The Villain Saint is my secondary account

After all, these orcs were also bewitched by the evil god, and the fight was a life-or-death struggle, so they were naturally as ruthless as they could be. But since they had already won, the group of defeated soldiers posed no threat, and there was no deep-seated hatred between them, so it was perfectly reasonable to offer them assistance.

If Ella were present, she might be able to perform a major surgery, but with Ye Xiao, it would be up to Ren Jinli to handle it; even with all his killing skills, he wouldn't be of much help.

But this brief respite was perfect for Ye Xiao to take some potions to replenish his energy.

Although Ye Xiao's attributes have now been enhanced through abundant general points, he possesses the stamina of a Grandmaster Swordsman and the mental strength of an Expert-level Mage, not to mention the attributes gained from the enhancements of other miscellaneous classes such as Hell Warlock and Phantom Assassin. This has made his three dimensions far surpass those of Grandmasters of the same class, so he no longer has to be out of breath when borrowing a Holy Flame from Ella as he used to.

However, since it is a divine art, there is still some mental energy depletion. Drinking some alchemical potions to help with recovery and regulating breathing will help you recover faster than using combat recovery potions during a fight, and the accumulated toxins will be relatively less.

[The skill "Drug Addict" has been upgraded to Mastery]

[Potion effect +18%]

Ye Xiao was taken aback. He had almost forgotten that he had such a little skill. How many pills must he have taken to raise this skill to the mastery level?

……

After a brief rest, the three of them left the ruined dungeon through the upper door.

After passing through winding stone steps and long corridors, the group arrived at the main hall on the first floor of the city lord's mansion.

The place is spacious and luxurious, with carved marble columns standing tall, and brightly colored felt carpets stretching from the main gate all the way to the lord's throne in the inner hall, with statues of wild beasts in various poses on both sides of the way.

The hall was brightly lit, with two rows of large candlesticks hanging from the ceiling casting flickering flames, but the entire hall was empty, including the city lord's throne, which symbolized the highest power in Thunder City.

Ye Xiao and his two companions entered the quiet hall. Beneath the magnificent palace and towering stone statues, they seemed like tiny insects.

Their footsteps were muffled by the carpet, adding to the desolation.

"It's so lively downstairs, but there's no one upstairs."

Mingya unconsciously touched his arm. It looked bright here, but for some reason, it felt even colder than the abandoned dungeon at the bottom that connected to the sewage pool.

"Mr. Ye, these statues..."

The koi fish gestured softly.

But even without being reminded, Ye Xiao had already noticed that the various beast statues standing in the stone pillars on both sides of the carpet all had strange tentacles. For example, the mane of the lion statue had become rings of tentacles, and the beard of the goat statue had become drooping tentacles stuck to its face...

These bizarre alterations have made the original animal images grotesque and somewhat unsettling. Walking in the middle of them feels like being stared at by these ugly creatures.

"Orcs are a race that reveres ancestral culture, and these statues are also an expression of ancestral totems. The original sculptures were certainly not like this."

Ye Xiao looked around as he said, "I've seen sea god statues with tentacles before, and I thought they were products of craftsmen with distorted perceptions. But now it seems that they might be even worse."

"What do you mean by 'one level worse'?"

Mingya asked in confusion.

"Reality."

Ye Xiao rubbed his chin. "This influence is even more profound than distorting cognition. The power of this evil god can gradually distort reality."

Mingya's throat bobbed slightly. "At this level... do we still have a chance to win?"

Koi's expression also showed some worry.

"Don't be afraid, I've seen even more powerful ones."

Ye Xiao recalled how Ella had once turned an entire mountain in Liangqiu Ridge into a believer. Clearly, compared to changing the appearance of a few statues, Ella's approach was far more outrageous.

Spiritual energy arises from inanimate objects, and stones transform into flesh and blood; the entire process no longer obeys the laws of nature.

But since then, Ella has released mud on a large scale, but a similar situation has never occurred again, and Ye Xiao doesn't know why.

Before long, the three of them arrived at the foot of the steps leading to the throne.

Above the throne, a banner bearing the crest of the Thunder City's Destroyer Hammer family, along with several banners of its affiliated families, hung prominently. Behind the stone pillars on either side were staircases leading further up.

"Crack, snap, snap"

As expected, an unexpected incident still occurred.

Ye Xiao figured that the other party probably wouldn't let the three of them continue upwards so easily.

A crisp clapping sounded from above, and the three of them craned their necks to see a girl in a purple priest's robe standing on the arched glass windowsill at the very top.

The other person's face was hidden under a hood, and long, dark purple hair was gathered into two strands that fell from either side of their neck. The cloak was embroidered with gray-white crescent moon patterns.

"Welcome, welcome! Alas, the City Lord and the Cult Leader are both unavailable, so I have to make an effort to entertain you all."

Neither Mingya nor Jinli had ever seen a cloak decorated like this before, but Ye Xiao recognized it at a glance.

"Hmm, the Full Moon Cult?"

He raised his brows slightly.

Isn't this supposed to be a small, clandestine cult operating in the Kingdom of Valen? How did it end up on the southern continent, separated by a vast ocean?

Chapter 103 Lower Hall

"It's great that you still remember us, Mr. Ye Xiao."

The girl tilted her head. "So, how was your time-traveling journey?"

"Time travel...?"

Mingya stared at Ye Xiao in astonishment—Wow, is he really a cheater? He had been saying that the strength of a player who had only been here for a week was a bit too outrageous.

"It seems that the Dark Shepherd has a deep relationship with you. He even takes you along as a burden without the protection of the evil god."

Ye Xiao took out his staff and pointed the crystal-encrusted tip upwards, saying, "Will you roll down yourself, or should I knock you down?"

"You're always trying to find out what other people are saying."

The girl lightly covered her thin lips, her playful smile deepening. "Don't be impatient. I'm just a frail girl; I'm not going to fight you."

As soon as she finished speaking, the girl opened her palm and gently blew on it, as if a few wisps of white snowflakes were falling from the sky and sticking to the surrounding stone statues.

"What? Are you trying to kill me with dandruff?"

Ye Xiao suddenly said.

The girl paused for a moment, then blushed slightly, pouted, and put her hands on her hips. "Hey, you can be really annoying sometimes."

Despite the mockery, Ye Xiao keenly sensed a slight tremor coming from the soles of his feet.

His gaze swept across the area, and he saw that the ferocious beast statues on both sides of the main hall suddenly seemed to come alive, twisting their bodies and crawling down from the base.

Without Ye Xiao needing to remind them, Mingya and Jinli had already taken up their weapons and stood on either side of Ye Xiao, watching the stone statues that were surrounding them warily.

Ye Xiao casually twirled his staff and softly chanted a spell.

Centered on the three figures, a ring of white ice spread outwards along the floor, freezing into frost that hindered the slow-moving stone statue's front feet.

These stone statues don't seem to be very functional.

Ye Xiao frowned slightly. A simple ice ring spell could control these stone blocks in groups. Did the other side really expect these broken things to stop them?

But as soon as he finished thinking, one of the griffin-like stone statues suddenly emitted a white light from its eyes, opened its beak, and let out a sharp shriek.

The piercing sound waves echoed through the hall, causing the candlesticks on the ceiling to tremble and extinguish all the candlelight in an instant.

The main hall instantly darkened, and all the ferocious beast statues immediately emitted eerie white fireflies from their pupils in the darkness.

"Click"

The sound of ice shattering echoed throughout the hall. The stone statues that had been moving slowly suddenly became agile and fierce in the darkness, easily breaking through the frost that Ye Xiao had laid down and transforming into several enormous dark shadows that attacked the three people in the center of the hall.

"Beware!"

Ye Xiao let out a low shout and dodged the fatal blow from the attacking stone statue.

It was a lion statue, its front paws slamming into the floor, creating spiderweb-like cracks.

Mingya and Jinli also spread out to the sides. Jinli put the flute to her lips, and accompanied by a melodious flute tune, water flowed out of her body and transformed into several seagulls. Their tails swept out azure waves and crashed into one of the attacking gray wolf statues.

The stone statue's half-body was instantly shattered by the storm petrel, revealing a pale white flame enveloping it.

The white light seemed to have no form, drifting and swaying through the water manipulated by the koi, and attaching itself to another griffin statue next to it.

The scattered stone fragments on the ground were attracted like by a magnet, flying up and condensing on the neck of the griffin statue, where a black and gray wolf head sprouted.

"These stone statues will reassemble themselves after being destroyed."

Seeing this, the koi fish quickly reminded her, "I don't know the principle behind it, but their magic power is increasing exponentially!"

"what!?"

Mingya had just raised his hand and cleaved open one of the slowest-moving tortoise statues with his sword when he heard these words, and his expression changed.

He thought he had become stronger and could deal with the things his enemies used against Ye Xiao, but what kind of hidden mechanism was in these things?

In the darkness, the stone statues that were attacking Ye Xiao were the most numerous. He dodged and weaved amidst the continuous attacks and bites. Hearing the koi's voice, he then fixed his gaze on the Full Moon Cult girl who was watching the battle with great interest on the high windowsill.

These stone statues are eerie; we might as well just kill the one who started them.

Apparition.

With a thought, Ye Xiao vanished into thin air amidst a circle of rushing stone statues, causing several large stone blocks to collide and scatter stone chips all over the ground.

"Well?"

The girl, who was leisurely watching from the high windowsill, suddenly caught a glimpse of an extremely thin, cold light slicing through the air and silently flying towards her. She quickly tilted her head.

It was a sharp throwing knife that slashed open the girl's hood and a few strands of hair with a "whoosh" and embedded itself in the glass window behind her.

Cracks appeared in the stained glass, letting in the cold, white moonlight.

In that faint glimmer of light, Ye Xiao, who had appeared using a throwing knife as an anchor point, suddenly materialized, drew his long sword from his back, and slashed at the girl in the long robe.

There was a flash of cold light.

But the gleaming blade only pierced through a pale white silhouette, which then dissipated into specks of light in the air, like countless fireflies scattering across the sky. Then, the candlestick hanging from the ceiling not far away condensed back into a human shape.

Ye Xiao held his sword horizontally, half-squatting on the windowsill, staring at the girl's figure in the distance with surprise in his eyes.

What is that? An illusion? Divine magic?

Ye Xiao had never heard of such a strange technique before.

"Tsk tsk, why not just play with those boulders?"

The white fluorescence coalesced into a human-shaped girl sitting on the edge of a large candlestick. Her two long, slender legs, encased in black stockings, swayed back and forth as the candlestick swayed, as if she were swinging on a swing.

She propped her chin on her hand, looked at Ye Xiao and sneered, "Let's keep things official and drag it out so everyone can have a better time."

"If you insist on making me participate, it won't be so easy."

For some reason, Ye Xiao seemed to sense from this guy's words that he was slacking off at work.

"……company?"

Ye Xiao then asked, speculatively.

He didn't actually have any solid evidence to support his suspicion about the other party's identity. If he had to say something, it was that Ella's investigation into Valen had uncovered some traces of the Samuel Order and the Full Moon Order's dealings with the company.

Furthermore, Ye Xiao observed that the other party was somewhat different from the Full Moon Priest he had encountered in Storm Harbor. Previously, he had intentionally denigrated the other party's faith as an "evil god," and even though that god had fallen, it was strange that the other party, as a high-ranking believer wearing priest robes, did not show any concern at all.

Furthermore, the fact that they were connected with the Dark Shepherds made it hard for Ye Xiao not to associate this force, which had different beliefs but still managed to get involved in all sorts of dirty business within the Dark Cult, with the company.

So, in that split second of thought, Ye Xiao subconsciously asked the question.

He hadn't expected any response from her, but the girl stopped moving her legs and her eyes widened slightly.

"Hey, really? How could you guess that?"

But before she could finish speaking, she immediately covered her mouth with her hand. "Oh no, my sister is going to kill me if I reveal my identity!"

Chapter 104 The Moon Goddess's Illusion

"Damn it, it's you bunch of bastards again!"

If Ye Xiao was still considering whether to cautiously decide whether to take action based on the other party's words, he was already furious the moment he figured out the other party's identity.

With Ella already having a headache from the company, and Ye Xiao now facing these guys, he certainly couldn't let them off easily.

Perhaps sensing Ye Xiao's sudden outburst of anger, the girl hurriedly waved her two small hands in astonishment, "Oh dear, I was just here to help out, this matter has nothing to do with me!"

"Die!"

Ye Xiao ignored the other party's sophistry, swung his arms and swung his sword, the surging sword energy instantly cleaving the candlestick and the ceiling in two.

After so much time has passed, Ye Xiao is only certain of one thing about the company: the people here are the kind of people who only speak the truth when they are about to die.