Another semi-divine artifact? The arrival of fear!

Yun Ni nodded, then extended her finger and pointed to where Cheng Shi had indicated.

Then...

With a "swish," before anyone could react, she straightened up.

And Wei Guan was unharmed.

"?"

It was over just like that?

Did she get it in?

Was it too fast?

Several players were startled by Yun Ni's speed. They were still trying to confirm if Yun Ni had actually penetrated him, especially since Wei Guan's corpse showed no reaction.

Only Cheng Shi smiled, guessing what Yun Ni had done.

In an extremely short amount of time, she had transformed her finger into a thin thread and poked it into Wei Guan's heart.

The Assassin's ability to dimensionalize her body was even stronger than he had imagined.

This suggested that the dagger might have just been a disguise.

When it came to killing someone, no weapon was more convenient than having your entire body be a weapon.

But the corpse's lack of reaction was somewhat abnormal.

A dead person's heart stops beating, and blood certainly doesn't gush out. However, the absence of gushing doesn't mean there's no bleeding. When external force breaks the organ's wall, dark red blood should definitely seep out.

Fang Jue seemed to have noticed this problem too. He asked uncertainly:

"Is there something wrong with his heart?"

Clever!

Cheng Shi nodded, pulled out a scalpel from his portable space, and skillfully began the dissection.

Within seconds, Wei Guan's chest cavity was dismantled by a pair of nimble, flying hands.

Everyone gathered around to look and found that his chest cavity was full of flesh and blood, but something was missing.

"The heart... disappeared???"

Du Xiguang stared in astonishment at the spot where the corpse's heart should have been, his brow furrowed, a thought forming in his mind.

Cheng Shi nodded and explained:

"Through touch on the skin, one can perceive the direction of internal muscles and fascia, as well as pressure gradients. When I was probing his chest, I noticed the pressure around Wei Guan's heart was much lower than in a typical corpse.

As you can see now, his heart was stolen."

"Stolen? This doesn't seem like stealing. To make a body part vanish directly, doesn't it seem more like the work of [Annihilation]?"

As soon as Fang Jue spoke, everyone turned to look at Yun Ni.

Yun Ni froze for a moment, then shrugged indifferently.

Her attitude was clear: it had nothing to do with her.

Everyone knew it wasn't her doing, of course. They were simply asking if [Annihilation] had similar methods.

Even Cheng Shi was silently wondering if he had overlooked an [Annihilation] killer.

But just then, as Yun Ni was also frowning in thought, Du Xiguang suddenly stood up and, with a hint of seriousness, drew a circle in front of himself.

Golden radiance formed a ring. Looking through the ring, the scene opposite was no longer the current street view, but a... library!

This circle seemed to pierce through time and space, connecting the present on one side with the past on the other.

The visual effect was quite stunning.

"Borrowing the Book of That Time.

Let me take a look. I remember there was a divine artifact that looked very similar to this."

Du Xiguang reached his hand through the circle and quickly searched the bookshelves. In a short while, he found a book and pulled its shadow into reality.

Like light and shadow, the pages flipped rapidly under his fingertips. After a few breaths, he found what he was looking for.

"Found it!

I knew this way of dying was so familiar: a terrified expression, a missing heart.

[When Fear Arrives], an SSS-grade divine-level dagger, from the Garuda Kingdom beneath the earth. It is a Demigod Artifact tainted with the dual divinity of [Filth Fall] and [Death].

This dagger doesn't need to pierce the body. It only needs to select a target and wait. When that unlucky soul feels fear, their heart will be stripped and offered to [Death].

A silent death.

You were right, it does resemble a curse, but it's even harder to guard against."

As soon as he finished speaking, everyone's faces turned grim.

A Demigod Artifact!

Another Demigod Artifact.

Before a dagger of this caliber, 2400 and 1400 are no different; they are both lambs waiting to be slaughtered.

"You still haven't remembered such a similar method of death? And you call yourself His follower."

Yun Ni looked at Du Xiguang with disdain, as if questioning if he was a follower of [Memory].

Du Xiguang's expression remained unchanged as he adjusted his glasses and said:

"Precisely because I am His follower, I do not need memory."

With that, he tossed the book of memories, which had transformed into light and shadow, back into the opened memory. The golden ring instantly vanished into the air.

Upon hearing this, Cheng Shi looked at him with a meaningful expression.

Du Xiguang was lying.

He didn't not need memory.

Perhaps, he had already lost the right to possess his own memories.

It was said that His followers exchanged their own memories for some additional power.

Cheng Shi wondered what talent Du Xiguang had gained by sacrificing his memory.

Fang Jue, being a man of action, didn't engage in idle chatter. With a grim expression, he stated his deduction.

"The killer is in the inn."

That's right! The killer was in the inn.

This dagger was very strange, but it still required a prerequisite: selecting a lucky victim beforehand.

With Wei Guan's skills, or rather, his alertness as a Hunter, he wouldn't have failed to notice someone in the night, nor would he have failed to notice someone tailing him after going outside.

Therefore, there was only one possibility: he was marked before he even left the inn!

The good news was that the two of them had successfully provoked the killer.

The bad news was that they had overdone it, and one of the actors had died.

However, having a direction was better than blindly searching like headless flies; at least the killer could now be narrowed down to the inn.

"There's still one more question..."

Cheng Shi frowned and added, "Have you ever considered what could make someone like Wei Guan feel fear?"

Undoubtedly, the moment the murder weapon was discovered, the murder method was confirmed.

The killer only needed to mark the target from the shadows; the rest...

was left to the victim themselves.

It was a case of being startled by the sound of wind and the shadow of a cup, all of it.

Once the fear of death quietly spread within a certain area, lone individuals in the night would become suspicious and jumpy.

At this point, the killer didn't need to do anything extra; a sound on a quiet street, a gust of wind under a moon obscured by clouds, could become the last straw that breaks the camel's back and takes the victim's life.

But Wei Guan was different.

He was a follower of [Foolishness], an archenemy of all ignorance!

Such petty tricks were probably beneath his notice.

The closer a person gets to the Truth, the more they detach from human emotions.

Would he truly feel fear?

The answer was yes.

Because his death was the best proof.

But the question was, what kind of fear could kill a follower of [Foolishness]?

Could everyone here be sure they wouldn't feel fear in the face of such dread?

Cheng Shi had no confidence.

Not just him; everyone was uncertain.

Of course, there was an even more pressing question before them now.

That was:

Whether or not they should return to the inn tonight.