299. Hymn of the Old Ones

Are you scaring yourself?

The Bandaged Man asked a question, but did not withdraw his hand. Instead, some gray substance escaped from between his fingers. The substance drifted in the wind like grains of sand leaking from between his fingers, spreading towards the corridor.

If someone were standing there, the smoke would reveal their figure; this was an extraordinary power honed by the Bandaged Man race over a long period of time.

However, to the Bandaged Man's surprise, no one was revealed even as the corridor was filled with gray smoke.

Only the boy in the classical oil painting hanging on the wall grinned, mocking the Bandaged Man's foolishness.

Be careful.

The Bandaged Man let the fishman go first, and slowly moved towards the depths of the corridor.

Lu Ban, standing in the room, took a light breath.

"I was so scared, I almost got caught."

He sighed.

"That's really terrible."

Feng Yu read it aloud in a monotone, emotionless voice.

Lu Ban continued to follow the two. Feng Yu's complete invisibility effect evaded all of their detection methods. Although Lu Ban was walking right behind them, the two did not notice him at all, and were only looking at the various things inside the ship.

The Bandaged Man entered a spacious room. Unlike the other bedrooms, this room had a large wooden desk in addition to the bed. On the desk was a nautical chart, and behind the chair was a display cabinet. Inside the transparent window, there was a model of the Starship.

This is clearly the captain's cabin.

The Bandaged Man didn't touch anything inside rashly. Instead, he reached out and used the Gray Fog falling from his fingertips to explore. His gaze swept over the cabinets, windows, and portraits, and he saw the mirror on the wall.

The image of the Bandaged Man was clearly visible in the mirror.

However, he clearly saw that there was another face behind him.

The face was slightly Pale, belonging to a completely different race. Its deep black eyes seemed to devour everything, and it was ferocious and terrifying.

"!!!"

The Bandaged Man immediately turned around, and the smoke in his hand transformed into sharp spikes that pierced through the man's position.

There was no feedback of being hit.

There was nothing behind the Bandaged Man; the merman was exploring another room.

When he turned around, only he himself remained in the mirror.

Snap—

A pen on a nearby table fell to the ground with a slight thud.

The Bandaged Man, his nerves on edge, looked over.

There was no one there.

He spread the Gray Fog from his body throughout the room, trying to detect the movements of any possible person, but found nothing.

"Illusion?"

Even though what he saw and heard gave him a strong sense of unease, his own abilities told him that he was safe here.

The Bandaged Man quickly found the cruise ship's blueprints, picked them up, and prepared to leave the captain's cabin.

Before leaving, he turned back and took one last deep look at the room before departing.

Inside the room, Lu Ban stood by the window, a slight twitch at the corner of his mouth.

"How could you suddenly break invisibility?"

He questioned Feng Yu.

Lu Ban was standing behind the Bandaged Man, but Feng Yu suddenly deactivated his invisibility, causing Lu Ban's face to appear in the mirror. Although he immediately reactivated his invisibility, he almost gave himself away.

The pen was knocked away by Feng Yu when Lu Ban was standing by the table, after Feng Yu suddenly deactivated the invisibility on his hand.

"Isn't this quite interesting?"

There was a clear hint of laughter in Feng Yu's voice.

"No, it's not interesting at all."

Lu Ban immediately replied.

If I were to expose myself to these people, then war would be the only option.

Lu Ban considered himself a pacifist, and the missions in the Silent Land were all kinds of strange things. Maybe these people weren't actually there to break the seal. What if they were just swimming next to that eerie city and he immediately treated them as enemies? That would be so awkward.

Moreover, these people are capable of undertaking tasks of [Alienation] difficulty, so their strength is at least similar to Lu Ban's level. There are three people on the other side, while Lu Ban only has two. It's not certain that they can defeat them.

Uh, wait a minute.

Lu Ban suddenly thought of a question.

Where did Laika go?

After being possessed by Feng Yu, I was unconscious for a while. When I woke up, Laika seemed to have disappeared.

Are they hiding?

Or is it...?

Considering Laika's characteristics, Lu Ban suddenly felt that the people on this ship might be in trouble.

Four-Eyes sat on the deck, looking at the island that was so close yet so far away, feeling troubled.

Before his eyes, the flags on the deck twisted and formed the system's crimson and ferocious text.

[Hymn of the Old Ones]

In the eye of the storm, a solitary temple stands.

The gods who once ruled over all things slumber here, awaiting an opportunity to resound the old hymns and usher in a new dawn.

Enter this temple, attempt to break free from the shackles imposed upon this Great Being, and witness a mad and magnificent feat.

[Mission Requirements: Enter the eye of the storm and reach the temple]

[Mission Requirement: Break the Seal]

[Task Difficulty: Alienation]

"It's unclear how long the storm will take to move; it seems the city will only rise from the sea when the storm actually hits."

The Four-Eyes rubbed his palms together, muttering to himself.

The mission has two companions, and so far, everything is going smoothly, but Four-Eyes feels something is very wrong.

He had previously experienced the mutated missions, which were extremely difficult and almost impossible to survive. He relied on his previous experience, proceeded cautiously, and sacrificed several teammates in order to survive these missions.

Some of these missions involved being attacked by terrifying monsters right from the start, others required assassinating a general who was heavily surrounded, and still others required surviving for seven days in a severely contaminated area.

This mission, however, has been extremely simple from the beginning. They originally thought they would have to physically cross the storm, but the tunnels in the ruins led them directly to the vicinity of the temple. No monsters have appeared for so long. The biggest problem is that the ship cannot get close to the temple.

It went far too smoothly.

Imagine a test paper that's supposedly incredibly difficult, one that even top students can't solve. But you finish it in a mere twenty minutes without feeling any difficulty at all. After you're done, don't you feel like something's not right?

That's the feeling of Four-Eyes.

The mission has progressed far too easily so far, without any difficulty whatsoever, making it hard for Four-Eyes not to suspect that something big might be waiting for them later.

Does this mean that after the seal is broken, the three of them will become sacrifices?

The ship's sudden appearance here must be some kind of mission element; perhaps there are monsters hiding on board?

Just as the Four-Eyes was lost in thought, he suddenly saw something flash by at the edge of the deck in the distance.

The thing looked like... a lump of flesh and blood?

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