In an instant, the entire team's attention, including the Duchess's, was drawn to the object in Fu Qian's hand.
Oval, with strange dark-red markings and covered in spikes of varying lengths.
This was—
Most of them looked confused. Only the Duchess's solemn expression flickered across her face for an instant.
Fu Qian didn't miss it.
The stone hadn't come from the box, of course. It was the one he'd taken from the skeleton.
When he'd crouched down to examine it just now, he'd quietly slipped it out and held it in his hand.
After cleverly finding a blind spot, Fu Qian had taken it out of the box.
He'd done it for a reason, naturally.
Judging by its effects when he used it, the object seemed to have some connection to the Loss of Color Curse. That was why Fu Qian had kept it.
But neither the Duchess nor the team members trusted him much.
As he'd said before, he was nothing more than a mascot to boost morale.
And information about the Loss of Color Curse was undoubtedly a highly sensitive secret.
If he took it out and asked directly, he'd have a hard time getting an answer—and might even arouse suspicion.
So Fu Qian had decided to test the waters this way.
Fortunately, judging by the Duchess's reaction, she clearly knew something.
"If it wasn't the Loss of Color Curse... have any of you heard of an ability that could cause something like this?"
Fu Qian casually set the stone aside, then turned his attention back to why the corpse had ended up like this.
The group shook their heads again. One of them steeled himself and stepped forward to take a closer look.
"I've never heard of any malicious ability that could turn someone into this, but