absurd deduction game.

Yu Xing's gaze followed Ai Wen, watching the piety and madness revealed in the actions of this fanatical believer of the ancient god, his senses already quietly spreading out.

What was behind the white cloth was hardly a secret to him.

There was a foul aura there, but the energy fluctuations weren't significant. However, it did exhibit some spatial flow phenomena. Combining this with Evan's words, Yu Xing guessed that there might be something like a teleportation array behind the white cloth.

He slowly followed and stood beside Evan.

“Actually, most of the time, the gatherings of the esoteric sect need to be held under the cover of the deep night. They will invite me—because I am the only representative of my lord here.” Evan’s fingers clenched the corner of the heavy canvas, the action carrying a solemnity that was almost blasphemous. He did not lift it immediately, but turned his head and looked at Yu Xing with his eyes that had accumulated too much gloom, a subtle smile curving his lips.

"But today is different."

"Now, the main force of the Church of the Mother Goddess has been foolishly led to the dense forest in the west. The calamity of the Chaos Rain has kept those ignorant townspeople from going out, and even the roar of the factories has stopped... The Secret Cult has decided to move the gathering to daytime... See, even fate is creating good opportunities for us, isn't it?"

"They still invited me, and I will take you with me. The time is coming, my friend. We need to take a more convenient route."

While Evan was rambling on, Yu Xing listened with his hands in his pockets, seemingly unmoved by his words. However, Evan didn't seem to mind this attitude at the moment. Whenever the ancient gods were mentioned, he would become excited, and his behavior was quite abnormal.

“Fear stems from the unknown, and power… also stems from the unknown.” Evan withdrew his gaze and said hoarsely, “Mr. Yu Xing, the step you are about to take will completely tear away the veil that has been blinding you. I hope you are ready to embrace this… truth.”

Before he could finish speaking, he suddenly raised his arm!
"Wow—"

The heavy white canvas was completely lifted, fluttered backward, piled on the floor, and raised a cloud of fine dust.

Beneath the canvas, there was clearly a "door".

A door painted directly onto the canvas.

Its frame is made up of countless tangled, writhing dark red lines. Upon closer inspection, those lines are actually miniature, wailing human figures. They squeeze and merge with each other, forming the twisted and intricate patterns of the door frame.

The door itself was a deep, dark black that seemed to absorb all light. On this blackness, a huge and eerie symbol was outlined with some pale pigment that emitted a faint phosphorescence—it looked like a bloated, bloodshot eye, with a chaotic vortex that was slowly rotating around the pupil.

Simply by staring at this door, a cold, sticky malice spreads along the line of sight, trying to penetrate the viewer's mind.

A faint, nauseating fragrance, like rust mixed with rotten fruit, began to permeate the air. It was the power of the ancient gods.

Yu Xing's gaze fell on that vortex-like pupil. He felt a sense of "emptiness" similar to when he saw "Starry Night". However, this door did not have the function of cursing. Just as he expected, it was a teleportation array disguised as a "door".

It's a short-range teleportation array that can't even take you outside the town.

In fact, among the diviners Yu Xing knows, there are several who can make this thing. When he was disconnected in the Dead Silence Island instance, he learned a lot about formations from the NPC Carlodi. The teleportation array that the other party could send him through the instance was truly powerful.

But the "door" in front of him was just a joke-like formation, yet Evan regarded it as a miracle... Apart from the fact that the dungeon dimension was limited and the ancient gods were far inferior to the Yin-Yang City's ghost god system, Yu Xing felt that there was also the reason that the ancient gods simply didn't care about Evan.

Otherwise, why would this fanatic act as if he's never seen anything good before, treating ordinary goods like treasures?

Because Yu Xing made a few complaints in his mind, Ai Wen saw it as him staring blankly at the door.

Evan chuckled softly, extending his pale, almost transparent fingers to gently touch the vortex at the pupil position of the door in the painting.

“With pupil-less eyes as witness, with silent throat chanting…” He chanted short, blasphemous syllables that did not sound like any known language, but Yu Xing could understand some of them.

As he chanted, the vortex of chaos that his fingertips touched suddenly accelerated its rotation!
The pale phosphorescence became blinding, and the patterns on the entire door seemed to come alive. The wailing human figures struggled even more violently, and the dark red lines on the door frame pulsated like blood vessels.

"Om-"

A deep, rumbling sound, as if from the depths of the earth, rang out.

The door painted on the canvas had a central black area that rippled like water after a pebble was thrown in, its color rapidly fading and becoming transparent, eventually transforming into a constantly twisting and rotating gray-white light curtain.

Behind the light curtain, a narrow, dirty passageway piled with clutter is vaguely visible, clashing with the elegant and tranquil environment inside the gallery.

A stronger, more pungent stench, a mixture of musty, filthy, and the putrid smell of some kind of decaying organism, wafted from the other end of the light screen.

“The passage has been opened.” Evan withdrew his finger, his face seemingly paler than before. Clearly, opening this “door” had not been without cost for him.

He looked at Yu Xing, his eyes gleaming with excitement and seduction: "Go, Mr. Yu Xing, we should go and meet our true 'fellow travelers'."

Yu Xing looked wary: "Where does this passage lead?"

Evan grinned. "Of course it's the gathering place for the cultists. Alright, my friend, don't ask so many questions. You'll know a lot of things when you get there."

He reached out and gently pushed Yu Xing: "Don't hesitate, step into the darkness."

Yu Xing twisted his body, playing the role of a stubborn investigator who didn't quite trust him: "You go first. If nothing else happens when you go in, I'll follow."

A hint of disdain flashed in Evan's eyes, as if he was mocking Evan's cowardice when it came to creations related to the ancient gods, yet also felt that it was only natural.

“Alright, of course,” he agreed. “This is a special treat I give to fellow travelers who are witnessing the blessing of my Lord for the first time… Remember to keep up quickly, lest your souls get lost in the passage.”

Without the slightest hesitation, Evan stepped into the gray-white light curtain. His figure seemed to be swallowed by the water, disappearing instantly behind the rippling waves.

Yu Xing stood still, taking one last look at the studio filled with the smell of oil paint and turpentine. His lips twitched almost imperceptibly, then he stepped out without lingering, following Evan into the distorted light curtain.

The feeling of passing through the light curtain was very strange, as if I had passed through a layer of cold, sticky gel for a moment. After a brief period of weightlessness and disorientation, my feet landed on the solid but somewhat slippery ground.

The light curtain behind him dimmed and contracted rapidly after he fully entered, eventually disappearing and transforming back into a solid, grime-covered brick wall.

LOL, it's only such a short distance, how could anyone get lost?
Yu Xing's consciousness expressed its opinions like branches; he gently pressed down and quickly surveyed his surroundings. This was clearly the interior of a building, but definitely not a gallery.

The space was low and cramped, with exposed wooden beams overhead covered in cobwebs and mold. The air was filled with the same mixed stench we had smelled before, now even stronger and more pungent.

The ground beneath our feet was uneven and muddy, mixed with stains and puddles of unknown origin.

The walls were made of rough red bricks, many of which had peeled off, revealing the black filling inside. The only source of light came from a few candlesticks in the corner burning with a ghastly green flame, which flickered and cast eerie shadows throughout the space.

They were standing at the end of a narrow passage, which seemed to lead to a slightly larger space, where hushed conversations could be faintly heard.

"Here you go." Evan's voice rang out from the side.

He produced two heavy, musty-smelling black cloaks from somewhere and handed one of them to Yu Xing.

"Wearing it here, unnecessary faces and identities are a luxury, and also a form of protection."

He was the first to put on another cloak, the wide hood falling down to completely hide his striking brown hair and pale face in shadow, leaving only a blurry outline of his jaw.

Yu Xing took the cloak; it felt rough and cold to the touch.

He didn't ask any more questions, and put it on as instructed, pulling up the hood.

The cloak seemed to have been specially treated, not only blocking out some of the unpleasant odors, but also seemingly having a slight effect on impairing perception, similar to the situation of the cult members that Qu Xianqing had previously discovered in the cult's hideout.

“Remember, you’re a ‘newcomer’ here for now.” Evan lowered his voice and led him forward. “I’ll introduce you to someone, but before that, we’ll attend a full gathering where you must sell or buy something that’s contraband to the church to prove you’re one of us.”

Yu Xing also lowered her voice and quickly replied, "Okay."

The passage was short; you could reach the end in just a few steps.

Before me was a basement of about several tens of square meters, with an irregular layout, which looked like it had been converted from an abandoned wine cellar or storage room.

The pale green candlelight cast flickering shadows on the walls, making the entire space seem even more eerie.

There were about a dozen figures scattered in the basement, all of them wearing the same black cloaks with their hoods hanging down, obscuring their faces.

Some people stood alone in the shadows, silent as statues; others gathered in twos and threes, talking in very low voices, their voices hoarse and indistinct, as if afraid of disturbing something.

In addition to the inherent stench, the air was filled with a faint smell of blood, the pungent odor of burning herbs, and an indescribable oppressive atmosphere of madness and depravity.

Yu Xing and Ai Wen's arrival attracted some attention.

Several pairs of eyes, hidden beneath the hood, swept over, cold and scrutinizing, with undisguised vigilance and inquiry. These gazes were almost tangible, scraping across Yu Xing's cloak, trying to penetrate the fabric and see who was hiding beneath.

Evan seemed to be used to all of this.

He led Yu Xing to a relatively empty corner in the basement, not in a hurry to greet anyone, but just stood there quietly, as if waiting for something.

Yu Xing stood silently half a step behind Ai Wen, mimicking the others by completely hiding himself in the shadow of the cloak.

His senses, however, were like the most sophisticated radar, quietly spreading throughout the entire basement.

These esoteric practitioners varied in height and build, but judging from their posture, habitual small movements, and the occasional aura they exuded, they were not a mob.

Several of them emanated a rather strong energy fluctuation, carrying a twisted and dangerous quality, roughly on par with some of the deacons in the Church of the Harvest Mother Goddess.

Time passed slowly in the oppressive silence and the whispers of everyday life.

About half an hour later, the number of people in the basement seemed to have reached a peak, around twenty.

At that moment, a tall, cloaked figure standing in the center of the basement coughed softly.

The cough wasn't loud, but it seemed to possess some strange magic, instantly silencing all conversation.

All eyes, including Yu Xing and Ai Wen's, were focused on that person.

The man did not remove his hood, but spoke in a hoarse voice that had been deliberately distorted and whose original tone was indistinguishable: "The time has come. Today, the others are dealing with the church under the High Priest's arrangement, and the High Priest himself is busy with the Fallen Coordinates ritual that will begin tomorrow. Therefore, I will preside over the gathering."

Without any unnecessary chatter, the gathering seemed to begin in this simple and direct manner.

The Tantric practitioners, who had been scattered around, slowly gathered around. No one objected to the presiding monk's words; they stood quietly, waiting for his instructions.

Yu Xing's gaze swept across the entire area seemingly casually. The faint sensory interference from the cult cloaks was as if it didn't exist for him. In the past half hour, he had already seen the faces under every cloak.

Some people have rosy cheeks and look like they're doing quite well, while others have withered faces, their features filled with pain and suffering.

The rich and the poor, two distinct groups of people on earth, are gathered in this dilapidated basement, standing together without a care in the world, because they share a common desire to explore the mysterious.

The host was a tall, strong transport worker.

His body was covered in scars, his skin bore the marks of wind and sun, and his spine was slightly bent from years of hard labor. Yet, as he looked at the crowd of fellow cultists waiting for his instructions, a somewhat morbidly excited smile involuntarily appeared on his face, hidden beneath his black cloak.

"As usual, let's exchange information and discuss our needs first," he commanded, as if he were undertaking something of great importance. (End of Chapter)