized hole in the rammed earth layer mixed with lime below. As a result, nothing suspicious was found until the raw soil layer was dug.

Where is that thing? After resting for a few minutes, Lawrence released [Detection Magic] on the ground again. As a result, he was surprised to find that the magical aura that was still here just now had disappeared.

Is what I discovered just now some kind of extraordinary creature? Lawrence frowned. But if it is a living thing, it should leave traces in the room, but when I came in just now, I noticed that there were no traces in the room.

Let's look for it, maybe that guy hasn't run away yet. Thinking of this, he stood up and patted the ashes on his body, and then tried to use [Detect Magic] to explore the magic reaction around him. As a result, when the magic range spread to the pile of construction waste that had just been dug out, a cloud of magical aura appeared again.

Huh? Lawrence immediately walked towards the pile of construction waste, only to find that the magical light emanated from an ordinary red brick that had just been laid on the ground. If there is any difference, it can only be said that there is a strange crack on the top of this brick.

What kind of treasure is this? Lawrence held up the brick in front of his eyes curiously, and found that there was no difference between this brick and ordinary bricks. Complete, with a few cracks on the top.

Because I couldn't see anything clearly in the dark storage room, and at the same time, the dust that had been stirred up in the room made me feel a little breathless. So Lawrence took the brick into the corridor, and then carefully inspected the brick with the help of a little sunlight filtering through the gap in the corridor window.

Hey, what's this? Just as he was looking at the sunlight in the crack of the window, he found that when he placed the brick at a certain angle, a little golden light flickered in the crack of the brick. Gold jewelry or—

Thinking of this, Lawrence slammed the brick onto the window sill forcefully. As the brick was knocked into two pieces, he finally discovered the mystery inside.

The thing in his hand was no ordinary brick at all. Instead, it was made of cement into the shape of a brick and painted with a layer of red paint on the outside. However, the person who made this cement brick back then was so skilled that Lawrence didn't notice anything wrong with the brick just now.

The luminous place just now was also found: just on the section of the cement brick, an ellipsoidal lead block was inlaid there, like a squashed gray egg. The golden light he had just seen came from a crack in the lead block.

Using a knife to pry open the lead block along the cracks, Lawrence found that the lead block was hollow, and there was a golden pendant inside, which was a little bigger than a coin.

Pulling out the pendant, Lawrence found that the pattern on the pendant was a relief skull. It is inlaid with red chalcedony and rubies. It may be because of the magic on this pendant, or it may be because it is very exquisitely made, which makes this very pocket-sized pendant give people the feeling that this skull seems to be floating from a sea of ​​blood.

Lawrence suddenly realized that it must be the most precious thing in this house. Being able to make its owner spend so much time wrapping it in lead and then putting it into cement bricks shows how much the owner of this pendant attaches importance to it.

However, to the surprise of those who hid this thing back then, the modern cement would produce some cracks after a long period of storage, and as a result, cracks appeared in the lead skin inside, which allowed Lawrence to discover a The presence of the pendant.

[Identification Technique] Lawrence released a magic that was mutated due to Bai Ze's bloodline on the pendant, and a message appeared in his mind instantly.

[A magic key, related to the Scarlet Sky Church. 】Even with the blessing of Bai Ze's bloodline, Lawrence only got one vague message.

Hey, is this also related to the Church of Scarlet Sky? Lawrence thought about using that piece of lead to re-wrap the pendant. After all, this building belonged to the ancestor of the woman who turned into a monster. People, they hid such important things back then to avoid something.

Lawrence put away the pendant after wrapping it in lead. He felt that this thing might be the key to enter a certain stronghold of Scarlet Sky Church. And now he happens to have a map of those strongholds in his hand, maybe he can use this thing for future expeditions.

After packing up the booty, Lawrence prepared to return to the place to evacuate the same way. Just as he was walking upstairs, he suddenly heard a strange sound coming from the stairwell on the first floor.