Chapter 189: A Sinister Heart

Calvin swiftly retrieved Presto's bones as he rushed to inform Old Zhong that he was leaving.

"Take me with you!"

"Take, your ass! You haven't even seen the danger of that village yet for yourself and you want to come with me?" Calvin retorted.

Old Zhong was instantly silenced and he didn't know what to say.

He knew that he was unqualified to intervene in supernatural matters as a civilian, but...

"I know what you are thinking. But I can't let you go with me. Trust me, what is about to happen isn't something that can be endured with willpower alone. I know you're tough, but toughness wouldn't cut it out against what we are about to face." Calvin bitterly smiled.

The more time he spent outside the Village of Tulog, the more he would be in danger.

If he didn't manage to return before the changes of the village ended, then he might be assaulted by monsters as soon as he stepped foot into the village's outskirts from the tunnels.

"All right, since you're being like that, then I guess I can't be with you at all." Old Zhong shook his head and lamented, "I wish you luck."

"Wait for our good news!" Calvin lightly chuckled as he waved his hand towards Old Zhong and dashed towards the valley. His speed was so fast that it turned the smile on Old Zhong's face bitter.

"With how fast he's going, he's already in the realm of superhumans... Damned it, why was I unable to pass that exam so that I could become a member of the three Judiciaries when I was still young?" Old Zhong started to reminisce about the past.

Calvin didn't hold back anything on his way back to the village.

The pieces of paper stuck on his legs shone in dim lights as the runes engraved on its surface manifested its power. He immediately felt his body turn as light as a feather as he leaned forwards and increased his speed. He had already memorized the terrain after passing through the same location twice so it wasn't difficult for him to reach the tunnels in under ten minutes.

As for the monsters that lurked inside the tunnels?

The moment they recognized who he was—they immediately scattered like smoke and didn't even dare to stick their heads out to look.

The tight and narrow tunnels that they had always taken advantage of in order to capture their prey was now their number one enemy as the terrifying presence of the Mortician and Stephanie flooded the tunnels and made them tremble in primal fear.

In contrast to these scared monsters hiding in the shadows, Calvin's pace was leisurely, yet it wasn't slow at the slightest.

The only reason why he had changed his pace was that he had no idea if the terrain within the tunnels remained the same. He didn't want to run as fast as he could only to slam his body onto a wall after realizing that the straight tunnel suddenly had a T-junction.

But despite jogging in a careful manner, Calvin was still faster than an average human's running pace.

It only took him ten minutes to reach the end of the tunnel and when he stepped a foot into the outskirts of the Village of Tulog. He immediately held his breath and extinguished his presence. He stuck close to the ground and made himself as small as possible so that he wouldn't attract unwanted attention from anything sinister in the area.

It was because he knew that if he attracted—even the attention—of a single monster. The others might swarm to his location and he would quickly found himself overrun by monsters.

Calvin turned his head to look at the adjacent hill. It was the hill that they used to survey the entire village before they entered. There was nothing suspicious about the hill.

To be honest, it looked incredibly ordinary.

But after hearing the old lady's words earlier, Calvin was convinced that this ordinariness in the outskirts of a village that contained not any ordinary beings was conspicuous.

How did he miss such a huge clue in the beginning?

Calvin couldn't help but lament.

He approached the hill in a cautious manner.

In fact, he wasn't even walking nor running anymore.

He stuck close to the ground and crawled his way to the hill where he saw nothing.

Calvin furrowed his eyebrows, 'It can't be like this, there must be something...'

He then remembered the words of the old lady.

"Remember this when you return to that village..."

"There is a thin line between illusion and reality."

"Do not be easily deceived!"

A look of firm resolve flashed across Calvin's face.

He took a deep breath and manifested his Aspect.

The golden quill materialized in the air as Calvin caught it in his hands.

Then, without any warning... he hurled the quill towards the hill!

The quill streaked through the air and the force it contained was inhibited. But the moment it struck the hill, it was as if it struck a piece of cotton. The golden quill lost all of its strength and bounced off the hill.

Calvin immediately realized that the hill was nothing but an illusion!

If it was a real hill, then his quill should've lodged itself into its soil.

Yet when he threw his golden quill with the intent to destroy—it bounced off!

Clearly, there was something fishy.

Calvin stood up as the sinister beings hid in his shadow throbbed. They were ready to react at any moment if the situation turned sour. It seemed that even the Mortician and Stephanie knew that there was something horrifying hidden behind the illusion that covered the hill.

Illusions in the world of Las Felipinas might be scary, but they weren't invincible.

After all, an illusion required a foundation for it to be made and as long as one discovered where the foundation was located.

They could easily destroy that illusion.

Calvin's knowledge regarding illusions was second to none in the current era. However, even he couldn't locate the foundation of this illusion that had fooled him earlier that easily.

But it didn't take him that long to pinpoint where the illusion boundary was located.

He summoned his golden quill again and sent it flying towards the core of the illusion, and at the very next moment...

Cracks spread on the surface of the entire hill as if it was made out of glass.

Calvin stared as the illusion was about to be destroyed, then a thought came to his mind—if he destroyed this illusion just like that, then wouldn't the person who made this illusion realize what he was doing?

Calvin's pupils constricted when he discovered these consequences, so he immediately stopped the golden quill from going any deeper into the core of the illusion.

Fortunately, unless the owner of the illusion physically inspected the illusion for damages.

He shouldn't be notified that the illusion had been damaged.

As for the reason why the owner of the illusion wouldn't know that his illusion had been damaged? It was because Calvin found out that the illusion wasn't connected to any spiritual traces that could point towards who was the owner.

This was a cautious move from the owner since no one would find out who he was in case the church discovered the existence of the illusion.

But now that Calvin hadn't destroyed the illusion, how was he supposed to enter what was hidden beyond it?

Calvin smirked.

He took a page out of the notebook of secrets and started scribbling down the method that he used to reveal the illusion that had covered the walls of the tunnels, albeit the method wasn't so forceful, and that it didn't involve the destruction of the illusion.

The logic was that using a brute-force method, Calvin would create a small crack enough for him to go through without disturbing the entire core of the illusion.

It took him ten minutes to inscribe the runes necessary and when he was done, he immediately slapped it on the illusion.

The piece of paper shone in a dimmed light as the sound of glass being broken rang out.

A hole was made and Calvin didn't hesitate to go inside.

"By the Emperor's Commandment, all shall obey!"

The moment he stepped foot beyond the illusion, Calvin immediately activated the Emperor's Veil.

Clad in golden robes, Calvin's entire being seemed to shine the same light as gold as he walked deeper into the warehouse step by step.

Stephanie and the Mortician grew restless—something was riling up their resentment, Calvin could feel it.

Calvin's Predator Senes spread through the entire warehouse and he quickly spotted something that caught his eyes.

On the doors of an adjacent room inside the warehouse, something similar to a cocoon was throbbing!

Calvin's pupils constricted.

The cocoon's color was as dark as the abyss itself and the stench that it emanated was so foul that Calvin found it hard to approach.

But his disgust disappeared when he realized the identity of the cocoon.

This cocoon—surrounded by locusts, flies, and wasps—was born from a technique that only a disciple of the Goddess of Pestilence could do!

"Sinister Heart!"

Calvin took a step backward and retreated.

Sinister Heart was an unorthodox art from the school of Pestilence and Plague. It involved the sacrifice of an entire city to the cocoon so that an Ambassador-ranked monster could be summoned.

But since this cocoon was so small, Calvin reckoned that the sacrifice made so far couldn't compare to an entire city.

But its size which was already as huge as an entire house—was still enough to summon an Emissary-ranked monster!

An Emissary-ranked monster was something that Calvin could never hope to handle!

"As far as I can remember, a Sinister Heart needs a host... and considering what the old lady had said. The host can only be her!"

"Freya!"

"Shit, this is something that we handle anymore... I must inform the captain and let them send the high-ranking officials of the church as a punitive force to purge this village!"

Calvin immediately turned around and made a mad dash towards the Village of Tulog.

"Heisenberg and Ricardo are in danger!"