Super Righteous Player-Chapter 1182 - 226: And so Annan chose to close his eyes

Shortly after Annan and Salvatore’s conversation ended.

Annan was still in front of the mirror wall, tidying up the final part of the ceremony, without leaving.

He perceived that Ofelia was calling out to him.

After Annan advanced to Gold rank and came out from the nightmare of "The Long Night Has Come," and gradually became familiar with his new abilities, his perception power had further improved.

Annan could now do more than just see through everything within his field of perception.

If someone, from a comparatively far distance, called Annan’s name, he could sense their existence. This "comparatively far" distance, for the time being, could not cross a grand barrier, but covering most of the United Kingdom was not a problem at all.

As long as he could sense the target, Annan could perform any ritual, ignore the positioning part, and directly bestow the ritual’s effects upon them.

Be it cursing to death, bringing misfortune, charming, or even forced teleportation... If he wanted to punish someone, basically, lower-tier Transcendents had no way to counter this.

Moreover, after reaching the Gold rank, Annan could now bestow "influence" to others. Annan also finally understood the essence of influence.

This thing is actually "the trace left in the world by mystical objects."

Specifically, it is possible for a being of "sublime false body" status or other beings of similar stature to leave a corresponding influence behind directly if they use "elements," "truths," Gold rank or higher Spells, or high-level rituals.

If a battle has taken place here and many people died, there will be the scent of icy coldness; if a funeral is being held here, a melancholic atmosphere will pervade. This is also a type of influence.

Unlike the "psychological effect" on Earth.

In the Mist Realm, the mere existence of these things genuinely influences the world.

That is to say, people do not feel subconsciously sad simply because "this is a funeral site" realizing the death of their kind... but because the funeral itself "secretes" some kind of invisible substance, and this substance is vaguely sensed by people.

Just like how the passage of a chariot leaves behind wheel ruts; if there’s a pet at home, one can smell it as soon as the guest enters the door. This is the essence of "influence" — it is truly some form of "influence."

It exists in this world in another way, cannot be directly, accurately seen or heard by any organ in a rational manner. But it does exist and can be perceived vaguely... Moreover, it will result in entering corresponding nightmares after receiving this signal.

Through ritual, Annan can also transfer the influence he possesses to others; it’s like a ritual that postpones the "echo" of influence. These rituals come as a set.

In addition, Annan also holds elements like "understanding," "wisdom," "beauty." Through this vague positioning, Annan can directly bestow corresponding influence on others, making them become "clear-headed," "spirited," which can be considered a kind of Divine Arts.

After laying his cards on the table with the players, many players would first call out Annan’s name upon logging in every day, receive a series of buffs, and then go ahead to lightheartedly push the plot forward.

Proudly proclaimed as a rehearsal for "Annan’s daily morning prayer after his sublimation."

The original plan between Annan and Ofelia was for Ofelia to find her way to Annan after she had gathered enough information and when no one was tailing her.

But on Annan’s side, he suddenly heard Ofelia’s "prayers."

The specific location... was inside the Dennisiowa royal palace, in front of Yawen’s statue. He was pretending to pray to Yawen, but in fact, he was using this method to convey some information to Annan.

Annan quickly realized Ofelia’s predicament.

——As a Prince, after getting his hands on the "Energy Transmission Tower" technology, is he now trapped in the palace, unable to leave? And even his actions are under surveillance...

Isn’t this preposterous?

This was Dennisiowa unintentionally admitting that there was definitely a problem with their Energy Transmission Tower technology.

And listening to Ofelia’s "prayers," Annan’s expression quickly turned serious.

——Things were different from what he initially thought.

At first, Annan thought that this was either under The Worm’s protection or they used Spell-related power... but it turned out that was not the case.

The "Energy Transmission Tower" is purely a product of ritual.

The only issue lies in its source of curse material—and the essence of this ritual.

Why can the Energy Transmission Tower against technological norms, directly transmit heat?

Because it transmits not "heat" but "life," or rather, it transmits "fire."

This ritual conceptualizes thermal energy as a liquid flame, and the concept of flame is "deep red," while pure thermal energy brings life. Therefore, the conduit for transporting heat... is actually "blood vessels."

The "Energy Transmission Tower" ritual conceptualizes the entire United Kingdom as a personified being. They consider the "nation" a conceptualized creature, with blood vessels constructed throughout its body... pumped from the "heart"—Dennisiowa—to the "limbs," or the Feld Archipelago.

And in order for this pipeline to have the concept of "blood vessels."

The answer is, it really incorporates a large number of actual "blood vessels."

It uses "pipelines over sixty years old" as the main material, with the blood vessels connected to the hearts of various homothermic mammals—especially humans—as materials, giving it the ritual characteristic of the "United Kingdom’s blood vessels."

Yes.

The key to the Energy Transmission Tower technology lies not in the towers, but in the pipelines. The secret formula for this pipeline is to use "people" as the material. Moreover, the heart must be "still beating"... Only in this situation, can the attached blood vessels be used as materials.

This means that they must be harvested while still alive. Or, by using special drugs, the heart can be kept beating after death to extract while still warm.

——This is also the real reason for the death of Drest Flamelle.

It wasn’t because Dennisiowa was worried he would leak the technology to other countries. It was because the royal family of Dennisiowa didn’t want others to know that the Kingdom of Dennisiowa was using such taboo technology.

This is actually why they declared war on pirates!

To build a heat transmission pipeline that could travel across the country, and even be sold worldwide, the Kingdom of Dennisiowa needed a large number of criminal corpses—although the blood vessels of ordinary homothermic mammals could also be used, it would be too costly.

And because of the huge market flow, it would be easy for others to analyze the formula.

In Dennisiowa, "pirates" are the most cost-effective "animals." They are large enough to harvest a large number of blood vessels, and there’s no extra cost involved, nor will it lead to the leak of the formula.

But ordinary people are productive. They have families, jobs, children, and their own networks of relationships... It’s not possible to simply abduct ordinary people to make the "Energy Transmission Tower."

Therefore, the only legitimate materials available are "pirates."

Pirates do not engage in any form of production, living off the plunder of others and monopolizing commodities. Executing them would actually make ordinary people cheer.

Considering the need for a large amount of blood vessels—each pirate’s material can only revive about five to seven meters of pipeline. If Dennisiowa truly wants to establish a heat transmission pipeline across the country, they must capture at least one-tenth of the pirates.

Because the ritual requires a large number of "blood vessels connected to still-beating hearts," there isn’t enough time to carefully separate the blood vessels. Even the most skilled surgeons can only quickly separate the major blood vessels in the torso near the heart.

In other words, the head is unnecessary.

Therefore, their heads would be intact, with not much taken from them. Hence, the pirates’ heads could serve as proof that they "have been executed," while the remaining bodies could be cremated into ashes.

Annan listened and felt it was quite subtle.

These pirates treated ordinary people like pigs for slaughter, skinning and cutting meat from them. But now, they themselves have turned into real pigs for slaughter...

"...Forget it."

Annan sighed, pondering for a long time. He still decides not to stop the royal family of Dennisiowa.

Although to Annan, this was not Justice...

But he felt that it was not appropriate to intervene and stop it at this time. If he did make a move, it might make things worse.

The royal family of Dennisiowa is definitely doing something wrong.

If it were according to Sisyphus’s "Path of Justice," Annan would have to stop the royal family of Dennisiowa, punish them legally for the crime of desecrating corpses, and force them to only use livestock for the ritual;

Or let Dennisiowa directly legislate it as a special capital punishment of Dennisiowa—the Heart Extraction Execution.

Instead of falsifying it as a beheading, executed in secret.

But then the ritual might leak.

If someone exploits this ritual for some special purpose, it might make the lives of ordinary people unstable.

Although Ofelia might not understand these pirates very well. In Annan’s view, these pirates can be said to have died a just death.

Since they were doomed to die... might as well let them contribute to the world after death.

Annan didn’t know if this met the requirements of the "Justice" holy relic.

But he still decided to close his eyes.