Even in another world, Joey's burning curiosity for gossip remained undiminished.
Golas fiddled with a strange instrument, and a mechanical creaking immediately filled the room.
Hunched over, he raised a hand toward a peculiar chair, signaling for Joey to sit.
Almost the instant Joey sat down, brilliant light flooded the dim little room.
He covered his eyes with a hand and waited a moment, only opening them once he had adjusted to the light.
What greeted him were crystal balls radiating pale blue light. Unlike the ones outside, these seemed more like vessels for holding things.
Inside were all sorts of eyeballs, apparently belonging to different species.
Most importantly, their pupils were contracting rapidly. These eyeballs were not dead.
Joey froze. Several seconds passed before he recovered, his gaze drawn to those eyes.
Golas gave him little time to think.
He activated the machine, and a metal cap bristling with tubes descended from the ceiling.
The cap settled over Joey's head. The scene looked uncannily like footage of condemned prisoners being tortured in movies from his previous life.
Drip!
A sound rang out like a falling drop of water.
Then Joey felt some sort of connection form between himself and the crystal balls.
His spiritual perception and field of vision expanded exponentially. While his mind was still reeling, he suddenly realized he seemed to have gained a god's-eye view. The entire Imperial City appeared to lie within his spiritual perception and Spirit Vision.
He could clearly see every detail, every passerby, even rats stealing food in dark corners.
This is a central surveillance monitor. It's the terminal server.
The sensation captivated him, giving him the feeling that he could peer into everything.
"Don't use this power indiscriminately. It consumes far too much."
Golas's voice snapped Joey back to his senses, and he hurriedly cut off the ability that let him see everything through Spirit Vision.
His gaze returned to the room. Looking at Golas before him, he said gravely:
"I feel as if more than half the blood in my body has been drained away."
And that was exactly how it felt. Only a few seconds had passed, yet Joey was drenched in sweat, his face deathly pale.
When he looked at the glowing crystal balls again, many of the eyes inside had shriveled and withered, clearly drained of life.
"Golas, if you want to kill me, there's no need to go to such lengths. Against a Demigod, I wouldn't even have a chance to escape."
"You can't blame me for that." Golas cast a pained glance at the crystal balls that had lost their signs of life, then stared at Joey with a peculiar expression.
"You were too reckless. I never imagined you would enter Spirit Vision so quickly."
"The last test subject took a full hour to succeed."
Joey sprang to his feet and moved to pull off the Metal Cap.
It had barely been any time at all, and he already felt more drained than a man who had gone seven rounds in one night. There was no way he would keep being a guinea pig.
"Don't!" Golas said, shaking his head helplessly.
Joey stopped what he was doing and fixed Golas's wrinkled face with a look that said, You know what I mean.
He wanted compensation. He had no intention of working for free.
Joey had noticed that this room held quite a few good things.
For instance, the thumb-sized glass balls in the corner.
Those things had another name: Tyrant Wild Thunder. They were similar to grenades from his previous life, only more powerful. Each contained a kind of lightning element. Throwing one at an enemy in a crisis could produce unexpected results.
Following his gaze, Golas noticed the things in the corner too.
A faint smile touched his lips.
"You want those? I have plenty. You can have them all."
"Thank you, Bishop," Joey flattered him with a smile. "Tell me what you need me to do. Just say the word."
His abrupt transformation left Golas momentarily at a loss.
"Use your spiritual perception to find Wade."
"That simple?"
"It isn't simple at all. As a Demigod, even if he stood right in front of me, I still wouldn't be able to detect his presence."
On second thought, Joey realized that made sense. If it really were so easy, there would be no need for him.
On a battlefield, a Fortune Teller's abilities would indeed make for a powerful support weapon.
Sequence 8 had not only given Joey new abilities, but also strengthened his existing insight.
"You only have three minutes. That is your current limit," Golas warned.
Joey closed his eyes again. This time, he did not rush to enter Spirit Vision. Somewhere beyond his senses, he seemed to catch a trace of energy tugging at him.
It was much like the way he summoned members to gatherings in the Heavenly Court.
Within Endless Darkness, a faint, elusive speck of light drifted about.
His intuition told him that was Vade Wisker.
Joey abruptly activated Spirit Vision. A ruined, collapsed building appeared before him. His gaze pierced layer after layer of mist until he finally saw it clearly.
It was Leila Aaron's manor. In front of the collapsed building stood a middle-aged man with a thick beard. He stood straight, his features stern and rigid, utterly expressionless.
That face had left a deep impression on Joey's mind.
Vade Wisker.
He was actually at the Earl's manor.
Joey tried to expand his Spirit Vision to see whether anyone else was nearby.
To his surprise, Wade, who had remained expressionless, suddenly turned around. In an instant, Joey felt a cold, sinister gaze staring straight at him.
"Ah!"
Joey fell off the chair, a thin trail of blood running from the corner of his eye.
"I found him. He's at Earl Aaron's manor."
Joey had no time to examine his injuries. He said urgently, "I saw an illusory door behind Wade."
He vaguely sensed that it was 0-09's true form. It was also the sight of the two eyeballs on the door that had made him cut off his Spirit Vision.
Joey had a feeling that if he kept staring, he would die.
"Good child. You did very well. The Lord's light will dispel your pain." Golas smiled, then turned and left.
Despite the unbearable pain in his eyes, Joey still gathered every last Tyrant Wild Thunder into his arms with a wicked grin before leaving.
Naturally, he would not hold back when it came to anything valuable he could carry away.
Taking a loss simply was not in his nature.
As a Bishop of the Sun God's church, Golas naturally had no shortage of healing potions. Within a few minutes, Joey's injuries had healed.
No matter how powerful a Sealed Artifact was, a single glance could not possibly leave someone utterly helpless. Had he been more careful, he might not even have been affected.
At the ruins of Leila Aaron's manor.
Wade looked up into the air in surprise, his brows drawing together slightly.
"What is it?" Several black-robed figures stood beside Wayne. He looked at Wade and asked in bewilderment.
Wade thought for a moment, then shook his head.
"Perhaps I imagined it."
Watching Wisker's thoughtful expression, Wayne opened his mouth, sighed, and finally spoke:
"I don't understand why you chose to open Him here."
"This is a secret of the Sun. I have no obligation to tell you. And don't forget your place. I can snap your neck at any moment," Wade said coldly.
"I am not a Defiler. I'm different from you."
As an orthodox Archbishop of the Sun God's church, he remained loyal to his faith, even though he was now surrounded by members of the Necromancer Sect.
While directing his subordinates to prepare the site, Wayne sneered. "Wade, who do you think you are? Would she have died if not for you?"
The subject weighed heavily on them. Both chose silence and let it drop.
Joey exhaled. Outside the Imperial City, he looked at the towering spires and still found it all rather unreal, like a dream during an afternoon nap.
A few hours ago, he had still been a Sequence 9. Now he had advanced to Sequence 8.
Originally, Joey had planned to advance once the political situation stabilized. Another reason was that he wanted to find an Antenna Worm himself. He did not dare use what Maimaiti had given him.
He had thought he was in for another interrogation by a master hypnotist. Instead, he had reaped a tremendous windfall.
After checking his direction, Joey ambled toward the former site of Earl Aaron's manor.
He deliberately slowed his pace, partly to adjust to his new abilities and partly because he was afraid to go.
There were at least two Demigods there. If a fight broke out, he would have nowhere to run.
His enhanced spiritual perception allowed him to avoid most dangers. The main city was far from peaceful now, and the civilian riots were only growing fiercer.
Explosions rang out from time to time. Dust and smoke filled the air, and the foul stench of rotting flesh was suffocating.
He did not need to investigate to know it was the work of Disciples.
Who knew how many members of the Necromancer Sect had successfully advanced to Sequence 7 amid this riot?
The once-imposing soldiers of the Empire were now in a pitiful state. Some were even drenched in blood as they grappled with civilians.
They all wore the same expressions: obsessive, savage, crazed, as though they had lost all reason.
Flames burned within the buildings, casting a red glow over much of the district. Corpses and blood silently told of the disaster's arrival.
Several Night Demons and beasts, once found only on Senegal's outskirts, had appeared as well, their fangs steeped in blood.
Joey walked slowly, his leather boots tapping against the ground.
His pace was leisurely. Strangely, neither the crazed civilians nor the mutated beasts attacked him, as though he did not exist.
Roars and sobs mingled around him.
He quietly watched a disheveled middle-aged woman weeping with a small baby in her arms.
The agony of losing her child had freed her from the Color Out of Space's influence.
Perhaps she had not broken free at all. Perhaps He simply enjoyed the negative emotion called despair just as much.
From the Color Out of Space's perspective, a war with a perfect ending was less desirable than a prolonged struggle.
That was why, despite Emperor Eng's overwhelming advantage, the coup had split Senegal in two.
So the war existed merely to please Him.
What did these lives, struggling so desperately, amount to?
His gaze pierced the dense mist, as though he could see the distant stars.
He was like an unfeeling machine, looking down on everything below.
The mother who had lost her child stood like a lifeless statue. Deep sorrow and anger had settled in her eyes, but above all there was bewilderment.
Multicolored mist swirled above her head. Its alluring radiance seemed to whisper to her, guiding her toward an endlessly dark abyss.
Every pair of eyes he could see was filled with madness. As though driven by some invisible force, people carried out brutal slaughter like machines.
Soldiers, civilians, women, children-they discarded their weapons and fought in the most primitive ways, biting with their mouths and ramming with their bodies. Every collision brimmed with violence and bloodshed.
The thick scent of blood hung in the air, mingled with sweat and gunpowder smoke.
Shouts, screams, and sobs intertwined into a scene of utter chaos. Everyone fought. Everyone killed. Yet even in death, they would never understand what they were fighting for.
The situation had become far more dire than it had been at the start.
Joey did not know whether this was the Color Out of Space's true nature or whether some other factor was involved.
At the very least, he saw a trace of 0-013's authority over directing.
Viewed another way, wasn't this just an enormous theatrical performance?
The situation had deteriorated after the Necromancer Sect seized 0-013. Everything fit.
This was a play about slaughter and despair.
The mentally deranged people had no reason left to speak of. They killed purely for the sake of killing. It had become an irreversible disaster.
"Demigods, Angels, Grade 0 Sealed Artifacts... just what is happening?"
Normally, any single one of these beings or objects could shake all of Senegal. Now they had appeared together.
Joey was doing his best to adjust to his new abilities.
Sequence 8, Fortune Shifter.
Literally, it meant manipulating luck. He could make others unlucky and siphon off their good fortune. That luck could be stored and used to produce different effects when needed.
An additional effect allowed him to shift away every trace of his own aura, even the signs of his existence.
Right now, Joey had shifted away his own presence. In other people's eyes, he became insignificant, like an ant on the ground or a germ. No one would notice him.
He still existed. He would simply be overlooked.
He looked at two people fighting nearby. Their clothes had been torn apart, exposing muscles bulging with veins.
The power of those punches striking flesh filled Joey with envy.
They were only Sequence 9 of the Giant Pathway, yet they already possessed physiques like that.
By comparison, he seemed weak despite being a Sequence 8. Not a single ability he possessed was related to combat.
All he could do was empty an enemy's luck, making them trip over a banana peel while walking down the street.
Now his powers were even stranger: nothing but escape skills.
"I wonder what the next Sequence is?" Joey sighed, feeling that his future looked bleak.
"Maybe I can switch to another Sequence!"
If an assassin possessed this ability, perhaps they could eliminate a target without making a sound.
As Joey headed toward the Earl's manor, forces began assembling in the Eastern District, which had remained quiet until now. Leading them was a man with a handsome, martial bearing: the Second Prince, Daniel Charles.