Chapter 85: Investigation Results, Self-Exploration

"The Gate of the Abyss?" Wang Yu recalled, searching through the basic intelligence passed to him by the Night's Blade to find information regarding the Gate of the Abyss.

An organization in Sevantan similar to the Royal Guard, they answered almost exclusively to the royal family, specializing in infiltration, assassination, and intelligence gathering, earning themselves quite a reputation as an established organization.

"They have already begun infiltrating our side; what a hassle." Wang Yu curled his lip. The situation was growing increasingly chaotic, and it seemed his plan to make steady progress was out of the question now.

These strange "gods," the members of the Gate of the Abyss infiltrating Aleister, and those hidden moles who might or might not have been uncovered—all of these were undoubtedly latent threats.

"Mr. Wang Yu, you don't actually believe we haven't conducted similar operations against Sevantan, do you?" An old mage in the team seemed to read Wang Yu's thoughts and asked in a low voice.

With a jolt to his mind, Wang Yu suddenly came to his senses. Right, why had his thinking become rigid again? This wasn't one of those web novels he read back on Earth, where he would just sit in his own territory, handling whatever plots and schemes the enemy brought along, and getting stronger by reacting to their moves.

In reality... the two kingdoms of Aleister and Sevantan were extremely close in size and power, and neither side could completely suppress the other.

Since the enemy could infiltrate and sabotage Aleister, what about Aleister? Wouldn't they turn around and do the exact same thing to Sevantan? Was that possible? Of course it was. This was war... both sides would eventually resort to any means necessary, until one side broke down and surrendered.

Shaking his head, Wang Yu admitted he was being presumptuous again. He could only hope that Aleister's infiltration and espionage organizations would achieve some results. Although he wasn't a native of Aleister, he was at least working for them for now.

Furthermore, from the look of things, Sevantan must have taken the wrong medicine to initiate this war in the first place. From Wang Yu's personal standpoint, Aleister could be considered the righteous side.

Casting aside his speculations and worries about Sevantan's infiltration of Aleister, Wang Yu refocused his attention on the remains left behind by the fellow who had mutated while walking.

Flipping open the inside of the hood, his fingers brushed against a groove on the inner lining. As the shape of the pattern registered in his mind, the identity of the individual was revealed to him. This was a captain-level figure from an operational team of the Gate of the Abyss, likely the strongest combatant who possessed the strength of an advanced Formal Knight.

Wang Yu felt somewhat fortunate that this guy hadn't rushed out alongside the vampire. Although the vampire was completely feral and would have likely killed this guy too, it would have surely caused massive casualties and losses.

However, what caught Wang Yu's attention even more was the transformation of this individual. From a human, he had mutated into an unknown monster. One didn't even need to think to know this was the handiwork of Elphyn, the Source of Life. Based on the Lady of the Night's evaluation, Wang Yu wouldn't be surprised by anything this madman did.

The captain's ultimate transformation reminded Wang Yu of the Gift of Life's Return he had witnessed on the night Captain Shugain slew Elphyn's flesh avatar. Those humans who turned into pure mush—this guy's transformation was remarkably similar to that.

In the materials he looked up later with Siegfried, Wang Yu learned the significance of this Life's Return ritual: "To return the life that inherently belongs to the Source of Life, allowing the deity's body to reappear before the eyes of the believers and the world."

The phrase sounded grandly ritualistic, but in truth, it was utter roguery, because Elphyn, the Source of Life, could never be a creator god; it was just a title forced upon him by his fanatical followers.

Returning the life that inherently belonged to him—translated into plain words, it meant robbing others of their lives to give to this "god." It was the textbook conduct of an evil deity.

However, in previous Sevantan records, only believers would perform this "Life's Return" ritual. Now it was a different story—since the guy had gone mad, it was only natural for him to force the ritual upon others, completely transforming into an evil god.

"Damn it, this move is truly insidious. Why aren't those orthodox gods doing anything? What's so bad about sending a true avatar down to slaughter this disgusting thing?"

Wang Yu felt a bit numb. The current situation was clear now: an evil god was hiding in the royal capital's sewers, secretly conducting rituals in hopes of shaping a physical vessel for Elphyn, which would eventually lead to the manifestation of an evil god that would turn the royal capital upside down.

Knowing the situation was one thing, but how to handle it became a massive problem. The history of the royal capital's sewers could be traced back to the early days of the kingdom's founding. Whether the royal family even possessed a map of this place was a huge question mark, and searching such a vast area would be a logistical nightmare.

Most importantly, they were looking for a "god." Hunting a person who hid intentionally was already troublesome enough in the intricate environment of the sewers, so what about finding a "god" whose power surpassed that of most living creatures?

Wang Yu shook his head at the thought. He truly hoped that the orthodox gods worshiped in the Kingdom of Aleister would step up to do some work and drag this Elphyn out to beat him to death.

Regrettably, compared to the numerous atrocities of the evil gods, the miracles of the orthodox gods seemed exceedingly rare. The activities of the evil gods far outnumbered those of the orthodox ones, a phenomenon that contemporary scholars, like Wang Yu, could not understand.

At any rate, they would be busy from now on. The job of the Night's Blade was to deal with these void evil gods, so the subsequent investigation of the sewers would have to be handled by the local branch in the city.

Still, Wang Yu did suggest a rather excellent plan for them: just pump chlorine gas inside. It would just be unfortunate for the small sewer creatures and the gang members hiding down there.

"The investigation is almost complete, let's head back." Wang Yu had gathered enough information. He just needed to relay this to Charles, who was writing the report, and have him submit it.

On the way back, Wang Yu processed some extra matters in his mind as he walked. The Void Blade gauntlet, which had been quiet for a long time, showed a reaction.

A long time ago, when he killed the fragment of the God of Fear, this gauntlet belonging to the old knight had reacted.

And after killing the vampire who was suddenly possessed by Elphyn, the Source of Life, this gauntlet, which had been inert for a long time, changed once again.

It seemed to have drawn something into Wang Yu's mental space. However, since he had been busy dealing with the physical changes in his body earlier, he hadn't had the time to examine it closely. Only after wrapping up the entire investigation did Wang Yu find the time to see what had happened.

Stepping once more onto that endless, crystal-clear surface of the lake, Wang Yu looked down at the water beneath his feet. Clearly, the water here was slightly deeper. Wang Yu now more or less knew that this lake water represented his void energy reserves.

Both absorptions by the Void Blade gauntlet had brought increments to his void energy. Compared to back then...

Wang Yu was somewhat surprised to discover that before he knew it, his maximum void energy reserve was nearly ten times what it had been a year ago.

A portion of this was generated autonomously through his study of wizard runes, while the rest was the amplification brought by the two absorptions of the Void Blade gauntlet.

A tenfold growth could not be considered small, but in reality, it was only because Wang Yu's initial talent had been so poor and the baseline so small. The current storage seemed to have grown immensely, but let alone comparing it to Alvia, it was less than a fifth of a normal wizard's capacity.

But that wasn't what Wang Yu noticed. What caught his attention was a fist-sized object floating above his lake surface.

The thing looked rather revolting, resembling a twisted, skinless chunk of anomalous, fleshy, soft-bodied organism, with structures resembling eyeballs and tentacles constantly writhing across it.

Yet, looking closer, one could see that this object was actually formed by a transparent, diamond-shaped crystal covered by a layer of flesh on the outside. Because of those disgusting things on the outer layer, the crystal appeared exceptionally distorted.

A somewhat familiar feeling... Was the thing inside a crystal of faith? It seemed to be, and it was quite large, about twice the size of the one Wang Yu had obtained after shattering it at the Will of the Abyss before. Although it didn't look as bright, it seemed to be the same material.

As for these hypertrophied flesh tissues, Wang Yu scraped at them with his hand. The thing instantly grew a large mouth bristling with fangs and bit down on Wang Yu's finger, which was, without a doubt, entirely ineffective...

Rubbing his chin, it was another familiar thing. This was similar to those chaotic mental energy aggregates within the Will of the Abyss. It was essentially a pile of mental energy, except that the composition of the mental energy in this flesh was truly too chaotic.

Upon making contact, a massive amount of assorted, chaotic images flooded in. Ridiculously, only a tiny fraction of the owners of this mental energy were human or ordinary creatures; the majority belonged to slimes, swamp ghouls, moor crawlers, and all sorts of bizarre entities...

If an ordinary person had these memories rush into their brain, they would probably go mad on the spot. However, Wang Yu remained unaffected. He saw a dazzling blur and understood absolutely nothing, but it was also true that he suffered no negative impact whatsoever.

"Holy crap, that's wild. No wonder the Lady of the Night dislikes the faith of goblins. Taking in the faith of these things must be pure torture."

Wang Yu finally understood why the Lady of the Night disliked goblin faith. Looking at a tiny fraction of these memory images, Wang Yu discovered they truly consisted of faith and imaginations of their god.

But the problem was that while faith made up perhaps one percent, the rest was filled with all sorts of stray thoughts from creatures devoid of wisdom, and chaos so profound that one couldn't even tell what it was. To use an analogy, this thing was like a cake mixed with feces—if you didn't eat the feces, you couldn't get the cake.

If you didn't eat the cake, you would starve to death, so you could only bite the bullet and eat it. As a result, the cake was basically full of feces, and eating it would make you gravely ill.

Well then, no wonder this fellow Elphyn, the Source of Life, was insane beyond belief. The quality of this faith crystal truly made one shake their head.

However, this item was quite easy to handle for Wang Yu. With a shift of his thought, his true mental palace appeared, the broken doorframe looking just as it always did.

He tossed this faith crystal, which was covered in a large mass of flesh, inside. The moment it passed through the doorframe, the flesh upon it vanished into thin air, leaving behind only a pure faith crystal that was far smaller than before.

Putting away this faith crystal, which was roughly half the size of the one he had obtained from the Will of the Abyss, Wang Yu once again pondered his own uniqueness. Although he would readily utilize his uniqueness without obsessing over it when he didn't understand it, he would not stop exploring it either.

His mind seemed entirely immune to the so-called mental pollution of this world or anything related or similar to it. His true mental palace was actually this broken doorframe.

The lake water and the infinite starry sky outside now seemed to be things that didn't belong to him, because the Lady of the Night could enter and leave this place at will.

However, the inside of his doorframe never permitted any foreign object he rejected to enter. Once they passed through the doorframe, the things he rejected would be completely erased.

Wang Yu had looked up descriptions regarding a wizard's mental palace, and it truly ought to be a mirror-like, infinitely distant lake just like his.

When communicating with Alvia, Father Fang, and even Alvia's mother through mental space, it was always done across this lake surface, which also proved that this lake was a part of Wang Yu's mental space.

However, that broken doorframe, which Wang Yu fully controlled and was most certain constituted his mental palace, exhibited too many properties inconsistent with this mental space.

Therefore, from beginning to end, the connection between this lake water representing his void energy reserves and himself, alongside the question of whether he possessed a soul, was what he had been constantly exploring. Yet, the vast amount of texts and data he had read so far failed to provide him with a satisfactory answer.

The uniqueness of his doorframe was never mentioned in any text, so this question would have to be left for the future to solve.

Nevertheless, there would be nothing to be surprised about if anything else appeared on his lake surface without any warning in the future, because the lake surface itself might not belong to him. As for why he could use this void energy, that remained unknown.

In fact, he could even fly out of this range to the vicinity of other people's mental spaces, so it seemed he himself was the truly unique one.

His reflections on his own uniqueness came to a temporary halt. Wang Yu picked up the faith crystal, which had lost more than half its size after being purified. Even mosquito legs were still meat. This time could be considered as having troubled the Lady of the Night, so this could serve as a form of payment.

Calling upon the name of the Lady of the Night, the tall lady silently appeared upon this lake surface.

"Thanks for the help this time. Consider this as the reward. I'll bring it over to you next time I go to the Capital's Dark Shadow."

Wang Yu showed the faith crystal to the Lady of the Night. The Lady of the Night had mentioned herself that she couldn

Nodding, Wang Yu pondered for a moment before voicing a question that had been weighing on him: "Lady Night, is the Source of Life, Elfin, truly of the same nature as you? You two seem vastly different."

Lady Night appeared as a human woman draped in somber, obsidian robes, while the Source of Life was a grotesque, pulsating mass of flesh that turned the stomach; the contrast was stark, yet both were seemingly products of some grand design by Sevintan.

"..." Lady Night remained silent for a long moment.

"Indeed, our essences are identical, yet He has been irrevocably corrupted by faith. I have no desire to be swayed by the prayers of mortals, and thus, I thank you once more, my friend; because of you, I may remain the being I choose to be."

Lady Night answered his inquiry and offered a sincere, graceful bow, leaving Wang Yu quite startled and feeling rather humbled by the gesture.

"Being a god isn't easy, is it? Keep at it, let us both continue to strive."