"Wow~! These are... Hanachirusato's photos! Amazing! Share some with me, Durandal."
"No. These are for punishing her, not specifically for you. If you want them, go find her yourself; don't take them from me."
Durandal ignored Lumine, who was clinging to her and acting spoiled, and carefully surveyed the situation on Seirai Island. Just as she had found in the material, the Electro Element concentration here was abnormally high.
This was still the edge of the island; moving slightly closer to the center of the island, the stinging sensation would become even stronger.
"There are even traces of human life here. It seems this place was once suitable for human habitation. It's just that the anomaly appeared, making it no longer suitable for living, and the islanders moved to other places."
"That's right, that's right. Although it wasn't as prosperous as Inazuma City, there used to be a village here. We found a place called Asase Shrine in the southeast direction of Seirai Island, and there we met a talking cat named Neko."
It was because of this cat that Lumine and her companions learned how to reseal the warding stone, successfully completing the first layer of sealing on Seirai Island.
It's just... she didn't understand why, according to Neko, the sealed warding stone was actually unsealed by the Shrine Maiden of Asase Shrine, who was A Xiang.
Why was this? Seirai Island was inhabited back then. Wouldn't unsealing the warding stone cause ecological damage here? As a Shrine Maiden, why would that A Xiang do such a thing?
Durandal didn't care about the sealing. In her opinion, since Lumine was involved in this matter, it was only natural that she would eventually restore Seirai Island.
She was interested in the cat named Neko that Paimon mentioned. She always felt that the cat was not simple. In a place that had been abandoned for so many years, there was a talking cat in an abandoned shrine. No matter how she thought about it, it was very strange.
"Are you planning to deal with the second seal next? I won't go with you. I'm very interested in that cat and want to go take a look there."
"Oh, okay. Leave the puzzle-solving to us. We'll find the solution and solve it very quickly."
Having experienced the puzzles in Mondstadt and Liyue, Lumine and Paimon's confidence in this matter was overflowing. In their opinion, no puzzle could stump them.
Shenhe, on the other hand, left the team and followed Durandal to Asase Shrine. From Shenhe's position, she indeed saw a black cat sitting there.
"Oh? Humans are coming again so soon? How rare, so many humans in one day."
The cat, curled up sleeping there, noticed Durandal's arrival and immediately perked up, raising its paw in a very human-like gesture to greet Durandal.
"Are you the cat of this shrine? Where is the Shrine Priestess (Head Priestess)? Since this is a shrine, there should be a Shrine Priestess (Head Priestess) responsible for managing it, right?"
"Hmm, you're right. The previous Shrine Priestess (Head Priestess) of the shrine was A Xiang. Because she's not here, I am the acting Shrine Priestess (Head Priestess) of Asase Shrine. If you have anything, you can ask me. If I know, I will answer you."
Perhaps Neko was happy to see so many people visiting the shrine after a long time and was very willing to answer Durandal's questions.
Well, this was also Durandal's purpose for coming here. Hearing Neko's cooperation, she didn't stand on ceremony and asked about A Xiang's situation and the events that had happened at this shrine in the past.
To motivate Neko to tell those stories, Durandal took out the food specifically for small animals that she kept in her storage space.
Don't forget, she was very popular with small animals, so to take care of them, she naturally kept some food on her.
With Durandal's feeding, Neko's favorability towards Durandal grew higher and higher, and the stories it told became more and more engaging.
In its description, Durandal learned that the original Asase Shrine was not as desolate as it was now. The incense offerings here were continuous under the care of A Xiang and Hyakume Oni.
It's just that at some point, those people stopped coming, and A Xiang disappeared. When she left, she only told Neko that she was going to Narukami Island, and left nothing else.
Besides this, A Xiang often mentioned an existence named Konbumaru. Whenever A Xiang talked about Konbumaru, a smile would appear on her face. Neko believed that Konbumaru, who could make A Xiang smile, must be a good thing.
Listening to Neko's narration, Durandal roughly understood some of the situation.
First, there was A Xiang, whom Neko constantly thought about. She should be the Shrine Priestess (Head Priestess) of this shrine. According to the shrine's name, Asase Shrine, that Shrine Maiden was probably named Asase Hibiki.
Konbumaru and A Xiang had a very close relationship, but she had never seen him. And there was the guy named Hyakume Oni; he seemed to have a good relationship with A Xiang, but A Xiang most likely only treated him like a younger brother to take care of... Of course, it's also possible she treated him as someone else.
The story here was very interesting. According to her understanding of Seirai Island's situation from the material, the warding stone's barrier on Seirai Island had been unsealed for several hundred years.
That Shrine Maiden named A Xiang had probably been gone for several hundred years. Although she didn't understand how Neko, this cat, had lived for so long, it had always stayed here and was unaware of human birth, aging, sickness, and death, so it didn't understand that A Xiang had most likely already died, yet it was still waiting for her to return.
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Webnovel updates will still be daily, as usual.
It might not seem tempting right now but who knows what the future holds?
[email protected]/SolyuraMT
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