When did the “Hero ” bring that weapon along?

The middle-aged man’s mind swirled with total bemusement.

“Honored Purifier of the Blood-Sacred Spirit, I implore you: help this wretched girl. Let the world not abandon its devout follower. Every second of her life, she has dedicated to simply being alive upon this earth; deep in both, each one shaped can any be broken: stay in everything that thus births across their bind-hem close to frame. “

Yang Zicang’s eyes narrowed slightly, a silver-white ring gleaming on his chest.

He Yishu, witnessing this scene, required no further words; he had already amplified the flow of time, positioning himself just beyond the wall adjacent to the room.

And right beside them,

within the “Essence Mind Force Field ” space of the sub-ether; a tall, stalwart figure densely covered in paper painted with identical magic-circle patterns was also standing silently nearby.

…..

“O revered Purifier of the Sacred Blood Spirit, I beseech you to accept my offering. This is your favorite dark tea, as well as the demon blood you once wished to collect. “

Valenteen set a cup of pitch-black tea, along with a glass of water, on the bedside table.

Yang Zicang had seen him draw that glass of water from the faucet.

This guy…

Epsiline watched nervously and worriedly.

As Valenteen called out in prayer once more, an oppressive weight slowly sank through the air.

Yang Zicang looked up. Wisp after wisp, strand after strand of ethereal, mist-like vapor drifted out from the blurry shadow lying on the small spatial bed, converging toward the figure of Liana, who was positioned headboard-to-headboard opposite the bed.

Valenteen knelt on one knee.

“Let the spirit of the divine soothe the soul of this woman whose spirit wanders the perilous alleys of the world, so that she may not raise doubts against the world in her heart. “

Filaments of energy coalesced with swift intensity.

This is only what his eyes could see. In the perception of Yang Zicang’s “Musing Night, ” far more intangible and translucent energies—too numerous to be directly gazed upon—were swiftly enveloping Liana, mostly converging around her head.

The girl’s skin trembled. Her eyelids fluttered, trying to open, but only the chaotic stirring of her eyeballs beneath them could be seen, and she could not force them open no matter what.

“‘The God’… what is it doing? ” Yang Zicang asked, a note of concern in his voice.

“Shh, ” Valendine hushed, raising a finger to his lips. “That’s the ‘God’s Spirit.’ The God has long been asleep. But the ‘Spirit’ it left behind still tends to and heals a patient’s memories, suppressing any anomalous parts. This has been done many times over the past few decades. If you doubt it, just look at the banners around me. “

They glanced at the white ribbons hanging in the dim room. Upon them were indeed several phrases written in Mutao script, expressing sentiments like “So-and-so thanks Dr. Valendine. “

Yang Zicang’s unease did not diminish, yet it remained within a tolerable range. He was certain that this so-called “God’s Spirit ” was probably some kind of “Bloodline ” ability related to memory. Names of bloodlines he had heard of surfaced in his mind, but he lacked detailed knowledge of their powers and couldn’t match them to exactly what was happening now.

However, upon hearing this, Eberseer’s reaction was far stronger than Yang Zicang’s.

“You want to search her memories? Wait, you mean it’s going to read my child’s memories?! There’s no way in hell I’d allow that! “

Both Valendine and Yang Zicang turned their heads to look at him.

It was at that very moment that the flow of energy in the air suddenly froze.

{This… it can’t be! }

The sudden phantom sound startled Dr. Valentine, making him tremble violently and retreat two steps. “A-awake? It woke up?“

In the blink of an eye, a terrifying aura violently burst forth from that bed.

It felt as if an incomparably powerful monster was returning from another world! A tingling numbness spread across Yang Zicang’s skin. Just as he prepared to hurl the silk scarf in his hand, transforming it into a giant blanket to envelop them all for an escape, all of a sudden, everything fell into dead silence.

The energy door and the bed within it had vanished, revealing only a none-too-large, decrepit old room.

“What… what the hell just happened?“

Yang Zicang exchanged glances with the other two people in the room. Dr. Valentine tentatively craned his neck to peer over.

If there was anything extraordinary about it, it was that at the very moment the ferocious aura was about to coalesce into form, some intangible force seemed to shatter it instantaneously.

……

Within the Sub-Ether Space, after a long wait, the one who had finally turned the sudden apparition into blasted fragments with a single shot let out a deep breath and took two steps back. The weapon in his hand flickered with a pure radiance that seemed capable of annihilating all things.

Strewn around him on the floor were magical paper slips etched with spiraling, coiling patterns, attached to the broken chunks of a corpse as they quivered nearby.

“Who… are you…“

Half of a paper-pasted head stared with demonic eyes, scanning the person before him with an oppressive aura.

“How dare you ambush me… Damn it, being able to enter the Sub-Ether Space, which organization are you from?! “

On this paper-covered head, the energy of the surrounding ‘Emotion’ Trait converged along the Magic Pattern lines.

｛-Radiance: subtitle Sealing “｝, “｛-Radiance: subtitle Medium Risk “｝, “｛-Radiance: subtitle Ambush｝… _”

“We don’t know you. “

“Why… attack me… ” The half-head struggled to turn. “Whose man are you? Who sent you? Spill it, and I swear I’ll spare your life. “

“I’m no one’s, ” the man whose body was now covered in just a shred of paper crouched down. “Quite strange, isn’t it—just waking up and getting attacked. “

The half-head on the ground looked around. At the far end, a shattered hand moved, and some remote village structures seemed to come alive, twisting and extending.

But on that hand, the papers quickly gathered more ｛-Radiance: subtitle Seal｝ Trait energy.

“Don’t bother trying to use those powers. They inherently reject you. “

“Who the hell are you—another investigator looking for the… missing ones? A wild Mist Folk detective? “

“‘Wild’? Hah, even if I were a detective, the case would be closed by now. ” The man, who hadn’t heard that ‘vintage’ title for ages, picked a ‘piece’ of the twisted mass of energy commonly referred to to as ‘flesh’ from a ‘component’ of the person on the ground.

“I came here just to claim one thing—a miracle that can wake me up. “

The single eye of the head on the ground flickered with confusion, then instantly realized something.

“Could it be that I went to the realm of illusions? Haven’t I been staying out these past two days? Wait, what time is it now? “

“Heh, finally convinced that we’re inside the ‘Sub-Ether Force Field,’ are you? “

The crouching man tossed the “piece of flesh ” in his hand and said:

“Finding this Trait was incredibly difficult. If someone hadn’t offered me this information on their own, I might have had to wait—perhaps several centuries more—before I got this chance. And by then, my Ether Trait would have long since been solidified. “

The head was taken aback for a moment, then suddenly filled with terror.

“The Trait you want is… “

“Naturally, it’s the ‘Sub-Ether Awakener’ Trait—the one that the ‘Sub-Ether Prisoners’ yearned for most before they lost themselves. “

The eyes on the half-head trembled as they watched the man stand up nearby.

“You think those etchings were sealing you? You fool. “

He peeled off a piece of paper from a section resembling the “chest cavity. ” That part began vibrating and expanding at a rapid pace, dissipating into a cloud of energy before vanishing.

“This… my body… “

“You should feel grateful. Unlike those victims you dragged into your Sub-Ether space, you won’t have to die without knowing what’s happening to you. “

He peeled off another piece of paper. That area quickly grew ethereal like smoke.

“Ahhh! ” The head on the ground began to panic.

The scattered body parts all tried to vibrate frantically. The surrounding terrain and houses extended and twisted along with them, like a reflection of a village rippling in the water.

“But you should also regret it—why did you have to wake up? ” The man tearing off sheet after sheet of paper turned to look at the half-skull. “Am I right, ‘One who Loves the Etheric Illusion’? “

“What! “

“Do you refuse to admit it, or are you truly oblivious? Don’t you know that so-called ‘Traits’ are just the labels the universe slaps on us? ” The man placed his hand beside the magic-patterned paper stuck to the skull.

“Wait, hold on! I can give you money, give you Glory, and even Moonlight and Blood-line Circuits. I know the locations of four different Blood-line Circuits; one of them is bound to be useful to you. Stop, please! “

“Ha, yeah. The thing is, even now, someone like you doesn’t seem to care about the word ‘why.’ Talking to you about this is truly like casting pearls before swine. “

“Please don’t. “

With a sharpwhoosh, the man tore the paper away.

The Trait energies gathered around it vanished rapidly, but at the same time, even more Trait energies from other sources converged, dense information ripples as if they were about to tear it apart.

And among them, the most powerful energies were the fluctuating Trait threads: ｛Etheric Illusion｝, ｛Love for Etheric Walking｝, ｛Etheric Prisoner｝.

The eyes on the half-skull stared in silent horror as their own head rapidly disappeared.

Just as half of it had dissipated, the man suddenly acted as if he’d just remembered something and said, “Oh. Almost forgot to mention. Those negotiation conditions you brought up? They expired a long time ago. “

The eyes, up to the nose that had now vanished, stared at him in shock, a flicker of desperate pleading shimmering within them.

“Because it’s now 428. Bye-bye. “

He let out a soft laugh, watching as the head’s eyes, carryingshock,bewilderment,resentment, andregret, vanished into thin air.

“You idiot—only now learning to think. “

The man turned to glance at the crackling Veilspite Plasm field around him, then let out a sigh.

“Mostly for myself, sure, but I guess I’ve avenged you all just the same. Rest easy, the lot of you. “

He pulled on a hat and slung his weapon as he sprang off the slope with a featherlight leap—like moonwalking across an alien void—launching himself far into the distance. Each time his feet hit the ground, he flickered through the first-lit glow of the Umbrapsychos Lattice until he completely dissolved.

By the forest along the village road, darkness twisted, and a human silhouette emerged.

Taking in the now-crisp air, the man in his thirties, his face recovered to a fully human form, turned and cocked his head to look at the quiet village. He was clutching a bamboo-shadow gun whose grip was etched with molten-gold filigree. Tilting his chin upward, he watched the full moon in the sky.

He pulled out a piece of letter paper, unfolded it, and started writing with a pen.

——Annexing the achieved Mark Shard. You have my gratitude, Lord Corn Moon Warden.

——Until our signs cross again, He Ping.

Done, he folded the paper carefully, just as arranged by the go-between of that august messenger, slipped it into a sealed envelope, then turned back toward the village and dropped the letter into a postbox by the side of the road.

Inside the envelope, the handwriting on the letter paper began to twist rapidly.

—I understand. May the Angel bless… grace upon you.