Eldritch Horror Theatre

From the very beginning, Fu Qian never expected Goya to reveal anything just by standing in front of the Nether Steed.

His purpose for suggesting they come down and take a look was actually quite clear: he wanted to see how Goya would react to this situation.

As the saying went: please, begin your performance.

Looking at it now, Goya seemed quite cooperative on the surface, but things appeared to be heading in the worst possible direction.

Having walked the jianghu for many years, Fu Qian had long mastered the highest realm of communication: listening without believing a single word.

The underlying implication of Goya's earlier statement was actually quite significant.

According to his previous deductions, wholly accepting the cognitive influence of Patches was likely the correct posture for establishing a covenant with the Nether Steed.

And past experience told him that once a covenant was established, there was no turning back.

Therefore, there was a high probability that Goya was lying about his inspiring personal experience.

Given his crafted persona as a mad researcher faced with a once-in-a-lifetime special case like Fu Qian, Goya had even taken the initiative to suggest visiting the Nether Steed.

Instead of properly observing Fu Qian's subsequent reactions, what kind of nonsense was he spouting?

He couldn't truly be trying to persuade the judge, right?

A more reasonable explanation for this obviously abnormal behavior was that he had said it on purpose to test Fu Qian's reaction.

Fu Qian's previously ambiguous hints had made him worry that certain secrets were exposed.

With this question raised, the probability that the Goya before him knew the covenant was irreversible increased drastically once again.

...

"What a wonderful story!"

Facing the stares of Goya and his companion, Fu Qian—seemingly left speechless by the rebuttal—chose to spout nonsense with a fake smile while his mind raced.

The reason things had gotten incredibly interesting was that if Goya knew the essential nature of the covenant, it represented a contradictory dead knot.

According to his own experience, the logic of the Warehouse's missions was always to solve the problem; dealing with people was secondary.

At the same time, the Warehouse was always highly sensitive to the unrestrained leakage of covenant transcendents.

Normally, if Goya were the only one who knew about the covenant, setting the mission objective to eliminate him would undoubtedly be reasonable.

However, this "stand-in" before him simply knew too much.

As a result, at first glance, the mission issued by the Warehouse wouldn't solve the problem at all.

Even if he actually killed Goya to complete the mission, there was a high probability that it wouldn't stop the project from moving forward.

It would be effortless for this all-knowing "stand-in" to instantly take over the official position; no matter how he looked at it, the situation defied common sense.

Why would this situation occur?

This was a test led by the Anjing Company...

They possessed believable motives, abundant manpower and resources, and professional researchers...

Other than an unusually difficult-to-kill target, everything was perfectly normal...

The Warehouse's designation for this mission was 2, which wasn't considered particularly dangerous...

So far, he hadn't encountered any characters with exaggerated Combat Power either...

The scenes from his last run up to now flashed rapidly through Fu Qian's mind.

Including the project leader, Goya—he cut a very classic, scheming figure who used the organization to seek benefits for himself...

No matter how he looked at it, this was a fairly classic problem. As long as he eliminated this person who knew about the covenant, things wouldn't spiral out of control for the time being.

It was exactly under these circumstances that the Warehouse had ultimately given a simple and clear mission objective, not even leaving him much time...

It felt like, in the Warehouse's judgment, this truly was a simple mission...

Wait a minute—everything just looked classic and natural, while Patches and his ilk were fraudulent by nature...

The next moment, a rather wild thought popped into Fu Qian's mind—

Could it be that this wasn't a test, but a ritual?

Was everything happening before his eyes originally meant for the Warehouse to see?

"So, I assume we've reached a consensus?"

Goya's voice rang out right on cue. Seemingly not expecting Fu Qian to be persuaded so easily, his tone briefly carried a mix of surprise and delight.

A consensus?

Looking up to meet the gazes of Goya and his companion, Fu Qian took a deep breath. A second later, he shook his head very naturally.

"Sorry, you didn't pass!"

After speaking, Fu Qian narrowed his eyes and assessed everything before him, completely ignoring Goya's sudden change in expression.

The faint sense of something being wrong from the very beginning had been correct after all—it felt too heavily designed!

This incident, this whole series of attributes—it was all simply too classic. It was almost as if it had been deliberately set up here to bait the Warehouse into arranging exactly this kind of mission.

However, once one actually entered, searching for Goya became a near-dead end that relied entirely on luck.

If he hadn't focused on staying true to one's original aspiration, steadfastly playing the role of a special case all the way, the previous few decoys alone would have wasted a lot of his effort.

Goya and his people weren't deceiving the innocent test subjects; they were deceiving the Warehouse.

It was a rather bold hypothesis. Relying purely on a few Mid-Tier Transcendents, no matter how inherently fraudulent they were, it was hard to imagine they could pull this off.

But adding the entity behind the Nether Steed to the mix made it hard to say.

Fu Qian had a profound impression of the Goddess of Sins and her ilk; they were absolutely a group of existences with an extremely high status.

He could almost imagine a scenario where one of his predecessors had been trapped in this maze again and again until their very last drop of SAN Value was depleted.

As for where the real Goya was?

"You disappoint me, Mr. 9527."

"In a sense, I would rather have my cognition influenced by Patches than become someone like you!"

Right then, Goya's icy voice rang out, his tone laced with disdain.

"It's wrong to personally attack the judge."

Facing the project leader's furious reprimand, Fu Qian scoffed and took two steps forward.

"What are you trying to do?"

Goya was clearly extremely sensitive to his movements and immediately entered a defensive stance.

Unfortunately, this couldn't alter the outcome. A second later, agonizing pain flared up, and he realized a ferocious claw had already ripped into his abdomen.

It was a terrifying strength practically on par with the Demigod Realm!

Just what kind of monster was this?!

And why hadn't he killed him, instead only leaving a wound on his stomach?

Fierce of face and faint of heart, he was just trying to scare him. He didn't dare to kill him. He still knew how formidable The Company was...

Amid his resolute and sharp reactions, Goya realized Fu Qian's face was already inches away.

Boom!

The next moment, something poured out of his abdominal cavity.

"Why?"

Amid a bloodcurdling scream, Doctor Goya was once again left as a corpse on the spot.

Fu Qian, who had brushed past him, had impressively used his favorite move: Visceral Attack.

Under that horrifying strike, he was instantly as dead as dead could be.

Unsurprisingly, the mission was still not completed.

His hands stained with blood, Fu Qian wasn't surprised by this at all; he merely looked up at the person standing to the side.

Witnessing that terrifying gouging attack just now, the normally composed Cynthia finally revealed the fear of a situation spiraling out of control.

It was like returning to the lab after lunch and watching the pressure gauge on a reactor spike uncontrollably.

Of course, Fu Qian didn't care about her feelings. He was focused on another aspect entirely.

He had clearly only gouged out Brother Goya's kidney just now, yet Cynthia's state had unexpectedly shown a trace of instability as a result.

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