The flickering deep red glow brought Klein a sense of warmth, a feeling that he wasn't entirely lonely and that someone still remembered him.
As the overlapping illusory prayers grew clearer, more real, but also more chaotic and noisy, Klein realized that the "Sefirah Castle" was calling him, the resonance between them growing stronger.
By the time all Tarot Club members had finished their prayers, Klein vaguely felt that he could enter the "Sefirah Castle" at any moment and manifest his consciousness there, but there was still a barrier preventing the breakthrough.
This issue was resolved after he fully digested the "Ancient Scholar" potion.
That was why he was able to seize the moment and return to the "Sefirah Castle" before Amon could break through the obstruction of Bradel, the "God of Honor."
"In just two days, all the Tarot Club members prayed. Normally, it shouldn't be that coincidental... Some prayers were fine, others were probably influenced by the Goddess and Will... I'm lucky enough, so naturally I get good 'developments'..." Klein thought, noting the inconsistency, but it was explainable and nothing to worry about too much.
Shifting his posture slightly, Klein's gaze grew deep.
Even though when he had seen the light door and the "cocoons," he had felt it was unlikely he could return "home," once he truly confirmed that this world was his homeland, he felt his hopes completely dashed, the dawn swallowed by darkness.
"Using the title 'Fool that doesn't belong to this era' as my honorific name was probably a hint from spiritual intuition... Deep inside, I might have had a slight suspicion... By the way, I remember I 'transmigrated' while sleeping, so why was I hanging in the 'cocoon' wearing a T-shirt and casual pants?" Klein frowned slightly, shifting his gaze to the Gray Fog beneath the Sefirah Castle.
As he searched for the reason among the light fragments from the historical haze, he tried to recall every detail of that night.
Finally, Klein found the corresponding historical segment:
Zhou Mingrui, wearing a T-shirt and casual pants, set up a "fortune-transfer ritual" before dinner, taking four steps backward and chanting the incantation "Fusheng Xuanhuang Xianzun" and other phrases.
In Klein's memory, nothing had happened then, but the scene in the historical segment was different!
After Zhou Mingrui completed the four steps and finished the ritual, his face turned pale, and his eyes became dull.
Then, with somewhat stiff movements, he ate dinner, read a book, watched a show, played on his phone—as if executing a preset program.
Finally, Zhou Mingrui went to the sink, looked at his lifeless eyes in the mirror, mechanically brushed his teeth and washed his face, then went to bed.
Throughout this process, he never changed out of his outdoor T-shirt and casual pants, just pulled the covers over himself and closed his eyes.
Soon, a brilliant light and intense shaking ended the historical segment.
Klein couldn't help but rub his temples, smiling self-deprecatingly: "So, after the fortune-transfer ritual, there were no changes; everything seemed normal—that was just my perception. In fact, I was already transforming..."
If it were before, Klein would have been terrified and horrified by this truth, but after enduring so many shocks over such a long time, and with his worldview nearly collapsing just now, such "minor" things could no longer cause strong ripples.
But upon realizing this, combined with the fact that the Great Emperor had "transmigrated" after buying a mysterious silver medallion, and that within one of the transparent "cocoons" above the light door, a suspended spirit even had a mobile phone, Klein quickly formed some guesses about his initial situation:
"It must be that the owner of the 'Sefirah Castle' influences reality, passing out items like the 'fortune-transfer ritual,' the mysterious silver medallion, the mutated phone, etc. Anyone who obtains them and performs the corresponding actions will at some point be pulled up to the Gray Fog and suspended before the light door...
"This is a random selection, not targeting a specific person. I don't know if that makes me lucky or unlucky.
"But why name it 'Records of Secret Techniques from the Qin and Han Dynasties'? Was it made up by some influenced human, or has it truly been passed down since those times?
"It's not impossible. If the prophecy of the stars' return is true and refers to the Original Creator, then He has been slumbering at the center of the Earth since ancient times. And the 'Sefirah Castle,' according to legend, derived from parts of His body... This is not a shelter or a life pod...
"That Original One, while waiting to awaken and destroy the world, simultaneously and persistently influences reality, teaching rituals and arrangements. Isn't that a bit contradictory?
"That prophecy was surely made by a human under His influence..."
Klein reached out his right hand and tapped the edge of the mottled long table, lost in an unsolvable puzzle.
Soon, he recalled a phrase and some events.
The phrase was:
"What is divided shall reunite; what is united shall divide."
Those events were: