Dice In The Darkness: Cthulhu Calls

Chapter 325: The Star Chart of the Ancient One

Seeking Sirius seemed to be the best course of action for Liu Xing and his companions, as they felt it necessary to gather information about the Shoggoth. Ling Ishikawa and the others understood this and nodded in agreement.

"Oh, by the way, any thoughts on Matsui Ichiro’s recent statements? What intrigues me the most is the travel writer he mentioned. Could it be Li Yongjie?" Miyako Goudong spoke up.

Ling Ishikawa raised an eyebrow and said seriously, "Miyako Goudong, are you suggesting that there might be issues with Inoue Kenjiro’s two letters?"

Miyako Goudong nodded affirmatively, "Exactly. Just like we discussed this morning, we might have jumped to conclusions initially and added some details to Alice. So, I started observing Alice and Matsui Ichiro after entering the Ancestral Hall of Fisher’s Village."

"Therefore, I’ve reached a conclusion. Unless Alice and Matsui Ichiro are exceptional actors, we might have misjudged some things. Alice and Matsui Ichiro aren’t the people we imagined... Of course, the fact that Alice is a high-ranking member of the Deep Sea Gospel Society has been confirmed by Watanabe Ryuusei and Ling Ishikawa. So, that part is certain."

"So, now I think Alice is just an ordinary person like us who accidentally entered Fisher’s Village. As for Matsui Ichiro, he might indeed be the Village Chief of Fisher’s Village. Of course, I’m not saying Matsui Ichiro is a good person. There are still many unanswered questions, such as the issues with the two letters, the Composite Magic Array, the relationship between the Inoue family and Matsui Ichiro, and the hypnosis Matsui Ichiro used while reciting the ritual text."

"The most crucial question, however, is why the villagers of Fisher’s Village have become the way they are now," Liu Xing interjected suddenly.

Though Liu Xing wanted to share his latest thoughts, "Watanabe Ryuusei" lacked information about Shoggoth. So, Liu Xing had to keep his thoughts to himself for the time being and wait for a suitable opportunity.

However, Liu Xing could still drop some hints to Ling Ishikawa and others, "I still believe Matsui Ichiro might not be the big boss of Fisher’s Village as we initially thought. He might just be an executor, assisting the behind-the-scenes boss in Fisher’s Village, who is probably the owner or leader of those mythical creatures."

"As far as I know, apart from individually powerful mythical creatures, most of them are communal. If you find one mythical creature, you can be sure there are more of the same kind nearby. The communal mythical creatures likely have a leader," Zhang Jingxu explained.

"So, as Liu Xing mentioned earlier, in the old site of Fisher’s Village, those houses sealed with cemented doors and windows might contain more mythical creatures similar to the one Panda Pig saw earlier. And these leader-level mythical creatures probably have higher intelligence than us," Zhang Jingxu added.

Liu Xing nodded, reluctantly saying, "So, I estimate there are at least five or more of these mythical creatures in Fisher’s Village, with one being a leader-level mythical creature. But the most important thing is, we probably can’t defeat any of them..."

Liu Xing’s words left everyone silent, as, except for Lu Tianya, who was an NPC, everyone else knew these mythical creatures were Shoggoths. Understanding Shoggoth’s combat capabilities, the group realized that even if they combined their strength, they might not be able to defeat one Shoggoth, especially considering they seemed to move in groups.

However, Liu Xing believed he still had an ace up his sleeve – the items Sirius left in the Underground Ruins.

Hoping to find something useful among these items, Liu Xing decided it was the right time to go down and look for Sirius’s belongings. Now that he knew the location of Sirius’s room, he estimated it would take him only ten minutes to find the items and then explore other areas for potential discoveries.

Thinking so, Liu Xing said to Zhang Jingxu, "Mr. Zhang Jingxu, is your condition fully recovered now? If so, please use Wall-Passing Technique on me now. I’ll go to the Underground Ruins to find some useful things."

Zhang Jingxu closed his eyes, contemplating for a moment. Liu Xing guessed Zhang Jingxu was calculating his remaining MP and how much using Wall-Passing Technique this time would consume.

After a while, Zhang Jingxu nodded and said seriously, "OK, no problem. I’ll cast Wall-Passing Technique on you now, Ryuusei. I believe you’ve mastered the basics of Wall-Passing Technique, so I won’t waste words."

Upon hearing Zhang Jingxu’s words, Miyako Goudong and the others quickly removed the table and the brazier, cooperating well.

Luck was on their side. Zhang Jingxu’s Wall-Passing Technique judgment succeeded this time, and Liu Xing didn’t need to go through a willpower judgment again. "Watanabe Ryuusei" had become determined to pass through walls after the events of yesterday.

So, Liu Xing found himself in the Underground Ruins without any surprises.

This time, Liu Xing didn’t use his phone for illumination. Instead, he used the Light Orb Art that Ling Ishikawa had used before.

Ling Ishikawa’s Light Orb Art was quite interesting. The summoned light orbs could attach themselves to any object until the MP consumption for maintaining the Light Orb Art was depleted.

Liu Xing had an hour to move around in the Underground Ruins this time. Thanks to the Light Orb Art, his visibility was much better compared to using the phone’s flashlight, which only illuminated the immediate path. This time, he could see the walls around him clearly.

Therefore, this time Liu Xing noticed numerous scratches on the walls surrounding the passage. Some areas even had weapons resembling swords and knives embedded in them. However, the materials of these weapons were peculiar – not quite gold, not quite wood. It seemed that when the Ancient Tribe fled here alongside the Star Kin, they engaged in a battle with the Deep Ones who had attacked.

Liu Xing originally thought of taking one of the weapons but received a frustrating message: "Your strength attribute value is not sufficient to pull out this ancient Deep One’s weapon."

Shaking his head, Liu Xing realized it was time to find an opportunity to train his strength attribute.

Although Liu Xing couldn’t freely choose his Interlude Growth at the moment, he heard that from the Shoggoth Region onwards, the game would introduce longer modules.

In general, the duration of Cthulhu Role-Playing Game Hall modules depended on the player’s location within the game. The Ghoul area typically took about a day to resolve issues, and the Shoggoth Region’s module lasted around one to two weeks. Liu Xing’s experiences so far validated this.

However, this only applied to regular modules, which usually had a time limit. Exceeding this time would result in party wipeout. So, completing Main quests in these regular modules had to be prioritized and couldn’t be postponed.

From the Shoggoth Region onwards, a special type of module appeared – ones without a time limit. In these modules, players could take as long as they wanted to complete Main quests, essentially spending their "lifetime" within. Moreover, in these special modules, there was almost no risk of "dropping out" since the Main quest was always available.

However, players wouldn’t choose to spend decades in such a module. The character card’s age changed over time, and with a high comprehensive attribute value, negative statuses increased as the character card aged, eventually leading to a risk of "dying of old age" during Interlude Growth.

Although the time in modules passed much faster than real-world time, spending about a year inside would likely result in returning to the real world and finding oneself listed as a "missing person" or even "deceased."

Therefore, unless most players in this special module abandoned treatment, aiming to spend their days in peace, the duration of this special module would be around half a year.

Though this half-year seemed short, during this time, players could freely move around. Going on a world tour was no problem. Most players chose to use this time to strengthen their attribute values or skill values – attending various training programs.

Hence, Liu Xing really hoped that his next module would be such a special one.

Liu Xing continued forward, reaching Sirius’s room with ease. Thanks to the Light Orb Art, he could finally see the entire room clearly.

It was evident that Sirius’s room had been modified by the Ancient Tribe, turning it into a site for Ritual Ceremonies or the residence of elders responsible for sacrifices within the Ancient Tribe.

Facing the entrance directly, in a place Liu Xing had previously overlooked, a massive bookshelf was installed after the wall was hollowed out. It held numerous bamboo scrolls, paper books, and various trinkets. Due to the distance, Liu Xing couldn’t see everything clearly.

On the surrounding walls, besides the "branches," Liu Xing noticed many decorations, such as shells, stones of various colors, and some individual weapons and armor. It seemed to be the Ancient Tribe’s decorative work. Liu Xing couldn’t help but think it looked quite poorly decorated.

However, at the top, Liu Xing saw a huge mural, or rather, a star chart. In the center of the chart, he saw the words "Earth."

Wait a minute.

Liu Xing raised an eyebrow; the writing on this star chart was clearly neither in Island Nation nor Chinese characters. It was a type of writing both "WatanabeRyuusei" and Liu Xing had never seen before.

So, this should be the language of the Ancient One, as the Ancient Tribe lacked the ability for interstellar travel and wouldn’t have been able to create such a vast and detailed star chart.

"So, have I learned the language of the Ancient One now?" Liu Xing muttered to himself.

In the skill section of "WatanabeRyuusei’s" character card, he indeed found the words "Other Languages: Ancient One Language 60."

Rubbing his chin, Liu Xing finally understood. During his soul communication with Sirius last night, in order to overcome the language barrier, Sirius used some advanced technology to teach him the language of the Ancient One.

Although aware of the limited time, Liu Xing couldn’t resist looking up at the star chart again. He was very curious about the unknown dangers surrounding Earth in this world of Cthulhu Mythos.

In this star chart, drawn by the Ancient One tens of millions, or even hundreds of millions of years ago, Liu Xing found that many planets around Earth were occupied by other mythical creature races. Most of these planets were held by powerful mythical creatures such as the Star Kin, Yis People, and Mi Ge. The Ancient One occupied very few planets, perhaps having been plundered by other mythical creature races.

Far from Earth, Liu Xing saw a massive red dot labeled "Mother Star." This seemed to be the birthplace of the Ancient One. Near this "Mother Star," a large area of planets belonged to the Ancient Ones.

Seeing this in the star chart, Liu Xing took out his phone and took a photo for future study. Then, Liu Xing moved to the center of Sirius’s room, also the center of the magic array drawn by the Ancient Tribe.

Because Liu Xing could now feel it – the items left behind by Sirius were right under his feet.

When Liu Xing stood in place, a stone platform suddenly emerged in front of him, making him take a step back in surprise.

But Liu Xing quickly realized that this stone platform was probably a unlocking mechanism.

Approaching, Liu Xing saw a "keyboard" appear on the stone platform.

Without hesitation, Liu Xing entered "Sirius," and the ground beneath him started to descend.

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