I don't want to conquer witches anymore.

"Is this the real way to use the Cognitive Modifier (Customized Version)?"

Duke looked triumphantly at Bone Eight and Quink, who were running away with their heads in their hands, and shouted with great enthusiasm, "Take down that guy with the bone knife first!"

"Okay!"

After dragging Cecil out of the Otherworld, Duke stuffed several potions from Eve into his mouth, and the diligent Jasmine gave him a few "calm-downs" before he regained his composure.

The Radiant Witch, who possesses reason, is one of the most terrifying among the Heroic Witches of the Floating City!

Holy light condensed into thin threads, which, under Cecil's control, pierced through Bone Eight and Quink at various bizarre and unpredictable angles, constantly piercing their bodies and drawing blood. Her control over magic was terrifyingly high, enough to make up for her lack of magical knowledge.

As for why she was hit by the A1 high-level flashbang she just threw... a person who believes in the power of big bricks and is prone to using light cannons to bombard people's faces and the ground, with a fear of insufficient firepower, would never use such a despicable thing as a flashbang. Cecil was doing it for the first time, so it is normal for her to be nervous and make mistakes.

Bone Eight tried his best to dodge the attacks, but he still couldn't stop the agile beams from piercing his body. He maintained high-speed movement in the hall and squinted his eyes.

He was a professional assassin trained from childhood, his entire life immersed in the violent act of "killing." Although his cognition had been temporarily altered by a cognitive modifier, his memories and inner logic remained unchanged. He quickly realized: "My cognition has been altered."

He paused and looked at Duke, Cecil, and Molly, who were keeping a close distance. He quickly realized the enemy's stronghold and rushed into the vicinity of Duke's formation within three meters.

With the cognitive modification reversed, Bone Eight raised his bone knife at Cecil without hesitation.

Just then, the Radiant Witch went out of power, and Duke then pressed the only button on the remote control in his hand.

Before Gu Ba could react, the elusive staff member appeared beside him and pinned him to the ground.

In this space, no one can defeat these bizarre staff members. Even heroes like Cecil and Bone Eight are no match for them. They are mostly protected by the rules of another dimension, and their ability to teleport to you instantly upon seeing you is simply unreasonable.

"Why do you always cause so much trouble?" Black Sir reappeared in front of Duke, his face looking as pale as ever. He glared at Duke fiercely, "You'd better hurry up and finish the game or get eliminated soon."

“Okay, let’s go.” Duke readily agreed. “We’ll go through customs right now.”

He waved to Black Sir in a good mood, then swaggered towards Kunk with his companions:

"Tell me, are you going to surrender on your own, or will we beat you until you surrender?"

Kunk: "..."

Clearly, this guy had a rather flexible standard of loyalty. Seeing that the situation was hopeless, he immediately decided to be a pragmatic hero and was about to surrender: "I surrender, I'll tell you everything, I'm a loser..."

Quink's words came to an abrupt halt. Under the astonished gazes of Duke and the others, his skin suddenly began to petrify piece by piece and cracked at an extremely rapid speed. In an instant, he was reduced to a stone sculpture and was crushed into dust by some force.

"what?"

This scene went largely unnoticed, not even by the Black Sir who had been watching Duke. It was as if the sudden death of someone here was perfectly normal. Only one nearby staff member came over and retrieved the card and star from the remains of the wreckage.

"'Lost'? The mute?" Duke frowned. He hadn't expected that the mastermind behind the assassination of the Radiant Witch would be involved with the Saint's organization. "Just what is the background of this organization?"

Without any information, Duke naturally couldn't figure out what was going on, and had no choice but to use up his cards with his companions to clear the level and leave together. It's worth mentioning that Duke left with three extra stars, and Jasmine had also won an extra star before meeting up with Duke.

Guangbao, what a disgrace!

After leaving the lobby, Duke and his companions were led by a staff member to a magnificent place where a dazzling array of valuable goods were displayed in counters, priced according to the number of stars. The building also had a second floor, where players who had completed the rock-paper-scissors game could choose to leave or continue.

"Wow, a divine artifact! Wow, a conceptual weapon! Wow, a forbidden magic scroll!"

Cecil stared in disbelief at the objects, then turned to Cecil and suggested with great enthusiasm, "Shall we continue? Without those guys causing trouble, we should be able to finish this witch game in one go, right?"

She was clearly the worst of the three, yet she was also the one who was most upset, even though she was still pale-faced and silly.

It's commonly known that he has a strong craving for vegetables.

Duke looked at Jasmine, who rationally shook her head. He agreed, saying, "Nobody knows what's going on up there. Your injuries are still quite serious. Let's call it a day. I suggest we all go home. I'm starving."

"……Oh."

Guangbao lowered his head regretfully.

"Not to mention that Amber and the others said they wanted to come over for a free meal."

"……Um?"

Guangbao, who had sensed the element, suddenly looked up.

Chapter 54 This is common sense in this book!

Amber and Greta sat side by side in front of Duke's apartment. Their cute maid outfits attracted the attention of many passersby, but no one could guess what they were doing.

Amber yawned listlessly, flipping through the booklet in her hand, and muttered irritably:

"I wonder where Duke ran off to. Didn't we agree that the two of us would come over for a free meal?"

Greta felt a little uncomfortable in such a crowded street. She shrank back awkwardly and asked with some concern, "Is Duke alright?"

"It's alright, what could possibly happen to him?" Amber wasn't worried at all, waving her hand. "You know how capable Duke is."

"Amber, what are you looking at?" Grete curiously came closer, but when she saw the large expanses of fair skin in the picture book, her face turned bright red, and she screamed, "What are you looking at? Why are these girls dressed so scantily?"

"The latest single-volume art book from the Drow Elves is a pity it's a pure love story, so boring." Amber shrugged and said frankly, "There's a market for scantily clad men. After all, there are too many shallow men like Duke who don't understand that sometimes you can only get erotic when you're fully covered up."

"What...what are you saying?!"

Grete stammered.

She shyly covered her eyes, because the contents of the notebook in Amber's hand became more and more intense as she turned the pages. She felt her face burning, but she couldn't resist her curiosity, so she spread her fingers and peeked through the gap.

When Duke brought Cecil back to his doorstep, this was the scene that greeted him.

"What exactly are you teaching Grete, you perverted elf?!"

"Some health knowledge that everyone needs to know in advance," Amber said without batting an eye. She put down the picture book in her hand, her eyes darting around as she sized up the two people in front of her. "Strange, how did you two end up together?"

Amber narrowed her eyes.

Duke and Cecil, who had just gone through a witch's game, looked a bit disheveled, especially the latter, whose clothes were torn to shreds from the fierce battle. Although his wounds were healing quickly under the effect of the potion, traces of fresh blood could still be seen.

Most people seeing this scene would suspect that the two of them had been attacked, but Amber's thought process was clearly different from ordinary people. She was the type who would say something shocking, and she blurted out: "You two got back together?"

Duke and Cecil: "?"

Cecil was slightly taken aback by Amber's conclusion, but Duke, who suffered from PTSD, became anxious:

"How did you come to this conclusion?"

At the same time, he quickly looked at the favorability system, afraid that Cecil's column would also jump to [Enthusiasm] all at once.

Cecil's favorability rating: Average.

Fortunately.

Duke breathed a sigh of relief, only to hear the lewd elf raise the picture book in its hand and say without restraint, "Generally speaking, when ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends reunite after a long separation, and with the help of the suspension bridge reaction, it's easy for them to rekindle their old flame and end up in bed together. That's common sense, you know."

Duke glanced at the sketchbook in her hand, and from the two pages he could see, the plot was pretty much exactly as Amber had described.

"What kind of common sense is this? Common sense from a notebook?!"

Amber stuck out her tongue, cautiously observing the interaction between Duke and Cecil for a few moments. Convinced they hadn't gotten back together (at least not yet), she secretly breathed a sigh of relief, tucked her notebook into her bosom, and pointed at Duke with one hand on her hip and the other:

"Come on, Duke, I challenge you to a culinary duel in the name of a former member of the Maid Knights."

"Let Gretel be the referee and let's see who has the better cooking skills."

"Hmph, today's diners and judges are all my people. What do you have to compete with me?"

……

"Waaaaah, I lost!"

The moment Amber took her first bite of the hot pot beef, tears of humiliation and defeat welled up in her eyes. Before Gret, the referee she had bribed beforehand, could even abuse his power, she tearfully surrendered and joined the frenzied army of people wolfing down their food, all the while stubbornly insisting on eating:

"The difference in ingredients is too great, you're cheating!"

"Then you won't eat it?"

"Impossible! Wow, Duke, those two wooden stick cutlery you're using are cheating! Teach me how to use them."

"Hmph, wait until next time."

Strictly speaking, Amber's skills were quite good; as a professionally trained cook, she was on par with Duke, who had learned on his own. However, the competition was never in doubt from the start, because the ingredients Duke used were ones he had just redeemed from the Witch Game:

[Item discovered: M999 premium beef.]

[Item Name: M999 Premium Beef]

[Item Description: Produced by the Casino Tower, made with premium beef from another dimension, the highest-grade edible beef in the entire other dimension. Exchange Price: Three stars.]

[Item Effect: Consuming this beef will randomly increase your basic attributes by a total of 2 points.]

Besides its powerful medicinal properties, this top-quality ingredient also tastes far better than any beef Duke has ever eaten before. Using this level of ingredient to make a whole beef feast hot pot, Amber's defeat is not unjustified.

Amber and the others might not have noticed that their base attributes had increased after the whole-beef feast, but Duke, who had an attribute panel, clearly saw his progress. After the feast, his strength and constitution had both increased by one point.

[Basic Attributes: Strength 9, Agility 14, Constitution 10, Intelligence 16, Perception 11, Charisma 18.]

Well, for Duke, who wants to switch to a mage class, this bonus is a little awkward, but being able to raise his physique to a normal level is a good thing for him no matter what.

Basic attributes are innate, and it's extremely difficult to improve even a little bit. This beef meal actually increased them by two points in one go.

The waters inside this "casino tower" are probably quite deep.

Duke was still reminiscing about his experience with the witch game, while Cecil, after eating and drinking her fill, told her sisters about what the two of them had just gone through.

Although Cecil was a fool, she had a great storytelling ability. She told the story vividly and meticulously, especially when the murder plot against her unfolded. Amber and Gretel couldn't help but gasp, feeling as if they were there, just one step away from falling into the abyss.

Duke and Amber's boastful storytelling, which sounded like they were drunk, was utterly inadequate compared to Cecil's.

As Duke listened, he suddenly sensed something was off. Cecil's story was very complete, but it seemed to be missing a key detail. He frowned and interrupted her, "Cecil, where's Jasmine?"

"Huh?" Cecil was taken aback. "Who is Jasmine?"

Chapter 55 Job Change

"Huh? Who's Jasmine?"

Cecil's tone was genuinely bewildered, and it was clear she wasn't joking. This, however, startled Duke as well. He opened his mouth, about to recount Jasmine's situation: "It's that..."

Duke hesitated, as if he wanted to say something but then stopped.

Because he suddenly realized that his memories of Jasmine were also very vague.

For a moment, Duke couldn't remember what Jasmine had done in this witch's game. The lack of memory gave him a piercing headache, and he tried hard to recall his ambiguous memories.

Duke's memories of the time before entering the Witch Game are still quite clear. He can remember Jasmine from that time. She was the talkative Thunder Witch's student and helped her teacher explain the hints of the Witch Game in short sentences.

However, her memories of Jasmine became hazy after she entered the Witch Game.