Eldritch Horror Theatre

Poor child, was it so chaotic that he even changed color?

Standing squarely at the center of attention, Fu Qian ignored the numerous scrutinizing gazes, narrowing his eyes at the massive body not far away.

For a brief moment, a patch of that bruised-black body revealed a shade of sky blue before instantly returning to normal.

This scene brought to mind a certain conversation overheard in the Opera House—the God of War's wife falling hopelessly in love with Hamadus over his blue muscles.

This had to be the main target.

Fu Qian stood at the dead center of a triangle.

Chelfus, Ariel, and Hamadus occupied the three corners. He had slipped into this spot during the earlier chaos.

As for how he could stand on the water's surface?

What a joke. He was the sage renowned for erudition; if he wanted to, his entire body could be tentacles. Standing on water was child's play.

First was Chelfus. The man's life had clearly just been saved. His already unstable Mythical Form was successfully dispelled; otherwise, he wouldn't be standing there looking so astonished right now.

Then there was the God of Clamor, Hamadus. His divine rank was absurdly high, and the effect of Eternally Lucid Mind didn't even last a fraction of a second on him.

As for Ariel, he finally reacted, slowly raising his head to look over.

Considering the man was a full tier higher than him, his faster recovery speed made sense.

Furthermore, judging by his still-raised arm, that brief moment of silence hadn't interrupted his Calling a Deer a Horse Great Art.

This made perfect sense. The pervasive clamor filling the air had only been dispelled for a few seconds before surging right back.

[SAN Value -1]

Almost simultaneously, Fu Qian felt a mental shockwave wash over him.

This had to be why Chelfus's snake head had lost control.

In Hamadus's immediate vicinity, amplified by Ariel's distortion, the brainwashing effect of the Tide of Clamor was vastly stronger than anywhere else. Not even a demigod was immune.

Was this why Ariel had the confidence to stand before a crowd, continuously casting his spell like a sitting duck?

Right then, Fu Qian was absolutely certain that if he stayed any longer, his SAN Value would keep dropping.

Yet he stayed right where he was.

...

"It's fine. Although you didn't follow the plan, you didn't cause much of an impact. There is no need to maintain a hostile stance out of worry," Ariel said in a remarkably earnest tone.

Watching Fu Qian put away the Bell, Ariel didn't aggressively demand accountability.

'Just who is this guy supposed to be?'

As he spoke, both Cassandra and Chelfus stared in dumbfounded silence.

He didn't exude a shred of a transcendent's aura, yet he could confront Ariel directly?

More importantly, the Divine Emissary actually seemed to be coaxing him!

'As expected of you!'

Fu Qian marveled silently.

The man cared nothing for the anger of betrayal, even actively emphasizing that Fu Qian shouldn't fear any vengeful retaliation.

Everything he did was purely to minimize the chances of Fu Qian causing more trouble.

By this point, Fu Qian had practically figured out the man's "purpose" in this operation.

The Origin Council's operation had a clear division of labor. Wehle handled the preliminary arrangements, Crow Feather guided the Tide of Clamor into forming, and Ariel was in charge of the distortion.

Oh, and Camus and Marco were there to serve as cannon fodder.

In short, Ariel's primary goal was almost certainly to ensure that Hamadus lived and became "Rom."

"Who is Rom?"

Facing such a bizarre character, Fu Qian's line of questioning took a similarly abrupt leap.

"That is an extremely dangerous concept. No matter what motivated you to interfere, you are in grave danger. It is best that you do not know," Ariel continued to explain in his earnest tone.

His refusal to answer proved that, in Ariel's judgment, revealing the truth might increase the odds of Fu Qian attacking—and that risk outweighed the benefits of showing sincerity by answering.

Fu Qian nodded. Often enough, no answer was an answer in itself.

Naturally, he didn't press the issue.

He didn't have much time for questions anyway.

His mission wasn't just to slay a god, but to do so before the clamor came to an end.

...

A moment later, Fu Qian took a step forward. The silver-white Mercy appeared in his hand, and he pulled the trigger at Hamadus without hesitation.

Unfortunately, the gun failed to fire. Ariel had pulled the exact same trick, completely unsurprised.

'My brand-new clothes!'

Not surprised in the slightest, Fu Qian let out a sigh and tossed Mercy aside as his body rapidly expanded.

Within seconds, a massive, bone-armored giant towering over five meters tall materialized before everyone's eyes.

He hadn't used this giantification move in a long time.

Aside from being much larger this time, his appearance sported other changes. Streaks of darkness, speckled like stars, flowed across his body like a sprawling galaxy.

Ever since advancing to Original Sin Sage, he finally possessed an initial Mythical Form.

He had shown it off once during his first encounter with Wehle's group, though he had only transformed a single hand back then.

[SAN Value -1]

The prompt chimed right on cue.

'Still losing SAN, huh!'

It was the same sad old cycle: you upgrade your graphics card, but the games upgrade too, and you can still never run the newest game with ray tracing turned on.

But it was fine. He wouldn't need to sustain it for long anyway.

A moment later, Fu Qian launched himself into the air, leaping directly above the ship-like god.

The moment he did, he saw a massive eye zero in on him.

The eyeball was dark and murky, enveloping a blood-red pupil at its center.

Just a single glance sent a wave of disorientation crashing through his mind.

Losing another point of his SAN Value, Fu Qian slammed his feet down onto the eerie, massive ship.

Everything was relative. Even in his giant form, he looked pitifully small against the sheer scale of the ship.

On the bright side, from this vantage point he could see a crisscrossing array of gruesome wounds etched across the deity's hull. The sheer number of them almost triggered his choice paralysis.

Fortunately, it only took Fu Qian a single millisecond to overcome that bad habit.

The next moment, his right hand—which had expanded several times more drastically than the rest of his body—plunged straight into a gaping maw, ruthlessly suffocating a howl before it could even escape.

'What a familiar scene. Back in the day, when I was contemplating the Dao under the full moon, I used this exact same posture.'

'I never thought I'd actually be ripping out a god's kidneys one day.'

Reminiscing about his glory days, Fu Qian activated Visceral Attack.

Amidst an earth-shattering wail, Fu Qian—taking yet another hit to his SAN Value—leapt back immediately to inspect his handiwork.

A horrifying, gaping wound had been torn open on the behemoth's body, looking every bit as devastating as a direct missile strike.

...

"You... how is this possible?!"

It was Wehle, roaring in absolute disbelief. The man had finally lost his composed demeanor.

'Foolish mortals. Why wouldn't it be possible?'

Fu Qian snorted and flicked his hand to shake off the gore.

Visceral Attack was incredibly powerful, but a single strike wasn't enough to put the God of Clamor down for good.

The only reason it had inflicted such devastating damage was that he had actually struck three times.

Mercy's chance to trigger a triple critical strike had activated on his very first attempt.

This had to be the so-called 'the benevolent are invincible,' right?

What? He didn't fire the gun just now?

There was no need to be so narrow-minded. The Boon of Release effect triggered upon striking the target; it never specified that it had to be with a bullet.

As it turned out, chucking Mercy like a brick to smash the target worked just as well.

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