After hearing The Hanged Man's prayer, Klein's instinct was to reject the request. The Craftsman was already suspected of being controlled by a cult or secret organization, so why still ask The Hermit for help? He should just go straight to The World! Who knew where the Future was drifting on the seas at this moment, and how long it would take to get there? Meanwhile, The World could teleport! Klein felt that this would only delay things and cause unnecessary losses.
He quickly calmed down, reasoning that given Mr. Hanged Man's caution and sophistication, he wouldn't make such a simple mistake. Since he thought asking The Hermit for help was better than approaching The World, there must be a reason.
In other words, Mr. Hanged Man judged that the situation wasn't urgent enough to require immediate action. He even wanted to observe a bit more to find more clues and confirm further details... Moreover, since Miss Hermit had voluntarily offered to help, it showed that she believed her recent area of activity overlapped with Mr. Hanged Man's to some extent. If something really happened, she could get there as quickly as possible... Or perhaps she now had a teleportation ability similar to The World's? But that was extremely unlikely... Klein tapped his fingers on the edge of the mottled table, feeling that he should still trust Mr. Hanged Man's experience.
Of course, this was also because the other party hadn't specifically described what he had discovered or what was suspicious, leaving Klein no way to infer or divine the truth.
With a shift of thought, Klein tossed the image of The Hanged Man's prayer into the crimson star symbolizing The Hermit.
He was waiting for the Star Admiral's reply when he suddenly noticed the star representing The Sun began to contract and expand, transmitting layers of prayer sounds.
Had the City of Silver obtained preliminary results from exploring the former Chief's mausoleum? Klein guessed and extended his spirituality toward it.
As he expected, Little Sun described in detail everything that happened after the three elders of the Six-member Council opened the former Chief's tomb. This included encountering the spirits of previously deceased relatives, crossing an illusory, dark river filled with countless strange creatures, facing the former Chief who was in an incomplete mythical creature form covered in white feathers, and how Shepherd Lovia separated a shadow that attempted to pounce on the illusory black tube extending from the former Chief's body, only to be thwarted by Colin Iliad, who used a Fortune Thief charm to briefly swap his own fate with the former Chief's, altering the outcome.
Illusory black tubes... a body covered in white feathers stained with pale greasy dirt... That sounds very familiar... Right, isn't this the main feature of the images I saw when I divined the anomaly with Azik's copper whistle? And the reason the former Chief built that mausoleum was because he wanted to switch to Sequence 3 "Ferryman" of the Death pathway... As Klein listened, his mind raced, putting together everything he could associate to think about what conclusion this could lead to.
Soon, he had a bold guess:
The former Chief of the City of Silver's transformation was related to the Death Church's artificial death god project!
Although this conclusion sounded incredible and hard to believe, because the City of Silver was completely isolated in the God-forsaken Land, which could only be accessed through some connection between the Giant King's Court and the God War Ruins. Even the seven gods could not find it or infiltrate it with their power. However, the similarity of many features, combined with Klein's sensitivity to coincidences and his observation of Shepherd Lovia's actions in this operation, made him eliminate other possibilities and seriously consider that these two seemingly unrelated events might point to something.
Starting from the images he saw in his divination and his experience of having white fuzz grow from the pores on the back of his hand when he summoned the failed artificial death god earlier, and comparing them with the experiences of the three elders of the City of Silver's Six-member Council, he initially suspected that the Death Church's attempts might have achieved phased success to some extent:
Through a series of sacrificial ceremonies and modifications to their own high-sequence existences, they had inversely influenced the remnants of the Death God, causing the more abstract, ethereal "Uniqueness" that represented the deity's authority to gradually develop a vague instinct, allowing that which was merely a totem or concept to initially "come alive"!
Thus, this thing, which had no intelligence and could not yet be called an artificial death god, began to assimilate with the entire ritual, exerting influence with great desire on Beyonders of lower Sequences of the same pathway.
When certain conditions were met, the thing hidden in the black fog could extend illusory black tubes to establish a connection with a target, drawing on his power and transforming his body.
This method might involve certain special aspects of the Underworld or the Death God's domain, allowing it to bypass the power that isolated the God-forsaken Land and effectively contact the beings inside!
"So, that shadow separated by Shepherd Lovia originated from the 'gift' of the True Creator, with the intention of using the illusory black tube on the former Chief to inversely contaminate the death god's remnants? Maybe that's exactly how the Mother Tree of Desire once replaced the Bound God and claimed the corresponding authority..."
"Fortunately, the current Chief of the City of Silver was very clear-headed. He knew to seek help from the hidden existence behind Little Sun in advance and used the Fortune Thief charm to cleverly sabotage the True Creator's scheme..."
"Hmm, one of the two powerful sealed artefacts of the City of Silver seems very good at purification, capable of restraining the shadow that could contaminate the death god's remnants..."
"Heh, it seems The Fool is going to be noted by the True Creator again. Of course, what stands in front is Amon, after all, that Worm of Time was donated by Him..." Through Little Sun's description and relying on his own inferences, Klein vaguely grasped the hidden conflicts in this exploration operation of the City of Silver.
At the same time, he felt he could preliminarily describe the psychological state of that Shepherd elder:
For Lovia, the illusory black tube that could connect to the outside world was undoubtedly the key for the City of Silver to escape the God-forsaken Land. Therefore, she was very sure of her actions, had no regrets, and only thought that the Chief was the one who destroyed hope.
Someone doing evil is not the scariest thing. The scariest is when that person does evil that they believe is right with a martyr's mindset... Klein couldn't help but sigh in his heart.