Goddess Kaleidoscope

If we can get Lude off the field, it would be a good strategy to drive away the tiger and get rid of the wolf!

According to Dick, this artifact was accidentally lost by the Goddess of Thieves on the battlefield of the final battle during the great war of the gods three hundred years ago.

Normally, there is a special connection between a divine artifact and the god who created it. No matter how far apart they are, the god can sense its existence. However, the artifact of the God of Thieves must have been sealed by some other god, which made it impossible for the God of Thieves to sense it. Therefore, he could only mobilize his followers to search for it with a "human wave tactic". This search lasted for three hundred years!

Ironically, the Black Hand Brotherhood has been searching for this artifact since its inception, for nearly two hundred years, but they still don't know what it looks like. Their master thief only said that the object's form has definitely been modified and could be anything.

But divine artifacts are not ordinary objects; they contain divine power. If believers discover any unusual treasures, they can simply take out the "Black Order," a token of the Black Hand Brotherhood, and touch it to see if there is any reaction. This will tell them whether it is what the God of Thieves is looking for.

Upon hearing Dick mention "the artifact of the gods," Ludwig glanced furtively at Hume beside him, who responded with a big eye roll.

Clearly, Dick's account does not conform to historical fact. Hume withdrew midway through the War of the Gods three hundred years ago; he did not participate in the final battle, and there is no basis for the claim that he lost any artifacts.

If we really have to say what she lost in that battle, it would probably only be her "face" as a god.

It's not hard to see from this that the "false god of thievery" spread a distorted history to her followers, and what she really wanted to find might just be Hume!

After a moment's hesitation, Lud decided to play along.

To help Hume, he needed to find an opportunity to contact the Brotherhood of the Black Hand, and the necromancer Dick was an ideal entry point. Dick held a high position within the Brotherhood and, mistakenly believing Hume to be a necromancer, was trying to recruit him.

If Ludd simply goes with the flow, it won't be difficult for him to blend in.

With this in mind, Lu De gradually began to form a rough plan.

End of this chapter

After asking all the questions he wanted to ask, Ludwig neither immediately accepted nor outright refused Dick's invitation to join the Brotherhood. He simply said that he had other important matters to attend to at the moment, but he was indeed somewhat interested in the artifact of the God of Thieves that Dick had just mentioned.

Lud then casually tossed the human skin bag full of black beads back to Dick, and said something understated.

"Considering we're in the same profession, I can forgive your past offenses, but I can't let you go now, lest it tarnish my current reputation. Do you understand what I mean?"

"I understand, I understand everything! I will do my best to cooperate with you. Or you can hang me in public, I know how to escape my soul, playing dead is no problem."

In order to make a good impression on Ludwig, Dick patted his chest and said that he would fully cooperate with the performance and would never arouse unnecessary suspicion about the master's public identity.

Lude nodded, thinking to himself, "So you can play dead after all. I'll have to be extra careful when I get my hands on you in the future."

Before leaving the detention center, Lud told the guards that after his thorough interrogation, he had basically determined that Dick was not an assassin, but a mage adventurer who had taken a forbidden potion and was mentally unstable, which was why he attacked him. According to local law, he could be detained for seven days.

As for Maine, he shouldn't have much to do with this. Just put him back in his cell; it's the Baron's prerogative to deal with him.

On the way back, Lud remained silent, his mind racing with plans. He had originally intended to use Maine to get close to the Black Hand Brotherhood, but the appearance of the necromancer Dick gave him a more suitable option.

Based on his experience as an undercover agent in his previous life, Ludger plans to set a trap to "help" Dick in order to gain his trust further and lay the groundwork for infiltrating the Brotherhood of the Black Hand.

During his conversation with Dick, Rudd learned another crucial piece of information: there was another Black Hand Brotherhood group searching for the artifact in the northern part of the kingdom, and this group was at odds with Dick, following him and waiting for an opportunity to steal his prize.

If you're going to set a trap, you could use this group.

Back at the temple, it was already past midnight. Most people in the temple were asleep, but Lud dared not sleep. He had to write down the information he had just obtained and the thoughts in his mind so that he wouldn't forget them the next day.

So Ludwig returned to his bedroom, lit a lamp at his desk, and began writing furiously. Then, as was his habit, he used the wall as a blackboard to list the names of all the relevant people, creating a rather complex network of relationships.

"We have the actors and the character setup, now it's time for the plot... Who!?"

Suddenly, Ludwig sensed someone behind him, which startled him. He thought there was another, more powerful assassin, but when he turned around, he saw Hume had entered the room without anyone noticing and was carefully examining the network of relationships that Ludwig had drawn on the wall.

Are you planning to wipe them all out in one fell swoop?

"Didn't you go back to sleep?"

"I am a god, whether I sleep or not is irrelevant to me, but I reckon you're still awake, so I came to check on you!"

"..."

Hume had by then removed her mercenary-style tight leather armor, leaving her in a thin shirt and hot pants so short they exposed her thighs, revealing large expanses of caramel-colored skin. Only two of the five buttons on her chest were fastened, revealing the deep ravines of the Loess Plateau above and a crescent-shaped indentation on the flat plain below, along with a pair of shapely, long legs.

In the dead of night, a dark-skinned elf woman dressed like this silently entered his room, carrying two cups and a large bottle of wine. The scene and atmosphere made Lu De, a virgin in two lifetimes, unconsciously think of some tense and exciting "movie plots".

"Isn't it inappropriate to drink so much at this hour?"

"What are you afraid of? I'm not going to use you as a snack."

Hume gave Ludwig a disapproving look and poured himself a glass. Ludwig thought for a moment and then picked up the bottle as well.

"Hey! I've never seen this kind of wine before. Where did you get it?"

"This souvenir from Oyster Harbor is a gift from my late friend, Bishop Evanrus. Before he left the port, I secretly went to his ship and found this in his private trunk. It's a high-elf-brewed wine, a rare delicacy that even kings might not easily obtain."

Hume swirled the fragrant wine in his glass, then gently blew on the rim, instantly filling the windowless bedroom with a refreshing breeze. Ludwig took a sip; the taste was indeed extraordinary, like mint with a subtle difference, as if he were holding a breath of cool air in his mouth.

"A very interesting taste."

"Not bad, right? During the Elven race's heyday, this was a sacrificial offering specifically used to worship the Goddess of Life."

The two, one human and one god, chatted over drinks. Although Hume talked about lighthearted topics, such as anecdotes and scandals about the gods and goddesses, Ludwig could tell that she was actually a little down and was trying to drown her sorrows in alcohol.

Putting yourself in her shoes, Rude could understand her sorrow. The once high and mighty goddess lost all her divine power due to the seal and wandered in the mortal world for three hundred years. She couldn't find a way to break the seal, but unexpectedly learned that someone was impersonating her in secret and even wanted to take her place.

This kind of distress and depression is quite difficult to bear, even for someone with an optimistic nature.

After thinking for a moment, Lud decided to talk about something that could help her regain her confidence.

Would you like to hear my plan?

"You want to deal with the Black Hand Brotherhood? I advise you to be patient for a few more years. Wait until your power is three times stronger than it is now, and Aina breaks through to the third level, before you consider how to fight them. It absolutely cannot be now."

"Don't worry, I'm not one to be overconfident, but since we're no match for them in a direct confrontation, we can try to dismantle them from within."

"Wait a minute! You're not thinking of joining the Brotherhood with that ugly guy in the mask, and then becoming a mole? No way, that's way too naive. A century-old organization this big isn't something you can just infiltrate and bring to a standstill."

Upon hearing Ludd's suggestion to infiltrate the enemy, Hume shook his head repeatedly, urging Ludd to abandon such a bold idea as soon as possible and instead focus on development.

Since the Brotherhood's fake Thief God has taken nearly two hundred years and still hasn't been able to truly replace her, then holding out for another ten or twenty years shouldn't be a problem. Hume is very optimistic about Ludwig's development speed and prospects, so there's really no need to take this completely unnecessary risk.

Seeing that Hume had no confidence in his plan and kept trying to persuade him to make a name for himself, Ludd downed his glass of wine in one gulp and said confidently.

"How about we make a bet?"

End of this chapter

When Hume heard Ludwig say he wanted to make a bet with him, he was taken aback at first, and then he gave a meaningful smile.

"Oh my! So you're just lusting after me, huh!"

"No, how did you come to think of that?"

"Oh! Isn't that right? Or... are you not sexually interested in me?"

As Hume spoke, he deliberately bowed before Ludwig, the fruits of justice and abundance swaying slightly, and through the narrow sliver of sky in the treacherous valley, one could glimpse that alluring ray of light.

Lude considered himself a gentleman, but swallowing was a completely subconscious bodily reaction.

"Don't do that, I'm a respectable person..."

"That's not a problem, anyway, I'm not serious."

"..."

The atmosphere in the room, deliberately provoked by Hume, became increasingly heated. While Old Man Lu, a virgin in two lifetimes, possessed an unparalleled wealth of theoretical experience—his XP was enough to make even otherworldly perverts envious—his lack of practical experience remained a definite weakness.

He really wanted to give a charming, domineering smile, and then use a more sophisticated approach to flirt back, making the arrogant goddess in front of him blush and reveal her girlish side. But no matter how many images flashed through his mind, it was all in vain if his body couldn't move along with them.

Lu De, known in the martial arts world as "Bloody Hand Soul Severer," was now as pathetic as a trembling, carefree guy trapped at home by a traveler!

Fortunately, Hume let him off the hook at this moment. After enjoying his embarrassed expression, Hume suddenly laughed so hard that he almost fell over, sweeping away the ambiguous atmosphere that he had just intentionally created.

"Alright! I'm not teasing you anymore, look how scared you are."

"Oh no, it's me..."

"Alright, alright! I was just trying to lighten the mood. Let's get back to business. You don't really want to abandon everything in Pinetown and go infiltrate the Brotherhood, do you?"

"How could that be! I said we'd dismantle the enemy from within, not that we actually want to infiltrate them. The first step is to establish connections. I originally wanted to use that Mann, but now we have the necromancer as a better option. First, we'll set a trap to gain his trust, making him think I'm willing to bring my own forces into the Brotherhood, and then we'll find a way to lure a bigger target over. You know what fishing is, right?"

When it comes to "entrapment," Lu De is an old hand at it. His first meritorious act was successfully setting up a trap to arrest a pyramid scheme gang.

When Lu De first went undercover, after successfully dismantling a pyramid scheme's hideout, he discovered that there were higher-ups in the organization. He then had a brilliant idea: to create the illusion that the organization was still operating, thus luring the higher-ups to come and inspect it.

To make it look real, Lu De recruited several office workers, created over two hundred WeChat accounts, and built a pyramid scheme group. Each person controlled more than thirty aliases, creating a bustling scene of "big business" in the group. This finally fooled the organizers, who, at Lu De's enthusiastic invitation, came to attend their offline conference in City D.

Lu De still vividly remembers the scene: six unsuspecting high-ranking members of the pyramid scheme were led by Lu De into a meticulously arranged meeting place. The extras were all off-duty police officers and temporarily transferred armed police officers. More than two hundred police officers stood up one after another and gave the most sincere and enthusiastic applause to the criminals who had traveled a long way to walk into the trap.

The old bureau chief, who was making a cameo appearance, even got carried away and added his own scenes, running up to the target and grabbing his hand, speaking with a tearful expression.

"We've been waiting for you!"

The pyramid scheme leader was still dazed even after being shoved into a police car.

Ludwig had similar experiences more than once; the key was how to use the existing conditions to create a flawless scheme.

"What is certain at present is that the necromancer Dick should have a tail following him. He said that he shook off the other party in Unos Town, but Unos Town is only three days away from Pine Town. Once the tracker loses the target, there is a high probability that he will head towards the nearest target."

Like Dick, the leader of the stalkers is also a high-ranking official with a "codename," known as "The Smiling Man." But unlike Dick, who is a complete nobody, The Smiling Man is the son of an elder, a very annoying second-generation rich kid.

Dick and he didn't get along, and this was precisely the point of conflict that Ludd could exploit.

"If the enemy has no internal conflicts, we'll create them for them, and if they already have any, we'll exacerbate them. The goal is singular: to plunge the Brotherhood into infighting, into a fight between their own members!"

After explaining his general ideas, Hume looked at Luther again with a different expression, as if to say, "So this is the kind of person you are."

"...If you do this, and things get out of hand, then it could lead to a full-scale war."

"Letting that fake know you're here is the same as starting a full-scale war. He wants to replace you, but I prefer a thief god with humanity to a cult leader who likes to organize evil forces."

After Luther finished speaking, he and Hume exchanged a smile and then clinked glasses.

Hume downed the wine in his glass in one gulp, then jumped off the bed.

"Since you have your own ideas, I won't say anything more. Just tell me what you need me to do. Also... our bet is settled."

"Wait a minute! What are you ordering..."

Before Ludd could finish speaking, Hume slipped out like a gust of wind, leaving Ludd bewildered but vaguely feeling that it was a good thing.

The next morning, Ludwig got up early, and everything seemed to have returned to normal. But in secret, some preparations were already underway.

Lude took some time to visit the Peach Blossom Village, where the Forest Rhaegar people lived. He learned that Nidhogg and Tawawa, the dragon couple, had not yet returned, but the few children they had left in Lude's care had already gotten used to life there.