Eldritch Horror Theatre

"Where did you... take them—"

Laywoman Tooth-Throat's reaction perfectly captured a mix of shock and fury. Her twisted expression made it seem as if she had witnessed something unimaginable.

At the same time, amid her screams, her gel-like body began to melt rapidly.

The flesh and blood of a Mid-Tier Transcendent was as fragile as ice cream under a scorching sun at this moment.

How honest of her! Indeed, only attacks at the Demigod Level could inflict any decent damage upon them!

Fu Qian felt a heartfelt appreciation for Laywoman Tooth-Throat's earlier suggestion.

And besides her, the bodies of two others were also rapidly melting.

Three in total, and exactly three had just been swallowed. A one-to-one ratio?

Fu Qian looked thoughtful as he analyzed the reaction.

Furthermore, the melting was clearly spreading to every single person, just at a slightly slower pace.

A series of details flashed through Fu Qian's mind, and suddenly, he understood: it wasn't a one-to-one pairing, but a single continuous chain?

Dodging a furious punch from the sage-like Old Man, Fu Qian watched the wailing figures filling his vision, as though he were looking at a worm that had been sliced into several segments.

...

So this was why the item was named the Greed Worm?

Recalling this mission, Fu Qian marveled inwardly at the biodiversity of the transcendent world.

How could a group of people achieve a near life-sharing effect? Even the Damage Transfer was directional?

It was simple. They had linked themselves one by one in some special way, forming a unified chain.

Every addition of a new member was like a millipede growing a new segment. Once they took damage, it would transfer according to a specific pattern.

As for why it was Laywoman Tooth-Throat who suffered the injuries during the two previous skull-crushings, the reason was also simple—she had to be the segment right next to Brother Daneta.

And if this guess was correct, Fu Qian believed Daneta was very likely at the very bottom of the chain.

As for the reason: on one hand, Laywoman Tooth-Throat was clearly senior to him. But more importantly, after Fu Qian left Jiang En last night, Daneta had tracked him down with unbelievable speed.

At the time, he had been curious about how Daneta managed it, even marveling that the man was like Jiang En's portable grandpa.

Looking at it now, could he simply have been watching his new downline?

And it was exactly because of this special connection that he had locked onto Fu Qian immediately, despite not even being present?

Actually, he could just ask directly.

Fu Qian slowly revealed himself, looking at the Old Man who had missed again.

"Is Jiang En Daneta's downline?"

...

In that instant, the Old Man could no longer maintain his ethereal, otherworldly posture.

"I don't understand what you're talking about."

However, he immediately followed up with a firm denial.

"If you truly didn't understand, you would have thrown a punch at me immediately."

Fu Qian shook his head.

"Let me think. You just said the timing wasn't right, so you couldn't take me in. Is it because you only get one chance to develop a new recruit each year? And the window for that has already passed?"

"How do you know..."

His deepest secret seemingly pierced, the Old Man's expression finally broke.

How else would he know? He had simply seen way too much of this!

Fu Qian sighed internally.

This kind of connection was clearly not a concept a group of Mid Tiers could access.

These days, it was obvious nobody here had much faith, so he naturally guessed it had to be a covenant.

The facts proved it—it indeed possessed the standard once-a-year characteristic.

"Could you tell me what the entity you made this covenant with is called?"

...

Answering Fu Qian was an overwhelming barrage of glittering gold.

The Old Man clearly had no intention of answering any more questions, instead launching a violent attack against his questioner.

That patch of golden yellow was composed of individual spikes the length of chopsticks. A single glance revealed hundreds of them.

Once launched, they were like the legendary Storm Pear Blossom Needles, completely blanketing Fu Qian and his surroundings.

As for where the Old Man pulled out such a lethal weapon, the answer was also simple—they were formed from his own flesh and blood.

Because of their special connection, the 'wind is tight, pull back' strategy was meaningless right now, which was why the Old Man didn't hesitate to risk his life in a desperate struggle.

And clearly, in his view, this whole mess had been caused by Dayun Mingwang. Killing him might just turn things around.

He also knew that Fu Qian had a special concealment ability, which was why he chose this kind of area-of-effect bombardment.

Unfortunately, the terrifying aspect of a dimensional strike was precisely that you couldn't even imagine the way you would fail.

The next moment, as Fu Qian appeared completely unharmed before him, the Old Man's eyes rapidly dimmed, and his withered body tottered.

With a heart like dead ashes, he looked as if he lacked even the lingering obsession to ask for a name so he could die with clarity.

"Jiang En needs to complete his ritual before he can be like you?"

Fu Qian's thirst for knowledge was strong, however, and he seized the opportunity to quickly ask his question.

...

The Old Man simply closed his eyes, clearly devoid of any interest in answering.

Fu Qian shook his head with a sigh.

There was, of course, a reason he asked this.

Based on the Old Man's reaction just now, Jiang En was definitely the new recruit they were developing this year.

However, judging from their previous encounters, he hadn't noticed Jiang En possessing any Damage Transfer abilities, nor did the guy seem to know this group of people aside from Daneta.

This was clearly quite different from the covenants he had seen in the past.

Moreover, according to his previous experience, once a covenant was established, a person's extraordinary essence would undergo a change, and things like advancement rituals would cease to exist.

Yet he was actively undergoing a ritual.

This covenant, which he tentatively dubbed Greed Worm, was clearly a bit out of the ordinary!

Furthermore, wasn't this drawback a little too severe?

Although there shouldn't be many people who could casually pull out an otherworldly worm, if they actually ran into such a situation, wouldn't dispatching one of them mean they all died?

While pondering, Fu Qian suddenly noticed an anomaly—the screams of agony filling the area had stopped.

Looking up, he saw that everyone—including the Old Man who acted as the host—wore the exact same expression of shock, looking as if they had no idea what had just happened.

The injuries were still transferring visibly to the naked eye, indicating that the life-sharing effect was still active, but the melting had stopped.

What was going on? Had Daneta and the other two been kicked out of the chain?

That was Fu Qian's first reaction.

After an obvious wave of relief, those who could still crawl to their feet looked over with eyes full of killing intent.

Having plummeted from their high spirits of just a moment ago down to this wretched state, and barely scraping their lives back, they undoubtedly treated Fu Qian as the chief culprit.

Now, it was no longer just a need to kill him; it was a clear-cut personal vendetta.

It was a pity that this newly roused killing intent was shattered in the next moment by a familiar buzzing sound.

After realizing what it was, those who could still move scattered in utter chaos and frantic turmoil. However, a second giant worm did not appear.

At the same time, they also lost sight of Dayun Mingwang's figure.

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