"What should we do with these people? Master Raphael? Yolande asked.

The captured halflings looked very emaciated, and the short man, like a child from a poor family, was staring at them with a frightened face, and his mouth was constantly 'squeaking', as if there was some kind of pattern.

Yolande guessed it was some kind of language they didn't understand.

"Over to you, Tika!" Raphael looked at the psionic wizard who was communicating with the bat.

Tika immediately stepped forward and grabbed the head of one of the halflings, casting [Memory Retrieval].

The rest of the halflings were all stunned, their faces turned pale, and the shouts in their mouths became even stronger.

After about five minutes, Tika reopened his eyes after searching his memory, and the halfling's incomprehensible words gradually became clear.

"Let go of Maca, human! Otherwise, the High Priest will not let you go! "O great moon god, please save us......

Tika glanced at a few halflings who were either frightened or praying sincerely, and said with disdain.

"Your god is dead!"

Even though Tika had just learned the indigenous language was very lame, several halflings understood it, and all threats, insults, and prayers suddenly stopped, and everyone stared at him with a look of horror and despair.

Tika ignored them and instead reported to Raphael. "Master, these people are all natives of foreign lands, and they believe in Diana, the god of the moon."

"The dead god?" Raphael also glanced at several halflings, and then continued to ask. "Why are they here by such a coincidence?"

"It's not a coincidence, in fact, this halfling settlement has been watching here for years." Tika explained.

Raphael paused, his face showing a bit of surprise, but fortunately he quickly reacted. "Is it because of the Church's expeditionary force?"

Tika nodded, in this cold, dark foreign land, access to food is a huge problem, and every time the Church's expeditionary force cleans up the demonic beasts in this vicinity, they always leave behind a large amount of stump flesh and blood.

The abundance of food and the smell of blood attracted both the rest of the beasts and the attention of this halfling tribe, whose strength was very weak, but their strength was that they had the advantage of wisdom!

The previous two times were to take advantage of the gap period when the Church's expeditionary force had left and there were no powerful demonic beasts entering the valley, and they did some post-war processing, and each time they could get enough food for the entire tribe to eat for several months or even a year or two.

This low-risk, high-reward way of obtaining food has made the halflings who are almost hungry and crazy fall into it, but they don't know when the next expeditionary force will arrive, and they don't dare to venture into this group of beings who are more murderous and dangerous than the monsters, let alone enter the gate of the lair of these people.

So I sent a few spies to stay here all the time, waiting for the next big harvest!

It is worth mentioning that the personnel sent by this tribe to investigate are not four, but five, and one of the halfling spies has already gone to report in advance after discovering the movement of the space-time gate!

"Isn't this what Speaker Lynn said?" Raphael couldn't laugh or cry for a while, now that the church had been destroyed by them, if it weren't for the fact that they needed to re-enter in order to find out the information of the Necromantic Lord, these halflings would not have been able to wait until the expeditionary force arrived even if they died.

"Is there any other important news in his head? Especially about the ...... of the Lord of the Necromancy," Raphael asked again.

"Unfortunately, no, but I saw some low-level undead creatures in his memory, far away on the other side of the mountains." Tika shook his head regretfully and continued. "These people know too little...... I think their high priest must have known something more. ”

"Then go to the High Priest!" Raphael said categorically.

Judging from the performance of the few people in front of him, there should not be any strong people in this halfling group, otherwise it would not have been reduced to the point of living by picking up corpses.

It is slightly worth noting that the high priest, but without the protection of the gods, the other party may not even be able to perform divine magic, and nine times out of ten it is the same thing.

Raphael estimated that with ample food and sheer power, they were more than capable of controlling the tribe.

In a way, they were lucky...... Although he was attacked by two [Sand Worms] as soon as he entered the door, he also found an opportunity to learn more about this world.

Thinking of this, Raphael's brow, which had been frowning, suddenly relaxed, and he already had a rough plan for this expedition to the foreign land.

"Tika Ling writes a report and throws it on the other side of the space-time gate with this halfling, so that you don't have to send anyone back for the time being." Raphael groaned and instructed that since a halfling had already returned to report the news, it was inevitable that the other party would flee and migrate, and they must immediately set out to block the tribe.

According to the original plan, if they could not receive electromagnetic communication, three of the nine of them would need to return to the space-time gate in turn within a day, report the situation here one by one, and decide whether to send more reinforcements according to the situation.

It didn't seem necessary to return to the two places so often, and they could use these indigenous halflings to go out to spy on information, so that they would not be so conspicuous, and they would not need to ask the council for more support in the short term.

Tika nodded, quickly writing a report on a scroll of hides, then grabbed one of the halflings, tied them up, shoved the hides into the man's mouth, and threw them heavily into the portal.

……

At the same time, Lin En and the others, who had left the exploration team, were not in a hurry to leave, but were waiting for news from the other end.

In order to ensure that the exploration team really entered the foreign land smoothly, and was not taken to some other strange place by the space-time gate, or even killed in the turbulence of space, Raphael and the others would send one of them back to report the situation after conducting a half-hour preliminary exploration and confirming that there was no problem.

In turn, they will also send another person over to exchange information and confirm each other's information.

Due to the difference in the flow rate of the two times, half an hour over there is about three and a half hours according to the time here.

However, four hours have passed, and there is still no movement from the space-time gate.

"We can't wait like this, Master Raphael should know the importance of the first contact, and we'd better send another group of people in." Vittorio's brow furrowed, he suspected that the exploration team had encountered some big trouble entering the space-time gate, otherwise he would not have missed the time to send someone back.

"Wait a little longer." Lynn shook his head, unless a six-ring wizard had a bad face and directly bumped into an incomparably powerful legend, or the lord of necromancy, he would not be killed directly.

According to their speculation, this space-time gate should be relatively safe.

The rest of the exploration team members are not very strong, but they are comprehensive, with almost all the elements covered by reconnaissance, healing, melee, range, magic, and technology, and if they really encounter something that they can't deal with, they can completely retreat into the space-time gate.

"Fifteen minutes...... Fifteen minutes later, if there is still no movement, we will send a second group in. Lynn said solemnly.

Vittorio nodded, waiting patiently.

As the minutes passed, the numbers on the quartz clock kept changing, and the wizards present were anxious.

Fifteen minutes had already arrived, and just when Lynn began to wonder if Raphael and the others had really encountered something, the surging space-time gate was activated again!

"It's coming!" Vittorio's expression immediately became serious, and the rune chains glowing with golden light surrounded the area near the space-time gate.

Lynn is also ready to strike at any time.

After all, the time is not the same as agreed, no one knows what will happen next, it may be that Raphael sent someone back, or it could be an invading enemy!

As everyone watched, a bound figure flew out of the surging space-time gate, and then was tied up again by the rune lock.

Discovering that it was not any member of the exploration team who came out of the space-time gate, but a captive who had lost the ability to resist, Vittorio became increasingly dissatisfied with Raphael.

"This should be a halfling." Lynn immediately recognized it, and he had had a lot of contact with Lydia and the others, so it was naturally impossible for him to admit his mistake, and then he also saw the animal skin in the other party's mouth.

The pages are not easy to preserve, there is a possibility of being torn apart by the space-time gate, and the electromagnetic wave signal cannot communicate across the two realms, so the exchange of information can only be recorded on the hard Warcraft leather.

Lynn's mind moved, and under the effect of the [Mage's Hand], the animal skin quickly stretched out, and on it was encrypted text written with magical power.

Tika recounted everything he saw and heard after entering the space-time gate in as simple words as possible, for example, on the other side of the space-time gate, there was also a valley, and the temperature was about minus twenty degrees...... Another example is that they encountered the attack of two [Sand Worms] as soon as they entered, and they found several natives under surveillance, and they delayed a lot of time in order to deal with these troubles.

On top of that, now that they've set out to contain the halfling tribe, they'll be sending someone back for more information a day later than that.

There's still plenty of time for a day over there, a week after their world.

"Very well, it looks like things are going very well." After reading these encrypted messages, Vittorio nodded, and some of his previous dissatisfaction with Raphael disappeared.

In the case of discovering that they are being monitored, it is natural that they can no longer send people in and out rashly, and it is normal to delay some time to solve the trouble.

Lynn was considering who should be sent to the space-time gate to exchange information, and Tika said in the letter that they didn't need too many people for the time being, but the councillor couldn't really send some useless people in.

"Why don't we send a few halflings over too?" Vittorio proposed, saying that since the halflings were natives over there, it would be more convenient to act in such an identity.

Lynn nodded, this was also his idea, judging by the information that Tika had extracted from the captive's mind, although the tribe was a believer in Diana, the god of the moon, most people didn't seem to be so strong in their beliefs......

But it's right to think about it, it's been a long time since the death of the moon god, and no miracle has appeared for a long time, and even the strongest faith will always waver.

What's more, the lifespan of a halfling is not long, even lower than that of a normal human, usually only about sixty years, and those staunch believers before should have died.

"Since everything is fine here, then it is time for me to return to the royal capital." Lynn turned to look at Vittorio. "What about you, Speaker Vittorio?"

"I'm going to stay here and continue to study this space-time gate, figuring out the effect of the speed of mana influx on time." Vittorio said with a raised brow.

He's also here to prevent some unusual situations.

As for the alchemy circle that stripped the tritium and deuterium element, Vittorio had already done it three days ago, and the efficiency was increased by about five times, and the rest was left to those alchemists to deal with.

Lynn nodded, and after saying goodbye to Sean and the others, he turned into a streamer and disappeared into the sky.

"Get a few psionic wizards and bring this halfling down for interrogation!" Vittorio looked at the halfling who was firmly bound on the ground with a frightened expression on his face, and commanded.

This native is weak, but it is very valuable, they can use the memories of the other party to decipher the language, and get a lot of basic information about foreign lands, which is why Raphael sent people here.

……

About forty minutes later, Lynn returned to the royal capital, took the time to talk to Haroff and Aurora about the information he had learned from the trip, and called a wizard in charge of managing the information, and asked where Lydia and the others were.

Speaking of which, he hadn't seen Lydia for a long time, and he had been busy studying the application of magic on a microscopic level, and he didn't have time to pay attention to her, and when he wanted to, he found that the other party was gone, and there was no longer a new air base.

"Mistress Lydia may be in the Alchemy Research Institute right now......" the wizard said hesitantly.

He had heard that Master Dennis had recently been working on a new explosive propulsion device to be used on a new warplane, and that there had been several accidents in the past few months, and that the council had received a number of complaints.

"Explosive propulsion?" Lynn was suddenly interested.

It's going to be a jet.

No wonder Dennis didn't even attend this year's symposium......

(End of chapter)