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Chapter 476. The Scapegoat (Part 476)

Upon hearing this, Jiang Jianxin was startled.

She never imagined that not only she had a part-time job, but Andorra also had a side business.

But... an inspector?

—What exactly is this?
Jiang Jianxin sorted through his memories of Andorra from his third playthrough and discovered a very strange point.

In a society where faith is paramount, almost everyone has their own belief system.

The Owen family, to which Andorra belongs, started their business in gambling and worships the gods of greed and wealth.

Followers of the god of greed would wear a multicolored flower on their chest as a symbol. In the second cycle, when the head of the Owen family, Anjana, came forward to sever ties with Andorra, she wore a multicolored flower on her chest.

But Andorra never wore it.

As for believing in the God of Wealth, that's even more impossible. His previous book, "Finance and Faith Studies," directly points to a conspiracy involving the God of Wealth.

Believers are absolutely loyal to their own gods and would never do such a thing.

So now the question is, who exactly does Andorra worship?
Upon raising this question, Jiang Jianxin suddenly realized that in a faith-based society, besides believers and believer trainees, there might be a third type of profession.

The ultimate goal of this profession is to become a court inspector.

When Andorra went to great lengths to infiltrate the Vatican in order to expose the God of Wealth's conspiracy, besides his passion, he was probably also motivated by his professional duty.

Having figured this out, Jiang Jianxin thoughtfully stroked his chin.

"Om..."

As Andorra raised his placard, a huge screen appeared above the courtroom, showing the entire process as Andorra witnessed from his perspective.

In the scene, he walks into the restaurant, the chef turns his head 180 degrees, and Andorra realizes something is wrong. He suddenly dials a number, but the phone rings only twice before going silent.

"Om..."

In the kitchen, the chef's limbs, like wet dough stretched by an invisible hand, suddenly extended, spanning several meters, and with a sticky, whistling sound, instantly wrapped around Andorra's limbs and torso.

The immense force lifted him into the air and slammed him hard onto the cold, sticky metal cutting board.

"boom--"

The dull thud of the impact to the back of the head and the crunching sound of bones grinding together were enough to make your teeth ache.

"call……"

All the lights in the restaurant went out at the same instant, and darkness swallowed everything.

Only in the chef's eyes, which were originally black holes, suddenly two tiny, crimson lights appeared, like the eyes of a demon opening in the abyss.

"Shh!"

A chilling light slashed down from above—it was the heavy, greasy cleaver, its blade still stained with some unknown dark red debris, and the sound of it cutting through the air was sharp and piercing.

"Snap—click!"

The dull thud of the blade slicing into solid matter was followed by the chilling sound of bones shattering.

The perspective rotates and inverts wildly, accompanied by intense pain and suffocation that almost bursts out of the screen, but there is not a single scream throughout the entire process, only broken gasps of suppressed emotions.

Vision blurred, blood filled the air, and everything was shrouded in trembling and dizziness.

I could only vaguely sense that my body was being brutally dismembered.

After an unknown amount of time, the inhuman torture seemed to have come to a temporary end. A large, bluish-gray hand with black grime embedded in its fingernails grabbed Andorr's hair and lifted him up like a piece of mangled flesh.

Blood gushed down like a waterfall. A blurred vision swept across the chef's numb face, across the chaotic kitchen, and then he was carelessly tossed aside—

"Pfft!"

Andorra fell into the river of blood that had formed on the ground.

"Gurgle..."

Bubbles churned around my ears, my body sank deeper and deeper through the wooden floor, falling into the darker next level.

After the feeling of weightlessness, there is a heavy impact as you fall onto some kind of hard object.

The visibility was poor, and I could only barely make out that it was an extremely spacious and damp space.

The strong earthy smell was mixed with the odor of preservatives.

"Tap...tap...tap..."

The crisp sound of footsteps, like hard objects striking tiles, approached slowly from the darkness ahead.

Finally, a pair of spotless, porcelain-white feet stopped in front of him.

A figure bent down.

It appeared to be humanoid, but its face was smooth like porcelain.

It suddenly grabbed Andorra's head and turned him to one side.

"Ho..."

The porcelain vase figure seemed to emit an extremely high-pitched laugh, like a baby's babbling, from that crack.

Then, it turned and walked into the darkness.

"despair……"

"despair……"

Andorra was led to a rough wooden cross that stood upright.

"Wow..."

The cold iron nails pressed against the sides of the skull—

"Boom!"

"Boom!"

The vibrations from the hammer blows traveled directly to the brain, but the pain had already numbed the senses.

His body was fixed to the cross, and blood began to slowly flow down along specific grooves, dripping into an unseen container below, making a regular and hollow "drip-drip" sound.

At that moment, perhaps illuminated by some ritualistic light, or perhaps just a brief moment of clarity in perception, Andorra noticed that the area around the cross was filled with countless identical blue and white porcelain vases, arranged in a dense, orderly fashion.

Above each bottle opening is a human head, its expression either frozen in terror, lost in eternal peace, or completely empty.

The heads gleamed in the dim light, silently watching their new comrades.

The moment their gaze met that forest of porcelain bottles adorned with human heads—

"Shh!"

The entire screen was instantly filled with an overwhelming red, as if it had been completely soaked in blood.

"Om..."

The giant screen above the courtroom shattered silently, dissipating into specks of light. At the same time, solemn words appeared on the panel:

[An unusual event of divine interference has been detected!]

[Large-scale illegal sacrificial rituals have been detected, involving a large number of innocent individuals. This behavior seriously violates Article 1 of the Basic Law, a core principle: ignorance is no excuse.]

[Identifying unauthorized deities...]

On the blood-red giant screen, several cold blue horizontal bars appeared, scanning repeatedly and regularly from top to bottom.

Like a merciless eye of judgment, it attempts to peel away the traces of rule disturbance hidden behind the chaotic blood and broken scene.

Jiang Jianxin held his breath and waited.

By this time, she understood the purpose of the precognitive family.

The bunch of meetings that person had pre-booked in the account were indeed useful—will this court hearing bring down the mastermind in one fell swoop?

Jiang Jianxin was a little nervous; she really wanted to know who or what god wanted to harm her.

Is it part of the God of Light lineage?
Or is it a branch of truth?

Or perhaps something else unexpected?

Each scan line on the giant screen struck like a heavy drumbeat, pounding against the intervals between her heartbeats.

The air seemed to freeze, and only the faint hum of the scanning lines could be heard in the courtroom.

until--

[Recognition complete.]

[The deity whose authority directly interfered with and directed the illegal rituals in this case is—]

[Bottle God.]

The cold words were imprinted on the bloodless screen.

Jiang Jianxin: "..."

She was stunned, a question mark almost forming above her head.

Bottle God?

The vase is the culprit, and the murderer is the "vase god"... Logically, it seems to fit perfectly and there is no fault to be found.

But why... did that intense sense of unease in my heart not only fail to dissipate, but instead become even more acute?

Like a fine thorn, it gets stuck in the cracks of one's mind.

That's so logical.

It happened naturally... almost deliberately.

It's as if someone had already prepared the "Bottle God" label, just waiting for this moment to stick it on.

A murmur of discussion arose from the judges' panel behind me, which quickly turned into fairly uniform applause.

Most of the judges, who came from diverse backgrounds and backgrounds, raised green cards in approval.

"The Basic Law is meticulous and traces back to the essence of things!"

"I never expected it to be the Bottle God..."

"Tsk tsk, violating the first ironclad rule of 'ignorance is no crime,' losing one's divine position is the least of one's worries."

"He brought this upon himself, so he has no one to blame but himself."

"..."

The buzzing of discussion carried a sense of detachment and satisfaction at the apparent manifestation of legal principles.

Jiang Jianxin ignored the noise behind her, her gaze fixed on the blue and white porcelain vases displayed as evidence in the center of the courtroom.

The glaze is cold, and the patterns are bizarre.

Jiang Jianxin understood perfectly well that this was a scapegoat.

The real hand behind the scenes may have also planned this court meeting initiated by the prophet and prepared this "bottle god" that could be thrown out.

[The deity Bottle God, having seriously violated the first core principle of the Basic Law: Ignorance is no crime, has been stripped of his divine authority by the Tribunal of All Realms and sentenced to the ultimate punishment—annihilation.]

[The review panel of this meeting is hereby requested to make a final ruling on the above judgment.]

The text appears with an unquestionable authority.

On the judging panel, green dots lit up one after another, and signs indicating approval were raised one by one, spreading like sparks.

Almost all the reviewers expressed their support immediately.

Soon, only the one at the very front remained.

The God of Deathly Silence.

He made no move, and the three-color cards representing for, against, and abstaining on the table in front of him remained as dark as ever, showing no sign of lighting up.

All eyes in the courtroom instantly focused on that gray shadow.

　Having two deities is correct; the God of Wealth can be considered a secondary deity. As explained before, the relationship with the God of Wealth is contractual; only worshipping him requires a service contract, and a contract is an agreement.

　　Regarding feedback on donations, I have time today, so I'll post two updates!
　　(End of this chapter)