Who designed this underworld dungeon?.

Chapter 688 Do you want to pass on the torch?
[Are you there? I'm feeling a bit lonely. How about we exchange some monsters?]

"."

The opening sentence of Chi Ya's letter had an effect comparable to a silencing spell, effectively silencing Gong Qiying for several seconds.

"Did I overestimate his seriousness?"

Is it possible that Akagi is the type who is very polite and serious with strangers, but reveals his true nature once he gets to know them?

"I still don't understand why his sexual fetish would be dragons. Is there really anyone who likes dragons?"

As soon as he said that, he thought of Monster Hunter. Realizing his slip of the tongue, he remained silent for a few seconds before continuing to read the letter.

Just kidding, it's okay if we don't exchange.

Your conflicted emotions—wanting to express your desires yet not wanting to be too blatant—are so palpable on the page; it makes me feel sorry for you.
Sometimes, Miyazaki is just like Shinpachi, very interested in making sarcastic remarks.

[Let's get down to business. After a brief investigation, I've gathered information about the sealed artifacts of the dungeon you're heading to—the Mad Faith Dungeon. I've attached a note with that information.]

Other city lords now discuss matters by sending voice messages or meeting in person, but only Chi Ya and a small group of people still insist on the traditional method of writing letters, which seems to have become an obsession for him.

Perhaps by flipping through history books and seeing which era was the most popular for writing letters, we can even deduce Chiya's age.

Gong Qiying pulled out another sheet of paper, which even had an illustration on it. Judging from the picture, it was hand-drawn by Chi Ya, and the quality was quite good, very lifelike.

The illustration depicts a classic cross, so classic that at first glance he even hallucinated a man with holes in both hands being nailed to it, but in reality it was just an empty cross.

Beside the cross stood two upright figures. They looked like humans, but their limbs and bodies were much thinner and their skin was pale and hairless.

"Honestly, Akagi could totally write light novels and be an illustrator at the same time."

He made a casual remark and then started looking at the description of this sealed artifact.

[The Sealed Artifact of the Mad Belief Dungeon—The Unbeliever]

The original form is a cross; the pale humanoid creature is a derivative of the cross, known as the Believer.

[Injury to one side will not affect the other, but destroying the cross can temporarily delay the actions of the unbelievers. The cross cannot be destroyed at present and can regenerate every 666 minutes.]

It cannot be destroyed, which indeed meets the conditions for being sealed. If it could be destroyed, there would be no point in bothering to seal it.

Every unbeliever is born from the cross, possessing immense power and precise movements, but without any special abilities.

This looks rather weak, but the more ordinary the derivative looks, the more extraordinary the cross is.

The cross, as the source of unbelievers, cannot be destroyed and has a profound impact on the psyche of surrounding beings. Specifically, it affects their "faith." Even fanatical believers who would slaughter their own kind for their faith will have their faith vanish without a trace once they step into the cross's influence, and they themselves will be transformed into unbelievers.

The power called faith that is drained from the fanatics will become the source of the power of the cross. Whether it is to produce unbelievers, strengthen unbelievers, or have other abilities, it will all need to rely on this power.

When a person is deprived of faith for an extended period and is threatened, the unbeliever will rapidly evolve intelligence and worship the cross as a deity. The cross then absorbs this faith and feeds back into the unbeliever, strengthening them. The unbeliever whose faith has been absorbed will experience a significant decline in intelligence.

[Such an ability certainly has limitations, but once it's used in battle, the intensity of the fight will increase significantly.] [To fight against such a sealed entity, I recommend using something like a puppet that has no self-awareness. It's important to note that even with a puppet, if the controller attaches their own spirit to it, the faith will still be drained by the unbeliever, causing them to become mentally weak and crippled.]

Faith doesn't necessarily involve a deity. It can be believing in a proverb, a famous person, astrology, tarot cards, or even a lifestyle habit. As long as you believe that something will have some impact on you, then it can be considered faith.

Even the lord of an underground city must be extremely careful when dealing with this item.

[The unbelievers emerged during the era when people's faith in gods was at its strongest, and they unleashed a catastrophe of annihilation. Looking at it from a broader perspective, they also contributed to the decline of faith in gods today.]

Gong Qiying roughly understood it.

This sealed artifact, known as the Unbeliever, is an entity specifically designed to target "intelligent beings."

According to this thing's definition of faith, then no intelligent being can escape the scope of faith. Even if he becomes the city lord, Gong Qiying himself still believes in the saying "early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy," which can probably be considered faith by the unbeliever.

This sealed artifact is so unreasonable.

If that's the case, then monsters with basic intelligence might also be within the influence of the cross. In that case, we'll need to be careful when choosing monsters.

The cross is the biggest problem.

If this thing can't be killed, the only way to suppress its movement is to destroy it repeatedly over a period of time. Six hundred and sixty-six minutes, a little over eleven hours.

It's impossible for him to go down into this underground city every day and beat up the unbelievers after taking over; that would be too torturous.

"and many more."

Gong Qiying looked at the cross on the illustration, and his gaze suddenly sharpened, just like that of Tu Mei Jiang.

No matter how you look at it, this cross looks like it's made of wood.

When people think of wood, they definitely think of Melina—no, no, they definitely think of wood as fuel.

so.
"Can the faithless be burned as Lord of Cinder?"

Thinking about this, he suddenly felt a surge of excitement. If the unbelievers evolved the intelligence to understand human speech, he would definitely go over and ask:
"To pass on the fire?"

If the rebirth of the cross were to occur in its original location rather than at a random one, then perhaps it would indeed be possible to burn it with the First Flame.

[In addition, I will invite the lords of the three dungeons, White Blood, Holy Light, and Blazing Flame, to participate in this sealing artifact extermination. I would like to ask you to observe their words and actions and select the most suspicious person.]

[Also, I haven't told them that you'll be taking over this underground city in the future. I'm afraid they won't want to come if I do, so don't let it slip.]

"Red Fang is quite thoughtful."

Gong Qiying also replied, and after some back and forth, they finalized the time for the extermination of the sealed artifact.

Just two weeks later.

(End of this chapter)