Good news and bad news.
This turn of events was a classic hedge.
The good news was that countermeasures against the heretics' bizarre method of traversal had already been finalized and stood ready to activate at a moment's notice. Once initiated, the entire Divine Kingdom would become thoroughly monolithic, turning soft soil to solid steel, leaving no further opportunity for rabbits to dig their burrows.
Furthermore, tracing the residue left by those traversals, the Celestial Eye Observation Hall was already close to pinpointing the location of the heretic encampment. Soon, they would be able to completely eliminate this thorn in the Holy God's side.
The dawn of victory was already breaking on the horizon. A joyous occasion indeed—truly worthy of celebration.
The bad news was that these bastards were cooking up something massive!
The spy they had planted deep inside enemy lines had risked his life to escape, bringing back catastrophic tidings of what was to come—these bastards seemed intent on taking the entire Order down with them in a blaze of glory!
It was said that after reading the report in his hands and examining the submitted evidence, the Pope remained silent for a long time. With trembling hands, he took off his spectacles, uttered a single sentence—"Unrelated personnel, leave"—and then struck the Bell of the Holy Spirit.
Soon, all the Saints assembled, arriving at the Hall of Descent.
The last Saint to arrive was shrouded in blazing radiance. That petite figure strode past the waiting Saints as though no one else existed and took the seat at the very head of the table. As the light gradually dissipated, it revealed a face that still appeared slightly youthful.
Wen Su.
She crossed her legs, resting a foot on the table, and cast a sneering glance at the reverently bowed Pope. "That fellow Wen Sheng really found himself a good dog, didn't he? So dutiful and conscientious."
The Pope lowered his head and answered calmly, "It is an honor."
Upon his aged countenance, wrinkles were deeply carved, remnants of a sorrowful expression.
He showed neither the fury of the other believers when she casually spoke the Holy God's name with contempt, nor the slightest stir of emotion at her petty mockery.
"Miss Wen is mistaken. We are all in service to the Holy God here. So long as we give our all, why make distinctions between high and low, noble and base?"
A fat man beside her chuckled, yet the voice that came out was delicate and tender like a young girl's, sending chills down the spine.
"Heh—" Wen Su sneered. With an indifferent flick of her finger, a surge of berserk power erupted in an instant, crushing the chuckling fat man into a puddle of bloody mush. "Enough. Get your foul filth out of here. Don't pollute my eyes."
The obese Saint had been ground almost to dust, yet in the very next breath, the flesh and blood writhed rapidly. Agonized, wailing faces pieced themselves together, reconstituting into wholeness once more.
Once again, that warm and kindly, pale, round face took shape, without the faintest trace of ferocity or madness.
Who could ever tell that Ekonzo, a warlord once notorious for cannibalism, had now undergone a complete metamorphosis into a Saint renowned for mercy and good deeds?
"Miss Wen mustn't misunderstand. The essence of the Great Feast is vast and profound. Though it may appear vulgar on the surface, it holds a subtle wonder of its own." Ekonzo grinned, utterly unbothered. "If an opportunity presents itself another day, care to learn a bit about it?"
Bang!
Amid a deafening crash, crimson blood splattered.
Wen Su was cold and aloof. "I told you: stop being an eyesore."
On the other side, Guangwen of the Dragon Sacrifice Society rested his chin in his hand, watching the spectacle with a silent smile. Among the remaining Saints, some hesitated to speak while others were choked with rage. In the end, it was the Pope who stepped forward to cut their exchange short.
"Everyone, let us look at this first..."
As he spoke, several figures carried out a glass display case. Inside, countless pale threads entangled and spread, blanketing whatever had originally been there, proliferating rapidly like mold.
Beneath the hyphae, a faint, rhythmic heave was vaguely discernible, as though something were breathing.
"What is this?"
Someone reached out, leaning in to tap on the glass, but was stopped by Saint Guangwen, head of the Celestial Eye Hall. "Don't touch it."
Across that usually grinning face, a rare hint of solemnity and caution surfaced.
He said, "It's poisonous."
Poison.
In the brief silence, Guangwen gave a hand signal. At once, the guarding angels cautiously tore away the warding seals and lifted the veil draped over the case.
Without the obscuring layer, the eerie mycelium became all the clearer. One could even distinguish a figure frozen forever in place, convulsing in agony with an outstretched arm begging for help.
Clap—
Guangwen clapped his hands.
The moment the sharp sound rang out, countless strands of mycelium inside the cabinet abruptly squirmed and swelled. The blurred humanoid silhouette was torn apart in an instant, and inexhaustible hyphae wriggled and meandered like a nest of serpents, surging madly toward the source of the noise, only to be stopped by the glass.
Clumps of viscous flesh continually collapsed into filaments and reconstituted into grotesque, chaotic shapes, only to rot away rapidly, dissolving into a breeding ground for new mycelial sprouts.
For a moment, everyone in the hall froze slightly, an eerie chill running down their spines.
"What is this?" Ekonzo frowned.
"Something the resistance camp—or rather, those heretics—have been quietly preparing these past few days: a spiritus poison targeting all souls. To be precise, I'm afraid it's a weapon of slaughter aimed directly at our believers..."
Guangwen explained slowly, "The undercover operative sent by the Celestial Eye Hall had infiltrated the resistance organization. Days ago, following the merger of camps, he managed to slip into the heretic artisan's camp, then risked his life escaping to deliver internal intelligence.
"Regrettably, before he could say more than a few words, he turned into this... It even infected sixteen Hierophants along the way. Everyone who handled him had to be liquidated, which really created quite a bit of extra work for us."
"Blasphemy!!!"
Saint Chengwei, in charge of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, flew into a rage. His face flushed crimson, and he could no longer hold back his wrathful denunciation: "Indeed, just as the divine oracle proclaimed, the Heaven-Sent Demon Ji Jue is a grave menace to the Divine Kingdom! To think we failed to exterminate that evil fiend sooner, and even allowed him to collude with that great whore destined for Limbo until he grew into a full-fledged scourge..."
Bang!
Before he could finish his sentence, his head burst, pulverized into mush by Wen Su.
The girl's gaze was frigid. "Whom did you call a whore?"
"Miss Wen, whatever pact exists between you and the Holy God is not my place to comment on. However, seeing as matters have reached this point, I hope you can temporarily restrain your fury. In accordance with the Holy God's instructions, once she is captured in due time, she will be left entirely at your disposal."
The Pope stepped in to halt the dispute. Scepter in hand, he effortlessly reversed the destruction inflicted by Wen Su, forcibly steering the topic back on track. "The peril posed by the Heaven-Sent Demon should be clear to all present. Are there any further intelligence reports or news to supplement? Speak freely."
"Supplement?"
Wen Su smirked. "When your Holy God went mad earlier, he took a slash from him and even got force-fed shit. Does that count as intelligence? I'm not making things up, you know—why don't you go ask your god yourself?"
The Pope remained impassive and wordless, turning a deaf ear as he looked toward Guangwen.
Guangwen's expression instantly grew complicated.
To be precise, the subtlety of his expression looked as if he were the one who had been force-fed shit.
"How should I put it... Though that artisan's renown isn't exactly resounding, his background is frighteningly formidable. He has extensive connections within the Ring of Taiyi; both the former and current guild presidents share deep ties with him. His roots in the Federation run quite deep, and he's even competed in the military-industrial race... Beyond that, within the Dragon Sacrifice Society, at least two people might have indirectly met their deaths at his hands."
Leaving aside his status as an Artisan of Celestial Craft and his other accomplishments, and setting aside the questionable possibility of the Celestial Conscription for now, this guy was truly born under a star cursed to clash with the Dragon Sacrifice Society...
You'd never know without looking into it, but once you did, it gave you a fright. Guangwen was genuinely spooked himself.
That unlucky bastard Lawrence went without saying: simply because he tried to make Ji Jue into his bullshit Vessel, Formless later inexplicably died in the Sage's workshop, and Ji Jue ended up becoming the sole inheritor of Fluid Alchemy.
Back in Quancheng, he meddled in a whole mess of affairs, resulting in Guildmaster Adrian returning empty-handed, and Lu Changsheng's decade-long grand scheme with the Evil Transmutation Cult falling apart at the final hurdle.
An absolute jinx!
It was one thing to be a harbinger of doom, but the Dragon Sacrifice Society had taken the fall in the most baffling ways every single time!
Once could be an accident, twice a coincidence, but happening three times was simply too eerie. Others might think it was stretching to connect the dots, but practitioners of Aether were more or less inclined to believe in fate. Sneaking around and playing it safe was all about the principle that it was better to believe it than risk it.
To tell the truth, if not for the Dream of Huangliang being sealed so tightly, Guangwen might have packed his bags and bolted already.
What was this called?
Nipping trouble in the bud!
Alarmist talk or pure fantasy—either way, hearing this intelligence sounded just like a ghost story, leaving everyone feeling uneasy.
"He is just an artisan in the end. Isn't this making a mountain out of a molehill?" Saint Chengwei frowned.
"Of course, one Ji Jue could be brushed off as trivial. But this time, we've really hooked another big fish." Guangwen sighed and tossed out several photographs. "These were extracted from the undercover operative's residual consciousness. That fellow has turned the entire camp into an arsenal, keeping nearly everyone tethered to assembly lines twenty-four hours a day... And besides that, there is this old man."
In the photograph was an old geezer reclining in a chair, picking his toes while yawning—looking completely like a salted fish, entirely devoid of drive, leaving everyone utterly bewildered.
"What is this?"
"Perhaps someone even more dangerous than Ji Jue."
Guangwen said, "Yesterday, the Celestial Eye Observation Hall finally deduced their method of traversing the Dream of Huangliang. If memory serves, every single trace matches up with a creation of legendary Tale Alchemy—the Rabbit Hole.
"A young girl chases a rabbit, climbs through a narrow rabbit hole, and arrives in Wonderland. A fairy tale like that inherently points to the domain of the Eternal Gate. Developed and transformed through Tale Alchemy, it's hardly surprising that it allows passage through dreams."
"...And so?"
In the silence of the Hall of Descent, Wen Su sat composed and indifferent, utterly disinterested, while the rest looked bewildered and lost, having no idea what he was getting at.
*Talking to you lot really takes too much damn effort.*
Guangwen covered his face, abandoning any desire to keep them in suspense. He said bluntly, "Tale Alchemy has long been lost! Over ten years ago, the Artisans Association placed it on the list of severed lineages.
"According to historical records, the last person to master Tale Alchemy was a master who mysteriously vanished after being expelled from the Ring of Taiyi forty-one years ago—Fan Qian!"
Chapter 519