He is the leader of the Tantric sect in Chagdu.

The deception was a resounding success!

Ding! The team has grown! (3→5)

During the storytelling, although Virtue and the other man repeatedly emphasized that they had important matters to attend to, they couldn't resist Ellen's subtle persuasion and gentle coaxing. In the end, they decided to bring these newbies along, just to develop their colleague relationship in the future and let them get familiar with the business.

Moreover, she also became somewhat interested in the mysterious "will" that Ellen had mentioned.

Anyway, this trip is to close the case of the incident in the suburbs, and there is no special purpose. It's a good opportunity to find the mysterious person who sent the secret message. Maybe we can even find out the remaining members of the "Mirror of Radiance".

The girl thought about it for a moment and decided it was fine, so she happily introduced herself to the group:

"My name is Wilting, and this is Sherlock, my assistant. We belong to the Trinity Foundation, the Special Countermeasures Bureau. In layman's terms, we are the 'official' mystical side of Hallownest, fully responsible for mystical matters within the city."

Wilting held up his name tag and waved it so the group could see the tree shape: "If you see this symbol anywhere else in the future, it means it belongs to the Foundation. If you encounter danger... well, let's talk about that after you're hired."

She had clearly already considered the three of them as future colleagues. Thinking of Sherlock's constant nagging in her ear, "Sir, going it alone isn't a long-term solution; you need to learn how to win people over...", she naturally wanted to get closer to them. However—

"However... before that, we still need to deal with your sister's problem first."

Veltin sighed softly and reached out to ruffle Nie's hair, but the girl dodged away like a kitten. Veltin could only offer an awkward yet polite smile and casually ask, "How old is she?"

"Fourteen years old..." Eileen displayed appropriate confusion, worry, and a perfectly timed feigned composure. "Nie, what happened to her?"

"If a child comes into contact with that red pool too early, there might be some risks involved, and neither of us wants that to happen. So, I need to make her a limiter so that her power doesn't get out of control."

"At this age, there shouldn't be any major problems, don't worry," Veltin reassured her softly, giving Sherlock a wink. "Do you have any universal ritual materials with you?"

The man shook his head—as a pure thug, Sherlock only carries weapons when he goes out, focusing on the thrill of combat. Asking him to deal with those complicated ritual props... would be too much of a challenge.

This is a bit troublesome...

Virtue was tugging at a stray hair by her ear, lost in thought, when suddenly something occurred to her.

After hesitating for a moment, she took out a small object from deep inside her long trench coat, gestured for Nie to hold out her hand, and then gently placed it in the girl's palm: "Here, take this. Remember to keep it with you at all times."

"..."

Nie stared blankly at the object in her hand. Ellen leaned over to take a look: it was a small, exquisite ring, heavy yet not like metal, but rather like a single ring-shaped gemstone, shimmering with a bright white crystalline texture.

On the ring face, the oval-shaped long leaves and the intertwined, layered stems naturally present an exquisite circular shape, without any trace of artificial carving. They blend harmoniously with the entire ring body, appearing as if it were made by nature itself.

Sherlock cast a surprised and confused look at her, and Ellen instantly realized—this was a good thing.

"This...is very valuable, isn't it?" Even Ellen, who knew nothing about mysterious items, could sense the extraordinary nature of this ring. It was like seeing a vibrant new branch in the dead of winter, with red sap dripping from the buds, its rich vitality dancing and swirling within the ring's surface...

His Insightful Eyes opened uncontrollably, and he saw the pure white door slightly ajar, from which a series of small emerald green characters emerged:

"Mistletoe in a Cycloidal Formation - A Ritual Vessel"

"Anchor/Fulcrum/A Beacon of No Return/Winter Breakthrough/Old News About the Sacred Tree (A Standard Before It Ripens)"

"Heart Anchor: When the soul needs a fulcrum, I learn from the compassionate mother, tying my beloved child to an unknown plant. The oval leaves bear silent witness. From then on, the child's heart will grow wrapped in flesh and blood, inseparable, sharing life and death. May he always be at peace."

"Golden Branch (false): My life and death are similar to the withering and flourishing of plants. We are of the same nature. Thus, the divine spirit can leave the body and reside in mistletoe. Even in the harsh winter when all the trees are bare, the emerald green and crystalline things still grow like golden branches among the branches."

"Please tell the secret of spreading this story... I beg you, it is the love of a loving mother for her child, the new life born from a golden branch."

"The ring's wish: it wants to transform old news into a story, to be passed down, or an epic... or even a myth that gets a sequel."

……

Although I don't quite understand it, it seems really impressive...

He fell into deep thought: Was this silver-haired girl, whom he had just met, being too kind to them?

"This is a 'ritual artifact'... It possesses the quality of a 'mental anchor.' As long as it is worn properly, the body and mind can be unified, thus preventing the loss of control over power due to immature mind, which could endanger life."

Veltin explained the ring's purpose, which elicited a sullen response from Ellen:

"But, wouldn't this...?"

Seeing Eileen's troubled expression, Veltin chuckled and narrowed his eyes: "Hmph... This is one of my childhood treasures. I used to love it, but I hardly ever use it now. Take it, consider it a gift from me to Nee."

Veltin concealed the ring's true value—a ritual object with a mind anchor attribute is not simply "precious." What does it mean to be immune to mental instability? For novice mystics, more than 95% of dangers originate from within rather than from the outside world. "Instability" is the risk with the highest mortality rate, and this ring can completely avoid it.

It means that... as long as you have it, even a small child can start exploring the Grand Prize Pool early on, getting a head start of several years earlier than others, giving them an enormous advantage.

This thing was just given away like that?

Sherlock felt his heart was bleeding: My dear Sir, our young lady, are you hungry?

You can give away such a precious item to a complete stranger you've just met?

As a subordinate, he had no way to get the ring back without going through Virtue... He could only swallow his anger and take a deep breath. Sherlock, just think of us as colleagues after the investment. Calm down, calm down!

Seeing the middle-aged man beside her cough violently, his face turning purple, Ellen thought carefully and analyzed the situation, then silently clenched Nie's small hand and held the ring tightly in her hand.

"Thank you so much... Red bean paste is so good."

Her nonsensical ramblings successfully amused Virtin. Elaine, meanwhile, was busy changing the little girl's equipment and putting the ring on Nee's finger, thus extinguishing Sherlock's last shred of hope.

This time, when faced with Virtue's hand reaching for his head, Ne didn't flinch. Like a cat that had just eaten a can of food, he felt obligated to help, and although he was still a little reluctant, he gently moved closer and rubbed his hand against the girl's palm.

Seeing the cat's coy and reluctant attitude, Virtue felt a surge of joy. This was one of the pleasures of petting a cat—pure bliss!

So cute.

but……

While enjoying her harvest, Virtue felt inexplicably dazed—this strange feeling lingered around the girl, and after searching for its source for a long time, she suddenly felt a sense of familiarity from Nie without any reason.

She stared blankly at Nie's face: she searched her memory palace again, confirming that she had never seen this girl before...

Looking into those dark red eyes, Virtin fell into deep thought.

Blood-red eyes... I have no recollection of that.

Other features...a young girl, with snow-white skin, a delicate and lovely appearance, gothic-style attire, and a long black and white dress...

And gray hair.

Gray hair...?

A feeling of palpitation rose in his mind and surged into his chest. Virtin stared at Nee's long gray hair, his eyes unfocused, his hands frozen in mid-air, and his lips remained silent for a long time.

She was trembling slightly.

It seems to be... that person.

"..."

At this moment, Nie seemed to sense something, silently tilting her head and hiding herself in the shadows between the carriages. Only when the neon lights outside the window could no longer illuminate the backlit girl did Veltin snap out of her daze—

As she instinctively reached to straighten her hat, she saw Nee suddenly blink, an unusual glint flashing in her jewel-like pupils, accompanied by a crisp sound, like the light crack of glass shattering on paper, entering Virtin's perception range.

"Ping—"

The girl knew what that sound was: the explosive sound of a bullet tearing through the air at high speed.

That noise came from a sniper rifle.

Shining with metallic luster, like a slender bullet with a sharp blade, it burst forth with a sharp, wing-like cry. From two opposite directions, the jet-black arc of light almost pierced through the entire neon-colored backdrop, shattering the side window of the carriage at the same time.

The air was bitterly cold, and the killing intent ran rampant.

A few meters can pass in the blink of an eye.

Human reaction speed has its limits, determined by the speed at which electrical signals are transmitted through neural synapses. Without any combat-oriented modifications, the average person's reaction time is approximately 200ms. This time would be even shorter if they possessed feline or other animal-like physical characteristics.

But no matter how much you compress the reaction time, it's hard to outpace a bullet that comes from behind and has been accelerated by electromagnetic force.

Except for occult scholars.

"Sigh... I'm actually a peace lover."

Veltin sighed softly. She believed that living was a wonderful thing, although this old-fashioned idea was not widely accepted in the lower town. But the girl still felt that life should not be wasted.

Unfortunately, the attackers didn't understand this.

The next instant, the surging red liquid carried her into an invisible doorway, where she watched the bullet freeze in mid-air—in this space of reason, thinking no longer required time, and the girl even had the leisure to observe the reactions of everyone present:

Sherlock, there's no need to look at him. He's got a crazy look on his face and is probably already thinking about how to have fun fighting.

Lin...Veltin suspected that she was just there to make up the numbers in the trio. No matter how you looked at her, she was a genuine office worker whose nerves, stimulated by excessive caffeine, did not react at all.

Nie, this is an alert little one. She must have noticed the unusual reflection and instinctively tried to dodge it.

Finally, Eileen...

Veltin rested her chin on her hand, but the girl on the other side of reality couldn't make the corresponding movement—she couldn't see anything in those gray eyes hidden behind the glasses, as if through a thick, murky fog.

Although he showed no expression, Ellen still reacted. He gripped Nee's hand tightly and leaned forward, as if trying to protect the girl behind him.

It appears they were unaware of the attack.

Veltin analyzed the meaning behind each person's actions, like a profiler, silently deepening her understanding of them. As a mystical scholar of the principles of enlightenment, this had almost become a professional habit for her.

It seems that the high-profile boarding earlier worked, and things started to get interesting immediately. There are always some impatient fools in the car who like to tip off their superiors, and those self-proclaimed secret societies, although they don't have much real power, are keen to cause some minor trouble for the foundation in order to create hype and promote their own power.

Now, it's time to get rid of those annoying flies.

Time, which had been frozen in her mind, began to flow again. With the whistling of bullets, the girl's arrogance remained undiminished, her eyes flashing with mockery, and a curtain seemed to rise behind her amber pupils—

The crimson liquid boiled, and an invisible force rose and fell in the pool, reaching out tendrils into the mortal world like new buds sprouting from a tree.

Those who lean, those who build their inclinations in the Great Ceremony Pool, those who have found their way. Facing a bullet already pressed against the back of his head, burning hot, Virtin did not turn back, nor did he need to.

The next moment was the instant when steel collided with the invisible barrier, sparks flew, followed by a tooth-grinding buzzing sound.

The rising transparent barrier reflects the projection of hostility, with countless tiny halos shimmering within it, like a flawless diamond with a myriad of facets—the shape of glass, born from the restraint of inorganic matter, dissolved by the red liquid, solidified into man-made brilliance.

The bullet tip was melted by the high temperature, and the remaining half of the bullet lost its last bit of kinetic energy, completely suspended in mid-air, imprisoned in a glass cage. The girl gently took it off, still quite warm, and quietly admired it between her two fair and slender fingers.

The principle of "Enlightenment" is indeed a power that is not good at fighting, but a mature tendency... requires the construction of at least two principles to be called a complete path.

"This is the magnificent path I have walked, the 'Gateway'—the path where 'Enlightenment' and 'Sky' go hand in hand. Enlightenment is the principle of insight, opening, and ceaseless exploration, while Sky..."

"Qiong" signifies sublimity, enclosure, and the eternal and constant principle.

In the early stages of a mysterious power's development, this is a principle that excels at defense.

Seeing that Ellen seemed to be still in shock, Veltin grinned mischievously and took the initiative to teach her some basic knowledge about the mysterious world.

"Is that so..." Eileen was still a little dazed from the sudden attack, and in her daze, she offered a formulaic compliment, "Ms. Velding, you're amazing..."

Ellen looked at Nee beside her. Just seconds before, the girl had turned around and hugged him tightly, almost melting her body into his embrace. At their feet was a circle of intricate ciphers, with tiny embers drifting around like dust. The boiling red liquid had only cooled down a few seconds ago, yet Veltin hadn't noticed.

The ripples of the invisible technique stopped a foot away from where they were standing. While protecting Ellen, Ne had laid down silence in a small area, concealing the power that was overflowing outwards.

Eileen thought to herself: I have a feeling... this side seems to be a bit more powerful.

"Holy crap, holy crap, holy crap, holy crap!"

Lin screamed like a startled groundhog, "Damn it, what the hell is going on? Is everyone alright?"

Now is clearly not the time for small talk, but Lin is completely oblivious to this. She probably just realized it; before her mind even started processing it, her mouth had already jumped out: "Has someone gone mad? We're not even out of the city yet, and they've already brought out sniper rifles. Are they going to bring out space-based cannons next?"

"Space-based cannons are out of the question; they don't have that authority," Veltin replied seriously, then turned to Sherlock, who looked distressed, and asked in a low voice, "Can you capture them?"

As another target, Sherlock appeared completely unharmed, and the bullet was nowhere to be found... Only a few steps away from him, on the ground, was a thin, charred patch that looked like molten metal that had solidified again.

"Sir, this time we ran into a coward. He fired a shot and ran away," Sherlock explained, sounding aggrieved. "He didn't even leave a single cannon fodder behind. The firing point was about a kilometer away, so we probably can't catch him."

"So you just let them go?" Eileen had just been so frightened that she lifted the silencing of Lin, so she was now very excited. "I was terrified... I'm guessing my period will be all messed up this month, and you just let those bastards get away like that?"

"..."

The men's lips twitched, but only Virtin rubbed his temples and replied helplessly, "I never said I was going to let them go. Since we can't catch them alive, we might as well just kill them."

The Foundation's authority cannot be challenged, and no one in the Countermeasures Bureau wants to hear those insects boasting in the suburbs, saying things like, "I survived from the Foundation, and those guys aren't that scary."

I couldn't stand it, so I covered it all up.

A faint light emanated from Virtin's palm. The young girl, still holding the mindset of nurturing the next generation, slowly explained to the three of them:

"General Mystic Arts Compilation, Ritual Chapter: The most basic and lethal ritual, simply named 'Curse Killing.'"

Picking up the molten sheet of iron from the ground, along with the broken bullet in his hand, Veltin had collected the "ritual medium." As an object carrying malice and murderous intent, a bullet is very dangerous if it falls into the hands of a mystic instead of killing its target.

The lethal rituals among mystical scholars require them to go to great lengths to collect various powerful ritual objects, purchase high-end incense and materials, and have very high requirements for the timing of the ritual, the purity of the medium, and the quality of consumables, since they need to overcome or break through the mystery of their opponents.

But dealing with mortals... requires no conditions.

The "unlucky guy" chosen to attack the Foundation's commissioner must be just an ordinary person, or even a scapegoat who was ostracized from within. Therefore, Virtue did not even use any "ritual" or "ritual implements".

She simply watched the two bullets silently, dissolving the invisible malice within them into crimson liquid, returning it to the Great Gift Pool, and then casually offering a sliver of light from her mind, making a request to the boundless swamp—

Simplified Ritual: "Curse Killing"

"As long as there is a catalyst as a channel to exert influence, murder can be committed regardless of distance. This power completely transcends worldly understanding. This is mysticism, the invisible art in the mouths of esoteric religions, the invisible and intangible influence."

Even the agents of the Countermeasures Bureau are strictly restricted from using mystery to solve problems, because it often destroys the mission objective as well—and if this power is not restrained, it will be a disaster for the entire Hive.

Veltin's expression was serious. "This is the meaning of the Foundation's existence. Power can only be somewhat pale and powerless when it is under the control of order, but it can still speak of righteousness... If possible, we will strive to shape it into justice."

The next moment, the bullet shattered into dust in mid-air.

Atop a giant building a kilometer away, two assassins who had recently cleared the sniping site and moved far away suddenly froze in place.

Countless cracks erupted from the inside of that body, gradually spreading throughout its entire form, and like glass collapsing, it exploded into a pool of blood mist in the next instant.