Experience: 0/120 Health: 26/40 (hungry, injury to the back of the head) Stamina: 40/60 Sanity: 4/5 Main class: None Secondary class: [Fisherman LV3] Attributes: Strength 4, dexterity 6, endurance 5, intelligence 3, faith 3 Special attributes: Charisma 7 (+2), willpower 5, insight 3, luck 3 Skills: Quick hands, sharp eyes LV1 (passive), sea legs LV1 (passive) Combat power: 4 [Assessment: A somewhat handsome young fisherman with absolutely nothing else going for him. A little piece of trash.]
"-Aaaaargh!!"
A piercing scream jolted Chen Lun awake.
He scrambled up from the floor and looked up from his knees. The woman in the opposite cell was howling in agony, half her body hidden in darkness. Countless twitching eyeballs kept sprouting from her legs, which lay exposed in the firelight.
They crowded together in a horrifying mass.
"Get back! Keep staring and I'll smash your bones!"
A shout rang out, and a tall, thin silhouette blocked Chen Lun's view.
Looking up, he found a guard standing before him on the other side of the bars, staring down at him. Even with the light behind the guard, the cold malice in his eyes made Chen Lun deeply uncomfortable. But he had no choice under the circumstances. He lowered his head and returned silently to sit in the corner of the cell.
"Ignorant idiot! Pathetic wretch! Stop sticking your nose into everything..."
The guard swept a vicious gaze over the others in the cell, the two halves of his little mustache tilting upward.
"Nobody looks outside! One look, one finger chopped off!"
He adjusted the short sword at his waist, its guard scraping against the scabbard with a crisp sound.
Everyone in the cell shrank back in fear and turned their heads away from the scene outside.
The guard snorted coldly, then turned away in satisfaction, still muttering curses. Chen Lun could vaguely hear him complaining about Monk Will.
"Quick! Get moving!"
"Group four's sacrifice has mutated! Take her away and deal with her!"
A flurry of footsteps sounded in the corridor outside. Keeping his head lowered, Chen Lun raised his eyes to watch from the edge of his vision. Three or four guards in leather coats and brimmed hats hauled up the woman in the opposite cell, threw her into a sack, and carried her away.
They moved swiftly, wasting not a moment, as though any delay would lead to something terrible.
Chen Lun slowly exhaled the stale air in his lungs. He already had a suspicion about the truth.
Based on his years of gaming experience, the woman had most likely suffered mystical contamination, causing her body to mutate. Once her sanity dropped to zero, she would lose control completely and become a monster.
By then, she would certainly be dead. Only her body would still be moving-a lump of rotten flesh harboring a crazed will...
What should I do...
Chen Lun began to think.
Trapped in the dungeon, he had no way of knowing the time outside, but tonight's sacrifice was certainly drawing ever closer.
Sacrifice!
The word was easy enough to understand, but in the fantastical world of Age of Mysteries, which incorporated elements of Cthulhu and New Weird fiction, it was only an umbrella term. It did not simply mean an offering to a god.
Chen Lun knew very well that the Red Apple Church made sacrifices to the [Mysterious Objects] it had collected at enormous expense in manpower and resources. Those sacrifices consisted of all kinds of living creatures, humans included.
In a sense, however, these so-called sacrifices were more like research.
The Red Apple Church had been secretly studying [Mysterious Objects] all along, seeking complete mastery over the mystical powers they contained.
Chen Lun's current role was that of a "sacrifice" to the [Mysterious Object] handled by the group Monk Will belonged to—the man the guard had mentioned!
In Age of Mysteries, [Mysterious Objects] could be understood as equivalents to the enchanted treasures and magical implements found in cultivation fantasy. Unlike those treasures and implements, however, these [Mysterious Objects] were far stranger and harder to control. Their origins were unknown, their mechanisms were unknown, and their properties and methods of use were all unknown...
Even the forms they took were unknown.
They could be commonplace objects-a fountain pen, a coffee cup, or a gun... Or something larger, such as a table, a chair, even a house or a car. They could also be living creatures: insects, cats, dogs, things that flew in the sky or swam in the sea... They could even be people.
Unless vast, perhaps staggering numbers of human lives were spent researching them through trial and error, no one dared use these [Mysterious Objects] lightly. You might well die for no apparent reason before you even started using one.
The woman's mutation reminded Chen Lun of a famous [Mysterious Object]. Those it contaminated grew eyeballs all over their bodies, and that particular [Mysterious Object] also belonged to the Red Apple Church.
If it really is that thing...
Chen Lun wiped away his cold sweat, a vague sense of foreboding stirring within him.
In his previous life, he had not been a player known for his strength. Unlike most people, he had little enthusiasm for pursuing power and remained in the middle ranks. Instead, he was more fascinated by the game's lore and worldbuilding.
Besides uncovering side stories and traveling around to experience local customs, his favorite pastime was browsing forum posts about curious happenings in the world of Age of Mysteries.
Chen Lun remembered reading a detailed introduction to the Red Apple Church that included information about that [Mysterious Object].
[Grade A Mysterious Object: Sun-Averting Potted Plant] Formed from the remains of a saint who abandoned Sun Worship, it possesses a powerful repulsive force and is especially lethal to supernatural beings of the sun pathway. According to legend, the Trisoul Empire's Tourmaline Royal City once had to be rebuilt, and this artifact was the culprit. This [Mysterious Object] belongs to Silent Nun Floy, one of the Red Apple Church's bosses. "Blood rains upon me. I watch in silence as the sunflowers bow their heads after the rain, and the sunflowers watch in silence as the sun burns to death." -Froy
I hope the [Sun-Averting Potted Plant] isn't here...
Chen Lun felt himself sweating more and more. His back was soaked, cold and unpleasantly clammy.
I don't want some rotten luck getting me buried along with these people!
I have to find a way out, fast!
Judging by the timeline, the Red Apple Church had not yet fully mastered the [Sun-Averting Potted Plant]. They would undoubtedly keep feeding living people to it in a frenzy of trial and error. The problem was that this [Grade A Mysterious Object] was far too dangerous, like a nuclear bomb that could explode at any moment.
Those damned lunatics could keep testing the limits of destruction all they liked, but he refused to get caught in the fallout.
Chen Lun forced himself to calm down, took several deep breaths, and thought carefully.
He recalled passing out from the loss of sanity after witnessing the woman's mutation. At the very last moment, that seemed to have activated his panel as well.
That's right-the panel!
Chen Lun hurriedly summoned his character panel, hoping to find something that could save him.
After spending several minutes examining it closely, he knitted his brows.
The first things that caught his attention were his NPC template and the countdown to the open beta.
Much of his initial delight at discovering the panel instantly faded. He seemed to have lost his status as a player, along with the resurrection ability that the fourth calamity relied upon.
That meant he had only one life.
The countdown also told Chen Lun where he stood in the timeline: before the game's opening curtain rose, one year before the Red Apple Church ravaged the empire in version 1.0.
That meant the Red Apple Church was still lying low, its strength nowhere near what it would be at its height.
Moreover, the Red Apple Church's headquarters were in the royal city. It would not dare recklessly expend so many human lives testing [Mysterious Objects] right under the royal family's nose. Chen Lun therefore suspected that his prison was most likely in a church branch in some remote region.
That also means they're short on manpower here. That's good news.
But Chen Lun did not let his guard down. He had no supernatural abilities yet and was merely an ordinary person.
As for the [Fisherman LV3] he had started with, forget it. Was he supposed to demonstrate advanced fishing techniques for those vicious church guards?
The key is charisma...
Charisma affected NPCs' natural affinity toward players. Together with willpower, insight, and luck, it was classified as a special attribute. What made these four attributes special was that they could not be increased by allocating points, making them quite valuable.
But the key Chen Lun had mentioned was not charming the guards into letting him out. It was the extra two points in parentheses after his charisma.
That's charisma added by equipment!
Of course Chen Lun recognized this. In fact, he was so familiar with it that he had spotted the crucial detail at a glance.
He hurriedly stood and began feeling around his body.
But like the other captives in the cell, Chen Lun wore only a ragged linen garment, with a simple strip of cloth tied around his waist.
What could it be?
Chen Lun frowned, then suddenly looked down-
A handmade Seashell Necklace hung around his neck.
[B-Rank Mysterious Object (damaged): Siren's Song]
Chapter 3: Starting with a Mysterious Object
Chen Lun was stunned!
A B-Rank Mysterious Object!
Even marked as damaged, it was leagues beyond ordinary low-grade items! In his previous life, he had owned only one [B-Rank Mysterious Object], a reward earned after months of painstakingly digging through a chain of hidden quests.
Back then, large guilds backed by financial conglomerates had offered astronomical prices for all kinds of [Mysterious Objects], yet few people were willing to sell. [Mysterious Objects] were simply too precious, especially [B-Rank Mysterious Objects], which represented the very pinnacle of that version.
And now he had started with one.
But as Chen Lun looked around the filthy, cramped cell, he fell silent. Was this good fortune or bad?
He did not dwell on it. The immediate priority was still finding a way to escape.
He took off the necklace and examined it carefully in his hand. The crudely twisted hemp cord was unremarkable, probably something picked up at random. What mattered was the finger-sized shell strung on it, its surface covered in intricate spiral patterns.
[B-Rank Mysterious Object (damaged): Siren's Song] Item description: A shell imbued with the magic of the deep sea. When held to the ear, faint sounds of tranquil waves and beautiful singing seem to emerge. It possesses powerful hypnotic abilities, but unfortunately, it has suffered irreversible damage and retains only a small fraction of its power...
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