Chapter 1131: The First Fool Hunter in History |
Cheng Shi had no idea what the situation inside the cell had devolved into.
He'd already stripped off the prisoner garb and grabbed a guard's uniform from a corridor rack, throwing it on before strolling right out of the prison as if he owned the place.
The moment he stepped outside, he realized the setting was a city built into the mountains. At a glance, peaks encircled the area on all sides, eerily reminiscent of the view from Katouting when gazing at the distant mountains.
He still wasn't sure if this was Redi Core, so he grabbed a random passerby, plastered on a professional fake smile, and asked politely:
"Excuse me, where is this?"
The robed passerby held his head high, "looked down" at Cheng Shi's uniform, then glanced at the prison behind him and let out a contemptuous snort:
"What's this? The Folly Prohibition Office didn't meet quota this month, so they've resorted to such crude tactics to drum up 'business'?"
"Even if you need to boost your revenue, at least come up with a better excuse."
"A question this stupid—even if I answered, I know you'd arrest me on charges of 'Knowing Folly.' So do you really think I'd humor you?"
With that, the passerby strutted away, nose in the air, leaving Cheng Shi standing bewildered in the wind.
'Excuse me, pal...'
'You say you won't humor me, so who was that just cursing me out?'
Cheng Shi stared down at his outfit in utter confusion, thinking this place was something else. Even law enforcement got trash-talked to their face? Apparently here, intellect outranked the law.
Not one to give up easily, he asked several more passersby—and received heaps of scorn for his trouble.
Now he believed it.
Folly's domain was truly remarkable. As long as you could seize the intellectual high ground and look down on others with withering disdain, tongue-tying them into silence, you were exempt from punishment. You could even replace the officer who'd challenged you.
Because during those exchanges, one passerby had actually started trying to strip Cheng Shi's clothes off mid-rant, declaring he was unworthy of serving as a Folly Prohibition Guard and demanding he surrender his authority.
Was Cheng Shi going to stand for that?
Shadow Cheng Shi circled behind the man and dropped him with a single chop. After dragging him into an alley for a heart-to-heart, it took only minutes for Cheng Shi to extract every bit of information he wanted.
This was indeed Redi Core—a city built atop the mountains.
Protected by the nearby Civilization Lonely Tower, the entire population worshipped Folly. The town was quite famous in this realm, because it was the birthplace of the very first Fool Hunter in history—and a prolific producer of Fool Hunters.
That was why the local law enforcement was called the Folly Prohibition Office, and its officers were called Folly Prohibition Guards. Because the birthplace of the Fool Hunter would tolerate no foolishness—all foolish acts were forbidden.
At this point, Cheng Shi nearly lost his composure.
'Does your Benefactor know—Him being the universe's number one practitioner of foolish acts—that you're simultaneously worshipping and blaspheming Him here?'
'Banning all foolish acts basically means banning your own god, doesn't it?'
'No wonder Wei Mu jumped off that cliff at the start. He must have known from the get-go that this place was impious...'
Then again, that was only idle musing. Cheng Shi was certain that Wei Mu wouldn't exit this early. From a swindler's perspective, when someone deliberately vanishes from everyone's view, they haven't actually disappeared—they've simply changed roles and returned to the stage.
He just didn't know why Wei Mu had come here, and therefore couldn't guess where the man had gone.
But regardless of Wei Mu's whereabouts, it didn't affect his own mission. Cheng Shi was only here to learn about the town of Redi Core. He hadn't expected to gain anything from this trial, so his mindset was completely relaxed.
Well, not completely relaxed...
The Prisoner and Mo Shu showing up still made him uneasy. He had to carefully manage his relationship with that unlucky Torchbearer while staying on guard against whether the Oblivion follower would make a move. Outwardly carefree, his nerves remained taut.
That's why he'd bolted at the first opportunity. Now he planned to head to the town center and examine the god-revering statue that honored the first Fool Hunter.
The interrogated passerby had told him that to commemorate the first Fool Hunter in history and express the people's devotion to their god, Redi Core had erected a massive stone statue in the town center.
Whenever someone in town committed a foolish act, the offender would be dragged to the statue and subjected to torture as tribute to the first Fool Hunter's god-revering will.
The players' identities in this trial were prisoners who'd been tortured just the day before. Their crime: losing a debate to an Executioner and then killing him in jealous rage—charged with Knowing Folly.
How absurd! They weren't convicted for killing a law officer, but for Knowing Folly!
Clearly, the people of Redi Core's rejection of foolishness far eclipsed their respect for the law.
The real prisoners' memories had been lost the moment the players arrived. Cheng Shi didn't know the specifics, but he knew that when you were out and about, identity was whatever you made it. So today he wasn't some prisoner—he was a Folly Prohibition Guard with real authority.
Cheng Shi followed the main road to the town center. The moment he looked up, he spotted the towering Fool Hunter statue—a figure drawing back a bow, gazing into the distance. The stone cape streaming behind it, though carved from rock, was so lifelike one could almost hear it snapping in the high-altitude wind.
But the statue's face was nothing like what Cheng Shi had imagined. He'd assumed the first Fool Hunter would be supremely arrogant—nostrils aimed at the heavens. But the face wasn't sharp or hard at all. It carried a faintly feminine quality; even the fiercely knitted brows held three parts melancholy.
The craftsmanship was exquisite—so detailed and refined that it re-created the first Fool Hunter's image with stunning precision.
Cheng Shi studied it for a long time, feeling that if this town harbored a secret, it had to be connected to this statue.
'So the Eye of Mockery—could it be hidden in...?'
With that thought, he raised his gaze to the statue's eye sockets. To his shock, those carved eyes seemed to sense his attention, swiveling slightly and casting a sliver of gaze downward at him.
Cheng Shi startled, pupils contracting. He retreated half a step and glanced around, only to realize that the passersby offering worship showed no surprise at all. Only then did he understand: the statue's eyes were designed to move.
"It's the wind!"
Just as Cheng Shi was reeling from the rotating eyes, a voice came from behind him.
Cheng Shi didn't need to turn—Shadow Cheng Shi had already identified the newcomer. It was none other than one of his trial teammates, the Erudite Scholar he'd once worked with: Ji Yue.
She'd changed clothes too, though her choice was subtler—one of the common long robes seen throughout town. She walked up beside Cheng Shi, looked up at the statue, and smiled:
"Quite an ingenious design."
"The higher the mountain, the stronger the wind. The statue towers above the surrounding buildings, so all they had to do during construction was hollow out the eye sockets and carve the eyeball into a lightweight sphere. Naturally, it moves with the wind, creating the illusion of a gaze surveying all creation."
"I must say—though Folly never shares, His followers possess remarkable mastery in many fields."
Cheng Shi raised an eyebrow, stealing a glance at this Truth scholar from the corner of his eye, wondering what her real purpose was in deliberately approaching him.
'She shouldn't remember what happened before... right?'