Mental corruption was mutual.
At least, that was how Gwen saw it.
Based on the experimental reference provided by the Eternal Sleeper and the technical data left behind by the Defiant, Gwen was almost certain that the birth of the gods was related to the beliefs of the mortals. Or to be more precise, it was the collective thoughts of the mortals that were projected into a certain dimension in the depths of this world, thus giving birth to the gods. And if this model was true, then the process of dealing with the gods was actually a process of mutual corruption.
The knowledge of the gods would unstoppably corrupt any mind that had established a connection with them (at least, Gwen still did not know how to stop this connection). And on the other hand, the minds that had established a connection with the gods would inevitably be affected in the opposite direction. But one thing was obvious: the mind of the mortals could not be compared to the mind of the gods, so this process of mutual corruption became a one-sided corruption.
But what if there was a mind that was not affected by the knowledge of the gods, and at the same time, had a massive memory bank to 'connect' with the gods?
The mountainous Narrator of the Upper Realm split apart, his body slowly falling apart. His remaining power was still struggling to maintain itself, but that little bit of power was quickly dissipating as the divine patterns dimmed. Gawain stood quietly where he was, watching everything while suppressing and dispelling the corruption on his body.
The corruption he had suffered was quite serious, much more serious than it looked on the surface. This time, Sui Xiong was no longer facing the flesh of a god sealed in a crystal cube, nor was it facing a fake god's sutured corpse created using biochemical technology. The Narrator from the upper level was a real, complete, and living god. Even if it was very weak, it still had a special status. It was quite a risky move to fight against its corruption.
But this was the only way Gwen could think of.
Swords could not kill the Upper Narrator, and no matter how good one's combat skills were, they could not fight the nightmare itself. To destroy the invisible and intangible god, one could only use the same invisible and intangible power. In the previous battle, he used the longsword to fight against Duwalter. That was just a cover for both sides to hide their mental corruption.
Gwen lowered his head and looked at his hands. He was relieved to find that his arms were gradually returning to human form.
The narrator was a young and inexperienced god. This was Gwen's only advantage. If it were the gods in the real world who had existed for countless years … it was better not to do such a risky thing.
Deep in the darkness, next to the spider web, the birdcage made of unknown material also disintegrated silently. Selena felt that the invisible influence that was suppressing her power was beginning to dissipate. Without checking her own condition, she quickly walked to Gwen's side. Seeing that he was slowly returning to his human form, she was secretly relieved.
"It's all over?" She looked at Gwen, then at the fallen Narrator, and asked in disbelief.
Gwen did not answer for a moment. Instead, he stared at the giant spider in the middle of the web. He was also asking himself — is it really over? That's it?
A hint of doubt rose in his mind. Gwen's face suddenly became serious. "Wait, I'm afraid not!"
He stared at the Spider Deity, who seemed to have lost its breath, and spoke quickly, "Duwalter said that he is the 'humanity' of the Upper Narrators. Then, where is the corresponding 'divinity'? And we saw the Upper Narrator protecting some 'cocoons' — where are those cocoons? "
Selena suddenly reacted. It was as if a part of her mind that was affected and blocked suddenly came to life. She realized the key point that she had overlooked. "That girl called Naretil?"
…
Deep in the underground palace of the Eternal Sleeper, in the corridor leading to the central area, Archbishop Semler's voice echoed in the long corridor.
"Not long after the operation began, something happened. First, the containment area was contaminated, then other areas. Many perfectly normal priests suddenly became believers of the Upper Narrator. We have to face everyone with the highest vigilance …"
"I can understand," Magnum said gruffly. "The Upper Narrator … this thing is really creepy. I just glanced at him in the sandbox, and I almost couldn't come back! But fortunately, I helped you find a way to quickly identify the contaminants … "
"Don't mention your 'means' anymore," Yuri interrupted Magnum with an unbearable look on his face. "I have never said such vulgar words in decades. I now suspect that you left the Church of the God of War not because you studied the heretical classics in private, but because you were kicked out because of your vulgar words and deeds!"
Magnum's eyes widened. "They did accuse me of such a crime back then. What's wrong?"
Semler's gloomy and solemn face was even darker than usual. He ignored the conversation behind him and continued to walk forward with a tense face.
Yuri also sighed and didn't speak anymore.
Magnum found that no one responded to him. He shrugged indifferently and walked in the middle of the team.
The deep and long corridor seemed to have no end, extending all the way to the central area of the underground palace. The light of the magic crystal lamp shone on the helmets of the Spirit Knight next to him, giving them a bright glow.
A faint translucent shadow suddenly flashed across the corner of Magnum's eyes, and he subconsciously stopped in his tracks.
It seemed to be a part of a giant limb, transparent and almost invisible. It penetrated the nearby wall and ceiling, flashed past the boundary of Magnum's vision, and quickly retracted into the wall.
"Archbishop Magnum?" Yuri noticed that Magnum had suddenly stopped with a serious look on his face. He immediately stopped as well. "What's going on?"
"Yuri, I just saw something flash past," Magnum said in a serious tone. "Like some kind of limb … a spider."
Semler immediately frowned and looked around. He confirmed his memory and shook his head. "I didn't see anything."
Everyone shook their heads. It seemed that Magnum was the only one who saw the shadow flash past.
Illusion? Saw wrongly? Was it a hallucination caused by being in a trance and being overly nervous?
These thoughts appeared in the minds of the priests on the scene for less than a second before they were directly eliminated. Yuri directly raised his hand and summoned a visible rune with invisible magic power. A ripple-like halo spread across the entire corridor. "Mind Detection!"
The other priests and Spirit Knight also acted separately. Some activated defensive spells, some began to scan the surroundings for unknown spiritual imprints, and some raised their weapons to form a formation to protect the relatively vulnerable priests in the center of the team.
The Eternal Sleepers never said that they "saw wrongly", and they never believed in the so-called "nervous hallucinations".
They were experts in the field of dreams, explorers of the spiritual world, and they were already on the dangerous path of confronting God. It was the professional habit of every Eternal Sleeper to be vigilant to the point of neurosis. Did someone in the team say that they saw an abnormal scene? Whether it was true or not, let's throw twenty Mind Detection spells first!
However, after all the detection spells were activated, no one saw what Magnum mentioned, nor did they sense any abnormal spiritual imprints in the space near the corridor.
"We didn't find anything …" Archbishop Semler said in a low voice.
"Regardless of whether we found anything or not, stay alert. Detection spells are not omnipotent. There are too many things in this world that mortals can't see," Yuri reminded. He then looked at Magnum and said, "Pay attention to the surroundings. There are some things … that only you can see."
Magnum was startled for a moment. Looking at Yuri's serious eyes, he understood the other party's meaning.
He had accidentally looked directly at the upper narrators without any protection.
Perhaps some irreversible damage had been left in the depths of his soul.
The whole team did not weaken their vigilance at all and began to return to the center of the underground palace.
Behind them, in the far end of the deep and long corridor, a blurry and almost transparent figure flashed by again.
It was a segment of a spider's limb. It penetrated the walls and the roof and moved quickly. It was as if an incomparably huge transparent spider was weaving an invisible spider web through the stones and soil in the depths of the ground.
Magnum and Yuri followed the team led by Semler and finally safely arrived at the center of the underground palace. It was also the control center and the largest computing center of Sandbox No. 1.
This was the most important and core area of the Eternal Sleepers' headquarters. It was the first place to be guarded under any circumstances. It was not allowed to be breached.
Relying on the strong walls and wide internal space here, Archbishop Semler built several lines of defense and urgently formed a "Bishop's Legion" consisting of archbishops and bishops to guard this place. At present, all the safe and uncontaminated clerics had been gathered here. There were also several teams of Psionic Knight and battle clerics active in other areas of the underground palace. They continued to suppress those who were contaminated by the upper narrators and looked for their comrades who were still conscious.
In the large and sturdy hall, a tense state of readiness for battle.
The fully-armed Psionic Knight guarded all the entrances and exits of the hall. They had also set up barriers in the outer corridor and several sturdy rooms connecting the corridors. Battle clerics in battle robes and light metal armor were waiting behind the barriers. They were also monitoring the mental state of their own people at all times.
Inside the tightly guarded hall, around the large stone pillars in the central area, the technical clerics in charge of controlling the sandbox system and the mental network sat neatly on the control seats with nerve cables connected to the back of their heads. They were still maintaining the normal operation of the system.
Before they connected, they had imposed a strong psychological cue on themselves. Even if the hall was breached and a sword was pressed against their throats, these technical clerics would maintain the system until the last moment.
Yuri noticed that there were traces of battle in the corridor outside, and some technical clerics who seemed to have lost consciousness were lying in a corner of the hall.
He and Magnum had been active in the sandbox world for a day and a night. Only two hours should have passed in the outside world. However, so many things had happened in the real world in these two hours.
The contamination and turmoil in the underground palace … were probably more dangerous than what Semler had described.
Before Magnum walked into the hall, he first carefully observed the barricades and the configuration of the combatants in the corridor. He then glanced at the weapons and equipment placed against the wall in the hall and the status of the reserves. Finally, he nodded to Semler. "Not bad."
As a former war cleric, he could see that the emergency fortification here had been guided by professionals.
"A few of the priests used to be soldiers. I temporarily promoted their command. Without them, the situation would have been worse," Semler said in a deep voice. "Just before I set out to confirm your situation, we encountered a wave of counterattack. The contaminated Psionic Knight almost broke through the defense line in the hall. It is not a pleasant thing to raise a sword against your compatriots."
"Leave the professional matters to the professionals. Your decision is correct. As for raising a sword against your compatriots …" Magnum shook his head. "This mess, we will slowly repay it after we all survive."
"Archbishop Yuri, Archbishop Magnum, I am glad to see you safe and sound."
With a gentle and magnetic voice, a female priest in a white dress with a gentle temperament came out from the depths of the hall.
"Archbishop Venti." Yuri was the first to notice the woman who came out. "I heard it's you. Is this blood?"
He looked at the leader of the psionic choir in front of him in surprise. He saw that her white dress was now soaked in blood. The glaring dark red color had soaked the fabric, and there were complicated and curved runes on the chest and hemline of the dress. It looked strange and mysterious.
But after taking another look at those runes, the tension in Archbishop Yuri's heart quickly dissipated by more than half. He realized what those runes were — a gift from the wanderers in outer space, a "gift from the deep sea" that could resist the mental pollution of the gods.
Venti smiled, but her face was a little pale. "I wanted to come out to report, but I was worried that if I left the room and left the runes, the contamination in my body would relapse again. So I had to 'bring' the runes with me. Blood is the only 'magic-conducting material' I could find down there."
She raised her wrist, revealing the wound on her arm. The wound had been mostly healed under the effect of the healing spell, but there were still coagulated blood stains that she had not had time to wipe off.
She had no choice but to use her own blood to draw the runes. There were many contaminated upper-class believers in the containment area, but Venti was worried about the safety of the contaminated blood, so she had to use her own blood to draw the runes.
Looking at Wendy, who was covered in blood, coming out to deliver the message, looking at the traces of battle in the corridor outside the hall, looking at the roadblocks set up in the underground palace, and the priests and knights behind the roadblocks, Urey let out a sigh.
After sighing, he still had to look up because the danger was far from over.
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