"The problem lay within the mist itself. You had been breathing high concentrations of hallucinogens the entire time."
When Red Falcon heard Lloyd reveal the answer behind the story, he could not help but speak.
"So that was the true horror of Valley Town. Sounds almost disappointingly ordinary, doesn't it? Like some elaborate murder mystery where, after layers of terror and suspense, the truth turns out to be nothing more than a madman suffering from mental illness."
As if he had anticipated their reaction long ago, Lloyd continued calmly.
"And yet… that is precisely what made this mission unforgettable."
"When mankind faces the unknown, the mind instinctively begins to imagine. Our so-called common sense becomes the very thing that deceives us. Every assumption, every fear, every expectation quietly shapes our judgment, until the simplest and most obvious truth becomes impossible to see."
"Even if one possesses absolute reason, the slightest doubt is enough to drag them into a flawless trap."
Lloyd recalled the suffocating unease of that place.
"A gloomy town isolated from the world. Fanatics driven mad by faith. Cruel rituals. Symbols crafted to provoke fear… Even today, if any of you entered such a place unprepared, the outcome would be no different."
His gaze swept across the listeners.
"In fact, those of you carrying Geiger counters would probably be easier to mislead. From the very beginning, everything there was built upon layers of suggestion and misdirection, carefully pushing our thoughts toward collapse."
"The entirety of Valley Town was a trap designed to drive people insane."
Lloyd looked toward the young demon hunters before him.
"But things like this lose all power the moment the unknown becomes known."
A voice suddenly broke the silence.
"If a man remains a firm atheist, then ghosts and gods cannot harm him. But the instant his will falters—when hesitation appears—that is when they find a way in."
Robin spoke slowly. Hearing such words from a devout believer genuinely surprised Lloyd.
Lloyd studied him with curiosity. Those were not words one would expect from a man of faith.
"Exactly," he answered. "They are always trying to shake our minds… and they almost succeeded."
But Robin did not follow Lloyd's line of thought. Instead, he asked quietly:
"Then if one refuses to acknowledge gods… do they truly cease to exist?"
Lloyd paused, clearly not expecting such a question. His thoughts drifted beyond the tale of Valley Town itself.
"That depends on how you define a god," he finally replied. "In my understanding, gods are not noble beings standing above the world, nor saviors who exist to redeem mankind."
Though he often called himself a priest, Lloyd possessed not the slightest reverence toward divinity.
"Then what is a god to you, Mister Holmes?" Robin asked. "You come from the birthplace of faith itself, yet deny His existence."
"And aren't you the same?" Lloyd countered. "You are a knight of the Purging Order. Your people try to quantify every unknown thing with formulas and measurements, yet you still choose to believe in some intangible deity."
"In my eyes, gods are nothing more than another form of life."
"Life?"
"Yes. Creatures. Strange and incomprehensibly powerful beings whose existence exceeds the limits of ordinary human understanding. To the people of a century ago, modern steam technology would have seemed divine as well. Myths and miracles are often merely things humanity has yet to comprehend."
He continued in a low voice.
"That 'pressure upon cognition' we spoke of… gods are merely unknown organisms, just like demons. Imagine returning to those dark ages when humanity trembled behind towering walls. Creatures powerful enough to inspire absolute fear… in a sense, were demons not simply another kind of god?"
The words were blasphemous enough to curdle the air itself. Robin's expression shifted slightly.
"You sound like the leader of a heretical cult."
Lloyd merely nodded.
"Exactly. According to the records of the Demon Hunter Order, many heretical sects throughout history began because someone accidentally obtained the power of demons."
"Perhaps an unlucky fool encountered a demon and somehow survived. Or perhaps they came into contact with a highly corrosive source of contamination… Think about it carefully. It's like Pandora's Box. Once the first stage of corruption begins, the body slowly starts turning into something inhuman."
"We, who understand demons, know such people are doomed. But what about the ignorant?"
His words spread like frost across the hearts of every listener.
The Purging Order had existed for far too short a time. They had never witnessed the darkest age of mankind's war against demons. They knew little of the filthiest, most twisted horrors that once crawled through the world.
"Think carefully, Robin," Lloyd whispered. "Imagine enduring unbearable fear and suffering… only to receive strength in return."
He guided him deliberately toward the dreadful conclusion.
Robin's face gradually lost its color.
"Exactly. The ignorant do not fear what they do not understand. To them, such power appears like a divine blessing. Before receiving grace, one must first endure trials—that is what they believe."
"And so one cult after another emerged. They worshiped demons as gods, believing that if they survived the terror and despair within their hearts, they too could ascend into something powerful."
Lloyd sneered coldly.
"When in reality, they were merely degenerating into beasts."
"Do not doubt this. These accounts all come from the records of the Demon Hunter Order. A corrosive contamination source, a silver-tongued manipulator, an isolated environment like Valley Town, and a crowd of ignorant fools… We exterminated countless cults born from exactly those conditions."
His voice carried the sternness of a teacher delivering a warning.
"So now, Robin… think again about your ridiculous god."
Within the pale gray mist, Lloyd's gaze burned like fire. He was not speaking only to Robin—he was warning every soul present.
"From our perspective—from a higher perspective—those cults worship filthy monsters we understand and hunt. But tell me… could there exist an even higher perspective?"
"A perspective from which someone looks upon us, upon you and your god, exactly the same way we look upon those cultists?"
Robin drew a slow breath.
Only now did he begin to understand the true meaning behind Lloyd's tale. The story called the Uncanny Valley.
All reverence and fanaticism were born from ignorance of the unknown.
"Then how does the story end?" Robin asked quietly.
How did the demon hunters' story end?
Seen from a higher narrative layer, their struggles suddenly felt painfully simple—almost laughably mundane. Yet was Lloyd himself not already speaking to Robin from such a higher layer?
His voice grew urgent.
"The ending is simple… painfully simple."
Lloyd leaned back against the chair, recalling the final scene.
And slowly, the story reached its conclusion.
The demon hunters walked through the gray mist. Past thick blood-soaked air and piles of mangled corpses, they finally arrived at the place where the fog was densest.
"This is it."
Agent 016 stared at the thing before her. Though mentally prepared, even she felt a tremor crawl through her nerves.
"Do not get too close. The concentration of hallucinogens here is overwhelming."
042 frowned in confusion. He could not understand why the source of all the horror was… this.
"What exactly are these things?"
He crouched near the edge and picked up a decayed object. A withered flower. Fragments of plant matter still clung to it, releasing a sharp and irritating scent. The moment he inhaled it, the dizziness intensified immediately.
"A rare species," 016 explained. "This is not its native habitat… fortunate for you that I'm here. Plants like these are mandatory study material for Raphael Branch demon hunters."
Before them stretched a sea of strange blossoms, endless and ghostly, merging almost seamlessly with the gray mist itself.
016 took the torch from 011's hand. Originally they had intended to burn the buildings and disperse the fog.
Instead, the fire would be used here.
She hurled the torch into the sea of flowers.
Slowly, flames began to spread.
"This plant is called Windshade Grass."
"A hallucinogenic species originating from the Fertile Lands. Someone brought it here and cultivated it deliberately."
"So this is the truth behind Valley Town?" 042 still found it difficult to believe something so horrifying could have such a mundane explanation.
"Most likely. The town lies deep within a valley. Massive quantities of mature Windshade Grass released hallucinogenic particles into the stagnant air, where the mist trapped them in place. Add a few lunatics already driven insane by hallucinations…"
"No demons. No supernatural force."
"This is the truth."
"A simple, cliché truth."
016 watched the blazing inferno and quietly concluded.
The rising firestorm devoured the mist, towering upward like a pillar of light piercing through confusion itself. Holding their breath, the demon hunters kept a safe distance to avoid inhaling the burning toxins.
And as the fog gradually dispersed, the truth revealed itself.
042 saw corpses.
Countless corpses.
Bodies lay scattered among the flower fields, their dead faces twisted into blissful smiles. It seemed the Final Covenant had succeeded after all—they had completed their ritual within beautiful hallucinations.
The valley reeked of death.
An invisible reaper laughed somewhere in the darkness, having just finished a lavish feast.
And then a strange feeling surfaced within 042.
Once the unknown became known, every terrifying assumption they had made upon entering Valley Town suddenly seemed absurdly ignorant.
"And that was the end of it," Lloyd said softly. "The fire burned for a very long time. After confirming there were no survivors, we left the town behind."
"And thus, the Uncanny Valley came to an end."
As Lloyd finished speaking, the last traces of mist vanished. Heavy stone bricks and ancient timber descended from above, reassembling themselves into the shape of an old castle. Warm firelight flickered within the hearth, driving away the cold as reality returned to normal.
The four listeners emerged from the story.
Their thoughts returned to the present world.
Their eyes met briefly, yet an indescribable chill spread beneath their skin.
Lloyd truly was a disturbing man.
Every word from his mouth seemed capable of shaking the human mind from some impossible angle.
The story had ended.
Only the ticking of a clock echoed through the darkness.
Lloyd curled into the sofa, firelight illuminating half his face.
"Like I said, the story itself is rather cliché. What matters is the contrast—the difference between the unknown and the known. The way common sense deceives us. The way suggestion quietly manipulates our thoughts."
"If the ones who entered Valley Town had not been demon hunters like us—creatures already barely human—but instead the lot of you…"
"You would have died long ago."
This time, no one argued.
Joey finally spoke.
"You're right… so that is what makes the Uncanny Valley so terrifying?"
Lloyd nodded seriously.
"Have you heard the old tale of the blind men and the elephant? It comes from Jiuxia. Several blind men touch different parts of an elephant and each reaches a completely different conclusion about what it is."
"The original meaning was to mock those who judge the whole from a single fragment."
He paused briefly.
"But are we truly any different?"
Confusion flickered within his eyes.
Lloyd was a man who thought too much. His mind roared endlessly like an engine that could never stop, thoughts racing without rest.
Back in the Order, 016 had once said that people like Lloyd were destined to lose themselves to madness eventually.
But Lloyd never cared about such things.
Compared to mental illness, he feared something far worse.
Watson.
The thing imprisoned deep within his consciousness.
"Think carefully, everyone," Lloyd said, his voice growing strangely excited. "This is the true warning hidden within the Uncanny Valley. We are the blind men."
"We embrace the unknown while understanding only fragments of it, yet we arrogantly attempt to explain those incomprehensible existences with our shallow language and limited understanding."
His words carried the allure of forbidden knowledge, dragging everyone's thoughts deeper and deeper.
"What if our understanding of the unknown is itself the greatest deception? What if everything we believe merely blinds us from the truth?"
Like ants gazing upward at humanity, incapable of comprehending the entirety of what stands above them.
Their very nature limited the truth they could pursue.
Humanity needed to become stronger.
To evolve from blindness into sight.
To force the unknown into becoming known.
"And what if demons themselves are the same?"
There it was.
The dagger finally revealed.
This was the true point Lloyd wished to make all along. The lunatic had woven an intellectual trap from the very beginning, leading every listener step by step into its center.
Like distant thunder rolling through the dark, Lloyd smiled faintly at them all, as though some hidden specter were whispering forbidden truths into mortal ears.
"Secret Blood technology. Divine Armor technology. We have taken countless things from demons…"
"But do we truly understand them?"
His speech quickened.
"The Demon Hunter Order spent generations searching for the essence of demons. Yet just as we approached the truth, the Night of Descent erupted. Even the supposedly dead Lawrence never understood what demons truly were…"
"Or perhaps…"
"Perhaps no one ever did."
The demon hunter's voice trembled faintly.
"I am certain of one thing."
"Something is stopping us."
"I can feel it clearly. Every time I think about the truth… something is preventing us from discovering it."
His words echoed through the dark castle like the whispering murmur of ghosts.
The truth of the world—
was almost within reach.