absurd deduction game.

Having achieved their goal and thoroughly enjoyed themselves, the group left the cemetery at 1 a.m.

The strange phenomenon vanished silently, and almost the instant they closed the door of the gravedigger's hut, the scene inside returned to the peace of daytime, without revealing the slightest trace of it.

The night, like thick ink, enveloped the town of Yolikev.

The chilling atmosphere from the depths of the cemetery still seemed to linger on their clothes and hair, but as the four stepped back onto the relatively orderly streets of the town, a sense of human presence—even in the dead of night—slightly dispelled the deathly silence.

Carlos was still examining the beating heart in his palm, sensing the lingering aura on it. The raven's heart was exceptionally vibrant, showing no signs of decay, and it was already a mature ritual material. Even though Carlos held it in his hand, the bloodstains on it did not smudge onto his gloves.

"..." Zeng Lai watched for a while, then suddenly felt dizzy.

A smell mixed with soil, rotting flesh, and a faint ghostly aura surged up from the depths of his soul, causing him to furrow his brow.

He rubbed his still somewhat weak chest and muttered, "I'm such a useless thing. Just getting close to this thing gives me the feeling of being affected."

soul.

His soul was severely damaged and has not yet been repaired, making him more prone to negative states and weakness than a normal predictor.

Including the scene just now where Yu Xing devoured that [Carrion Raven - Undead Gravekeeper], although it was silent, Zeng Lai felt that the scene was almost aggravating his soul trauma... If Carlos and Yu Xing had a lot of fun in the cemetery, he was like someone with acrophobia who got on a drop tower.

He was quite excited while playing, but afterwards he learned what nausea felt like.

Yu Xing glanced at him, his pale face expressionless, only a hint of languid satisfaction flickering deep in his eyes. He first steadied Zeng Lai with a branch, then touched his seemingly still flat stomach, and said slowly, "Carlos, let's put that heart away first. What shall we eat next?"

Upon hearing this, Carlos elegantly flicked non-existent dust off his coat, readily conjured up the Raven Heart, and then glanced at the leaderboard.

"..."

The last place on the first day has disappeared from the list, and the current number of predictors is [49/50].

They recorded a rare fusion monster, which boosted their overall rankings. He is now in second place, overtaking Qu Xianqing, while Zeng Lai has moved up to fourth.

However, Yu Xing's contribution level was still significantly lower—after he ate the tomb guardian, the gap widened even more dramatically, and his rating reached A-level.

This is only the first day.

Carlos had a playful smile on his lips. He tried to put his arm around Yu Xing's shoulder like a brother, but a wisp of an invisible branch gently slapped his hand away. He didn't care and continued to laugh, "You've almost eaten all the 'feast' around here in one night. Do you know what sustainable development is? Many monsters have quest chains behind them. Can't you eat a little less, my captain?"

Yi Qing floated to the side, her jade-bone fan lightly covering her lips, letting out a soft chuckle. The ghostly figure in green robes swayed in the night breeze, appearing extremely content.

Yu Xing pondered for a moment, his brain working at lightning speed.

After devouring the powerful fused monster, the burning hunger was finally suppressed by most of it. Although he was still far from being truly "full," at least he was no longer in a hurry. Unlike when he first entered the dungeon, he no longer saw everything as a walking buffet.

“Alright, let’s stop here for dinner tonight.” Yu Xing nodded in response, but her gaze was already fixed on the street ahead. “Besides, there are plenty of monsters in town, so there’s no need to worry about the mission.”

His tone was calm, but the inhumanity in it sent a chill down Zeng Lai's spine.

The four walked back along the empty, deserted street.

Carlos's office was also in the wealthy district. The nights in Yolikev were eerily quiet, with only the sound of their footsteps echoing softly on the main road.

The windows of the mansions lining the road were all dark, like the pupils of silent behemoths, warily watching the uninvited guests in the dead of night. Occasionally, a church night patrolman's kerosene lamp would flash by on a distant street corner, but it would not approach the group of investigators with special identities.

Just as they were about to cross the central square and take a shortcut back to the office, Yu Xing, who was walking in front, suddenly stopped.

His movement was so abrupt that Zeng Lai, who was following behind him, almost bumped into him.

"What's wrong?" Carlos's fingers twitched slightly, and several playing cards silently slid into his palm.

Yu Xing did not answer, but simply raised his chin slightly, gesturing for them to look at the fountain pool in the center of the square.

There stood a figure, seemingly still.

It is described as "standing" because it does indeed have a rough outline and limbs resembling those of a human. But it could never be a "person".

It was tall and thin, dressed in tattered, stained, old clothes, like some kind of uniformly issued prison or hospital gown, hanging loosely on its skeleton. Its skin was an unhealthy grayish-white, gleaming like plaster in the moonlight, stiff and lifeless.

But what's most terrifying is its face.

There are no facial features there.

There are no eyes, no nose, no mouth, and no ears. There are no undulations or openings that could be described as "facial features".

Instead, there was a smooth, finely polished dark wood panel.

The wooden plank covered its entire front of its head perfectly, as if it had grown there naturally. The material of the plank looked ordinary, like an old plank that could be picked up anywhere, but its edges seemed to be strangely integrated with its flesh, exuding an extremely unsettling inhuman feeling.

It stood there quietly by the dried-up fountain pool, motionless, like a strange new sculpture added to the square.

Moonlight bathed it, casting a distorted and elongated shadow. Its smooth wooden face reflected a cold, hard light, staring blankly into the empty air ahead—or perhaps watching them approach.

[Side quest triggered: You have encountered the Faceless Ones]

The Faceless One?
Yu Xing's mind drifted to one of the few monsters listed in the booklet that had not yet shown any aggressiveness.

The Faceless Ones are a monstrous "clan," numbering at least four or five. They typically roam at night, their behavior patterns are enigmatic, and their most distinctive feature is the eerie wooden plank covering their faces.

Carlos raised an eyebrow, the playing cards still in his fingers, but his tone relaxed slightly: "Yes, it's this thing... more like a phenomenon than a monster, with a very low profile. In the first phase, everyone thought they might have hidden stories, so they didn't touch them, wanting to see what happened next."

Yi Qing waved his fan and commented with great interest: "Covering your face with wood, is it out of fear of light, fear of people, or fear of yourself?"

Yu Xing remained silent, his gaze fixed on the faceless figure.

His perception in this regard was more acute than others. Beneath the Faceless One's rigid, lifeless shell, he did not sense the surging malice, greed, or frenzied appetite that other monsters possessed.

However, in that extreme emptiness and stillness, Yu Xing caught a faint yet strangely familiar fluctuation, so faint that it was almost obscured by the presence of the Faceless One itself.

Where did I feel the same aura before?

Yu Xing's fingertips twitched slightly, and the ethereal tentacles, under his control, spread silently toward the faceless being like the finest probes.

Just as the tentacles were about to touch a certain area around the Faceless One, something inside the wooden board seemed to wriggle.

The familiar scent vanished; there was nothing left.

The faceless creature began to move—which was in line with their behavior pattern. Its pale legs walked silently towards Yu Xing, step by step.

Yu Xing narrowed her eyes.

"What's wrong?" Carlos noticed the subtle change in Yu Xing's aura.

“…It’s nothing.” Yu Xing slowly withdrew her senses. “Let’s go.”

He looked away. Since he had just promised not to eat tonight, and he was a tree that kept its word, he said, "It doesn't seem to have any ill intentions. I don't need to worry about it."

As it spoke, the Faceless One brushed past the group of people, silently "walking" along its coordinate axis like a pre-programmed background, showing no reaction to the investigators beside it.

Carlos glanced back at the Faceless One thoughtfully and nodded.

Yi Qing floated in the air, her deep blue eyes glancing one last time at the eerie figure under the moonlight, a hint of inquiry flashing in her eyes, before she left.

……

After walking a distance, Carlos seemed to remember something and took a small paper figure out of his pocket.

"I'll ask Sister Qu how things are going over there, and whether she needs to come back and rest," Carlos said.

The paper doll, as if suddenly brought to life, landed precisely on Carlos's shoulder, and Qu Xianqing's cool voice came from its mouth: "The slums are more complicated than expected. Let me take another look. Don't wait for me."

"Alright." Carlos shrugged and put the little paper doll away.

The journey that followed was uneventful, and the three of them and the ghost quickly returned to the detached house that Carlos rented, which served as both a residence and a magician's office.

The building was unremarkable on the outside, but the interior was more spacious than expected. Carlos snapped his fingers, and the gaslights in the porch and living room lit up one by one, emitting a warm glow that dispelled the chill of the night.

"The second floor has living rooms and guest rooms." Since Yu Xing and Qu Xianqing had left too quickly earlier, Carlos had to introduce them to them again. "There are plenty of rooms, so you can choose whichever you like. The bathroom is at the end of the corridor, and there is hot water—thankfully, the tech tree in this instance world is reasonably well-developed."

The interior decoration reflects Carlos's consistent style, exuding a sense of mystery amidst its opulence, yet retaining a touch of everyday life. Various exquisite magic props and "occult" items of dubious authenticity are placed appropriately, showcasing the owner's profession without appearing cluttered.

Yu Xing looked around and nodded: "Okay." He walked to the window and looked at the still quiet street outside. "Starting tomorrow, I'll greet guests with you."

Carlos was about to go upstairs when he heard this, so he paused, turned around, and a hint of surprise flashed in his eyes, which then turned into a knowing smile: "Oh? I thought that in your current state, you wouldn't be interested in having 'friendly and cordial' exchanges with the town's powerful figures."

Yu Xing glanced at him sideways and smiled, "I'm just twisted, not stupid."

Interacting with wealthy people is one of the most effective ways to obtain intelligence, as the Defit family's experience has proven.

Those prominent figures entrenched in the upper echelons of the town possess more secrets and have more complex connections with the church and even esoteric religions. Reaching out to them through the network of contacts that Carlos has already established will undoubtedly be much more effective.

Moreover, those bloated nobles, whose hearts may have long been corrupted by various desires and secrets... occasionally exuded a different kind of "fragrance" in Yu Xing's perception.

Although he couldn't eat it, he was still somewhat curious about it.

Yu Xing didn't say those words aloud, but Carlos understood seven or eight parts of what he meant from the look in his eyes. His lips twitched, finally turning into a soft laugh: "Alright, no problem. With you, this big shot, it seems my firm will soon attract more 'ulterior motive' clients."

He could almost foresee all sorts of tests that were about to happen, and even the disappearance of a few customers was not unusual.

After the rooms were assigned, everyone washed up and rested.

Yu Xing chose a room at the very end of the corridor. It was simple and clean. He took off his trench coat, took a shower in line, accepted the brand-new pajamas that Carlos kindly handed out, and lay down on the bed.

Yiqing didn't follow; he went out for a stroll again.

Yu Xing turned over in bed. She wasn't physically tired, but deep down, the instinct to take root and spread like a tree became especially clear in the stillness of the night.

He closed his eyes and relaxed his suppression of his own power.

Almost instantly, his consciousness seemed to sink into an endless expanse of dark soil. Countless ethereal roots and branches, invisible to ordinary people, silently and wildly spread downwards and outwards from the center of the room where he was located.

They penetrated the floor, penetrated the foundation, like black veins with their own life, rapidly merging into the earth beneath the town of Yolikef.

These tentacles sense the moisture and texture of the soil, and they sense all sorts of things buried underground—ancient foundations, abandoned pipes, rat burrows, and even some skeletons buried at an unknown time…

They are extremely fast and cover a very wide range.

Soon, starting from Carlos's small building, the branches spread out like an ever-expanding invisible giant net, capturing different auras.

They sensed the sacred power in the church basement, the filth and despair permeating the slums, and the vibrations of machinery beneath the factory.

They also "saw" various faint energy reactions sleeping underground, some of which were traces of residual evil magic, some were faint ley lines, and some were... some still sleeping embryos or cocoons exuding a bizarre aura.

The entire town was enveloped in Yu Xing's perception. The dormant, active, and hidden "anomalies" were reflected in his inhuman sensory network in a vague yet macroscopic way, quietly sensing all the "nutrients" and "secrets" flowing through this land.

Yu Xing lay on the bed, her breathing steady, as if she were already fast asleep. (End of Chapter)