Eldritch Horror Theatre

Although this place exerted immense pressure on a Demigod, fighting off the erosion wasn’t entirely impossible.

However, Fu Qian hadn’t even used his Mythical Form. He was playing the role of an extreme environmentalist to minimize the chances of triggering an alarm.

He still needed to visit the Night Watchers’ headquarters soon to gather information on the Blazing Rainbow.

It was better to keep a low profile for now. He couldn’t let a mere chance at leveling up ruin the bigger picture.

Mid-thought, without even waiting for his legs to fully recover, Fu Qian used his tentacles to launch himself high into the air, rapidly vaulting between the protrusions.

When he severed his legs a moment ago, he had split his focus to pinpoint the exact direction of that faint connection.

And time was likely tighter than he’d imagined.

He had already noticed that even though he amputated his legs in time, the gorgeously bewitching Rust Marks were rapidly spreading across his body.

This was a pure flesh-and-blood erosion comparable to Old Man Camus’s Divine Blood Curse.

Moreover, he wasn’t here as a task runner this time. He was tomb-raiding in the flesh, meaning the Warehouse wouldn’t be around to cleanse the pollution for him.Even for a master of Flesh and Blood Ascension, once the erosion set in deep enough, simply shedding a Skin wouldn’t fix it.

Especially since this was essentially a map-wide aura.

Whether it was the Blood Lake below, the protrusions he landed on, or even the omnipresent stench—everything compounded the effect. There was simply nowhere to hide.

In short, his physical body might give out before his Pseudo-God Incarnation even ended.

Amidst his sighs, his newly regenerated legs hit the ground. Fu Qian picked up his pace and retracted his tentacles.

...

This was the place.

His sprint didn’t last much longer. At a certain point, Fu Qian noticed a subtle shift.

It was no longer a formless connection; the feeling of mutual attraction had suddenly become clear.

He seemed to have officially entered the target’s area of influence.

Although it looked no different on the surface.

Before him lay the same boundless Blood Lake, and even footholds had become sparse.

But that was only the surface. The change had already occurred without him realizing it.

Fu Qian skidded to a halt. He stretched out his left hand and raised his middle finger.

Something was calling out, urging him to go down.

But Fu Qian had absolutely no intention of taking a dive. Instead, he studied the back of his hand.

The rapidly multiplying red Rust Marks were now slowing their spread.

More accurately, after crossing some invisible boundary, everything belonging to him seemed to be congealing under a wondrous effect.

Eternity.

A moment later, a word he rarely used popped into Fu Qian’s head.

As a materialist, he had never believed anything could remain eternally unchanged.

But at this very moment, he was truly experiencing the concept in every sense of the word.

Fu Qian had no doubt that if he stayed here long enough, his very existence would be permanently solidified in this exact moment.

Whether it was erosion or ascension, neither would hold any meaning for him anymore.

”An interesting form of power. The pressure is on Classmate Su Gao now.”

Faced with this ominous development, Fu Qian still didn’t move. He muttered to himself while silently counting the time.

One, two, three...

Time didn’t flow particularly fast, yet it continued to cross his estimated critical thresholds one by one.

Fu Qian’s posture didn’t change in the slightest. Finally, the White Finger Ring on his extended middle finger gave off a faint tremor.

It worked!

Without any hesitation, Fu Qian abandoned the target right in front of him, turned around, and broke into a mad dash.

As an exploratory probe, Fu Qian had never treated this trip as a Child of Destiny scenario, where he could take a stroll, pick up heavenly treasures, and become a supreme martial lord in one fell swoop.

The way he saw it, if he were truly naive enough to chase after that fated encounter, his chances of success wouldn’t be any higher than jumping off a cliff to find a white ape.

From start to finish, his goal had been incredibly pure—to make the most of the ten points of SAN Value he’d sacrificed by locking onto a coordinate that might be useful to the Red Moon, to serve as the starting point for his next operation.

The fact that he’d made a discovery on this trip was largely due to the tide, which had allowed the information of the Divine Trait to drift out.

But in essence, the tide was still an extreme negative influence. Even a paramecium knew to seek fortune and avoid disaster.

The only problem was how to locate this place again without the tide.

Even if the Red Moon pulled through perfectly and helped him pinpoint this bubble, navigating the environment without any informational guidance would turn finding the target into a game of pure luck. His condition might be even worse next time.

So the most logical choice was to use the attraction to establish a preliminary anchor on the location, then strike at full strength next time.

This was the absolute limit Fu Qian was striving for. His target had never changed.

But the ensuing problem was that the target location he’d found through this extreme maneuver had absolutely no points of reference. If he wanted to open the door accurately, he still needed to provide Mother with some recognizable markers.

In response, Fu Qian’s choice was to use the White Ring to record the wondrous effects present here—such as Eternity.

The benefit of doing this was that if it succeeded, it would effectively help him recreate the state. Furthermore, the chances of triggering any potential surveillance by the Night Watchers during the attempt were minuscule.

The downside was that he wasn’t sure if Eternity counted as an attack. On top of that, according to the White Ring’s instruction manual, the success rate against this kind of Rank should also be infinitesimal.

But that was fine. True experts always fought for the highest probability within their limited resources.

If it didn’t work, he would just expend another portion of resources.

The facts proved that ”pure power” had withstood the test.

After a tolerable number of attempts, it actually managed to record a trace of Eternity’s effect.

...

Having achieved his goal, Fu Qian not only sprinted rapidly toward the aura of the world where the exit was located, but light also flashed in his hand as he used Homecoming once again.

Nothing happened.

In this place, his connection to the Half-Step Moon seemed to be severed.

It really was a dangerous spot!

Fu Qian wasn’t too surprised by this result.

The Red Moon’s warning was one thing, but as early as when he had just entered this place, he’d tried using Blood Crusade—only to find it had no effect.

A moment later, he removed the Emissary.

No effect *3!

Impressive indeed. Fortunately, he’d prepared contingencies for this.

If either of those two methods had worked, they could have turned his trip into a one-way journey.

But after his experience dealing with Yasui Tokiyuki, Fu Qian found it difficult to remain an idealist.

Finally, right before his entire body was covered in red rust, that bizarre, grotesque expanse appeared before his eyes once more.

”Everything really does require comparison. After taking a spin around, this place is much more adorable.”

Fu Qian sighed sincerely as he stepped onto that vast land once more. After running a few steps, he clearly felt his Rank drop.

The Pseudo-God Incarnation had ended.

But it didn’t matter. After all, he no longer had to worry about alarming the Night Watchers here.

With a ripping sound, Fu Qian tore off his entire Skin and headed straight for the Ruins.