Act of Courage

"You just said it yourself, didn't you? Job and those people attacked you, which violated federal law," He Ao answered seriously. "So this is an act of courage."

"?"

Selina recalled Job's miserable death. You called that an act of courage?

She stared blankly at He Ao's earnest expression, but... it seemed like he genuinely thought so?

For an instant, she even felt that the Evil God priest before her did not truly possess reason. He had merely gone so completely mad that he seemed rational.

Then she shook her head, casting the thought from her mind.

He was probably just teasing her. How could there be someone in this world so insane that he seemed rational?

She was about to say something else, but He Ao had already stopped paying attention to her.

While speaking with Selina just now, he had actually been watching her every move with utmost focus, checking whether she was using the conversation to distract him while making some small move, or revealing greater strength.

He sensed the danger emanating from Selina gradually increasing. He needed to determine whether she was recovering her strength, but it now seemed that she had not regained it yet. She was merely buying herself time to recover.

It seemed her strength did not recover linearly, but would instead return all at once once the right moment arrived.

However, Yezuola's innate danger-sensing ability had foreseen that risk in advance and warned He Ao.

He Ao found this danger-sensing ability quite useful. He wondered whether it was the Talent Sequence Job had mentioned before.

Even as he pondered, He Ao did not stop flipping through the bookshelf. Once he realized Selina posed no immediate threat, he left only a small part of his attention on her and focused mainly on the books.

Based on the changes in the danger level detected by his danger sense, he roughly estimated that Selina needed nearly another hour to regain her strength, while conducting the ritual would take a little over forty minutes.

So although the game system seemed to impose no time limit for completing the mission, it had effectively imposed one after all.

His plan to exploit a bug and gather more information before completing the mission had failed.

Therefore, before Selina regained her strength, he had to find as much information as possible and complete the ritual.

As for killing Selina outright?

It was a good idea, but he was a law-abiding good person!

Selina, who was wondering why He Ao was ignoring her, had no idea that she had just narrowly escaped death.

She watched He Ao's movements. As his tentacles danced, countless books were opened—revealing blank pages inside.

Most antique books nowadays were expensive. People who could not obtain real books often chose to buy these modern, artificially aged Fake Books to decorate their homes.

That was perfectly normal.

However,

Selina watched He Ao's movements in confusion. Wasn't this his own residence? Why was he searching so frantically?

What was he so anxious about? Had he discovered that she was rebooting her system?

He Ao noticed Selina's gaze, but did not care. His actions had been deliberately disguised, making him look like someone who had just returned home and was urgently searching for something.

Rather than a strange thief breaking into an unfamiliar home and frantically searching for valuables.

The difference was simple. When people searched through their own things, they instinctively took care not to damage them. A thief, on the other hand, would not care about the homeowner's possessions at all.

Thus, as He Ao searched through the books, he also took care to avoid damaging them. Whenever he found a book he wanted, after opening it, he would consciously close it again and casually put it back.

With time to spare, He Ao had only ten minutes to search these bookshelves, so he skimmed through the books at an astonishing pace.

Yezuola's eyesight itself was not very good. If He Ao missed something, he would not turn back to search carefully for it.

In the end, he finished searching the entire bookshelf within ten minutes. Unfortunately, he did not find any books introducing the ritual. However, he did unexpectedly find a palm-sized book.

Its pages had all yellowed, its corners showed severe damage, and it had been tucked away in an edge of the shelf, serving as a wedge to keep the books tightly packed.

This book was not written in any language Yezuola knew. Instead, it was written in a simplified script resembling pictographs. It looked somewhat like the writing of the Central Earth Republic, but it was not a script He Ao recognized.

However, although neither He Ao nor Yezuola recognized the text, someone had translated the title on the cover into a language familiar to Yezuola.

The book was called "Thirty Days to Become a Sword Immortal."

Another strange element had been added.

A book like this appearing in such a world—was it even legitimate?

He Ao roughly flipped through it. Inside were simple portraits of people, annotated with dense text he could not understand.

It seemed that the person who had translated it had only translated the title and could not be bothered to do the rest. Or perhaps they simply could not.

Although he could not understand the writing in the book, the contents looked fairly convincing. Moreover, it was the only book he had found so far that was not an elementary school textbook. After thinking for a moment, He Ao pocketed it. In Selina's blind spot, he tucked the small book between two elementary school textbooks and wrapped them in his tentacles.

Then he gathered up many of the items in the cave that could "please" the God of Knowledge and headed toward the passage through which he had entered.

Selina seemed to realize what he intended to do and hurriedly shouted, "Yezuola, didn't you say you were law-abiding? Do you know how great a disaster summoning an Evil God Subordinate will cause? Do you know how many people will die? You can't do this!"

As He Ao walked forward, he casually asked, "So which law says that summoning an Evil God Subordinate is forbidden?"

"Huh?"

Selina was stunned. How would she know whether there was a law forbidding the summoning of an Evil God Subordinate? Wasn't the harm caused by summoning one obvious? Wasn't this the kind of thing everyone should condemn?

Who had nothing better to do than read those law codes as thick as bricks?

He Ao looked up at Selina. This young investigator had decent combat ability and a good temperament, but she was a little too naïve.

Naivety could get you killed!

As he spoke, he had already left the passage and returned to the cave containing the Ritual Array.

The glowing "tubers" on the ceiling, like stars, emitted a faint radiance that illuminated the dim cave. The enormous Ritual Array flickered with specks of fluorescent light.

He Ao wrapped one end of the metal wires the confinement device had left inside his body around a tentacle, then pulled the wires out one by one with force.

Just watching him made Selina hurt. Even after losing power from the metal stakes, those wires remained covered in countless tiny barbs, as fine as mosquito legs. Every single one had embedded deeply into flesh. She could not imagine the pain of pulling them out.

Yet He Ao pulled them out expressionlessly, then lowered Selina, who could practically feel his pain.

Under Selina's bewildered gaze, he tied the metal wires around her.

Selina:?

After tying her up, He Ao turned his attention to the Ritual Array.