"Utter nonsense!"
As it turned out, Folly's followers were genuinely devout. Even at this point, the survivors had the nerve to curse the thing in the coffin.
They shouted abuse and kicked and punched the coffin.
"This is Folly's sacred ground! The place where our Lord bestows His blessings! How dare a foul demon spew such lies!"
"Lord Skart was the greatest Fool Hunter in history! After his death, even our Benefactor acknowledged his status and let him act as proxy to purge the world of folly!"
"He CANNOT possibly be a Death follower!"
"I understand now! I know what you are!"
"You must be the incarnation of foolishness—a projection of the world's absolute folly!"
"Lord Skart sealed you here to ensure no folly remains in this world!"
"Great Lord Skart, you succeeded! What you sealed was indeed the most foolish creature in existence!"
"..."
The outburst silenced both Cheng Shi and the coffin.
After a mont's contemplation, Cheng Shi raised his blade and dispatched them all in quick succession. As bodies thudded to the ground, wisps of red light stread into the coffin. But even after feeding it this many people, the "Skart" inside still sounded feeble.
"I'm not foolishness... The truly foolish ones... are those Folly followers..."
"?"
'Do tell!'
Cheng Shi caught the scent of pri gossip. His expression sharpened as he silently assessed the situation.
Regardless of what was inside, he'd already planned his response:
If the "Skart" in the coffin was telling the truth, then a hidden history lay within. And against a being that was rely "human," he likely had a fighting chance.
But if the coffin actually imprisoned so demon or embodint of absolute folly, and he accidentally released it—well, he'd simply divert the disaster straight to Mo Shu's doorstep.
That way, he might still play the fisherman reaping rewards while others fought in muddy waters.
With that reasoning, Cheng Shi took the gamble.
He sliced a small cut on his arm with a scalpel, letting blood drip down and condense into blood essence, which the coffin eagerly captured.
At first, the coffin absorbed slowly. But when it discovered this particular supply seed inexhaustible, it accelerated.
Cheng Shi rely frowned slightly—no real reaction.
Blood essence was just another expression of vitality. Under the protection of his Vitality authority, sustained damage was the least of his concerns. The coffin could gorge itself to bursting and still never drain him dry.
What he hadn't anticipated was that the coffin nearly did burst.
Like rain after a drought, the "Skart" who'd starved for who-knows-how-many years finally had a feast. He guzzled Cheng Shi's blood essence with reckless abandon. Before long, retching sounds echoed from inside.
Years of atrophy had left him unable to handle the sudden richness, producing vertigo and nausea.
Hearing the genuinely unforced vomiting, Cheng Shi finally accepted that whoever was in there did sound like a Scarlet Hunter.
The retching didn't last long. Soon the coffin settled. Dawn light was already reaching the mountain peaks—ti was running out. Cheng Shi frowned and was about to press for answers when the sated "Skart" pulled himself together and spilled everything at once.
"I really am Skart—the one Redi Core's history calls the first 'Fool Hunter.'"
"But I wasn't lying. I was never a Fool Hunter. I was a genuine, authentic, devou—well, not that devout—Scarlet Hunter!"
"It's a long story. Could you, or rather, could You perhaps—"
"Then make it short."
"...Very well. You've shown
a chance at escape. I'll answer every question you have."
"I was originally a hunter from a Death tribe in the surface-dwelling Nature Alliance. Truth followers fleeing the Civilization Lonely Tower's pursuers passed through our tribe and were spotted by Folly believers. Fighting broke out."
"Seeing a once-in-a-century opportunity, our entire tribe deployed, hoping to seize the chance to seek an audience with our Benefactor."
"But I... was still young. I hadn't yet grasped the value of drawing closer to my Benefactor. So I panicked. I ran."
"But it's not exactly easy to flee a battlefield saturated with large-scale magical attacks. I was hit by a Folly spell, hurled into the void, spat out by the current, and crash-landed on Folly's territory."
"Lucky —at least I wasn't killed on impact. I landed on a Folly follower."
"The first thing I did was endure the pain and ask him where I was. But I'd... crushed him to death."
"While I stood there dazed and lost, an entire squad of Folly believers rounded the low hill ahead."
"They were a reserve force of the Civilization Lonely Tower. Seeing a foreigner who'd killed one of their own on Folly's ho turf, they moved to execute
on the spot."
"But I didn't want to die. Driven by desperation, I argued and babbled. I rembered my tribespeople once telling
that Folly prized wisdom above all and despised foolishness. So I said: this man's death wasn't unjust. If he were truly smart, he wouldn't have been crushed to death by ."
"He died—therefore he was foolish. And the foolish deserve to die."
"I don't know which words got through to them, but they stopped attacking. They looked at the bow in my hands, began to cheer, and hailed
as the 'Fool Hunter.'"
"From that mont, I—Skart, a Scarlet Hunter from the Nature Alliance's Death tribe—beca the first Fool Hunter, celebrated across the Civilization Lonely Tower..."
"And to survive, I had no choice but to fake my faith and pretend to be a Folly devotee who hunted foolishness in Folly's na..."
"That's the whole story. I know it sounds absurd, but I haven't told a single lie. Can You find a way to get
out?"
"..."
Cheng Shi was dumbfounded.
'Are you telling
that the Folly hunter class "Fool Hunter" actually originated from a national case of mass misidentification?!'
'What is this—to hunt the foolish, one must first be foolish?'
'Yeah. That's very Folly.'
But Cheng Shi wasn't in a rush. He frowned and asked: "Then why are you sealed in the coffin? Did they find you out?"
"...This isn't a seal."
"I was originally a Death follower. Blasphemy against my faith distanced
from death itself. For decades I didn't die—but Folly's followers don't live forever. They age and pass on. If I kept living, I'd beco undeniable heresy."
"So I devised an exit strategy."
"After decades building my reputation, I had plenty of power. I staged a fake death, planning to escape this blind, foolish land once I was buried."
"But..."
"I never imagined their devotion to
would be so fanatical. The day after my burial, they worked through the night to build a divine throne above my grave—trapping
inside this coffin!!"
"To make my fake death convincing, I'd already weakened myself to the brink. With the statue pressing directly on the coffin, I couldn't break free!"
At this point, Skart's voice dripped with grievance.
Even though centuries had passed, he spoke about it as though it had happened yesterday.
"I was trapped like this for over ten days. Without food or water, I could practically see the end of my life. Just when I thought my Benefactor had finally forgiven my betrayal and was summoning ..."
"A turning point appeared."
"In my honor, the people of Redi Core held a Knowing Folly lashing ceremony at my statue's foot."
"The blood essence leaking from the sinners' bodies gave
hope for survival. I sipped it through the coffin's cracks—just barely enough to cling to life. But I didn't dare take too much, terrified that these 'smart' people would notice sothing. So I could only sip here and there... and survive until now."
"..."
Cheng Shi paused, then shook his head with an incredulous laugh: "Your blood-drinking was mistaken for Folly's proxy power—a divine gift of purging foolishness. And your cries for help were heard as the statue's ravings!"
"More or less..."
"No wonder only drunks heard the statue's ravings."
"With how cowardly you are, how would you dare openly deceive a sober Folly follower?!"
"Your plan wasn't bad, I'll give you that."
"Too bad you're a bit stupid."
"Then again, you're not the only foolish one here. Otherwise, how would you have survived this long?"
"But I still have one question. If everything is fake, then what exactly was the so-called divine gift that Koshna received?"
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