In Bayam under the cover of night, the sea breeze carried a salty fishiness and a slight chill.
The group sped silently along the stone-paved road. Behind them lay the abandoned Cathedral of Storms, and ahead was the coast where legends said only weeping could be heard. Gravity was etched onto everyone's faces, with only Danitz's complaints breaking the deathly silence.
"Shit! I knew it would be like this! I knew it!" he grumbled as he ran. "I shouldn't have agreed to that masked guy. First, I met you—you're just as annoying as your predecessor. Then, we ran into two opponents we clearly shouldn't mess with, and now we're heading to a coast that's obviously dangerous! I shouldn't have taken this job! My life, my sun and beaches! They're all leaving me."
"Shut up!" Lin Huai turned back and roared. "If you say one more word of nonsense, I'll send your head to Backlund to collect the bounty first."
"Yo, Wise One, you seem to have been led around by the nose the whole time." Loki's figure followed beside Lin Huai like a ghost. He elegantly straightened his collar, which didn't have a single wrinkle, a mocking smile playing on his lips. "Haven't you realized yet? From that perfectly timed fire at the hotel to the stage waiting for our entrance in the cathedral, everything has been part of the other party's script. We are merely actors invited to the show, stepping toward the climax he designed for us."
Lin Huai didn't respond to Loki's mockery. His gaze fell on the very back of the group, onto the Demoness of Afflictions, who had been silent and trembling ever since they left the cathedral.
"Kaelan," Lin Huai slowed his pace to walk alongside her. "It's time you spoke up. Is that old man the Saint you mentioned? Does he really want to break free from his teacher's control? It doesn't seem like it."
All color drained from Kaelan's beautiful face. She looked up, her watery eyes filled with undisguised terror. Her lips quivered a few times before she managed a voice as faint as a mosquito's buzz: "Yes, it's him. The one in black should be the Sinful Angel, the Saint's teacher."
She hugged her arms tightly.
"It's his style. He enjoys watching hope extinguish bit by bit before his eyes, and he loves listening to the wails of life in despair."
"Shit! An Angel? That son of a bitch masked guy, we're actually going to face an Angel head-on!" Danitz turned around, ready to bolt.
But Lin Huai just gave him a look. As if remembering something, Danitz obediently followed along again.
They had arrived at the Weeping Coast.
The scene before them made everyone stop in their tracks.
There were no waves, no sound of the tide, and not even a single seabird could be seen. The pitch-black seawater was like a solid piece of congealed ink jade, without a ripple, deathly still. The shore was not a soft beach but was covered with black reefs eroded by the seawater into bizarre shapes.
A cold wind blew past, whipping up sharp sounds that resembled a woman's sobbing as it passed through the holes in the reefs, making one's skin crawl.
Even more eerie was the low, rhythmic vibration coming from the ground beneath their feet.
"So many... so many ships..." Danitz pointed toward the nearby coastline, his voice trembling.
Over a dozen fishing boats of various sizes lay skewed and stranded on the shore. Sails hung haphazardly, and fishing nets were scattered everywhere, some still holding deep-sea crystal fish that hadn't been removed in time. The entire scene looked as if the people on board had suddenly vanished into thin air at the same moment.
Lin Huai activated his Spirit Vision.
In his vision, the entire coastline was shrouded in a thick layer of grayish-black, ominous aura. This aura was like a living mist, slowly converging toward a point deep within the coast. Around the abandoned fishing boats, he saw over a dozen blurry human-shaped spirit outlines.
They were the fishermen who had come to make a fortune.
Now, they were no longer living. They stood motionless where they were, their spirit forms covered in a layer of grayish-white salt crust, like a dozen or so salt sculptures gazing out at the sea. Their faces were frozen in expressions of ecstasy and greed from when they had discovered the big fish.
"Their life force... has been drained dry," Kaelan's voice rang out.
Just then, the bodies of the salt sculptures all emitted a crisp "crack" simultaneously.
The salt crust covering them shattered bit by bit, revealing the withered, mummy-like bodies beneath. Their eyes, like those of all the previous victims, had turned a pure, abyssal black!
Then, they crumbled into ash.
Lin Huai's Spirit Vision remained locked on the ashes. He clearly saw the ashes turn into a stream of pure negative energy, carrying despair and pain, which dissipated and was then pulled by an invisible force, slowly disappearing.
Lin Huai started walking.
The group bypassed the abandoned fishing boats and massive reefs, continuing further in, when a massive vibration suddenly occurred.
Countless sea fish surged out from the ocean.
Finally, behind a massive ring of reefs—as if waiting for Lin Huai and the others to arrive—a thin, invisible film of light made of illusions vanished. They saw a colossal seaside cavern with an irregularly shaped circular entrance, looking like the gaping maw of the earth. The interior was pitch black and bottomless.
Lin Huai said nothing; he merely stared into the deep cavern entrance. In his Spirit Vision, it was a massive, swirling vortex of energy. The negative emotions of all Bayam, the despair of all the previous dead, and the energy that had just dissipated from the mummified corpses were being continuously sucked into it, becoming part of some grand ritual.
Just then, the entire coast suddenly jolted violently!
"Boom!!!"
A loud bang, heavier than all the previous vibrations, echoed from deep within the cavern.
Immediately after, all the energy vanished, as if nothing had ever happened there.
Lin Huai looked at his teammates. "It feels like we're late again, but I still want to go in and take a look."
Having said that, he took out the yellow crystal pendulum he hadn't used in a long time and began a divination.
"I'll go with you," the Demoness Kaelan was the first to speak.
"We're definitely following you; you're our instructor, after all." Thor solemnly grabbed Loki, who was clearly reluctant.
"Um, I'm actually not very willing to go. I still have a lot of savings and assets; I don't want to die before I've spent all my money. Can I not go?" Danitz looked at Lin Huai with a face full of sincerity.
"Very well. Since no one has any objections, let's head straight in. Mr. Ten Thousand Pounds, thank you for being so diligent and responsible for my commission. I will definitely tell Mr. Fool about your performance. Don't worry, the divination tells me there is no danger to our lives." Having finished his divination, Lin Huai righteously pushed Danitz to the front and then pushed him toward the cavern entrance.
"Don't even try to lie to me. This ritual involves an Angel. Can a Sequence 7's divination even be trusted? Let go of me, I'll walk by myself. I've received an oracle, so I'll be obedient."