On the way back to the Lake of Wrath’s shore from the island and then to the Underground Ark Iron Mountain entrance, the Old Task Force members remained silent as their conversation kept echoing in their minds.

“How long did the first batch of people that went to Lake Heart Island wait for the Oracle? Where did they wait?”

“Why are you asking?”

“How are they now?”

“A-all of them contracted the Heartless disease.”

“All of them?”

“All of them.”

After returning to basement two and entering the reception room, Jiang Baimian turned her head to glance at Shang Jianyao and broke the indescribable atmosphere. “Why aren’t you saying anything? You’re the last person to be scared.”

Shang Jianyao rubbed his temples. “It’s afternoon, and I used my abilities again. I’m almost out of juice.”

He had yet to fully recover from his damaged psyche.

With this interlude, Long Yuehong finally couldn’t help but say, “If you stay inside Yama Tiger Temple for more than 15 minutes, stay in the area around the temple for more than half an hour, and stay elsewhere on the island for more than three days, you will definitely be infected with the Heartless disease?”

Jiang Baimian nodded indiscernibly. “From the looks of it, yes. I wonder if the company figured this out at the cost of human lives…”

“Then, what’s the reason for all of this?” Bai Chen didn’t care much about how Pangu Biology could formulate such precautions. She was concerned about the connection between the sleeping Yama Tiger and the Heartless disease.

On the way back, Jiang Baimian had long thought of many possibilities and rejected them one by one. At this moment, she threw out the one she felt was most reasonable. “Yama Tiger is actually trapped in the New World, so his body is equivalent to a node where the New World and reality intersect? Such nodes are uncontrollable. They will slowly leak the New World’s aura, matter, and…”

At this point, Jiang Baimian paused and added, “Virus.”

Long Yuehong’s eyes suddenly widened. “Are you saying that the Heartless virus comes from the New World and spreads to the Ashlands through similar nodes, infecting the surrounding people? Just like how the human settlements on Lake Heart Island were quickly destroyed by the Heartless disease after Yama Tiger fell asleep?”

“That’s one explanation. We need more evidence.” Jiang Baimian tried her best to calm down.

Investigating the source of the Heartless disease had always been her dream.

She exhaled and added, “To the New World, the Heartless virus might be nothing—it might not even be a virus. However, it’s highly fatal for people living in the Ashlands.”

This reminded her of some books she had read in the past. After humans came to a place isolated from the world, the bacteria and viruses that were harmless to them brought large-scale deaths to the natives.

“B-but isn’t it said that the New World is a paradise. There’s no Heartless disease, no famine, no cold, no monsters, and no mutations…” Long Yuehong felt like the holy land in his heart had been tainted.

“There might not be any humans either,” the listless and mentally exhausted Shang Jianyao added.

This sentence made Long Yuehong’s hair stand on end.

Bai Chen nodded. “The New World might not be a good place. Didn’t Oray say that he would rather die than go to the New World?”

Jiang Baimian gave a terse acknowledgment and recalled. “We previously discovered that the date of the company’s Heartless outbreak matches the time of First City’s chaos. Didn’t we make a guess? The uprising in First City might very well be noticed by the Kalendarium, or they might even directly intervene. ‘Their’ clash produced a certain high-level fluctuation, causing small-scale Heartless disease outbreaks to erupt in many places in the Ashlands… From the looks of it, we have to correct this guess.”

Shang Jianyao raised his hand and tried to answer, but he weakly rubbed his forehead. “Forget it. I can’t be bothered to think.”

Jiang Baimian glanced at him and deliberated over her words. “During the First City uprising, the powerhouses from the various large factions—whose minds had entered the New World but had their bodies remain in the Ashlands—more or less returned. Coupled with the Kalendarium’s attention and interference, many tunnels definitely appeared between the New World and the Ashlands that morning, causing the Heartless disease to leak out again.”

Compared to the fluctuations produced by a power struggle, this guess seemed more reasonable and realistic.

Long Yuehong nodded and remarked, “Since we can’t stay in Yama Tiger’s sleeping temple and the surrounding area for too long lest we get infected with the Heartless disease, it’s impossible for humans to exist in the area inside and streets around the interior of the Crystal Consciousness Church’s Sikhara Temple. The same goes for First City’s Golden Apple Zone or even the entire city. It should’ve long been ruled by the Heartless.”

From Long Yuehong’s point of view, the Buddha’s Nirmanakaya was essentially no different from the sleeping Yama Tiger. There was definitely more than one active powerhouse in First City who had entered the New World in a similar situation—where their mind had entered the New World while leaving their body in the Ashlands.

They would also bring what Yama Tiger would bring!

Jiang Baimian replied with a bitter smile, “Why do you think Heartless cases occasionally appear in First City then?”

This question gave Long Yuehong the creeps.

Jiang Baimian continued, “But compared to the unlucky Yama Tiger, they have more freedom. They can choose when to return and sleep. Furthermore, they maintain a certain level of control over their surroundings. They can drastically suppress the Heartless disease’s leakage and spread. Besides, I suspect that they can still consciously allocate strength to selectively protect people. Therefore, very few people in the company’s management contract the Heartless disease, whereas the employee population suffers from it once or twice a year, or even more.

“Regarding this, we can verify it when we return to First City in the future. We can compare the incidence rates of Heartless cases among the nobles, officials, and ordinary citizens.”

Bai Chen recalled a certain detail and echoed in enlightenment, “It’s no wonder that Oray didn’t feel sad, panic, or fear after his butler contracted the Heartless disease. Instead, he was angry and confused… He believed that the person who was supposed to protect the butler hadn’t fulfilled their duties.”

Upon hearing this, Long Yuehong felt like another clue had been linked.

Smack!

Shang Jianyao clenched his right fist and punched his left palm as he forced a gratified expression onto his face. “Therefore, we really wronged Xiaochong back then!”

For a period of time, the Old Task Force had suspected that the Heartless disease outbreak in First City’s Green Olive Zone was related to Xiaochong.

Jiang Baimian chuckled. “Don’t forget how Teacher Du Heng evaluated Wu Meng and Xiaochong. As this world’s poisonous sores, their connection with the New World might not be weaker than those sleeping old fellows.”

Silence ruled the reception room once again.

After a while, Bai Chen took the initiative to raise a question. “Since Yama Tiger is very likely an Awakened whose mind has entered the New World while leaving his body in the Ashlands, why did he shout ‘save me?’ Besides, he can’t occasionally return like other New World powerhouses.”

Jiang Baimian had some thoughts on that. She said with a smile, “Yama Tiger calls himself Yama and is considered a deity in the present world. He clearly doesn’t believe in any Kalendaria. When he reached the New World, there was naturally nobody to take him in or protect him. He probably encountered something subsequently. I suspect that he’s suppressed by a Kalendaria, just like how DiMarco was sealed in the Ark by Eidolon Nun…”

Jiang Baimian spoke the latter half of the sentence in a softer voice.

This was once a place Eidolon Nun often watched.

For this, Jiang Baimian deliberately changed the topic and scoffed at Shang Jianyao. “For someone like you who carries the Blessings from all Kalendarium, you will probably be in a worse state than Yama Tiger when you enter the New World.”

Shang Jianyao sighed. “‘They’ will understand my good intentions.”

“What good intentions do you have?” Long Yuehong knew that Shang Jianyao couldn’t give a serious answer, so he wanted to hear what ‘superb theory’ the latter had.

Shang Jianyao shrugged. “I haven’t thought of it. It’s still early anyway.”

As he spoke, he yawned.

Upon seeing this, Jiang Baimian concluded, “We gained much more from this trip to Redstone Collection than we imagined. Furthermore, it’s crucial information. Next, let’s temporarily put aside the exact connection between the New World and the Heartless disease because there are no clues to continue the investigation. We’ll consider it later.

“Hey, follow us to the library and line some books to sleep on. We’ll get the Ark residents to help filter them. We’ll try to dig up every comment that Modeus left behind before we meet the mountain monsters tomorrow afternoon.”

The Old Task Force’s current direction for investigation was the relationship between Modeus and Iron Mountain City’s Second Food Company, a Buddhist holy land.

…

In the dead of night, Jiang Baimian directed a question at Long Yuehong, Bai Chen, and Shang Jianyao—who had woken up from his ‘afternoon nap.’ “Any progress?”

“No,” Bai Chen replied first.

Long Yuehong and Shang Jianyao shook their heads.

Jiang Baimian frowned slightly. “After the initial shock, panic, and confusion, Modeus seemed to become careful. He no longer left behind any clues.”

After pondering for a few seconds, Jiang Baimian asked, “Are there any Buddhist scriptures in the library?”

Zen Master Redemption Shang Jianyao was very sure of this. “No, I was planning to find a few volumes to learn from.”

He was the only one who wanted to learn the Buddhist scriptures; there was no ‘we.’

Jiang Baimian made a terse grunt. “He’s never read the Buddhist scriptures and doesn’t seem to have passed Star Cluster Hall. Where did DiMarco—or Modeus—learn that one of his abilities is named Destiny Connection? This is a Buddhist term that many Ashlandics don’t know or don’t understand. How did he, a Red River person, come up with it?