A blunt object—drab, square, and solid—took physical form on the spiritual plane.
Lin Hong held it in his hand like a brick and slammed it bang onto the evil spirit’s spiritual body.
“Gah?!”
In an instant, the evil spirit’s consciousness was shattered.
Its form remained intact, but its mind was knocked senseless, plunging into unconsciousness.
The eerie, dark-red humanoid figure collapsed straight onto the spiritual sea, twitching nonstop as if in convulsions.
Lin Hong looked at the unconscious evil spirit, utterly disgusted.
“Damn, what the hell was that creep saying? Can’t he talk normally? If you’re going to possess someone, just possess them—why make it so disgusting? Is he gay or something?”
[… Host.]
At the same time, the entity in Lin Hong’s hand trembled slightly, emitting an extremely anthropomorphic, resentful wave.
That was the mysterious panel.
He’d just had a whim and summoned the thing to use as a brick.
It was a spur-of-the-moment idea, but the effect was unexpectedly outstanding.
Looking at the mysterious panel, though it only displayed two simple characters, the resentment emanating from them was almost overflowing.
Lin Hong felt a little guilty, but immediately doubled down: “Well, I just had a sudden urge to try it out. I didn’t expect you to actually answer the call—and with such great results!”
“Not bad, not bad. That’s the spirit.”
[…]
The panel displayed six dots, seeming utterly speechless.
The whole board seemed to dim for a moment.
In the end, it sent out a wave indicating it wouldn’t hold a grudge against Lin Hong.
It slipped out of his hand, floated to the side, and entered do-not-disturb mode.
Lin Hong gave an awkward laugh and apologized.
Then he brought his focus back to the present and began seriously considering how to deal with this troublesome captive.
He sensed briefly—this dark-red spiritual entity was clearly weaker than the previous dark-robed evil priest.
That priest could split off at least two clones, but this person couldn’t.
His soul had come out in full force, completely intact.
But that also meant this person couldn’t be killed just yet.
Otherwise, his physical body—hidden somewhere unknown—would die as well, which would certainly alert his accomplices immediately.
“Soul search technique?”
Lin Hong immediately thought of the most direct way to gather information.
However, it wasn’t feasible.
The lesson of Bazi’s head exploding was still fresh.
This person’s soul was likely also implanted with a restriction.
A soul search wouldn’t work—it would probably just set off fireworks in the spiritual sea and tip off the enemy.
Even imprisonment wouldn’t do.
After all, he’d already extracted some information earlier.
Their group had already been marked as prey.
The enemy was hiding in the shadows, had evaded the knights searching outside the town, and was surely on high alert.
Lin Hong had a headache.
This was a hot potato—couldn’t kill, couldn’t search, couldn’t imprison, couldn’t release.
A true fourfold dilemma.
“I never know the techniques I need until I need them!” he sighed.
His home universe did have more advanced soul-searching methods—ones that might bypass restrictions and do even more, like directly altering memories or implanting false ones.
But unfortunately, he hadn’t learned them.
Because that wasn’t his specialty.
He was from the killing-technique school, responsible only for slaying enemies—rarely taking captives.
Those matters were handled by specialized comrades.
They weren’t in his scope of study; he only knew this crudest, most direct method.
“What a shame. Otherwise, I could at least erase this segment of his memory, mark him, and let him go—then follow the trail right to their hideout!”
Lin Hong muttered to himself, quite regretful.
Wrong specialty.
[Host, I have an idea.]
Just then, the mysterious panel that had entered do-not-disturb mode suddenly emitted a wave.
“You have another idea?”
Lin Hong was surprised.
The panel trembled slightly and sent out an affirmative wave, quite proudly.
Lin Hong’s face lit up with joy.
After all, although this thing was cryptic, it never made empty claims.
Maybe it really had a solution.
He immediately rubbed his hands together, scooted over to make room, and grinned, inviting it to try.
The mysterious panel slowly circled the evil spirit’s spiritual body twice, as if searching for the right spot.
Watching its movements, Lin Hong had a strange thought.
His expression turned odd.
This thing wasn’t going to…
Bang bang!
Two dull thuds echoed through the spiritual sea.
The mysterious panel moved on its own, so fast it blurred, and slammed down hard on the spiritual body twice in a row!
Lin Hong was startled.
“Easy! Don’t kill the thing!”
The panel paused, turned its text-displaying side around as if looking at Lin Hong, then said proudly: [No problem. This board knows its own strength. It won’t die.]
[Besides, wouldn’t it be better if it died? I’ll give you fate points for it.]
Lin Hong’s forehead darkened.
“Don’t you know the saying ‘let the long line catch the big fish’? How many points would it give if it died now?”
The panel paused, as if thinking, then sent out a wave.
[Good point.]
Then—bang—it hit again!
“You again?!”
Lin Hong’s eyes widened.
This thing was really no gentle creature.
Under these three heavy blows, the evil spirit’s spiritual body convulsed even more violently, even emitting chaotic waves as if babbling nonsense.
[All right, Host. You’ve lost sight of the bigger picture again. You must understand: great truths are simple.]
“Don’t fucking misuse phrases you just learned,” Lin Hong’s face darkened.
[You need to trust this board! This thing definitely won’t remember what just happened, and it won’t wake up for a while. The rest is up to you, Host.]
The panel slowly drifted back to the edge of the spiritual sea, fell completely silent, and stopped moving.
Lin Hong was quite speechless, but he couldn’t be bothered to argue.
He casually restrained the evil spirit, then opened his eyes in the real world.
In the spiritual sea, communication and combat had happened in an instant. Not much time had passed outside.
Lin Hong examined the possessed young man’s body.
Fortunately, the soul damage wasn’t severe—it was like having a very vivid nightmare.
Lin Hong treated the young man to ensure no lasting harm, settled him down, then immediately returned to Old Man Robert’s residence to find Lovella, his expression serious.
“Sister, there’s been a turn of events. It’s urgent.”
He explained everything from start to finish, omitting the fight, but worried Lovella might not believe him.
So by the end, he simply revealed the restrained spiritual body directly.
Lovella’s expression immediately turned grave, but she wasn’t panicked—very composed.
Without asking many questions, she stood up immediately.
The two of them went to find the two royal knights lodged in a neighboring villager’s home and raised the alarm.
At first, the two knights were clearly dismissive, maintaining only polite respect on their faces.
“I recall that Lady Lovella already gave us a warning. We took it very seriously and conducted a thorough search for dozens of miles around the town. Nothing.”
The older knight spoke.
“Moreover, we just contacted the camp outside not long ago. Everything is calm and normal.”
“Border towns occasionally have bandits or unusual disturbances. You two, having spent a long time in the capital, may be overly sensitive—understandably so. But please trust the competence of us Royal Knights.”
It was clear they had pride.
They were confident in their own abilities and those of their comrades—after all, they were elite soldiers directly under the emperor.
Lin Hong didn’t waste words arguing.
Instead, he simply extended his right hand, palm up.
A dark-red soul light sphere appeared!
A cold, sinister aura spread out, filled with what seemed like malice toward the entire world.
The two knights’ expressions changed instantly.
They were experienced, truly elite.
Perhaps they hadn’t directly clashed with true cultists of evil gods many times, but they immediately recognized this—it was the power of an evil god!
At the same time, they were astonished.
This soul light sphere was not weak in intensity!
How had it infiltrated so silently?
And yet—this evil spirit had been captured by the young master of the Vien/Wayne family.
And it looked effortless!
“Our deepest apologies, young master! My lady!”
They were straightforward, immediately apologizing to Lin Hong and Lovella.
Then they quickly pulled out a magical communication stone from their chests—used for urgent contact—channeled battle qi into it, and activated it.
The two knights spoke rapidly in low voices, informing their comrades outside of all this.
But soon, their faces turned grim.
From the other end of the communication stone—no response.
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