There's a big problem with dreams in this world.

"Bishop Kera, is she alright?" Lu Qing asked with some concern, recalling the information about the cursed magic circle.

She had seen Bishop Kera this morning; surely a person can't become something indescribable just from not seeing them for a few hours.

"Fortunately, the treatment was timely; she'll only be uncomfortable for a couple of days at most," the Pope said after hearing Lu Qing's words.

As soon as she finished speaking, Lu Qing saw the entrance to the medical room not far away. The Pope came to the door and gently knocked on it.

There was no response from inside the room. The Pope frowned, then kicked the door of the medical room hard.

"boom!!"

The door remained unmoved. The Pope silently lowered his right leg, then looked at Knight Myron and said, "I'm old now, I don't have the strength I had when I was young. Knight Myron, you should do it."

"I won't pay for anything if you break it," Knight Myron said, his face serious as he suppressed a laugh.

He arrived at the door of the medical room, raised his right leg, and kicked it hard.

"boom!!!"

The door to the medical room was kicked open and crashed into the medicine cabinet opposite the door. Lu Qing and the other two entered the room, only to find that there was no one on the bed sheets.

On the floor next to the hospital bed in the medical room, some wriggling, dark red, foul-smelling chunks of flesh lay quietly on the ground.

"This smell is really strong," Knight Myron said, waving the air.

"..." Lu Qing and the Pope did not speak, but quietly observed every corner of the room.

Lu Qing activated Eagle Vision and discovered barefoot footprints left on the edge of the medical room window.

With her eyes closed, Lu Qing switched to Wayne's perspective.

"Vayne, fly to your left and see if there's anything worth noting," Lu Qing instructed Wayne in her mind.

------------

Chapter 520: Bishop Kera is dead!

"Found her!" Not long after Wayne flew in the direction Lu Qing indicated, Lu Qing saw Bishop Kera running on all fours like a wild beast.

"I know where Bishop Kella went." Coming to her senses, Lu Qing looked at the Pope and Knight Myron and said.

"Where?" the Pope asked, turning to look at Lu Qing.

“It’s over there by the window.” With that, Lu Qing placed one hand on the edge of the window, then flipped over and jumped out, running towards Bishop Kera.

"Hurry up, maybe we can still catch up," Lu Qing urged. As soon as she finished speaking, Knight Myron jumped out of the window after her.

"..." The Pope glanced silently at the area below the window, which was almost five stories high. Although he had been a hunter in his youth, now...

"Sigh, never mind." The Pope sighed almost imperceptibly, then also flipped over and jumped out of the window. However, after landing, the expression on his face suddenly froze for a moment before returning to normal.

"Are you alright?" Knight Myron asked, looking the Pope up and down. He still remembered the scene of the Pope kicking the door, but the door didn't budge.

"It's nothing..." the Pope said in a low voice. Would he say that he had strained his back? Impossible.

"Um, the Pope must have other ways to get it down, right?" Lu Qing thought for a moment, but still couldn't bring herself to say what she was thinking.

As the Pope of the Hongli Sam Cult, a top-tier fighter in this world, the Pope possesses a vast array of magical abilities. Even without using magic, he could have had the vengeful spirits send him down, but he still chose to jump himself.

This was probably influenced by Lu Qing and Knight Myron, to the point that the Pope forgot he could come down in other ways.

"But she doesn't seem to be in any danger." Lu Qing thought to herself, seeing the Pope's normal expression. Then, she thought of something else and looked at the Pope, saying, "Speaking of which, it's so high up here, how did Bishop Keira manage to jump down unharmed?"

Upon hearing Lu Qing's words, the Pope realized something was amiss. He frowned and said, "I don't know either. Bishop Keira doesn't seem to exercise regularly."

No sooner had he finished speaking than he saw Bishop Kera running on all fours like a wild beast in the distance.

"This is really..." Knight Myron felt that he had been challenged more times today than in the entire previous year combined.

"She's probably been affected by the void; we need to hurry and give chase," the Pope said, his brow furrowed. (Part of the reason for his furrowed brow was his back pain...)

"......"

Lu Qing didn't speak. In her line of sight, she noticed a blood-red fleshy ball that looked like it was made of mist floating above Bishop Kera's head.

Lu Qing turned off Eagle Eye and Spirit Vision skills, but found that she could still see the shape of that ball of flesh.

After thinking for a moment, taking advantage of the fact that the Pope and Knight Myron were not looking at her, Lu Qing used her golden vertical pupils. The next moment, two cold and slippery tentacles began to wriggle out from under her clothes.

"It's a bit cramped... Hey, don't move!" Two tentacles, squeezed inside the clothing, touched some strange places as they ran...

With a slight manipulation of the tentacles, which coiled around her waist, Lu Qing used her golden vertical pupils to look at the top of Bishop Kera's head.

This time, what appeared in her field of vision was not a blood-red ball of flesh, but a grotesque hand of flesh with numerous stitches and seams on its body.

The strange hand floated straight above Bishop Kera, each of its five fingers pulling a blood-red, tumor-covered chain of flesh that connected to Bishop Kera's limbs and head.

The next moment, as if noticing that Lu Qing was looking at him, the strange hand slowly stopped manipulating Bishop Kera's fingers.

"Snap." The fleshy chains connecting the monstrous hand's fingers snapped suddenly, and the next moment, these chains flew straight toward Lu Qing.

"!!"

Faster than the blink of an eye, Lu Qing had no time to react before she found these fleshy chains already connected to her body, yet she felt nothing at all.

Just as she was about to do something, the shadow beneath her suddenly began to writhe, and a slender, pale arm grabbed one of the flesh chains attached to Lu Qing's body.

"Come here." The younger sister Lu Yu's voice rang out from the shadows, and the next moment, the fleshy monster hand was pulled into her shadow.

A sound like some kind of monster was devouring something rang out, and Lu Qing's shadow kept changing and wriggling before quickly calming down.

[Congratulations to player, Floating Spirit: Sister and Teddy Bear's skill has been upgraded!]

[Shadow Binding Technique - Shadow Manipulation: Uses the power of shadow to control the target's body.]

"..." After a moment of silence, Lu Qing looked at her shadow, then at the contents of her diary, and asked somewhat blankly, "Is that all?"

She opened her mouth, then looked at her own calm shadow. For some reason, she suddenly had a feeling that "something strange lives in my shadow."

Of course she knew her sister Lu Yu was there, but she never expected... "Wow, my shadow is terrifying!" Lu Qing thought to herself.

Just then, Bishop Kera, who was running in the distance, suddenly stopped. A rational light returned to her eyes, and then...

"Ahhhhh!!"

Bishop Keira is dead...

.......

After returning Bishop Kera to the infirmary, Lu Qing explained to the three of them:

"That's pretty much it. Bishop Kera was controlled by a blood-red hand. After that hand realized I had seen it, it tried to control me, but I killed it with a mental attack."

"A spirit I can't even see?" The Pope frowned and said, "Is this something new created by the Guiji Cult?"

"I'm not really sure either. After I arrived at the medical room, I rested for a while and suddenly felt nauseous and wanted to vomit, so I got up to go to the bathroom."

“As soon as I stood up, I threw up…” Bishop Kella said, her face pale. “You probably saw what I threw up, those blood-red chunks of flesh.”

"After I vomited all that stuff out, I tried to use a purification spell on myself, but before I could even start, I lost consciousness."

"Your Highness, do you see anything strange on Bishop Kera?" After hearing Bishop Kera's words, the Pope looked at Lu Qing and asked.

Lu Qing shook her head and said, "No, this time it's really over."

"Hmm... then let's leave it at that." The Pope lowered his head thoughtfully, then looked at Bishop Kera and said, "Bishop Kera, please rest here. We're going to the Hall of Roots to check on everyone."

“You go ahead with your work, I’m fine,” Bishop Kera nodded.

------------

Chapter 521: The Prison Break Operation

"Have all the guards been moved to the cathedral?" Number Two asked, looking up at the prison in the distance on the streets of Vanhustan.

"Yes, because of a shortage of manpower, most of the soldiers guarding the prison have been transferred away, leaving only the minimum number needed to maintain the prison," said a man with an extra mouth on the left side of his face.

His name doesn't matter; what matters is that he is now a high-ranking member of the Guiji Sect, codenamed Number Eight. However, due to Number Four's defection and Number Five's death, he has been temporarily promoted to the position of Number Five.

Number Two frowned and said, "Be careful not to let anyone see your face."

“I understand, I understand. Ordinary people can hardly understand our art. I will pay more attention.” Number Eight, no, Number Five, nodded with a smile, then pulled down the collar of his shirt to cover the lower half of his face.

"Why aren't you wearing a mask?" Number Two asked, somewhat puzzled.

"Masks are too stuffy, and don't you think wearing a mask makes you look more suspicious?" Number Eight said nonchalantly.

"Never mind... Tell the men below they have five minutes to prepare." Number Two shook his head, looking towards the prison in the distance. "Once I enter the prison, you can begin your operation!"

"I understand, I'll pass it on to them, but..." Number Five seemed to have thought of something and looked at Number Two, saying, "Shouldn't we inform Number Three?"

"No need." Number Two shook his head and said, "Number Three has more important things to do."

No, actually Number Two had no intention of telling Number Three about this operation. He thought of what happened a few days ago when Number Three went to the swamp to pursue someone but returned empty-handed.

Judging from the escape route of Number Four and the traces left behind, Number Three was 100% certain that Number Four had definitely left from the swamp, and given her condition at the time, she couldn't have gone very far.

But when Number Three came back, he said he hadn't found anything. Number Two certainly wouldn't completely believe that Number Three had betrayed him because of this, but this matter was too important, so it wouldn't hurt to be a little more suspicious.

If he could, he would even like to carry out the operation alone, but that was unrealistic; he couldn't succeed in breaking into the prison on his own.

"First, they deliberately exposed the location of a large stronghold near the capital, resulting in a significant reduction in the city's guards. Then, they caused a riot inside the cathedral. If the operation fails..." Number Two narrowed his eyes, calculating the costs and benefits of this operation.

No, it's not a matter of profit or loss, but rather that they have to do it.

With that thought in mind, Number Two calmed down and quietly waited for the time to act. Soon, five minutes passed, and Number Two arrived at the prison gate and asked the guard, "Hello, may I go in?"

"Unauthorized personnel are prohibited, uh..." Before the guard could react, Number Two's right hand pierced the guard's abdomen like a sharp blade, interrupting his words.

"You!" Just as the other guard was about to do something, a sharp dagger pierced his heart from behind.

Number Five stepped out from behind the soldier, licking his lips simultaneously, and said, "The blood flowing from the heart smells really good, intoxicating..."

Number Two couldn't understand what was so pleasant about the smell of blood. He looked at Number Five and asked, "Have the rest of the guards been dealt with?"

"It's been taken care of; not a sound was made," Number Five replied.

“Very good, let’s go in.” Number Two nodded in satisfaction, then looked at the prison gate in front of him.

........

On the other side, Lu Qing and Knight Mellen followed behind the Pope to the Hall of Roots, which Yorick had previously shown them.

The place was now crowded with people, some of whom were unaware of what had happened and stood there bewildered, asking those around them if they knew anything.