Magnan and Yuri both paused in surprise at Gawain’s words.

The boundless mist continued to surge around them, and an invisible malicious mind seemed to pervade the entire plain. Amidst the omnipresent low murmurs and spiritual pollution, Gawain spoke without turning his head: "Something is trying to bypass the protection of Sandbox One. If I’m not mistaken, the infiltration of the Supreme Narrator into the real world has already begun."

Whether it was the spider-like Duvalt or the endless mist and spiritual pollution, all these visible things only occupied half of Gawain’s attention. The other half of his focus had been, from start to finish, on monitoring the changes in the "border"!

This border was the boundary of the mind network, composed of countless hidden doors, jump boards, and concealed ports that Gawain and Daniel had set up within the mind network long ago. These elements spread throughout the entire network, covering all nodes except for Sandbox One. They were once tools Gawain used to infiltrate the mind network and monitor the actions of the Eternal Sleepers. But at this moment, they served as a hidden defense line to monitor whether the network was functioning normally—

With the mind network’s nodes executing dream control and all computational power concentrated on Sandbox One, any untagged information appearing in the network was undoubtedly pollution from the Supreme Narrator!

Just now, Gawain faintly sensed this pollution, detecting suspicious information sniffed by some hidden ports in the mind network. Undoubtedly, anomalies had appeared in the network outside the sandbox, and this indicated that anomalies might also be occurring in the real world!

Magnan widened his eyes, keeping a wary eye on the shadows in the mist while speaking quickly: "But we haven’t received any warning signals from the real world... wait a minute... damn it!!"

He suddenly realized something, and his expression became very grim in an instant.

"Yuri, we have to detach immediately!" Magnan turned abruptly to Yuri Charlvin beside him, then turned to Gawain and Selena, "What about you two?"

"Selena can’t ’return to reality,’ and she’ll stay here with me. We’ll find a way to deal with the Supreme Narrator. In the meantime, you need to find the infiltration points in the real world and close the breaches, making sure it doesn’t escape," Gawain said. "If we can solve it at the source, all problems will be eliminated."

"Understood," Magnan nodded vigorously and looked at his side, "Yuri, why aren’t you ready yet?"

"I can’t detach," Yuri’s hands moved swiftly in the air, sketching out golden runes, and layers of illusory light spread outward from him. However, they were continually blocked by an invisible barrier. "I’m being interfered with... I can’t locate the border of the real world!"

In the endless mist, Duvalt’s hoarse, overlapping voice came again: "The real world... there is no such thing as a real world here..."

The shadows in the mist suddenly contracted, and a thick, sharp, barbed limb abruptly cleaved down. Gawain raised his Longsword with a clang to block the sudden attack, but immediately more assaults surged from all directions! 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

Selena gracefully dodged the attacks aimed at her, and with a casual swipe through the air beside her, invisible ripples layered outwards. Those black limbs were instantly covered in translucent foam and quickly dissipated as if exposed to sunlight.

In the brief respite Selena created, Gawain withdrew two steps to Yuri and Magnan’s vicinity: "Get closer; I’ll send you back to the real world."

"You can..." Magnan looked at Gawain with wide eyes in astonishment. He was about to question how it was possible to send someone back to the real world when the borders couldn’t be perceived, but then he remembered the eerie and formidable nature of the Wanderers from Outer Realm and quickly changed his tone, "Tell me what to do!"

"You don’t need to do anything," Gawain said, locking onto Yuri and Magnan’s minds through a pre-set hidden door, "the process might be a bit uncomfortable—"

Yuri instinctively asked, "What do you mean..."

Before he could finish, he suddenly felt an overwhelming flood of memories surge into his mind with a complexity beyond human comprehension and a speed too swift to resist. The magnitude of this flood was so terrifying that everything he had known and seen in his life, all his memories and knowledge, seemed insignificant like grains of sand on a beach under its impact—

His surface consciousness went into shock, his mind short-circuited, forcibly logging off.

Yuri and Magnan didn’t even have time to see what was in that massive torrent of consciousness before the flood’s attack forcibly severed their connection.

With the sudden disappearance of the two Archbishops’ figures, the boundless mist surrounding Gawain and Selena also momentarily halted.

The master of the mist seemed momentarily baffled, then all the thick mist densely contracted and piled up, once again forming Duvalt wearing a worn-out robe.

"You’re more... dangerous than I imagined." Duvalt looked at Gawain quietly, his tone peculiarly calm.

"To me, you’ve always been dangerous," Gawain swung his Longsword, looking as calmly at the old man not far away.

Duvalt took a step forward toward Gawain.

With that step, Gawain suddenly felt the environment around him change again, a sensation of being gazed upon by countless pairs of eyes and being shrouded by an invisible web flooded his mind.

Behind Duvalt, the large spider, which had died lying quietly on the hillside, seemed to come alive again with his step.

On his second step, the "Supreme Narrator’s" divine corpses behind him started to ripple with wave-like surges, and layers of magic symbols quickly brightened from dimness. The limb, clinging to the rock like a giant pillar of support, slowly moved, rolling numerous boulders down the slope, causing a rumbling crash.

"The God is dead..."

Duvalt spread his arms wide, resonating with the giant divine spider behind him, declaring loudly. The head of that giant spider also lit up with rays of red light like countless eyes simultaneously focusing on Gawain and Selena’s direction.

"It died for all living things...

Its death will return the world to its origin, everything to the cocoon, and the cocoon to everything...

And today, it will also die for..."

Ripples spread beneath Gawain’s feet, and his entire figure, like a cannonball, turned into a shadow. In an instant, he and his sword charged toward Duvalt, piercing the latter’s chest with the black Sword of Pioneers outlined with dark red.

"Can’t wait for the villain to finish his speech," Gawain gripped the sword’s hilt tightly, calmly looking into Duvalt’s eyes. Illusory flames had already ignited on the Longsword, rapidly consuming the old "priest’s" body. "That’s experience."

But as the flames burned wildly, no pain showed on Duvalt’s face. Instead, he wore a slightly eerie smile and continued speaking in a steady, unperturbed voice:

"It will be reborn for all living beings.

Words must be finished; it’s polite."

After a sound like the pop of a bubble, Duvalt’s body silently shattered under the Sword of Pioneers, and suddenly, a wave of darkness rose before Selena Gerfen and Gawain. This darkness seemed to surge from their hearts, unavoidable and unstoppable, instantly engulfing them both.

In the darkness, Selena Gerfen heard a distant and elusive voice: "Sweet dreams, our ’Creator’..."

...

Magnan abruptly opened his eyes, the objects in his field of vision crazily shaking and reforming, finally taking on the arrangement of the familiar room.

The next second, he suddenly jumped up from the magic circle layered with protective spells, almost losing his balance and falling to the ground. After precariously supporting himself against a nearby pillar, he dry-heaved with dizziness and discomfort.

This horrifying state lasted for a full thirty seconds before the powerful Archbishop of the Eternal Sleepers caught his breath, grumbling and adjusting his own state, while glancing back.

Behind him, the magic circle set with numerous protective spells had dimmed significantly, with almost all the Mind Protection Runes having melted and extinguished.

Magnan gasped, muttering with a lingering fear: "The power of the Wanderers from Outer Realm... Their understanding of ’a bit uncomfortable’ is probably different from us humans..."

Then he steadied himself, turning to look at the entrance of the sealed chamber.

There was no unusual noise outside, and the situation seen through the mental visual field appeared quite normal.

But he did not relax because of this; instead, he expanded his perception range until he confirmed that the entire Doctrine District had no abnormal situation. Only then did he step to the entrance, push the door, and leave the room.

Almost simultaneously, another door on the opposite side of the corridor not far away was pushed open, revealing Yuri Charlvin with a slightly pale face in front of Magnan.

"Magnan," Yuri glanced this way, shook his head with a wry smile, "I suspect that the Wanderers from Outer Realm have a different understanding of ’a bit uncomfortable’ than us humans..."

"I almost thought I was already dead," Magnan shook his head, frowning, "How’s your situation?"

"It’s alright," Yuri nodded, "We’d better quickly find Archbishop Semyr in charge of Church affairs, hoping the infiltration by the Supreme Narrator has not opened an irreversible passage."

Magnan nodded and, along with Yuri, quickly walked toward the central area of the Church, muttering as they went: "The situation is terribly bad... For today’s action, we shut down many ports of the mental network, and to maintain computational power under such circumstances, many bishops and archbishops originally scattered around have returned to the Orlandeau Region... If a breach occurs between us, the consequences will be unimaginable."

"Think positively," Yuri shook his head, "If a breach truly occurs among us, at least the leak will be controlled within this underground ruins. As long as the upper dome collapses then, no issues will reach the surface."

"... Often your optimism is really incomprehensible."

Magnan muttered, and almost simultaneously, urgent footsteps suddenly echoed from the corridor ahead, causing both archbishops to stop immediately.

Yuri instantly placed his hand on a magic book at his waist, while Magnan slightly raised his arm, ready to cast a spell.

This place is the haven of the Eternal Sleepers, the most familiar headquarters, the safest place in the hearts of every Eternal Sleeper for many years.

But tonight, it is no longer so.

The footsteps grew closer, and finally, familiar figures appeared in front of Yuri and Magnan.

It was Archbishop Semyr, responsible for the underground palace tonight, clad in a black robe, with a somber and serious aura, hair sparse with strands of gray.

And behind this archbishop followed several fully armed high priests and a dozen Spirit Knights in heavy armor wielding the Nightmare Cutter battle blades.

This full-armed stance was unlike that of a normal patrol.

The unexpectedly met parties almost simultaneously stopped, with the priests who were comrades not long ago shrouded in a tense atmosphere.

"Yuri, Magnan," Semyr stared at the two in front, "Weren’t you supposed to be executing tasks in the Sandbox?"

"The Wanderers from Outer Realm brought us out to warn that there may be unnoticed infiltration in the real world," Magnan said in a deep voice, "Semyr, what’s the situation on your side?"

Archbishop Semyr visibly breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing Magnan’s words but still frowned: "I’m afraid your warning is a bit late... There’s already an issue."

Yuri’s eyes widened: "There’s an issue!?"

"The containment area has become contaminated; some Spirit Knights are already under control. Archbishop Wendy burst out risking her life to report the issue, after which the Doctrine District, winery, and Lower Clergy District also showed varying degrees of chaos," Archbishop Semyr said rapidly, "Now we are intercepting those contaminated priests in various areas; I’m patrolling the middle tier of the Church."

The situation seemed to be clearly articulated soon, yet the vigilance and guarded expression on Magnan’s face didn’t change.

"This does not rule out your suspicion; I hope you understand, Semyr," he stared at the person not far ahead, "Despite us being friends, I must suspect everyone now."

"We all need to prove our innocence, Magnan," Semyr also nodded, showing thorough understanding.

"I have a suggestion, quicker than any Divine Arts means," Magnan raised a hand solemnly, "Now repeat after me:

"The Supreme Narrator is a son of a bitch."

Yuri immediately widened his eyes, and after shock, gave Magnan a disdainful glare: "Vulgar!"

"Vulgar but effective," Magnan glanced at Yuri, "I used to be a War God Priest and was once ordered to eradicate heterodoxies. I understand how to quickly identify devout followers, especially those converted due to mental pollution; they cannot use reason to control their behavior, so...

"Everyone, follow me in saying it..."