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Welch, whose eyes were bloodshot, finally threw away the tattered documents in his hand, ignoring the brass-colored revolver that had fallen to the ground.
Welch stumbled through the marble tea table and leather sofa, walking somewhat tremblingly towards the living room wall, and then violently crashed into it.
Naya, whose thin gauze gloves were stained with blood and whose beautiful face showed a hint of madness, kept muttering, "Everyone will die, including me..."
She knelt on the chair, burying her face in a washbasin full of water, her brown hair flowing down smoothly and swaying in the wind, but her entire body remained motionless.
Welch lay on the ground, his eyes fixed on the ceiling, his forehead completely shattered and covered in blood, while the wall bore numerous impact marks, bleeding profusely.
Klein, who had collapsed onto the ground, watched this bizarre scene, trembling all over. The will to survive deep within his mind filled his weak limbs with strength again. He picked up the revolver from the ground and rushed out of the room as if fleeing.
On the desk not far away, the Antigonus family notebook, stained with yellowish-brown and blood, turned its pages without a breeze. Many hidden symbols were depicted on the pages, collectively forming a vertical eye!
Stumbling through the Hollow iron gate, the dim gas streetlights cast their light on Klein, but they brought him no sense of security.
It wasn't even late night, yet the streets were already empty, which was clearly abnormal for Iron Cross Street in the wealthy Howes district.
Fine beads of sweat oozed from Klein's forehead. He always felt as if pairs of greedy eyes were staring at him from the Darkness beyond the dim light, and the fear in his heart spurred him to quicken his pace, eventually breaking into a run.
Tap-tap, tap, the sound of footsteps went from fast to slow, finally stopping.
After an unknown amount of time, Klein, who had been walking and running, finally stopped, panting. Looking at the familiar yet somewhat simple attic in front of him, he rubbed the cold metal cylinder in his pocket, pressing his fingers tightly against the gun grip, and a faint sense of security slowly emerged.
Thinking of the bizarre deaths of Welch and Naya, his heart, still pounding from the intense exertion, suddenly felt a sharp pain. Klein took a deep breath and walked into the dark corridor.
The hurried footsteps echoed in the silent night, sounding particularly harsh. If it were normal times, Mr. French, the landlord, would have certainly disregarded his Gentlemanly demeanor, fiercely brandished his cane, and loudly shouted:
"If you dare to disturb my rest again, take your dirty luggage and get out!"
Not hearing that familiar roar, Klein felt no joy in his heart. The sense of unease grew stronger. He fumbled somewhat frantically for the key from his brown, old coat, tried several times before it finally fit into the lock, and opened the Door.
Benson wasn't home, and Melissa was already asleep. Klein, somewhat dazed, walked to a light wood-colored desk and placed the revolver from his pocket onto it.
Without turning on the wall lamp, under the illumination of the scarlet moon, Klein opened a notebook with rough, yellowed pages. It contained information about his research on that Mystical notebook from the Fourth Epoch during this period.
As he flipped through the pages of the notebook, an exaggerated smile appeared on Klein's face, yet tears streamed from the corners of his eyes. He picked up a round-bodied steel pen and slowly wrote in Hermes:
"Everyone will die, including me."
Looking at the ink, which grew darker and more dripping under the scarlet moon, Klein, whose smile became increasingly bizarre, trembled slightly as he picked up the revolver from the table and held it against his temple.
Bang!
A short gunshot echoed in the dead of night, yet it caused no ripple, as if it were merely a hallucination before death.
The hand stained with blood fell limply. A faint blue light emerged from the corner of the compartment, and Aaron's figure slowly appeared. The strange aura enveloping the room instantly dimmed by several points.
Aaron silently looked at the corpse on the chair. A hidden power spread from the Darkness Mark, preventing 0-08 from detecting his arrival.
Looking at the gray-white brain matter slowly wriggling within the gruesome wound, Aaron's expression was somewhat strange. As if remembering something, he took out a portable camera from his "Traveler's Satchel."
This Mystical Item, obtained from Botis, was almost like a so-called spatial ring. Although carrying Sealed Artifacts could not block negative effects, if it only contained daily necessities and some spiritual materials, it was extremely convenient.
The only drawback was that the power of 'space concealment' had to be reinforced periodically, otherwise this Mystical Item would gradually lose its effectiveness.
However, this was not difficult for Aaron, who had mastered Botis's Beyonder characteristic, but to make the most perfect use of a Demigod-level Beyonder characteristic, he would still need to find the Church of the God of Steam and Machinery.
Although Harland Rooney could also forge it, the ability and negative effects of the finished product could not meet Aaron's requirements. He would have to find Bernadette again later.
A sly smile appeared on his face as Aaron raised the camera in his hand and took several close-up shots of Klein's corpse.
The rebirth of Mr. Fool is still worth commemorating!
Only one photo was left in his hand, the rest of the items were returned to the "Traveler's Satchel." Using his finger as a pen, golden light points then condensed into a passage of text on the back of the photo:
"The Source and Shadow of Order;"
"Great Emperor of the Land of Chaos;"
"Lord of Order Who Holds the Rules;"
He manipulated the photo to float next to the open notebook, ensuring that his dear Mr. Fool would see it the first time he woke up.
The smile in his eyes flashed and then disappeared. Aaron suddenly looked out the window. In mid-air, above the black "velvet curtain," the scarlet full moon's light brightened by a few points, and deep Darkness filled his eyes.
Feeling a certain gaze, Aaron showed an awkward but polite smile, bowed slightly, and quickly drew a scarlet moon on his chest, chanting:
"Praise be to You, Evernight Goddess, more exalted than the Cosmos, more ancient than eternity!"
After a while, Aaron finally felt the gaze depart, and he slowly breathed a sigh of relief in his heart. After all, by all accounts, he really shouldn't have been here.
Before he could think further, as if sensing a certain aura, the dark golden mist in front of him boiled. Aaron looked up, his golden eyes gazing at the gray-white mist suspended in the spiritual sky, that ancient palace above the Spirit World appearing indistinctly.
This brought a slight tremor. A certain power, following the connection, shook that ancient palace, causing the independent "kingdom" to briefly merge with reality once more.
In a house somewhere in Tingen City, a sigh of unknown meaning sounded.
In a deep hall with no natural light source, the huge, blurry, wriggling mass suddenly froze, and the frenzied Blatherer stopped, a brief silence descending.
-----------------
The Forsaken Land of the Gods was completely shrouded in Darkness, with only occasional flashes of lightning bringing brief light.
At the easternmost part of this abandoned continent, there was a gray-white mist that covered the sky and the earth.
They acted like an invisible barrier, not only blocking sight but also preventing any living creature from passing through.
That seemingly unchanging gray-white mist suddenly showed obvious wriggling, quickly "spitting out" a black shadow.
The black shadow was like a huge velvet curtain, frantically absorbing all the surrounding light.
Fine, dark, illusory "Spirit Body Threads" appeared out of thin air, extending to different sections of the black translucent "curtain."
The "curtain" became more and more transparent, more and more illusory, finally reaching a point where it was invisible to the naked eye.
A Demonic Wolf, covered in dark short fur, with eight legs and a height of four or five meters, suddenly emerged.
This Demonic Wolf had a tuft of gray-white short fur on its forehead, and its pure black pupils occupied at least three-quarters of its eyes. It was the Dark Demonic Wolf Kotar, who had not yet fully manifested its complete mythical creature form.
The Dark Demonic Wolf raised its head and opened its mouth, seemingly letting out a roar, but it produced no sound.
The next second, another figure appeared in front of it, another version of itself.
This historical projection of the Dark Demonic Wolf lightly pushed off with its eight legs, instantly reaching the edge of the "deep pit," and after a few attempts, it was forced to dissipate.
The Dark Demonic Wolf Kotar did not give up. At times, he transformed the surrounding Monsters into puppets, and at other times, he summoned historical projections, sending them forward again and again.
Although it suffered various failures, ultimately, its new batch of puppets still picked up and controlled the "curtain" formed by the Sequence 1 Attendant of Mysteries Beyonder characteristic.
The Dark Demonic Wolf Kotar, draped in the transparent "curtain," rapidly moved away from the re-solidified mist and disappeared into the Darkness.
Blinding lightning once again streaked across the night, illuminating a young man standing on a mountain peak, wearing a monocle.
He glanced at the dark sky, where lightning occasionally flashed, and then at the solidified gray-white mist to the east, a pleasant smile curling at the corners of his mouth.
-----------------
The anomaly of Sefirah Castle ended in an instant. Apart from the high-level Beyonders of the "Three Families," the Nation of Disorder, stimulated by the Sefirah Castle's aura, also allowed Aaron to clearly perceive that momentary change, which also confirmed some of his ideas.
A strange power surged into the corpse on the chair. The scrambled brain matter wriggled on its own, and blood once again flowed through the body.
Watching Klein, or more accurately, Zhou Mingrui, who was prematurely enjoying the treatment of a Miracle Invoker, Aaron's figure slowly disappeared.
A painful groan sounded a moment later. Klein, holding his forehead, reopened his eyes and sat blankly at the table. After being startled by the blood moon in the sky, memories gradually flooded his mind.
Coming to his senses, Klein finally saw the open notebook and the photo on the table. Looking at the unfamiliar corpse in the photo, his mouth twitched. The successive shocks left him physically and mentally exhausted right after waking up.
Just as he was about to put down the photo in his hand, he noticed the texture on the back of the photo. Curiously, he flipped it over and read the line of golden Hermes text. Klein, still receiving the original owner's memories, subconsciously read it aloud.
And the moment he finished reading, the photo in his hand spontaneously combusted without fire, turning into golden specks that scattered with the wind and completely vanished.
Aaron, surrounded by dark golden mist and seated on a magnificent throne, watched the prayer light points that suddenly appeared on the stone chair below. The smile on his lips became more pronounced, but considering Mr. Fool's psychological endurance, he did not act now.
"Is this magic?"
His mouth widened, and Klein muttered in disbelief, looking at his empty hands.
At this moment, he fumbled to turn on the wall lamp. In the dim light, he saw the revolver and hurriedly hid it.
Looking at the blood on his hands, Klein surveyed the room he was in. The continuous throbbing in his head prevented him from thinking effectively, but it also prompted him to walk towards the cracked full-length mirror.
After a few steps, a medium-height figure with black hair and brown eyes, possessing a distinct scholarly air, clearly appeared in his vision.
This was Klein Moretti!
His pupils instantly flashed with an expression of disbelief, because just now, he had seen a photo of this corpse...
He instantly pulled out the revolver from his embrace, warily looking around. His somewhat trembling words echoed in the simple compartment:
"I know you're here. Don't force me to shoot."
After saying this with a hint of feigned bravado, Klein held up the revolver and, using the dim light, inspected the room. After confirming there was no one else, his initial terror gradually gave way to shame and anger.
A national curse escaped his lips. Klein sat on the chair with an uncertain expression. It was then that he realized the handprint on the revolver perfectly matched his own.
"Did I commit suicide earlier? And who left that photo?"
One after another, questions surfaced in his mind. Having fully received the original owner's memories, he now had a simple understanding of the world he was in.
Remembering the honorific name on the back of the photo that he had subconsciously recited earlier, Klein wanted to slap himself.
As a top student in the History Department of Khoy University, and well-versed in Fourth Epoch history, he knew that strange powers existed in this world.
Examples of people dying tragically after being gazed upon by certain evil gods due to reciting their honorific name were abundant in historical records, and that photo that turned into golden specks just now certainly didn't look fake.
His smile became increasingly bitter. Klein, or rather Zhou Mingrui, at this moment profoundly felt the manipulation of fate: a bizarre transmigration, a strange suicide, and the unwitting recitation of an honorific name, which apparently was even real.
Klein felt his brain was a tangled mess, his CPU about to burn out. He suddenly closed his eyes hopefully and silently chanted in his mind:
"This is just a dream..."
A moment later, he reopened his eyes. What met his gaze was still this simple compartment and the eerie Crimson Moon outside the window. His unrealistic fantasy shattered, his pupils unfocused, and a feeling of loneliness and fear permeated his heart.
-----------------
While Klein was still in the cabin, trembling with fear, Aaron, the "evil god" who was half the instigator, was looking at another matter through the prayer light points.
Within the hazy prayer light points, a ship, broken beyond recognition, drifted in the mist. Its hull was like a withered branch drained of its essence, covered in scorched black marks. It was the original Death Knell.
After the Blatherer was stripped away, this ghost ship was not completely scrapped. It had a certain special quality itself; otherwise, it would not have been able to carry a Blatherer.
Although it was severely damaged, in certain specific environments, it could still have good effects.
Cavendish Lancer Pinto now stood where the sails used to hang. In his hand, he held the stone figure that "Orange Light" Hillarion had given him, which could guide direction in the Abyss.
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