Chapter 38: Shadow of Silence
"Where are you going?" Xia Hafu asked us in not very standard Mandarin with a flashlight.
It looked like they were going to call our teacher immediately, teach these two disobedient students a lesson, and deduct all their credits.
In theory, we're working to maintain world peace, but why did we wind up racking our brains in the middle of the night in the desert trying to figure out how to avoid losing credits?
"Come out for some fresh air." "Go watch the stars."
"Go see the stars." "Come out for some fresh air."
...very good, no tacit understanding at all.
Villar and I saw some despair in each other's eyes.
I even considered knocking the guide unconscious and modifying his memories, and I moved my wrist, ready to call out the Book of Omniscience.
"…Investigator?"
Xia Hafu said these three words with some doubt.
Villar and I were stunned. It's great, association! It turns out this guide doesn't know everything. But considering that the Astronomy Department, which is the main source of personnel for the Tianxing Association, has more or less connections with the association, it's normal.
But it's not certain, maybe he is a follower of some evil cult.
I nodded cautiously, and Verar tensed his muscles, making sure he could throw a punch if anything went wrong.
"I will assist you." Xia Hafu said, and then took out a small badge on his body, "Someone told me before you came..." Then there was a string of Uyghur words that I couldn't understand, mixed with Mandarin. The general meaning was that he had been rescued by people from the association because of some things that happened to him in the past, so he would usually help.
He was also the one who discovered the matter of the cult.
"There's something strange going on in our village right now—" he said as he led us to the village. "Because this place is cursed by the gods, there are some taboos that need to be observed. Otherwise, I can't guarantee your safety."
Standing at the village entrance, he turned off the flashlight and said, "In the village, if more than three people gather together, they are not allowed to talk, but it is okay to talk outside the village."
This is a very strange taboo.
"Why don't you consider moving to another village?" If you can speak outside the village, then it is a regional issue.
"That's not true. As long as we gather together to form a village, no one more than three people within the area can talk—" Xia Hafu recalled something. "When I was a kid, I couldn't help but speak, and something terrible happened."
His expression was dazed. “My mouth disappeared, as if it had never been on my face.”
…
I thought about that scene, no matter how you look at it, it seems like a supernatural power.
You might as well suspect that there is something strange going on!
So Veral and I were not in a hurry to follow him into the village, but decided to find out clearly - Veral and I must act together. If we accidentally open our mouths while catching the cultists, we will be doomed if we lose our mouths.
"So what exactly happened? Your mouth is still there, right?"
There was nothing abnormal about Xiahafu's facial features, indicating that this was not an irreversible taboo.
"It was an investigator who helped me... I don't know the details of how they did it, but my mother paid a heavy price. She can no longer speak and died very young."
"The investigator said there's a terrifying existence in our village. It's unconscious, but its power is affecting us."
"Unless He is willing to leave, we will have to follow this rule for generations to come."
What he said made Verar and I look at each other. Could this be one of the evil gods we are looking for?
Otherwise, how can he be called the protagonist?
...But doesn't this also mean that some divine powers exist in many places in this world, subtly influencing our daily lives that we cannot see?
This kind of silent infiltration is the most terrifying. If left unchecked, the world will be destroyed by these gods sooner or later.
And they don't care at all.
"We are just here to find someone, and we will abide by the rules," I said to Xia Hafu.
It is said that the cultist is related to the information that my father sent back to the association. If Villar did not have any weaknesses except the fear of being possessed by God, the association would not have trusted the two of us to come.
In terms of combat power, Villar is definitely at the top.
My brother who is good at fighting.
If he wasn't so friendly in front of me, he would have the image of a cold-blooded, mysterious and capable boss.
Characters from the Investigation Bureau.
After confirming this, Xiahafu took us two into the village.
It was late at night and all the villagers were asleep. No one knew where the cult member was hiding, but the village was not big and there were only a few places that could accommodate guests - so Xia Hafu would know as long as he took a quick look.
But this matter is even easier for me who has a thermal imaging left eye. I can know it by just scanning it——
Wait a moment.
Wait a moment? ? ?
Why are the energy fluctuations of all the people in this village the same as Xiahafu, and there is an energy line on their bodies connected to the same place?
Good news, I know where the cult member is.
Bad news, I even know where that "Him" is.
Sometimes I want to enjoy the tug-of-war from the initial investigation and the shock of meeting the big boss, rather than having the answers shoved in my face like this.
To be honest, this is no longer a question of golden fingers, but rather a question of my brain, which has not yet calmed down, quickly processing the information collected.
About the fact that I discovered that everyone in this village was parasitized by Him and they all supported Him together.
...Why don't Villar and I just say that you can't get a tiger cub without learning from the tiger?
I calmly held onto Viral and continued to follow Shahav, who was leading us to His location.
Soon we will become nutrients just like that cult member.
Keep silent.
This is the rule of this village, but as long as you abide by this rule, you will be connected with Him. For humans, this is a rule, but for Him, it is a sign of being His believer.
The previous investigator probably didn't even notice this, let alone these villagers.
This is why even if they move the village, they cannot change this rule.
For these evil gods, there is no option to abandon their faith. If you abide by this rule, you will become his believer. If you break the rule, it means you are disrespecting him and will be punished.
Xiahafu's mother helped Xiahafu bear the punishment, and then also paid an additional price.
It can be said that the gangster rules are taken to the extreme.
But there is no way, they don’t care about humans.
...We are just here to arrest people, why does it turn into fighting against evil gods?
Xia Hafu stopped. It was an altar in the village dedicated to ancestors and also a simple resting place for travelers. It had the largest house in the village.
I immediately saw the ball of energy inside - the cult member.
It feels like he is about to turn into an evil god.
I glanced at Villar, and he understood what I meant. He slashed Shahafu's neck with a knife, then grabbed him with one hand and put him in a place nearby that looked quite safe.
The movements were so smooth and flowing that I was stunned.
Too skilled, bro.
Just in case, I pulled out my phone.
-Inside, a little trouble, protect me?
He made an OK gesture.
Is it okay to talk like this?
His voice echoed in my head.
Now that I have left the Dreamland, I can no longer have this conversation with Verar.
But this is Villar's fixed skill.
I called out the Book of Omniscience, then took two plasters from my bag and put them on both of our mouths.
There are only two of us now, so if we can't hold it in later, we can still survive.
This looks a bit funny, but fortunately there are not so many spectators in life.
This house is not much different from other self-built houses in the village except for its height. It just has ethnic characteristics. However, if you look closely, you can find that the patterns on it are not unique to the Uyghurs, but more like engraved runes. They should be special runes belonging to "Him". I wonder how long "Him" has been here to make such a profound impact.
To be honest, I've already seen three evil gods, but this one is the one I'm about to see for real—
-Close your eyes.
I held the cell phone in front of Villar, afraid that what he would see when he opened the door would burn out his remaining sanity.
[Release side quest; Shadow of Silence
The smells on you are so mixed that He seems to have recognized you as His children, and so He came.
Mission objective: Drive them out or capture them. You know the best cage.
Mission Reward: **Switch】
In the silence, the voice in my head was all too clear.
The hand that pushed the door open paused.
What the hell is He coming?
Then, unexpectedly, the door opened. I subconsciously turned my head and found that Villar had obediently closed his eyes. To be honest, I also wanted to close my eyes.
What on earth is that in front of me?!
The house has a door with a narrow corridor about two meters long, then an open yard of about fifty square meters, and then a floor about five meters high. Opposite the door and across the yard is a huge room, which should be used to place the tablets of the ancestors who need to be worshipped in the village. Surrounding the main house are some guest rooms or utility rooms.
But now all this is gone.
The black flesh that spread from the main house to the yard filled the entire house. There were small cracks on these pieces of flesh that were wriggling and opening and closing, as if their mouths were saying something.
In the middle of these pieces of flesh, you can barely see a humanoid creature, with only a head left.
After careful identification, I found that it should be the cultist that Veral and I were looking for.
I don't know if he can recover.
Seeing the two of us coming in, the pieces of meat began to move slowly, and the mucus left traces on the ground, which must be highly corrosive.
Although Villar had his eyes closed, his intuition about these things was still very strong. He had already stood in front of me, and the "Book of Omniscience" was also suspended in front of me.
But those pieces of meat didn't try to catch us. Instead, they stretched out and formed an indescribable shape, like a mouth inside a mouth, changing. I felt a black screen in front of my eyes and turned my eyes away, unable to look closely - if it weren't for my current brain, Villar would have gone crazy.
This is almost equal to His essence.
[Offspring…?]
[Container…?]
[…It smells so good, it’s their scent.]
[No, there's also my taste.]
A jumble of words entered the minds of Villar and me—
It was different from the voice of the golden "Him" and Verard. It felt like the brain was covered with asphalt, which was rough and sticky.
There is a feeling of lack of oxygen to the brain.
I feel like my brain is dirty.
Veral jumped up holding my clothes. The Book of Omniscience was already opened, and the pieces of meat that flew out from nowhere were sucked into the book.
...Don't eat everything?!
He wants to eat us.
I know that evil gods devour each other, but shouldn't Verael and I have reached such a high level of purity?!
Wasn't he just an heir?!
The parent-child relationship of you evil gods is really confusing!
But if there really is a relationship, then Veraer and I might have six more fathers or mothers. It does sound confusing.
[Ding ding ding—This isn't the god's complete form, but only a tiny part of him, an anchor in this world. He wants to devour you simply out of instinct, wanting to return to his full form.]
[I suggest the host run away. That side quest just now wasn't issued by the system! The system can't assess its danger!]
The system's voice was not like usual, but instead carried a rare sense of anxiety.
[The system has issued an early separation request to the main system. The current assessment of this world does not meet initial expectations. The world's consciousness is concealing important information... Zizi... Host... Master...]
Then it stopped abruptly.
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