Life Game In Other World
Chapter 387: Ritual Array (Double-Length - Please Subscribe, Bookmark, and Vote for Monthly Tickets)

Chapter 387: Chapter 387: Ritual Array (Double-Length Chapter Please Subscribe, Bookmark, and Vote for Monthly Tickets)

"Grim Reaper"

The moment He Ao’s voice dropped, a black shadow sprang out from his right side.

Then a full and slender thigh, wrapped in black stockings, whipped toward He Ao’s forehead.

It was a roundhouse kick.

A flash of red sword light passed by, colliding with the kick in the sky. He Ao’s body jerked, his feet bending. An orange glow emerged on the surface of the slender thigh, blocking the red sword light, then instantly shattered.

The shadow violently retreated backward, landing in the middle of a triangular pattern not far away.

Her skirt fell down, covering the delicate and plump area between the stocking top and the short skirt.

It was indeed Elijah’s maid.

Zip—

Accompanied by an extremely faint noise, the taut stockings on the maid’s thigh, where they had just collided with He Ao’s sword light, ripped apart violently, exposing the snow-white skin underneath.

Then that skin suddenly split open, revealing a long and narrow wound, from which blood glowing with orange brilliance overflowed.

He Ao raised his hand to look at his bracelet.

"With a large number of refugees entering the Southern District, the number of theft and robbery incidents has gradually increased... Ah! The mercenaries from the Mining Consortium have just started shooting on the streets... City Defense Army, where is the City Defense Army!!!"

The bracelet was broadcasting current news.

"F**k the Mining Consortium, I’ve had it with you guys!!!"

"Brothers, let’s do them in! If we don’t kill them today, we’ll die! Fire! Fire!"

Next was the host’s panic-stricken flight and the chaos of gunfire.

The Southern District was also in disarray.

As the last area of Rock City that had maintained some order, the chaos in the Southern District meant that disorder had completely spread across the city.

In the Federation, those who love chaos the most are the followers of the God of Chaos, and the followers of the God of Chaos like to create chaos everywhere.

In addition to the God of Chaos, another Evil God that delights in chaos is the Grim Reaper.

Unlike the God of Chaos, who enjoys the chaos itself, the Grim Reaper relishes the despair and death that chaos brings.

The more people in despair, the more death that may result, the more pleased the Evil God becomes.

Therefore, the followers of the God of Chaos often like to cause a disturbance in an area with a small price, shooting and moving, creating more chaos to please their Divine Being, and such chaos is easily extinguished.

Meanwhile, the followers of the Grim Reaper prefer to meticulously arrange their gambits, leading to large-scale slaughter and death.

The best time for the Grim Reaper’s Advent is when a massive amount of death occurs, as the newly deceased souls are the finest Sacrifices to offer to the Grim Reaper.

The followers of the Grim Reaper were active during the end of the Great Calamity and the chaotic era of the Original Federation’s establishment.

That was the most glorious time for the worship of the Grim Reaper, with numerous cities and settlements being established. The followers of the Grim Reaper roamed among these cities and settlements, fomenting discord and creating slaughter and death.

Then they would Sacrifice the entire settlement to the Grim Reaper in exchange for promotion or Grace.

After the Federation was established, they began a large-scale crackdown on and pursuit of the followers of the Grim Reaper.

It has been a long time since the followers of the Grim Reaper have left any active records. If not for Dawn City’s ancient history, preserving extensive records from the end of the Great Calamity and the period of the Original Federation’s establishment, Christos could not have found such detailed materials for He Ao.

The Grim Reaper has the power to polarize human emotions, driving people increasingly toward madness. Now it is merely chaos, but soon the chaos will be induced into slaughter—that’s when the Grim Reaper’s Advent is near.

He Ao’s gaze swept over the huge pattern that flowed with crimson fluid.

The Eye of Truth pattern actually has two forms. The pattern commonly used by wizards has an eye closed within a triangle.

’The Truth watches over all its followers, yet the followers can never see the eye.’

An inverted triangle with a closed eye embedded within, in the realm of esoteric studies, means ’the unattainable Truth’ or ’Truth is forever on the path of exploration.’

And if this eye were to open, it would mean "the truth has been found."

Generally, only exceedingly arrogant wizards would use this pattern, as other wizards feel that rashly using this motif is "profaning" the truth.

Yet, the Grim Reaper used this pattern directly for his own communication ritual array.

Although the other was a Great Being, wizards still felt that the Grim Reaper was an "arrogant madman."

After the wizards’ organization disappeared, some wizards became the core force of the Church of the God of Knowledge, thus the church inherited part of the wizards’ viewpoints and has long been at odds with the Church of the Grim Reaper.

The maid did not launch another attack but retreated behind Elijah.

A beautiful woman with her eyes covered by a light veil reached out and laid her hand on the maid’s wounded thigh, the blood from the wound slowly stopped flowing.

That kick just now was merely a test, a test of He Ao’s strength.

"You don’t seem curious to see me—how did you guess?"

The gentle words, akin to a mother’s, rang in He Ao’s ears, causing his somewhat tense mood to gradually relax.

His figure stiffened, but he did not show any surprised expression; rather, he glanced at the Eye of Truth that had opened before him, drawing upon the minute power of his Divine Sense, and his entire field of vision changed.

Streams of purple circuits flowing through the sky appeared in his vision, one end connected to the Eye of Truth’s Ritual Array before He Ao, the other end spreading past the walls and extending in all directions.

At the same time, he looked towards Elijah with a light chuckle and said,

"There was a bit of luck involved,"

In fact, Old Foreman had given He Ao two hints, one on the night he handed He Ao the pickaxe, and the other, actually, during their first meeting.

The night he first met Old Foreman, after their chat, Old Foreman had shown him where the washroom was and added another sentence, "Feel free to wander around the church; God loves all, but please keep quiet."

It was this sentence and the subsequent attraction he felt that led He Ao to the door of the secret library, where he saw the emblem of the Eye of Truth and Elijah.

The emphasis was on the phrase "please keep quiet."

Elijah could not see, but her hearing seemed very strong, capable of identifying a person’s location through subtle sounds quickly.

So, He Ao had to tread extremely lightly, which he indeed did; hence, he was able to successfully evade some of Elijah’s perceptions, find the mechanism, and open the door to the secret library.

However, at that time, Old Foreman probably did not intend to tip He Ao off on purpose; he might have discovered the secret library but had yet to find a way to enter it without alerting Elijah, which is why he had He Ao move around freely.

The chaotic sounds of movement could affect Elijah, like crying wolf, ultimately reducing her sharpness.

For Old Foreman, this was a long-term task; he probably not only sought He Ao but also approached others and might have been at it for a while.

But he did not expect He Ao as a ’warrior’ to have such excellent control over his body, with footsteps light enough to find the cross and unlock the mechanism before Elijah detected him.

If not for He Ao, Old Foreman might have completely numbed Elijah with his ’cried wolf’ strategy before she completed the sacrifice, which may also be why Elijah was unprepared for such ’tricks.’

In any case, if one were to use gaming terms, He Ao had completed a difficult ’hidden quest’ the first time he entered the church map, acquiring a key clue for the entire main questline.

His first encounter with Elijah in the secret library was not pleasant, so He Ao had always been on guard against her internally; Elijah must have been surprised and confused at the time too.

Because of this wariness, he did not show his resistance to corruption when Elijah advised him not to look too closely at the books about Divine Beings. Instead, he followed Elijah’s advice.

If he had shown his resistance to corruption at that time, the bookshelf barrier would not have been so easily broken just now.

However, He Ao rationally demonstrated a cooperative attitude at that time and did not delve deeper, and since Elijah still needed the Miners’ Mutual Aid Association, she did not act against him directly.

If he had been more impulsive, Elijah might have seized the opportunity to eliminate him, a discoverer of the secret, even at great cost.

Later, when leaving, He Ao asked Elijah if anyone else knew about the secret library.

Elijah’s response was that Old Foreman did not know.

But at that time, He Ao had already sensed that Old Foreman knew something, which proved there was some rift between Elijah and Old Foreman.

However, at that time, He Ao did not particularly suspect Elijah; he just considered that she had no emotional ties with the Miners’ Mutual Aid Association and that it was simply mutual caution for the sake of interests.

What truly started his vigilance was when he was examining the Mayor’s data and noticed a complete change in the Mayor’s composure, witnessing the Mayor during his initial speeches, sitting with his shoulders naturally leveled and body upright.

Ordinary people might find it normal that someone suddenly starts studying hard to change themselves, as this is not uncommon.

But having experienced several Copy Worlds, lived different characters’ lives, and having a puppet in the main world, He Ao immediately realized that the mayor might no longer be the original ’mayor’ anymore.

From that time, he began to suspect the mayor’s identity.

He had used the Puppet Crystal Ball and knew that in this world, there existed the power to control others.

And that special sitting posture was due to the discomfort of taking over a new body, naturally revealing one’s habitual movements.

At that time, He Ao felt that the sitting posture looked somewhat familiar, but the clues he got were too few.

Elijah had almost perfectly handled all the intelligence, and she had also noticed the minor oversight at the beginning of the mayor’s campaign, so she consciously sealed off all the materials related to the mayor’s campaign.

He Ao’s suspicions continued until the Old Foreman was attacked. The Old Foreman did something obviously out of character and then was attacked, leading He Ao to almost instantly think of the puppet-master behind the ’manipulated’ mayor.

The other party could also control the Old Foreman.

Based on this, he began to make inferences, naturally thinking that the Old Foreman might be acting against his will, sometimes speaking in a roundabout way, and then he thought of the hint the Old Foreman had given him on the night he gave him the pickaxe. As the Old Foreman was leaving, he said one last thing,

"Remember to collect my body, and don’t let it end up like Yates, taken away by the city’s garbage collectors."

Elijah was probably only able to perceive the more obvious surface emotions of the Old Foreman; she couldn’t detect deeper layers, so the Old Foreman had to go around in several circles to pass on a message to He Ao.

Firstly, mentioning collecting a body, the Old Foreman anticipated a possible death, so he brought it up, but in the end, the one who took him away severely injured was the Pharmacist, meaning he might have arranged for the Pharmacist to "collect his body" from the start.

So why did he mention collecting his body?

An abnormal point is often to emphasize a specific content.

The content the Old Foreman wanted to emphasize was "Yates was taken away by city trash collection."

When He Ao killed Yates, the Old Foreman was not present. To find out about Yates, he had to inquire through an intelligence network. However, if he was only concerned about Yates’s life or death, then he’d just inquire about that, no need to emphasize about city trash collection.

What was the context of Yates’s body being collected?

The stand-off between Elijah and Aber—Aber might have disdained Yates and didn’t want his body, but after Aber left, Elijah shouldn’t have handed the body over to the city authorities, because that’s like handing it over to the mayor.

This isn’t something an enemy of the mayor would do.

Of course, this incident on its own could be explained with various reasons, but the Old Foreman’s emphasis on this point was a hint to He Ao.

There might be a problem with Elijah.

After figuring this out, He Ao naturally associated it with the mayor’s sitting posture, which at the beginning was almost identical to Elijah sitting in a wheelchair.

It was the posture of someone who had been sitting in a wheelchair for a long time.

Elijah has no relation to the Mining Consortium.

Considering the series of actions taken by the mayor favoring the Mining Consortium against the miners, this could be explained from the perspective of the mayor being the actual controller of the Mining Consortium, but from the standpoint of a puppet-master not related to the Mining Consortium, it is difficult to comprehend.

If Elijah coveted the power and prestige of the Mining Consortium, she could have directly come out and taken control of it, which as a B-level, would have been much easier than supporting the mayor.

Moreover, during her control of the mayor, she did not seek any profit for herself and even lost her position as the Speaker due to the mayoral election.

If one does not seek small gains, they must have a larger plot in mind.

Combining this with the Old Foreman’s attack, He Ao quickly speculated that Elijah might want to incite chaos between the miners and the Mining Consortium.

This also explained why the night the Miners’ Mutual Aid Association attacked Vinc’s team, they happened to fall into the City Defense Army’s trap.

Because on both sides were her people. That time, she not only wanted to get rid of Vinc but also Yvo, who with his superb Mecha piloting skills and piloting a C-level Mecha, was too strong an asset for the Miners’ Mutual Aid Association.

Exacerbating conflicts is something that can’t benefit a person from a human standpoint, so He Ao guessed Elijah’s actions might be connected to the divine or supernatural.

That’s why he asked Christos for information on the Eye of Truth.

Of course, the deductive process was complex, and He Ao didn’t feel the need nor had the time to explain to Elijah. He shrugged and continued from the phrase ’a bit of luck plays a factor,’ saying,

"The moment I saw you, I knew you didn’t look like a good person."

He Ao had actually not been lying; when he was in the underground library, he initially didn’t think Elijah was a good person.

Elijah: ?

Her pristine feet stepped into the bright red flow of water.

This cold-faced, sexy woman showed an expression of shock for the first time.

She had heard many compliments regarding her looks, but "you don’t look like a good person" was a new one for her.

The maid beside her also looked clearly confused, unsure whether He Ao was joking or seriously explaining.

The key was that He Ao spoke with an unusually serious tone.

While the two women were stunned by this response, He Ao was also simultaneously mobilizing his Divine Sense, carefully deciphering the energy flow of the Array before him; this Array’s flow of energy and the forces involved were far more complex than anything he had ever analyzed before.

Elijah was quite wary of his contamination resistance, biding her time for the moment the ceremony would be complete, but wasn’t He Ao also buying time to decipher the Ritual Array?

After a moment, Elijah’s gentle voice rose again, "Even if you had guessed my identity, you should have come to find me at the Church, not here."

He Ao glanced at her, and this time he didn’t respond with a general answer but gave a thoughtful explanation.

Indeed, the starting point to confirm the core of the ceremony had to begin with the monsters contaminated by the War God.

The thirty-odd locations where monsters appeared did not form any specific pattern.

But knowing that Elijah had nothing to do with the War God, He Ao decided not to start with the monsters, but with the effects the monsters had caused.

If the areas where these monsters had caused killings were marked out, they would form over thirty irregular shapes.

All these irregular shapes had a rather obvious, slightly central location; connecting these centers would result in a giant perfect circle, encompassing most of Rock City.

At this point, integrating the pattern of the Eye of Truth into this circle and adjusting the angle, one would discover that at a certain angle, the pattern of the Eye of Truth coincided perfectly with some of the places the Mayor had visited.

The Mayor’s trajectory was extremely complex, all tangled up, including what must have been intentional misdirection and distractions. He Ao couldn’t be certain this method of overlap was correct; it was possible the Mayor’s erratic paths just happened to form an Eye of Truth.

But the Mayor’s death gave He Ao a hint.

Before, all indications behind the scenes pointed to the Mayor, so under ordinary circumstances, it would naturally be assumed that the ultimate core location might be at the Mayor’s residence or the Mining Consortium building—that was the first layer.

But with the Mayor dead and He Ao confirming that Elijah was the one behind the scenes,

then under normal circumstances, one would speculate that the core location was at the Church that Elijah often frequented—that was the second layer.

At that point, He Ao put himself in Elijah’s shoes and seriously pondered. According to Elijah’s meticulous way of doing things, it was likely she had set up a third layer of reversal.

That is, the core point might still be the Mining Consortium or the Mayor’s residence—the most dangerous place is the safest.

And right at the pupil of the Eye of Truth, which coincided with the Mayor’s trajectory, was the Mining Consortium building.

Therefore, He Ao conjectured that this core point was the Mining Consortium building.

Upon hearing He Ao’s serious explanation, Elijah was bewildered once more.

He Ao’s earnest and detailed exposition here made her start to believe that his earlier comment about her ’not looking like a good person’ was heartfelt.

He Ao looked at Elijah, aware that he still had other judgments that he hadn’t shared.

Outside, a massive Ritual Array was constructed by the monsters’ killings and the Mayor’s arrangements—that was the real body of the Ritual Array. Under this Array, everyone could be affected, with their minds polarizing and drifting towards slaughter.

The Ritual Array inside the Mining Consortium building was supposed to be the core of the outside Array.

Through the flow of these energies, after half of his second layer of Divine Sense had been consumed, he had already grasped the core of the energy circuits of these Arrays.

Destroy these cores, and the massive Array outside should collapse simultaneously.

He lunged forward abruptly.