Death: Gou Feng

There was only one scream, and then the entire courthouse fell An Jing again.

After leaving the inner hall and entering the outer courtyard, Cheng Shi no longer looked into the hall, but instead cautiously surveyed his surroundings.

He feared that the scream was just a trick to attract attention, and that the real danger might be lurking elsewhere, so his expression was unusually solemn.

Zhang Jizu shared the same idea, but when he saw Cheng Shi's wary look, he instinctively shifted his gaze to the hall, creating a complementary effect with Cheng Shi's vigilance.

The two of them, simply because of that the Great One, suddenly became tacit partners after a few brief tests of each other, neither of them seeming to have imagined that the other would betray them.

Zhang Jizu came with a bodyguard mission, so naturally he couldn't kill the person he was protecting like Grand Marshal Hu Wei. As for why Cheng Shi trusted him so much, it was probably because of the Great One on the Bone Throne.

He could hardly imagine how interesting the Great One's expression would be if he were killed by that the Great One's Chosen of God, and then had to meet Him again in the Fishbone Hall and "go to court" with Zhang Jizu.

He doesn't like crowds, so he most likely won't allow this situation to happen.

Therefore, Cheng Shi was not worried about Zhang Jizu having any problems; he was worried about his other three teammates having problems, and big problems at that.

Why did all the people who had been traveling with them disappear after entering the courtyard, leaving only a scream for the two of them?

This is very strange and doesn't make sense.

Cheng Shi cautiously sensed all the Change around him and asked quietly:

Can you sense the Change in [time]?

Zhang Jizu narrowed his eyes and shook his head slightly.

"You suspect that Scorpio is the hunter?"

"It's not impossible."

"But I didn't sense any remnants of the time progression, at least not in the courtyard."

Cheng Shi frowned, his eyes darting around, and said, "It's been a while, shall we go in and take a look?"

"Okay, you go first."

"?"

Cheng Shi glanced at him sideways, inwardly grumbling:

Isn't this a trick I used when I was Priest? How come this person is so skilled at it?

"If you're not afraid of death, why don't you go first?"

Zhang Jizu explained very seriously:

"Firstly, I am Priest, and I naturally lack offensive skills, so I am not suitable to be a striker to clear the way."

Secondly, even if I am His Believer and I am guarding the gate of death and selecting Sacrifice for Him, I cannot frequently make unnecessary changes, as this concerns the piety of my Faith.

Third..."

"Third, I'll go first! Master, stop chanting, I'll go first, okay?"

Cheng Shi quickly interrupted his spellcasting and walked away speechlessly.

Seriously, what kind of person is this, babbling on and on like Tang Sanzang?

And you keep talking about piety, piety, piety. I think you're not thinking about piety, but about your future, aren't you?

Seeing that Cheng Shi had agreed to his plan, Zhang Jizu followed with a smile.

So the two of them walked back along the path they had come from in the outer courtyard, one after the other. When they reached the bottom of the spiral staircase, Cheng Shi looked at the dimly lit second floor and suddenly shouted:

"Is my brother still alive?"

The hollow voice echoed in the hall for a moment, but no one responded.

Cheng Shi frowned, held the Scalpel horizontally in front of him, and pinched the ring on his finger with his right hand as he stepped up the stairs.

Zhang Jizu followed closely behind, constantly examining the footprints on the stairs, and whispered:

Something's not quite right.

The inner hall door was open, and it wasn't far from the courtyard. There was no way we wouldn't have heard that kind of stomping sound. Besides, he clearly knew someone was behind him, so why didn't he call for help while he was being chased?

Cheng Shi paused, then said without turning his head:

"The first possibility is that the footprints are the final evolution of the [Time] Assassin. He overwrote the pursuit in the deduction into the present, so we could not hear the stomping sound in another time and space."

The second possibility is that someone Annihilation the sound.

But since you didn't sense any residual power of [Time], it means the second possibility is more likely.

Of course, it's also possible that Scorpio is a master and has the means to erase any remaining power.

But either way, it means our tour group has disbanded.

Tsk, they were just walking together in the city a moment ago, and then they turned around and started fighting. People's minds are really hard to fathom.

"We con artists are so naive; we never have any bad intentions."

Didn't you say you were Wood Elf from a plant protection association? How did you become a fraud?

So you're not pretending anymore, huh?

"..." Zhang Jizu's eyes twitched violently, unable to continue the conversation.

The two continued walking cautiously, and soon reached the second floor. The windows on the second floor seemed to be sealed off, with only a faint light shining through the gaps in the wooden boards, but this level of brightness was not enough to illuminate the entire space.

Cheng Shi peeked out and found that the entire second floor was extremely dark. Near the stairwell, several rows of large bookshelves blocked the view. Through the gaps between the overlapping bookshelves, he could vaguely see something on the floor and some decorations on the ceiling.

There were several messy footprints next to the bookshelf. Judging from the marks, it seemed that Gou Feng rushed behind the bookshelf, turned back, and then rushed in again.

The overlapping of the footprints revealed his shock and unease. Cheng Shi paused upon seeing this and shrank back slightly.

There might be something wrong behind the bookshelf.

He turned back to signal to the squinty-eyed man to be careful, then took out a spherical magic lamp from his personal space, tossed it high into the air, leaped over the top of the bookshelf, and crashed into the depths of the second floor.

The ball lamp made a "thump-thump" sound as it hit the ground, rolling all the way to a corner where it hit the wall before suddenly lighting up. In an instant, bright light filled the entire second-floor space. Cheng Shi, who was prepared, shielded his eyes to avoid being blinded by the light, and then quickly lowered his hand to look ahead.

But to his surprise, that one glance sent a cold sweat down his spine.

"This is..."

Looking through the gaps between the maze-like bookshelves, he immediately noticed that the second-floor ceiling was densely covered with the corpses of infants. They were curled up like fetuses still in gestation, with something resembling an umbilical cord wrapped around their ankles, and then hanging upside down from the ceiling.

The space was enclosed and windless, so these eerie infants wouldn't normally move. But as sounds gradually arose, they began to sway slowly in sync with the sound waves, like a string of chilling, terrifying human-shaped wind chimes.

Cheng Shi was genuinely startled. He instinctively took a step back, but someone pressed his back against his hand and pushed him back.

Zhang Jizu walked up with a frown, his gaze sweeping over the upside-down, eerie infants. His eyes showed no shock, but rather a growing sense of doubt as he said:

"An evil child?"

"That's not right. Didn't you say the evil infant was split open and burned to ashes?"

"..."

That one sentence, which almost exposed Cheng Shi's lie, instantly dispelled the slight fear in Cheng Shi's heart, causing his toes to unconsciously grip the floor.

He dared not turn around for fear of revealing his secret, so he could only walk forward with an embarrassed expression, muttering to himself as he went:

"... That was just a form of punishment from a certain era; it may have changed since then."

"That seems to make some sense." Zhang Jizu nodded slightly and followed in his footsteps.

"However, since the evil infants represent the Divine Nurturing Church's denial of Faith, why do they still hang these things here instead of destroying them?"

To me, this looks more like a ritualistic ceremony of a cult than a method of dealing with evil infants.

Cheng Shi couldn't answer the question, so he could only laugh it off:

"You're overthinking it. What if it's not that complicated?"

Perhaps the conditions at the abandoned courthouse aren't so good, and the staff here just want to dry some cured meat to eat. See, doesn't that make much more sense?

Zhang Jizu did not refute, but simply continued:

"Dried meat should be ventilated by opening windows; sealing the windows makes no sense."

"..."

Dude, I was just cracking a joke to lighten the mood, you don't have to take it so seriously...

Cheng Shi twitched his lips, then fell silent, turning all his attention to the "human wind chime" above his head.

The arrangement of these upside-down dead infants is clearly regular, with equal intervals between them, and they even subtly form a kind of symbol.

Out of caution, Cheng Shi did not touch them, but he wondered if someone was really blaspheming [Birth], and if this place was a secret blasphemous place.

But then he thought of the Divine Nurturing Church. This church, which advocates "pregnancy," doesn't seem to value Newborn as much as Believer who advocate "Birth." Plus, with the accusation of "evil infants," maybe that's really how they deal with evil infants.

After all, he didn't understand what was written in the file.

Mouth Brother is the same; he still hasn't said a word.

Cold-blooded! Ruthless!

If this is truly the method the Divine Nurturing Church uses to deal with evil infants, then this approach is indeed rather crude.

But that makes sense, since Civilization in the Life Era have never been refined; they have always been quite crude.

As Memory says, the gods of Life are also quite rugged.

While Cheng Shi looked up at the sky, Zhang Jizu was not idle either. He squinted and pushed Cheng Shi forward, while also looking around.

Just as they passed through the bookshelves and arrived at the empty back area, the two of them suddenly froze.

They were horrified to discover a huge pool of blood on the floor in front of them!

In the still-warm pool of blood, a severed hand lay forlornly to one side, while the body that should have been attached to it sat slumped on the floor between two rows of bookshelves, leaning against the wall with its eyes closed.

"!"

Upon seeing the corpse, the two men's gazes sharpened, and their expressions simultaneously darkened.

Gou Feng!

This Believer, Birth, seemed unable to endure even half a day of the Trials that his Lord of Grace had sent down.