Shang and the image of the butler continued walking through the hallways one at a time.
For the next three hours, nothing special seemed to happen on the outside, but in reality, a huge portion of the castle had completely died.
Everything still seemed to be filled with life, but the life was only the cold manipulation of dead light.
But the scary part was that this illusion of light only affected someone's Spirit Sense. In fact, the light looked chaotic if one looked at it with their eyes.
Yet, every High Mage and higher only relied on their Spirit Sense.
Looking at the world with a Spirit Sense was just superior to looking at the world with eyes.
But Shang knew the truth.
Ever since he lost his sight, he knew that eyes were not an inferior method of perceiving the world but a different one.
Eyes could see light, while ears couldn't.
However, ears could perceive things from behind the person using them.
One of the two might be better most of the time, but that didn't mean that it was always better.
The same thing was true for eyes and Spirit Sense.
A Spirit Sense was superior in over 99% of cases.
But the remaining 1% of cases could still kill someone if they didn't use their eyes for that.
Shang learned that the hard way when he had been bitten by something while traveling towards the north after leaving Area 23.
He hadn't been able to sense the thing that had bitten him with his Spirit Sense, no matter how hard he tried.
Luckily, he had been able to hear it, but it was still a terrifying experience to be attacked by something one couldn't properly locate or sense.
In the many decades since leaving Area 23, Shang had learned a lot about how Spirit Senses worked.
And also how to trick them.
The illusions Shang was conjuring wouldn't be able to fool someone's eyes, but they could fool someone's Spirit Sense, and with everyone only talking with their Spirit Senses, this was a terrifying ability.
In the last three hours, Shang had killed over 400 High Mages and over 5,000 people in total.
Nearly 90% of the castle had turned into a land filled with deathly cold light.
Light was usually perceived to be warm and welcoming, but it could also be cold and clinical.
It brought an illusion of life and warmth to a ruin filled with death and corpses.
But after three hours, Shang noticed that some people started to grow suspicious.
He had already intercepted a couple of people that had left their rooms to go to someone else's room.
Usually, these people would just directly talk with that person with their Spirit Sense, but Shang's illusions couldn't talk.
Most of the time, the people would think that this had something to do with the visit of the butler. Maybe the Patriarch of the family gave them orders to remain quiet no matter who asked? Maybe they were searching for a traitor?
But not everyone would believe something like that.
Some of these people felt that something was foul, and they decided to check on the others with their own eyes.
The worst spot was the children's playroom. Shang had needed to intercept five people that wanted to go there.
Of course, as these people suddenly started turning around and going back to their rooms without looking at their children, other people that watched all of this grew even more suspicious.
Something definitely wasn't right.
Shang noticed that things became difficult to hide, and he decided to go for the last sprint.
He had already killed the majority of High Mages.
In everyone's vision, the butler started to Mana Step towards the front gate and waited there.
Then, he just stood there, doing nothing.
WHOOOOOOOOM!
Suddenly, the gigantic barrier surrounding the property turned an intense purple. At the same time, the amounts of Mana it was giving off also shot into the sky.
It was like the barrier was entering overdrive!
The strongest people in the castle had just been holding a meeting, but the strange actions of the barrier immediately drew their attention to the outside.
The couple of Peak High Mages couldn't perceive the barrier with their Spirit Senses since it was too far away, but they could still see the bright violet light coming off it.
The Patriarch, an Early Archmage, extended his far greater Spirit Sense and checked the barrier.
He found that it was rapidly burning through the stored Mana Crystals while activating all of its functions at once.
The Patriarch immediately checked on the huge Magic Circle creating the barrier, and willed it to stop.
But the barrier repelled his will!
One of the functions of the barrier was to stop anyone from messing with it while emergency mode was active. This function existed to protect the castle no matter what. There were several Mages that could deactivate a barrier by using certain Spells to weave through the barrier and manipulate the Magic Circle.
The emergency mode would make it impossible for exactly that to happen.
As soon as the Patriarch saw the barrier acting this way, he knew they were under attack.
The first thing he did was to take out a light-blue Communication Crystal.
But then, he gritted his teeth.
The expensive barrier he had bought for his family could also isolate Communication Crystals.
There was no way to break the barrier.
There was no way to deactivate it.
There was no way to touch its resources.
There was no way to contact the outside.
The Patriarch knew that they would be isolated until the barrier consumed all the available Mana Crystals.
If no one attacked the barrier, it would take ten minutes.
At that moment, all the illusions inside the castle vanished.
Everyone had just been in an uproar, but as soon as the illusions vanished, the entire castle fell silent.
Thousands of corpses appeared inside everyone's Spirit Sense at the same time.
WHOOOOM!
Everyone turned towards the outside as something dark blocked the light of the purple barrier.
A sudden explosion of darkness had appeared outside, and it covered the humongous castle in nearly an instant.
The people had no idea what was going on, but they knew one thing.
The darkness outside the castle felt cold and terrifying.
At that moment, Shang had already entered the castle again and stood in front of the front door.
A long, thin, and black sword was in his right hand.
The edge moved.
Shang's expression didn't change.
