absurd deduction game.

A glint flashed in Deacon Herbert's eyes. He gestured for the guards to step back, then stepped forward, his palm covered with a faint golden light of wheat ears, and gently pressed against the wall.

He closed his eyes and sensed for a moment, then said in a deep voice, "There is space behind, and... there is a faint trace of unclean energy!"

He stepped back and nodded to the tallest of the guards.

The guard understood, took a deep breath, raised his shoulder covered by arm armor, and slammed it against the seemingly solid wall next to the gap!
boom!
With a muffled thud, the wall caved inward, and then the entire "wall" spun inward like a flipped leaf, revealing a dark hole.

A stronger, more intense odor, a mixture of old dust, mustiness, and some indescribable, strange smell with a hint of sulfur and a sweet, fishy tang, emanated from it.

Beyond the hidden door was a narrow, downward-facing stone staircase leading to the pitch-black underground.

Almost simultaneously, another group of guards searching the second floor reported: "Butler! A large number of suspicious items have been found in the staff lounge on the second floor!"

"Split into two groups!" Deacon Herbert decided immediately. "You three, come with me to the secret room! You two, guard the entrance on the first floor and assist the investigator in checking the second floor!"

Yu Xing gestured to Qu Xianqing and the musician, and the three of them quickly followed the two guards up the stairs.

The second floor is the staff's living quarters, simply furnished, but now it has been ransacked.

After a locked wardrobe was violently broken open, what was revealed inside was not clothing, but stacks of neatly arranged parchment scrolls covered with twisted symbols and ancient writing.

On the desk next to him, there were some black stone seals carved with round eye symbols, and several notebooks with unmarked covers written in secret language.

Beneath the bed in the bedroom, the guards dragged out a heavy metal trunk. Inside were several neatly folded, hooded, dark red robes—identical to those worn by the cult members in the slums Qu Xianqing had previously discovered!
“Just as I thought…” Yu Xing picked up a round-eyed symbol seal, which he was already familiar with.

A cold touch came through, containing a faint but pure, unsettlingly twisted thought.

He opened a secret notebook. He shouldn't have been able to understand the words on it, but after being exposed to the pollution of cosmic knowledge in the City of Terror, he was able to understand the specific spellings of words that frequently appeared, such as "sacrifice," "ritual," "starry gaze," and "descent coordinates."

Meanwhile, the search of the underground chamber also yielded astonishing discoveries.

Deacon Herbert, accompanied by three guards, descended the stone steps and found a small stone chamber below, decorated like a miniature altar.

The walls were engraved with huge, dizzying patterns of distorted starry skies, while the ground was painted with a complex magic circle in dark red paint that looked like dried blood.

In the center of the magic circle was a stone platform with remnants of binding ropes and dark stains.

In a corner of the altar, they found a hidden compartment containing more crucial items: a list of some named figures in Yolikef, including some merchants and minor officials, labeled "potential sacrifices" or "developable targets"; several sketches depicting church patrol routes and personnel; and several fragments that exuded a strong, ominous aura, resembling black crystals.

According to Deacon Herbert's initial identification, this is likely a medium used for deep communication with the ancient gods!

When Deacon Herbert returned to the first floor with the key evidence recovered from the underground chamber, his face was so dark it could drip water.

He slammed the list and the church patrol map onto the service counter, his voice trembling with anger:
"A lighthouse...what a lighthouse! It illuminates not the path to knowledge, but the road to hell!"

Yu Xing: "..."

Such exaggerated grammar! It's like singing an opera.

In short, all the church's doubts were found to be supported by conclusive evidence.

Analysis revealed that the Lighthouse Bookstore, a well-regarded knowledge center that had been operating in town for many years, was actually an important liaison point, intelligence hub, and even an outpost for carrying out evil rituals within the cult of Yolikev!
Those "corpse heart" shop assistants who perform immune testing are the loyal guardians they use to remove any "moths" that accidentally wander in and protect this nest.

The lights in a bookstore are never meant to guide, but to lure.

The search of the bookstore continued into the early hours of the morning.

The Lighthouse Bookstore was completely under the control of church personnel. Deacon Herbert personally led a team to thoroughly search the bookstore, its hidden rooms, and every corner of the second floor, ensuring that no scrap of paper with possible information or any item that might contain clues was overlooked.

The seized evidence was categorized, carefully packed into boxes, labeled, and guarded closely by designated personnel.

The stench of decay lingered in the air, mixed with dust stirred up by the turning over of old objects, and a sense of oppression mixed with shock and anger.

Yu Xing and his two companions watched the priests busy themselves while listening to their whispers:

"By Mother Goddess! My child loves reading in this bookstore the most..."

"Damn it, when were they swallowed up by the cult?"

“We have allowed Tantric Buddhism to grow under our noses for so long! Even the holy light of the Mother Goddess has not noticed the stench lurking in the shadows.”

"The esoteric sects already have such methods; we've underestimated them all along..."

As a faint glimmer of dawn appeared on the eastern horizon, dispelling some of the darkness, the archbishop himself arrived at the Lighthouse Bookstore.

He was still wearing that solemn red robe and holding an amber staff, but his steps were noticeably hurried, and his aged face was etched with solemnity and a hint of disbelief.

When he stepped into the bookstore and saw the still-unprocessed corpse of the bookstore employee on the ground, as well as the various pieces of evidence piled up like a small mountain on the service counter, his body visibly swayed, and the veins on the back of his hand holding the staff bulged.

"By Mother Goddess..." he murmured softly, his voice trembling with suppressed emotion.

He walked to the service desk, his gaze sweeping over the parchment scrolls, round-eyed seals, and dark red robes, finally settling on the list of "potential sacrifices" and the church patrol map, his face instantly turning ashen.

“They…they actually…” The archbishop’s voice was choked with extreme anger. He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths before he could barely calm his turbulent emotions.

He turned to Yu Xing and the other two standing to the side, nodding deeply, his tone filled with sincere gratitude and lingering fear: "Three investigators, on behalf of the Yorickf Church and all the townspeople who are still unaware, I thank you for your courage and wisdom! If it weren't for your risky infiltration and exposure of this den of scoundrels, we would still be kept in the dark, and the consequences... would be unimaginable!" He raised his head, his gaze sweeping over the evidence, his eyes sharpening and resolute once more: "This evidence is enough for us to see the enemy's cunning and malice. Lighthouse Bookstore... is a den of iniquity!"

"Archbishop?" Qu Xianqing raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you forbidden from leaving Harvest Church? Now that you're out, what will happen to the things in the church that need to be guarded?"

The archbishop shook his head: "The situation has been special these past two days. I have already made things easier for those people in advance. Now, I will have no problem going out for a short walk."

"Of course, I must go back as soon as possible. I came here only to witness the truth with my own eyes."

Yu Xing narrowed her eyes.

As the archbishop turned to issue a brief order to the other church members, he and Qu Xianqing exchanged a glance but remained silent.

The archbishop did not linger at the scene. He ordered Deacon Herbert to stay behind to oversee the final cleanup and security, ensuring that all evidence was safely returned to the church.

He then personally invited Yu Xing, Qu Xianqing, and the actors to return to the church to gather and analyze the intelligence.

When we returned to the church, it was already dawn.

The church was busier than at night. After learning that Lighthouse Bookstore had been shut down, a mix of excitement and greater anxiety permeated the clergy.

Without taking a break, the archbishop led the three directly into a more heavily guarded archives analysis room in the church's underground chamber.

The thick stone walls were covered with runes to prevent prying and energy leakage. The room was brightly lit by candlelight, and on the long table were photocopies of some of the core evidence brought back from the bookstore and a preliminary report.

"Please sit." The archbishop gestured for the three to sit down, and then took the seat of honor himself. His face showed the exhaustion of not having slept all night, but his spirits were high.

"We need to extract the most critical information from this intelligence as soon as possible to guide our next steps."

He first rejected a photocopy of the list of "potential sacrifices".

Yu Xing picked up the list and quickly scanned it.

The list above contains more than twenty names, followed by simple identification information and annotations.

He saw the names of several well-known businessmen in town, a low-ranking official in charge of security in a certain area, and even two teachers working at the church school. Next to the list were coded comments such as "weak-willed and easily tempted," "dissatisfied with the status quo and can be developed into an outsider," and "possessing special bloodline or physique, a high-quality sacrifice."

"This list shows that the infiltration of the cult is far deeper than we imagined," the archbishop said gravely. "They are not only secretly developing their power, but also systematically seeking 'sacrifices.' We must immediately conduct a secret assessment and monitoring of the people on the list to prevent them from being used by the cult or from meeting with misfortune."

Next were the church patrol route maps.

The drawings were quite detailed, not only indicating the routes and times of daily patrols, but also recording the patterns of some hidden sentries and shift changes.

Next to it was an analysis written in coded language, pointing out several "defense weaknesses" and "opportunistic time windows".

"Either it's an inside job, or it's an extremely skilled spy," Qu Xianqing said coldly, pointing out the key point.

The archbishop nodded grimly: "I will immediately begin an internal investigation and adjust all defense deployments. Thank you for bringing back this intelligence; it has prevented us from creating a potentially larger vulnerability."

Then, everyone's attention turned to the scattered clues about the ancient god's descent ritual found in the secret altar chamber.

The information was fragmented, consisting mostly of symbolic patterns, incomplete fragments of prayers, and energy node markers.

After joint identification and analysis by Yu Xing, the archbishop, and several elderly scholars who were urgently summoned and were proficient in ancient symbols and mysticism, several key pieces of information gradually emerged:

The ritual involving the esoteric sect and the ancient gods is about to begin. The core location is not in a fixed building in the town; the clues point to the desolate land known as the "Silent Hills" to the west of the town.

The area is sparsely populated and is said to have been a tribal sacrificial site in ancient times, where the earth's energy is somewhat unusual.

The materials required for the ritual mentioned several extremely evil and rare items, such as "pure blood," "twisted core," and "stone of star resonance." Yu Xing thought that only those who had participated in the underground black market of the esoteric religion would be familiar with them, such as Carlos.

In addition, these materials also contain some time indications. The incomplete star charts suggest that the ritual may need to be performed when a specific "star position" is aligned. The exact time still needs to be calculated by the church, but the general range points to the next few days.

“Silent Hills… Twisted Core…” the archbishop murmured to himself, his expression growing increasingly grave. “They are indeed plotting their final conspiracy. We must stop them!”

Finally, the archbishop granted Yu Xing and the other two extremely high privileges: "The three of you are the key to uncovering all of this, and the force we can rely on most right now. I grant you special permission to access all these declassified core intelligence originals, and the church's library and archives are also open to you. I hope you can discover details that we may have overlooked."

He looked at Yu Xing, his eyes filled with a sense of entrustment: "The next operation will likely be even more dangerous. We need to find the exact location of the ritual, interrupt their preparations, and even... completely destroy their scheme before they finish."

Yu Xing smiled and said, "Of course, since we chose to help in the first place, we won't give up halfway. But we are really tired and need to go back to our place to rest for a while."

The morning light shone through the small window of the archives room, falling on the documents spread across the table. The archbishop nodded in agreement and agreed to meet again at the church at 2 p.m., since the church also had many things to do and prepare.

However, Yu Xing, Qu Xianqing, and the musician all laughed out loud after stepping out of the church.

There were almost no pedestrians on the street, and the surroundings were completely silent.

They walked two blocks to make sure no one was following them before stopping in front of a closed clothing store.

The actor chuckled softly, "I never imagined the Archbishop would be switched by the Secret Church. Tell me, why would the Secret Church willingly sacrifice the Lighthouse Bookstore as a transit point..."

"Just to draw everyone's attention to the dense forest west of the town."

"What are they trying to achieve by pulling this stunt?" (End of Chapter)