"Did he say anything?" Jiang Ran paused. "It was a very ordinary thing. I just asked him to give my regards to the director."

"Huh?" A question mark appeared above Gwen's head. "[Director]? What do you mean?"

“Is that so? I see.” The big black dog raised its paw. “You guessed the [God] of this world. No wonder the [Holy Serpent] was so surprised.”

"You mean, this ghost story world is the work of the 'Director'?" Gwen waved her hand. "Hey, hey, hey! How did you even guess that? Judging from the architecture of this world, shouldn't the first person you'd guess be the 'Pope'?"

“No.” Jiang Ran shook his head. “It is precisely because I have been to the world of the Pope that I can be certain that this is absolutely not a world created by the Pope!”

"Aren't there so many other options? How can you be so sure it's the [director]?"

Jiang Ran lightly tapped Gwen's forehead with her finger: "Well... I'll leave that to you to figure out! It's good to use your rusty brain sometimes, haha!"

"Huh?! Whose brain is rusty?!"

[You have acquired the Copying Talent: SS-Rank Holy Light Crossbow]

"It seems an old friend has arrived."

The game 【Holy Serpent】does not stop time at all, which means that Jiang Ran wasted too much time in the game, while others could do far too many things outside.

Jiang Ran estimated that almost everyone else had entered the Holy Church, and those who hadn't entered yet were probably already dead in the black mist.

Aransta didn't come in from outside; he came up the stairs.

"Oh? Jiang Ran, so that's why I haven't seen you causing trouble. So you were hiding here." Aransta said casually. "Where's Velens? I haven't seen him. I need to have a good talk with him!"

"Dead."

"Really? Then you've really done a good thing."

Aransta didn't linger and quickly disappeared from Jiang Ran's sight.

Is he still looking for the cross fragments? But half of those things are in Jiang Ran's hands. After so long, everyone who could be found has already been found. It would be a miracle if he could still find them.

Jiang Ran sensed Yu Cheng's position, and her heart sank!

What happened? The positional information of the statement has disappeared!

"Collecting all four fragments of the cross should be enough, right?"

Let's rewind to when Jiang Ran first entered the game—

Yu Cheng followed the firefly, opened the hidden door of the first-floor room, and entered the dusty basement. The firefly stopped in front of the black wall.

It wasn't until she got closer that she realized it wasn't a black wall at all, but a huge book with a black cover!

[Rule Seven: Do not linger in the church at night. Remember, there are no books in the church, and certainly no large books with black covers. If you see any books in the church, close your eyes and stay still for at least two minutes until you open your eyes and can no longer see any books. Then, please leave the church as soon as possible.]

Yu Cheng closed her eyes. She felt something cold crawling up her body. It was a very uncomfortable feeling, but she didn't move. It was better to be uncomfortable than to die.

Two minutes later, Yu Cheng opened his eyes. The huge black book next to the wall had disappeared, but the room seemed to stretch out infinitely, with no end in sight!

Yu Cheng tried to move her body and then realized that the entire room was flooded. She hadn't felt anything before and had no problem breathing!

A human figure appears in the water.

"I am the Holy Fish. Want a fragment of the cross? Let's play a game."

Ye Ye also arrived at the Holy Church.

With the wooden sword slung over his back, Ye Ye walked into the weapons room.

"Sigh, it seems there's more than one person who arrived before me."

He didn't really need these holy weapons, but just in case there was something that could only be killed with a holy weapon, he decided to take one anyway.

Ye Ye chose a small dagger simply because it was easy to carry, and he wouldn't need it most of the time.

The raven sculpture, almost half broken, faced Ye Ye, revealing its scarlet eyes.

Ye Ye stared at the crow with great interest until the stone dust on its body fell off again, revealing more of its flesh and blood.

Is this why we can't stay here for long?

As long as it stays here, the raven sculpture will gradually "break free of its seal".

Ye Ye stood at the door until only a few specks of stone dust remained on the crow sculpture before leaving the room.

"Alright, let's make this room a big surprise!"

Ye Ye hid not far away with his back turned. If the next person to enter was his companion, he would have to go out and warn them.

They also pushed open the door and entered from the mountain.

"Okay, don't worry."

Ye Ye smiled and stopped guarding the area, instead setting off to search for the fragments of the cross.

"A holy weapon?"

Yamaue's bullets were limited, so he wanted to find other ways to hunt the strange creatures. He then went into the weapons room.

The crow broke free from the stone dust and flapped its wings, flying over! There wasn't even time for Shan Shang to grab the sacred weapon from the room!

Bang!

Helpless, he could only raise his gun and kill the crow with a single shot.

As if by unspoken agreement, Alansta finally arrived shortly after entering the Holy Church on the mountain, followed closely by Bouls, the SSS-rank ghost storyteller from the Iron Tower Kingdom who had always been relatively unknown.

Apart from the others, all the other ghost storytellers have perished in the black mist.

Everyone began searching for the fragments of the cross in the church, but from God's perspective, Jiang Ran had one fragment, and there was one fragment each in the games of [Sacred Serpent] and [Sacred Fish]. The only fragment that hadn't been discovered yet was just one.

But in everyone's eyes, none of them were minor figures; they all believed that they could at least get a fragment no matter what.

An hour had passed since Ye Ye entered the Holy Church before Yu Cheng finally escaped from the [Holy Fish] game and successfully obtained a fragment of a cross.

"Phew, luckily I managed to win one round against him!"

Sensing that Jiang Ran was in the back hall, Yu Cheng rushed over as soon as possible. When he arrived at the back hall, he found that he could not open the door and realized that Jiang Ran was probably trapped inside for some reason.

Jiang Ran probably wouldn't be able to get out anytime soon, and since she couldn't waste this time, she decided to go and find the last piece of the cross fragment.

Turning around, I saw Ye Ye.

"Oh, what a coincidence!"

The moment Yu Cheng saw Ye Ye, she became wary. It wasn't that she didn't trust Ye Ye, but she was worried that the person in front of her was an illusion.

"Don't worry, the illusion is probably caused by the black mist. At least I haven't encountered any illusions since I entered this place."