Squinty Eyes was dead.
Against all expectations, just as the group was preparing to sneak out of the Church basent to retrieve Turadin, before anyone even reached the door, Zhang Jizu — walking behind the others — collapsed to the ground without warning.
Cheng Shi, right beside him, caught him with lightning reflexes. But the mont he saw Zhang Jizu's flesh and vitality wither in an instant, his entire body shriveling into a skeleton wrapped in skin, Cheng Shi's pupils contracted sharply. He imdiately gripped his ring.
Scorpio's heightened senses made him the second to react. He whipped around, disbelief flooding his widened eyes, and drew his Arc of Ti Restoration with blinding speed, carving ring after ring of Ti swamp-traps around the entire group.
Gou Feng furrowed his brow and dropped to one knee. He clutched Zhang Jizu's hand, his face turning a terrible shade of dark.
"His vitality is severed. He's... dead."
The words hit like a physical blow. A chill surged from the base of Gao Ya's spine straight to her skull. She went rigid, imdiately scanned the surroundings, and clenched both fists. Opening her mouth, she launched into a lody of calming and reinforcent, driving every person present into a state of razor-sharp focus.
"What's going on? Brother Cheng, didn't you say the Scavenger was dead?"
"???" Gao Ya snapped her head toward Scorpio, incredulous. "He's actually dead?"
Cheng Shi's expression darkened. Now was clearly not the ti to discuss the Scavenger. Mo Shu was undoubtedly dead — but the question was: what had felled Old Zhang?
The question had barely ford before the answer struck him. Cheng Shi's face contorted as he shouted, "This is bad!" and snapped his fingers, vanishing on the spot.
Seeing his lifeline disappear, Scorpio jolted and instantly connected the dots. He gripped his weapon tight and took off toward the place they'd been planning to visit.
But Gao Ya seized his wrist and barked:
"If you don't want to die, don't move! Whatever killed a Chosen One Gravekeeper in an instant is not a situation we can involve ourselves in.
If you want to survive, there's only one option: stay here, guard the Gravekeeper's body, and wait for the Fate Weaver to return.
Otherwise, don't bla
for not warning you when you die out there."
Scorpio froze, then hardened. "Brother Cheng isn't a Fate Weaver — he's a Druid!"
"?" Gao Ya nearly laughed with rage. Of all tis for this — could his brain not rotate even a little?
She felt like she was talking to a brainless idiot. And Scorpio's next action only confird her assessnt.
He wrenched free of her grip and declared firmly:
"Even if we need to guard Brother Zhang's body, the two of you are more than enough. I have to go help. Brother Cheng shielded
from the greatest danger, and I created this much trouble for him. No matter what, I need to go see what's happening.
If I can help, great. If not, at the very least I can be his eyes!"
"Tch. So in this entire trial, exactly how many threats did you 'detect' in advance? Those eyes of yours — are they even functional?"
Scorpio's face went dark. He lowered his head and marched off.
Seeing she couldn't stop him, Gao Ya cursed with a grimace: "Stupid. You're going to die."
"No — I trust Brother Cheng. He won't let
die. Hold down the fort. I'm going!"
With that, the little assassin shadow-shuttled and vanished.
After Scorpio's departure, the black-faced Gou Feng dropped to the ground and furrowed his brow tightly.
Gao Ya glanced at him and sneered. "I thought you were the sentintal type. Turns out I misjudged you — fooled by a little assassin.
He's the sentintal one. So what about you, Chieftain? What's your excuse for feigning weakness?"
Gou Feng rubbed his head in agitation but didn't respond.
His fear ran far deeper than the others'. Zhang Jizu had left sothing inside him — a control chanism — and now the person controlling him was dead. What would happen to that thing inside him?
He didn't even know what the Chosen One of Death had planted in him!
Seeing the Chieftain ignore her, Gao Ya frowned slightly.
She didn't press further. Instead, she walked to Zhang Jizu's body, crouched down, and began examining the skin-wrapped skeleton with ticulous care.
The cause of death was obvious enough — sothing uncanny had drained every drop of his vitality in an instant. But what force could strip a Chosen One of all vitality so quickly?
She had her suspicions. Instinct made her reluctant to entangle herself with this matter. But Folly's relentless curiosity kept pushing her to study Zhang Jizu's remains, determined to extract so fresh, useful "knowledge" from his manner of death.
And when she grasped Squinty Eyes' head and pried open his tightly shut eyelids, two bloodshot sockets — nothing but crimson — blazed into her sight.
Those orbs seed to pulse faintly. More than eyeballs, they resembled two irregularly throbbing sacs, as if sothing inside was struggling to burst free.
Gao Ya's gaze sharpened. She thought, 'Not good,' and imdiately threw herself backward — but she was too late!
The two pure-red blood-sphere eyeballs detonated without warning. Countless frenzied, worm-like threads of blood — wriggling like earthworms — erupted into the air like confetti, spattering across Gao Ya's head and face.
Gao Ya shrieked in horror, scrambling backward on all fours. But as she retreated, her eyes slowly narrowed to slits.
Gou Feng's pupils contracted at the sight. He started to rise, but she had already executed an agile leap to land before him. She clamped a hand on his shoulder, pinning him in place, and spoke in a deep, frowning voice:
"Stay here. Don't move. Handle Berios. Otherwise, I'll sacrifice you to that great one."
With that, she narrowed her eyes, rolled her body loose, and without an instant's hesitation, took off in the direction Scorpio had vanished.
Gou Feng watched the "Folly follower" disappear with a terror that nearly stopped his heart. Only after she was gone did his pulse hamr back to life. His strength gave out and he collapsed to the ground, discovering he was drenched head-to-toe in cold sweat.
"It's him!
Then what about Gao Ya...
Is she... dead? Just like that?"
He turned to stare at the skeleton on the floor, wrapped in its sheath of shriveled skin, at the empty eye sockets where crimson had exploded outward. Swallowing hard, he shuffled two more steps backward in horror.
'So this is a Chosen One of Death!'
'Can he really... be killed?'
...
anwhile.
The mont Cheng Shi saw Zhang Jizu fall, he knew sothing had gone wrong again — and this accident had a ninety-nine percent chance of originating from the target beyond his line of sight: Turadin.
So he imdiately used Never Lost Gambling Gear to teleport to Turadin's side. But he was one step too late.
Because the instant Squinty Eyes hit the ground, he should have realized — Turadin was already dead.
Turadin was indeed dead. She had died inside the cell the Child Stealing Brotherhood had prepared for her.
Though it was called a cell, its construction and décor were virtually indistinguishable from an inn's quarters. Its only distinction was that it lay deep underground at the city's edge, sealed away from sunlight. Apart from that, the living conditions were no worse than genuine surface dwellings.
And there were many such cells down here, far below the ground.
This was where Lis Field had indoctrinated the Brotherhood's abducted children into new brothers.
And right now, a mother who had been on the verge of delivering their newest "brother" was dead.
Just like Squinty Eyes — drained of all flesh and vitality, she lay dead in a corner of this cell.
When Cheng Shi landed, spun around, and discovered Turadin's corpse, the shock drove him an involuntary step backward. The surge of raw terror was so imnse it instantly charged the Bone Servant Le Le'er's Ring to full capacity.
"Shit...
What the hell is this thing?!"
...
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