Foolish Game of the Chapter 1156: Hurry—Don't Keep Him Waiting

A thunderclap split the air, and dawn broke over Redi Core.

Balf jolted awake at the commotion outside, hands shooting to his neck.

Drenched in cold sweat, he sat up and found no wound on his throat. He was actually alive.

'But didn't I die at that villain's hand?'

'How am I still alive?'

'Was it just a nightmare?'

He scrambled to his feet, examined every inch of his body, checked the mirror again and again—not a single wound. Every cut he'd made with his own scalpel had vanished without a trace.

"Phew—"

"It really was just a dream!"

"But it felt so real."

Balf was overjoyed. Basking in the ecstasy of "rebirth," he cheered aloud, then pressed himself against the window to see what all the ruckus outside was about.

After a bit of asking around, he learned that a bolt of dry lightning at dawn had shattered the ground at the statue's feet, exposing Lord Skart's tomb.

A chill ran through him. Without bothering to dress properly, he bolted outside toward the gathering crowd.

Four or five others had rushed out in equally disheveled states—exactly matching the number of lucky winners Cheng Shi had chosen.

They pushed through the crowd to the front row. As the Folly Prohibition Office guards cleared the blast site and maintained order to protect the slumbering soul beneath the statue, each of them wore a peculiar expression, eyes darting nervously.

Before long, they noticed one another. When their gazes t in pairs, their hearts lurched in unison—the realization that their earlier experience wasn't just a pre-dawn nightmare but sothing that had actually happened.

They just couldn't explain what had happened to them. Or why the villain had brought them back to life.

But as long as they were alive, nothing else mattered.

One by one, they kept their mouths shut. Even upon seeing the coffin's corner blown apart with no body inside, they said nothing. When the guards questioned them, they shook their heads and claid they were just there for the spectacle.

As for where Lord Skart's remains had gone...

If lightning could shatter the ground, it could certainly reduce a body to ash. And the mountain wind would carry the ash away. So naturally, nothing remained in the coffin.

What was so hard to understand about that?

...

The Eye of Mockery's trail hadn't gone cold yet. Cheng Shi still needed to stay in Redi Core and investigate, which was why he'd staged this whole scene.

Of course, the lightning hadn't actually targeted Skart. He'd simply run out of ti to refill the hole he'd dug, so he faked a lightning strike instead.

But the cowardly Skart, having felt the thunderbolt's fury a hair's breadth away, was markedly more obedient now. He crawled out of the damaged coffin and followed Cheng Shi away from the plaza without a word of protest.

His face, though, was a picture of lingering dread the entire way.

Cheng Shi paid him no mind. While the Folly Prohibition Office guards were all out maintaining order at the statue, he brought the blind Skart back to the office and had him feel Koshna's corpse to search for the missing eyes.

Skart, expression odd, groped the body for a long while before shaking his head.

Seeing this, Cheng Shi sighed. Of course—once the Fun God was involved, nothing was ever simple.

With the trail cold again, Cheng Shi reluctantly turned to Brother Mouth. He wanted to know if the Eye of Mockery had any other distinguishing features besides being removable.

For once, the Fool's Lips didn't stay silent—though their words were harsh as ever.

"A clown truly earns his keep by acting stupid for the audience's amusent. And in that regard, you've reached the absolute pinnacle."

"..."

'You've also reached the pinnacle of insults, Brother Mouth...'

Cheng Shi went numb.

'If you don't want to tell , fine—but why the personal attack? What did clowns ever do to you?'

'And aren't you a clown yourself?'

'Past life or present, you've always been a clown's mouth.'

He didn't dare snap back. After all, he'd need Brother Mouth's help going forward. But Brother Mouth never said anything without purpose. Had he really overlooked sothing? Did the Eye of Mockery have so obvious feature he'd missed?

Cheng Shi sank deep into thought.

Beside him, Skart didn't dare interrupt. He stood obediently to the side, "eyes" fixed straight ahead, carefully avoiding "looking" at this terrifying lord, lest he provoke another thunderbolt.

Cheng Shi ruminated for a long ti. Nothing. Frustrated, he turned to Skart:

"Have you ever thought about eting your Benefactor? The one on the Bone Throne?"

The question scared Skart half to death. He dropped to his knees, prostrating himself:

"Please spare , my lord! Please!"

"Yes—I'm a coward, I deserve to die, I desecrated my own faith! But I've been desecrating it for centuries now, which ans I've lost all right to an audience with Him!"

"I can't sully His temple with my filthy, faithless presence! I can't dirty His eyes and ears! I'm not worthy! Just let

rot in the mortal world! Let

suffer every worldly tornt, forever cast aside by my Benefactor in contempt!"

"..."

'Good lord, are you making birthday wishes over here?'

'Nice try. Being cast aside by that lord in contempt is basically immortality.'

'I'd like so immortality too. The question is, does that lord actually get to decide?'

Cheng Shi rolled his eyes and said flatly:

"I see. So you just don't want to dirty His eyes and ears—but it's not that you don't want to see Him. Right?"

"I..." Skart stamred, tears and snot streaming. "Can I possibly not want to?"

Cheng Shi grinned:

"No wonder you were the first 'Fool Hunter.' You really are clever."

"No, you can't."

"I want you to want to, so you have to want to."

"Let's go, blaspher. Let's see what that lord thinks of you."

With that, Cheng Shi plunged a blade into Skart's heart and began to pray in place:

"Soul sleeps in peace, life cos to an end."

"Great God of Death, your most devoted employee has been so busy with work lately that he hasn't reported in. The guilt has been unbearable. Today, there happen to be so matters I'd like to report to You. Might You have a mont to spare?"

An ordinary sacrifice couldn't reach the Fishbone Hall directly. Cheng Shi's confidence in speaking to that lord ca from the fact that upon entering the Folly Prohibition Office, he had secretly struck his Bone Bell.

In other words, everything he'd done was happening right under that lord's watchful gaze!

That was why Cheng Shi felt so relaxed.

Of course, he wasn't doing this to show the lord a disloyal follower. Skart wasn't important enough to warrant a god's judgnt of his devotion.

The real reason Cheng Shi wanted to see that lord was an entirely different plan.

But to his surprise, this "deeply moving" "heartfelt appeal" received no response whatsoever. The body slid off his blade and crumpled to the floor. Apart from the dripping of blood, total silence.

Cheng Shi was dumbstruck.

'Is the boss not ho?'

'That can't be right. Even if He's not in the Fishbone Hall, He can't possibly not hear my call.'

'Unless... to avoid suspicion, He can't respond to prayers within the Bone Bell's coverage area?'

'Oh no. Then this was all pointless?'

Just as Cheng Shi stood there in stunned blankness, Skart's corpse at his feet popped open like a jack-in-the-box—BANG—exploding into countless chattering little skulls. They jabbered and clattered, assembling before Cheng Shi's eyes into a Bone Gate, and cried out in unison:

"Hurry! Faster! Don't keep Him waiting!"

Cheng Shi was overjoyed. He stepped through without hesitation.

"Coming, coming! My lord—your top sales champion is here to report!"