When Liang En counted to three, he and Jeanne d'Arc simultaneously lowered their heads, touching their noses to the surface of the light spot. They then felt the surrounding environment suddenly invert, and their bodies were thrust forward into the light.
In an instant, Liang En, with all his gear, disappeared from the clearing at the edge of the ruins. Only the faintly blue light spot, visible only to Liang En and Jeanne, remained, sending out ripples.
Just like last time, Liang En didn't feel as if he passed through any special barrier. He only felt himself falling into a cold, dark substance, as if being sucked into a black whirlpool.
Though he still felt a sense of drowsiness, possibly due to his increased extraordinary powers, Liang En arrived in this historical projection with a clear mind.
Jeanne seemed to be in a similar state, looking drowsy, as if she had just woken up, her eyes somewhat hazy.
Strangely, Liang En's three ravens also appeared beside him, likely due to the connection between them.
This was evidently a good thing, as the card effect of the ravens gave Liang En a unique aerial reconnaissance and intelligence advantage in this historical projection, allowing them to go to important places without being noticed.
More importantly, compared to hawks, falcons, or pigeons raised by humans, ravens were less conspicuous, making them harder to detect while performing covert tasks.
After scanning their surroundings, they noticed a castle not far away, with a flag on the top they both didn't recognize.
This was very common in Europe, as there were countless noble families, even experts in this field couldn't identify them all.
"Where's the target?" Jeanne asked as she came to Liang En's side. "In the castle or around it?" "Inside the castle, and in the main tower," Liang En replied, with a helpless expression, knowing that the main tower of a castle was always heavily guarded, making it extremely difficult to enter without the proper identity.
The worst part was that they couldn't confirm whether the person inside was imprisoned like Jeanne was last time, or if this was the person's home, making an unplanned intrusion a bad idea.
After all, their next step involved communicating with the person to get the next piece of action information. If this was the person's home, Liang En didn't think they would be willing to give him the next task clue after he killed a bunch of their guards.
"This complicates things a bit—but it's not unsolvable," Jeanne said after carefully observing the castle with a telescope.
"The fortunate thing is that the castle isn't in a wartime state, and the personnel at each post is insufficient, leaving many blind spots in their surveillance."
"When it gets dark, we can use the darkness to climb the castle wall near the slope, cross half the castle, reach the main building, and enter a room through a window in a blind spot."
As Jeanne said, such castles had many defense loopholes in peacetime. Except for the main gate and a few key locations, the rest were undefended.
After conducting a comprehensive aerial reconnaissance with his ravens, Liang En made minor adjustments to Jeanne's plan and formulated a nighttime action plan.
As night fell, Liang En directed his ravens to conduct extensive reconnaissance while taking out an astrolabe for positioning.
Due to the time constraints of this historical projection and the fixed requirements for items stored in the card-provided space, the only positioning device Liang En could use was this ancient astrolabe.
Interestingly, both the astrolabe and the telescope Jeanne had used earlier looked very luxurious, decorated with gold, silver, and gems, and engraved with intricate patterns.
This wasn't because Liang En liked to show off like some nouveau riche, but because the space formed by the [Atreus Treasury (SR)] card didn't allow ordinary items.
After several attempts, Liang En could only ask the craftsmen of a jewelry company to gild these devices, set them with gems, and engrave them before they could be stored in the card's space.
"Do you know our current location?" Jeanne asked quietly after Liang En put away the astrolabe.
"I can roughly determine that we haven't moved much spatially," Liang En said, storing his observation equipment. "My ravens just scouted, and the castle should not be far from Eagle's Beak Rock."
"My judgment is based on both the instruments and the surrounding vegetation, as well as the terrain my ravens saw, which is very similar to what we saw from above Eagle's Beak Rock."
"So, spatially we haven't moved much, just temporally," Jeanne said, looking at the sky. "It's getting dark, so we should set off."
Soon, the two of them gathered their items and set off. When they reached the foot of the castle wall, a raven flew over, grabbed a leather hook, and gently placed it on the wall along with the rope below.
Under the cover of darkness, they avoided the fire pits, torches, and oil lamps at several key points, quickly approaching the main building of the castle, their target.
"Wait, someone entered a room with a window. I'll have a raven check it out," Liang En suddenly said as they were about to climb up, having seen something through the raven's vision.
"What did you see?" Jeanne asked curiously, lowering her voice. She was also curious about what kind of person this future colleague would be.
"An elderly woman," Liang En said, maneuvering one of the ravens closer to the window. "If I'm not mistaken, she should be a noble from Hungary under the Holy Roman Empire."
Having obtained a castle from that era earlier, Liang En had done some research on the Holy Roman Empire, and through the raven, he picked up some information.
"She's speaking Hungarian, so she's likely a local, and the servant at the door addressed her as Countess, indicating she is a noble."
Liang En found it odd that the person in front of him was an elderly woman, and through the raven's eyes, he noticed she looked very sickly.
Though nobles often possessed various knowledge and had greater historical value, this frail old woman naturally filled Liang En's heart with doubts.
However, since the card identified her, Liang En decided to follow the plan and inquire, to figure out what was going on.
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