Finding Materials

"It's truly terrifying. Who would have thought that the industrial age I opened with my own hands would actually become a hotbed for the descent of evil gods?"

The first sentence of the third page of the diary was already packed with information, causing Klein to frown at once.

"The descent of evil gods often requires a large amount of negative emotion, and the negative emotions in the factory district have already accumulated to a rather terrifying degree. This makes me somewhat uneasy."

"Based on my personal understanding of evil gods, although They still can't descend by relying on negative emotions of this level, creating a few evil god's offspring to cause trouble is still possible."

"I was reminded of the Beyonder incident I encountered last month. The True Creator conducted a secret conception ritual in the dock district, and a woman became pregnant with His divine child. Fortunately, the Purifiers arrived in time and prevented the disaster from spreading across the entire city."

"Even so, the entire dock district suffered considerable damage. Is this the power of an evil god? Even Their offspring aren't something I can deal with at my current level..."

Evil god's offspring?

Klein tapped his fingers against the table and began to ponder.

If he remembered correctly, wasn't there one in Tingen City...

A few days ago, the Mandated Punishers had come looking for Captain and asked us Nighthawks to help hunt down a woman named Megose. She seemed to be Lanevus's fiancée and was supposedly pregnant with the offspring of the evil god True Creator... Although they hadn't told me where their intelligence came from, I couldn't help wondering whether it was related to Melvin. He had been tracking Lanevus before...

At the time, Captain had already warned us that this was very dangerous and sent a telegram to the Holy Cathedral. The police and the Beyonder team sent by the Holy Cathedral had already begun searching, but who knew when they would manage to catch them...

"Fool" Klein pondered the scant information about the True Creator's offspring before shifting his gaze to the last two pages.

At this moment, "Justice" and the "Hanged Man" had also reproduced Roselle's Diary and handed them over to the "Fool."

Klein set this page of the diary aside and continued reading the next one. Unfortunately, the Beyonder knowledge mentioned on these two pages was just as sparse. Most of them described various incidents he had encountered during his reign.

"The history of the Fourth Epoch was truly magnificent, making it impossible not to let one's imagination run wild. How exactly was the Solomon Empire established? How did the Tudor Dynasty fall? And why did the Underworld Emperor hurriedly launch the Pale Disaster together with the Primordial Demoness... How fascinating!"

Exactly. I'm curious too. Did you ever find out about this part of history later? If you did, please write it in the diary. Thanks... Klein silently sighed inwardly.

In fact, this was also Aster's own question.

He dared to mix this private material into the diary not only because he believed the Fool wouldn't discover that he was faking it—even if the Fool was the pinnacle of the Seer Pathway, this diary had already been transcribed by the others, and it didn't even exist in physical form!

All the diaries on the Gray Fog had been manifested by the three of them. With the original diary nonexistent, it would be a miracle if anything could be divined from it... Divination had to follow basic principles too!

That was only one reason. More fundamentally, the questions Aster posed in the diary in Roselle's tone were also historical matters he himself was curious about.

As for the game's setting, Aster only knew the general outline—roughly when things happened and who fought whom. He didn't really understand the specific causes and effects. He likewise knew very little about the extraordinary nobles of the Fourth Epoch. The ones Aster understood relatively well were the Zaratul Family, the Amon Family, and the Sauron Family.

His understanding of the Zaratul Family came from certain unofficial histories on the forums: You may not know this, but the reason Roselle rose so quickly was that he had sold his backside to Zaratul...

When it came to such unofficial histories, Aster might at most put them into his forged diary as a joke. But actual history couldn't possibly be explained entirely through that sort of theory. Now that he had transmigrated into the game, if he didn't try to learn about extraordinary history, he might truly lose his life because of an information gap.

Thus, in the forged diary, he had emphasized two matters. One concerned the descent of the True Creator's offspring, which affected his own safety. In the past, if he couldn't defeat it, he could still run away. But now that he had a mission issued by the True Creator and couldn't even leave Tingen, he naturally had to do everything possible to eliminate this unstable factor.

Aster had mentioned this matter in the diary to remind the Fool: "The True Creator's offspring is dangerous. Shouldn't you arrange for some people to make things difficult for Him?" He understood this Fool's hatred of evil gods very well.

The reason he mentioned the history of the Fourth Epoch was much simpler: Boss, I don't know much about this history either. Could you explain it to us?

Of course, all of this was based on the premise that the Fool could understand the information in the diary, or comprehend it through some other method.

From this perspective, it might be a good thing that He could understand the diary... Aster rubbed his slightly throbbing temples. Strange, could a spirit body get headaches too?

After putting down the several pages of the diary provided by Aster, Klein picked up the diary provided by Justice. Then he fell silent.

"July 14th. I met that mysterious Mr. Zaratul again. He's actually the leader of the ancient organization, the Secret Order!"

Mr. Zaratul?

Then that previous page...

Klein recalled every sorrowful event he had encountered in both this life and his previous one before managing not to burst out laughing at the Tarot Club.

No, no, perhaps it isn't what I think. Ah, right, I remember now. I've seen this surname in the Church's records on secret organizations. The Zaratul Family was a great noble family of the Fourth Epoch. They once controlled the Seer Pathway and were connected to the Secret Order. This diary further proved Zaratul to be the leader of the Secret Order... From this perspective, perhaps the person who had become involved with the Emperor was this Mr. Zaratul's daughter or sister... Well, I'll put this sort of unofficial gossip aside for now. Let's see what comes next...

Roselle was ultimately a high-sequence Beyonder. Even the slightest bit of Beyonder knowledge leaked in the diary was something Klein could only come across by chance at his current level.

From the diary, Klein gained quite a bit of Beyonder knowledge, such as the characteristics of fully digesting a potion and Zaratul's evaluation of the Savant Pathway...

He set the earlier pages of the diary aside and began reading the final page of Roselle's Diary.

"March 3rd. Ailued came again."

"I only discovered today that this fellow and Zaratul seem to share some sort of tacit understanding. The times they come are always staggered, and they've actually never encountered each other even once."

"However, they have one thing in common: They both like to beat around the bush. Zaratul is a charlatan from the Seer Pathway, so I'll let that pass. But you're a fellow from the Death Pathway. Why do you speak like Zaratul and leave half of every sentence unsaid?"

"Ailued asked about my relationship with the Church of the Eternal Blazing Sun again. I find him rather inexplicable. No matter what, I, Roselle Gustav, am an upright and dyed-in-the-wool member of the Church of the God of Craftsmen. I can understand Zaratul asking me to steal the Church's sealed artifact, but what are you trying to do by asking about the Church of the Eternal Blazing Sun? How would I know those fanatics?"

"After receiving my negative answer, he seemed thoughtful and didn't say anything else. I actually wanted to ask about his goal, but Ailued definitely wouldn't tell me anything. His conversation skills were excellent, and I was led off-topic after only a few words."

"Ailued chatted with me for a while about the Black Emperor of the Solomon Empire and teased me by saying, 'The Lawyer Pathway is practically the neighboring pathway of every pathway.' His explanation overturned my understanding of the Beyonder world!"

The diary ended abruptly. With his curiosity completely aroused, Klein flipped the diary over, only to discover that he had finished reading all the copies of Roselle's Diary obtained at today's Tarot Club.

I really want to curse... Great Emperor, couldn't you finish what you were saying?! Couldn't the person transcribing the diary make the handwriting a little smaller? If I ever get my hands on a saber, I'll slaughter every cliffhanger-loving bastard under heaven!

The resentment of being forcibly left at a cliffhanger made Klein glance at the "Hanged Man," who had provided this page of the diary. This left him bewildered, and he couldn't help beginning to reflect on whether he had shown disrespect to Mr. Fool somewhere.

After spending a few seconds calming himself, Klein made the diary vanish from his hand and smiled at the three waiting members. "Actually, you don't need to wait for me."

"It's our honor," the three said in unison.

When Klein had previously commissioned them to collect Roselle's Diary, he had already used the excuse of "accumulated merits." Thus, the three members weren't in a hurry to ask for payment for submitting the diaries. Instead, they first began trading among themselves.

"Lovers" Aster looked at "Justice" Audrey and asked, "Miss Justice, have you found the eyes of a Feathered Man?"

Audrey felt a little guilty and apologized to Aster. "I'm sorry, Mr. Lovers, but I don't have any leads on the eyes of a Feathered Man at the moment. Um... If you're short of money right now, I can compensate you with gold pounds."

"No need. Continue helping me look for the eyes of a Feathered Man." Aster shook his head. He wasn't only short of this one Spirit Guide potion ingredient, and even if he obtained it immediately, he couldn't make use of it. "Until I tell you that you no longer need to search, you can continue keeping an eye on the Beyonder channels around you."

"Thank you for your generosity, Mr. Lovers." Audrey sincerely expressed her gratitude, because she believed that she had failed to promptly provide the information payment "Lovers" had requested at the previous Tarot Club.

"Mm, and as for Mr. Hanged Man..." Aster shifted his gaze to Alger. "Would you be willing to help me purchase the stomach pouch of a White-striped Swordfish? I'll pay an intermediary fee."

"That won't be a problem," the "Hanged Man" replied steadily. "White-striped Swordfish only appear near the Berserk Sea. They can devour the souls of those who drown, and their strength is powerful and strange. The related Beyonder materials are very rare, so there will be a certain premium."