Eldritch Horror Theatre

Could there be a connection? Or was it merely a simple coincidence?

This question regarding Su Gao could equally be applied to his own Mechanical Tyrant.

This trip had truly yielded quite a few unexpected gains.

After performing a final self-inspection, Fu Qian canceled his Mythical Form. He had long since tossed aside the Umbilical Cord in his hand.

After failing to explore the Mind World earlier, his original intent had simply been to see whether visiting the Bone Burial Ground under the identity of an Ancient Higher Being would trigger a special reaction.

He had found himself specifically targeted by the "tides" there, but the high-risk decision he ultimately made had still yielded a commensurate reward.

That final location was clearly very different from the other "bubbles."

Red Moon's warning and the parasitism he suffered proved its danger. At the same time, compared to the ruin found elsewhere, the place was in noticeably better condition.

Not only were the "tides" unable to penetrate it, it even had dedicated guards.

If the person in that cell truly belonged to the Night Watchers, this arrangement alone proved how much importance the organization attached to the place.

At the Blood Lake he had visited previously, they had merely left a bug alarm.

Senior Liliana's hiding place had been ignored altogether.

But here, there was a high probability that a High-Tier Transcendent squatted in the prison year-round.

Furthermore, Fu Qian had only stayed inside for a short while and was already parasitized. Did this prisoner really possess a way to continuously fend that off?

More likely, it was simply a one-way trip—staying there as a guard through sheer self-sacrifice.

When his blade struck, the prisoner's arm had automatically recovered just like those guards, which proved this point to an extent.

Perhaps if he had stayed inside a bit longer, or if he hadn't been able to use a Deity perspective to find and purge the anomaly on his body after coming out, he would have soon gained similar abilities.

And paid the corresponding price.

...

As for why he had waited until he came out to activate his Mythical Form?

Going too far is as bad as falling short.

If he hadn't discovered a special prisoner inside, Fu Qian wouldn't have minded directly shifting into his Mythical Form to test the waters of that place.

However, the sudden appearance of a suspicious party to interact with meant that his two misdirections—the White-Faced Man and the golden flames—had a certain probability of reaching the Night Watchers. Realizing this, he had promptly abandoned the idea.

Instead, he chose to use the faint signs of a reviving ancient power to bait the Night Watchers into helping him investigate matters related to the King of the Abandoned Prison.

Such as spurring Old Man Stoss to visit the Academy a bit sooner.

If he took it too far and ancient Divine Entities revived to the point of roaming about freely, the Night Watchers' reaction—given their attitude toward ancient Deities—would likely escalate to a completely different level.

In that scenario, the people coming to the Academy to find him probably wouldn't be seeking an academic exchange. Instead, regardless of innocence, they wouldn't spare anyone involved; they would instantly seize and refine them.

As he had repeatedly emphasized, grasping the perfect measure was always a technical skill.

As for why he hadn't purged the parasitism on the Half-Step Moon and had run all the way back to the Warehouse instead?

When he realized something was wrong with his body but stubbornly continued his deep exploration despite Red Moon's dissuasion, the safety net Fu Qian had prepared was his Mythical Form.

Even if he hadn't discovered the truth beneath the "plating" in the end, he still would have used the King of the Abandoned Prison's perspective to give himself a thorough check upon hurrying back.

Conducting the operation on the Half-Step Moon was indeed an option, and perhaps Red Moon could have even helped.

But on the one hand, Red Moon herself considered that place dangerous, and her current condition wasn't very good. If he brought that sort of danger over, or if the King of the Abandoned Prison's Rank was too high and overstimulated her, it wouldn't be good for Red Moon.

It was fine to be a stubborn brat who refused to listen to advice, but it was best to clean up his own messes.

...

By the time he returned to the Laboratory and concluded his exploration, Fu Qian's physical restoration was basically complete.

In fact, to prevent Red Moon from taking drastic action, he had gone home to change his clothes and then specifically visited the Half-Step Moon to undergo the lengthy restoration process that followed.

By placing this step under Red Moon's scrutiny, he let her double-check that there were no lingering issues. After confirming that her own condition was also stable, Fu Qian felt very gratified by the outcome.

Although Classmate Su Gao's condition inevitably provoked some thought.

The night sky outside the window remained dark and gray. Sitting in his Snakeskin Chair, Fu Qian gazed at the scattered starlight, recalling the Doll he had pulled out at the very end.

In essence, it was the remnant of the parasitic power.

The key to this self-purification had been relying on the King of the Abandoned Prison's Deity perspective to fish out the foreign anomaly on his body.

If he were only at a Tier 2 standard, this parasitism would have been practically unsolvable.

This included deliberately lingering in the tides a bit longer before returning to the Half-Step Moon. His goal was to fully confirm the changes his body underwent under the devastation, making it easier to draw comparisons after activating his Mythical Form.

In short, after creating various conditions to successfully lock onto the danger, he had used his Calamity Authority to destroy it in one fell swoop. Only then did the power degrade and materialize in the shape of a Doll.

To an extent, the form this remnant manifested in explained why the place had resonated with the Umbilical Cord in his hand—Dorian.

If the Umbilical Cord was a mixture of Akons's multiple recurring higher powers, it was natural to wonder which one corresponded to that "bubble."

However, his exploration, even the anomaly beneath the flames at the very end, had surprisingly failed to answer that question.

It wasn't until the object finally appeared in his hand that he was inevitably reminded of that Akons miracle doctor.

Turning outsiders into dolls. He had previously wondered about this method with its obvious extraordinary properties; it shouldn't have appeared out of thin air, either.

If this was truly the case, things made much more sense.

Furthermore, the Doll's somewhat similar coloration didn't just bring to mind Madam Madeline sitting on Su Gao's shoulder in the Rotten Forest. It also evoked the memory of their time in the West Plain, when Su Gao had gazed out the window just like he was doing now, almost entirely devoid of a human aura.

Could the very beginning of Su Gao's ascension to the Transcendent Tier be related to these things as well?

Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be a good way to actively confirm this at the moment.

Bring her to that place for a look?

Setting aside whether he could hide it from the Night Watchers, given Su Gao's special constitution, there was no guarantee a mutation wouldn't occur if she directly faced that group of demons and monsters at the Demigod Rank.

Fortunately, although it was difficult to take the initiative, there was still a passive method—observing the Night Watchers' subsequent attitude toward her.

The Night Watchers were confident in handling that place and clearly understood Su Gao's abilities. If there truly was a connection between the two, they might take some special actions following an incident like this.

"Morning, Professor Fu."

Amidst his silent pondering, the pre-dawn silence was broken.

Classmate Liushuang naturally offered a greeting while coming downstairs.

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