Chapter 157 | I Transmigrated into Cultist Simulator

The morning dampness, like fine sand soaked in ice water, seeped inch by inch through the rough cracks of the tree hollow.

The damp, soft moss was fully saturated with the night's moisture, its edges hung with dense, tiny dewdrops that refracted a sickly glimmer in the dim, weak morning light.

He slowly raised his head, his gaze falling to his side.

Lucia was still asleep.

The girl's small, thin body was curled up on the makeshift bed of dry moss and rough bark. The old blanket they had brought from the sailboat wrapped tightly around most of her body, leaving only her pale, almost translucent face exposed.

Over the past two days, she had been sleeping deeper and longer, especially after stepping into the territory of this ancient tribe.

Sometimes, Ryan even had to call her name two or three times right next to her ear before she would open her eyes in confusion.

Ryan remained on the highest state of alert regarding this.

Through his observations over the past few days, he had long since discovered that the tiny, faintly fluorescent spores floating in the air did more than just make people feel drowsy. They were like silent, warm water, gradually dissolving the tension in human nerve endings and stripping away one's intuition for danger.

They made everyone who stepped into this place feel safe, as though finding a spot to enjoy a nice, deep sleep was no big deal.

Yet, in any dangerous and bizarre environment, the moment that felt the most comfortable and safe was often the precursor to the closing of a fatal trap.

Suddenly, extremely close outside the tree hollow, a very soft footstep sounded. It was the squelch of bare feet stepping on damp earth and rotting leaves.

Ryan's lowered eyelashes lifted instantly.

The footsteps drew closer and closer, finally stopping three paces away from the tree hollow.

Ryan raised his right arm, using the tip of his blade to gently push aside the heavy vines hanging over the entrance as a curtain.

Outside the tree hollow stood seven or eight tribal residents. They carried no bone spears or beast-bone hunting knives, clad only in rough bark and dried fern weavings.

Leading them was a middle-aged woman. Her cheekbones were high and prominent, her skin a dark brown from long exposure to the forest mist, and her eyes were numb and vacant. At this moment, her arms were raised flat, carefully holding a shallow basket woven from fresh vines.

The moment she saw Ryan poke his head out, the woman did not speak, nor did she make any sound. She merely lowered her head slowly, avoiding his sharp gaze.

Behind her, the seven or eight tribal members performed the exact same movement—lowering their heads in unison, pressing their chins tightly against their chests.

A bizarre, deathly silence spread outside the tree hollow.

Ryan kept his hand pressed on his scalpel, his body blocking the entrance, showing no intention of stepping aside.

Until from deep within the tree hollow behind him, there came the rustle of a blanket being shifted, followed by the sound of Lucia groggily sitting up.

“Teacher...”

The girl rubbed her slightly red eyes with her small hands, calling out in a mumble. Just as her voice fell, a tooth-gritting scene occurred.

The seven or eight natives standing outside the tree hollow suddenly fell to their knees with a thud, without any warning!

Their foreheads pressed heavily against the damp, sticky soil, even crushing a few glowing fungi growing on the ground. They prostrated themselves entirely, as if worshiping some supreme totem.

Lucia was jolted completely awake by the sudden loud noise. She stared blankly at the row of backs prostrate in the mud, her small hand instinctively clutching the hem of Ryan's trench coat as she took a small step back.

“What... are they doing?” The girl's voice carried a hint of dread.

Ryan did not answer, for even with his knowledge and composure, he was completely unable to decipher the behavioral logic of these native residents.

The middle-aged woman prostrate at the very front slowly raised her head. She extended her hands, pushing the vine basket forward slightly, her eyes fixed intently on Lucia.

In those originally cloudy, numb eyes, there was still not much worldly human emotion. Yet, unlike the cold indifference of looking at dead matter from days prior, Ryan captured an extremely complex glimmer from deep within her pupils.

It was not fear in the face of a threat, but more like an awe engraved deep in her very marrow. There was even... a trace of sorrow mixed in that she herself could not conceal.

The woman left the vine basket on the muddy ground at the entrance of the tree hollow. There was no food or fresh water prepared in the basket, only a piece of deadwood, about the thickness of a thumb and half a foot long.

The deadwood was a dark yellowish-brown, its surface covered in complex, naturally formed patterns that looked like miniature snakes tightly coiled together. At the very tip of the deadwood was embedded a polished black stone bead. The surface of the stone bead lacked any luster and absorbed light intensely.

The instant Lucia's gaze fell upon that piece of deadwood, her expression suddenly changed. Her breathing abruptly grew rapid, her fingers gripping Ryan's cuff so tightly that her knuckles turned slightly white from the exertion.

“Teacher...”

“I don't like this thing.” Her voice trembled, carrying an instinctive repulsion and disgust.

Ryan looked down at the piece of deadwood. He did not rashly touch it with his hand, relying instead on his formidable memory to lock the patterns on the wood's surface and the characteristics of the black stone bead deep into his mind.

The middle-aged woman's lips moved as she softly uttered a sentence, her voice very light, like a breeze brushing through leaves.

Lucia closed her eyes. In this forest governed by mysterious laws, she seemed to have grown increasingly accustomed to closing her eyes to capture the faint, residual emotional wavelengths in the air.

Only after a long while did Lucia slowly open her eyes.

“She wants me to take it,” the girl translated softly.

“Why?” Ryan asked in a low voice.

Lucia shook her head in confusion. “I don't know... She didn't say why.”

The girl paused, a strange expression on her small face. “But... she seems very afraid. Not of me, and not of you, Teacher... She is afraid of keeping this thing in the tribe.”

Ryan looked back at the middle-aged woman. She had already pressed her forehead back against the damp soil, her arms tucked tightly under her head, as if that single sentence just now had exhausted all her courage.

Just then, from beneath the massive golden tree at the very center of the tribe, a high-pitched, elderly shout suddenly echoed.

The voice pierced through the heavy morning mist, rippling in layers through the dense forest.

Hearing the call, the middle-aged woman did not hesitate for a second, immediately standing up. The few clansmen behind her also scrambled up like a group of stiff puppets, backing away toward the center of the tribe with lowered heads and in silence.

Ryan did not rise to pursue them. His gaze fell back onto the solitary vine basket on the ground.

After a moment, he squatted down, extending an ungloved finger to gently touch the piece of deadwood.

It was unexpectedly light, so light that it didn't feel like a piece of hard wood at all, but rather like an empty husk drained of all moisture.

However, the very instant Ryan's fingertip made full contact with the black stone bead—

Hum.

Deep within the pupil of his left eye, that sliver of golden glimmer originating from a mysterious power throbbed violently without any warning!

An extremely faint yet bone-chilling throb surged up from his fingertip, traveling up his arm and straight into his brain!

Ryan's gaze darkened completely. Instead of handing the object to Lucia, he grabbed it and slipped it into a dry pouch on the outside of his trench coat.

...

Noon.

The sunlight finally managed to pierce through the dense, overlapping canopy above, casting thick white pillars of light down into the moisture-laden forest.

The old man leaning on his deadwood staff arrived. This time, he was not accompanied by the highly hostile young hunter whose face was painted with black-green sap.

Only two white-haired, hunched native elders followed behind him.

The old man stopped five paces away from the tree hollow. His cloudy, pale pink eyes lingered on Ryan for a second before slowly shifting to rest on Lucia.

Opening his lips, which were as dry as tree bark, the old man spoke a long string of extremely complex, oddly pronounced syllables.

Lucia closed her eyes, her long eyelashes trembling slightly in the sunlight.

As the old man spoke, the confusion on the girl's face gradually deepened, eventually turning into a long silence.

“Teacher...”

Lucia opened her eyes, looking up at Ryan with some unease. “He says... we must leave.”

Ryan's brow twitched slightly. “Leave here? Leave this tribe?”

“Yes.” Lucia nodded.

Seeing that Lucia had finished speaking, the old man raised his withered arm and spoke another brief native phrase.

And this time, the expression on Lucia's face changed dramatically. Her pupils dilated slightly, her eyes filled with disbelief.

“No...”

The girl swallowed hard, her voice trembling slightly. “What he said was... for me to leave.”

Ryan's gaze instantly turned cold. He took a step forward, shielding half of Lucia's body behind his own, facing the old man's gaze directly for the first time.

The old man did not adopt a defensive posture, nor did he attempt to explain anything.

He merely watched Ryan quietly. Then, the old man slowly raised his dirt-caked, wrinkled palm, pointing toward the thin mist at the outer edge of the tribe; next, he pointed at Lucia; and finally, his index finger pointed unmistakably at Ryan's chest.

The gesture was extremely simple, requiring no translation: Take her away. Take the girl behind you away from this tribe, away from this forest.

Ryan remained silent for a full five seconds.

“Why?” He turned and had Lucia translate.

Lucia repeated the question in the ancient syllables.

After listening, the old man did not answer.

He merely shook his head extremely slowly. Then, the old man slowly turned around, tilting his head toward the deepest part of the forest—that unknown forbidden zone completely sealed by eternal, dark brown fog, where even sunlight would instantly vanish upon entering.

The old man stared at the thick fog.

This time, on his face—which seemed carved from ten-thousand-year-old ice and had never shown any emotional fluctuation—a very distinct crack finally appeared.

It was fear, an extreme, primal fear stemming from the very instinct of his soul.

Though it was only for a fleeting instant, Ryan, who was constantly monitoring his facial micro-expressions, captured this crack with absolute clarity.

Retracting his gaze, the old man looked at Lucia and spoke one final sentence.

Lucia's small face instantly turned as pale as paper.

“He says...” The girl's voice trembled, her small hand clutching Ryan's trench coat tightly. “If I don't leave today... I will never be able to leave.”

Ryan did not ask any further questions, because at this very moment, he heard a sound himself.

Extremely far away, it came from the deepest part of the forest, from beneath the ground of that forbidden zone where even the black fog writhed.

Thud—

An extremely dull, heavy, and massive thud.

The sound was not like the beating of drums, nor was it like thunder. Rather, it felt as if an unimaginably massive behemoth had heavily rolled over deep within the rocky layers of the earth.

The entire forest changed completely in that instant. The sound of the wind vanished instantly, and the towering canopy stopped swaying; not a single leaf vibrated.

The glowing spores that had been slowly drifting through the air seemed to have their buoyancy drained by some invisible force at the exact same time, beginning to fall to the ground in massive sheets.

One. Two. Thousands upon thousands. Like a greyish-white rain falling in absolute silence.

Every single native in the entire tribe stopped what they were doing in that instant.

The woman washing bark raised her head, the native children playing high up on the vines froze, and even the young hunter, who had been hiding in the shadows of the distant canopy with cold eyes, suddenly leaned half his body out.

No one spoke, and no one made the slightest sound.

The gazes of everyone, like a hundred pairs of dead eyes carved from wood, turned stiffly toward the depths of the forest.

In the next second, an extremely agile, dark green figure leaped down from the vine corridor over ten meters high!

Thud!

The heavy impact splashed wet mud. The young hunter painted in green sap dropped to one knee, then quickly stood up.

He did not attack, nor did he look at the scalpel at Ryan's waist. He simply took a firm step sideways, using his powerful, panther-like body to stand directly in front of the tree hollow where Ryan and Lucia were.

The rough bone spear, fashioned from the rib of some giant beast, was held horizontally across his chest.

The old man looked at him, then took a step forward and began to argue with the young hunter.

The native language was rapid and high-pitched, mixed with many sharp, abrasive sounds. No one could understand what they were arguing about.

But this time, solely from their movements and expressions, Ryan could already comprehend the core of their disagreement—

The young hunter was in a frenzy, his bone spear pointing fiercely again and again toward the dark fog in the deepest part of the forest, his eyes filled with fanaticism and a near-martyr-like determination.

Meanwhile, the old man stubbornly shook his head, pointing his withered finger repeatedly at Lucia, and then toward the outer edge of the forest.

The young hunter roared in furious denial. The old man's voice grew heavier, each word accompanied by the dull thud of his deadwood staff striking the muddy ground.

The dispute reached its peak within a few seconds.

Ultimately, the young hunter seemed completely crushed by some harsh reality. He suddenly threw his head back and let out a non-human roar, then gripped his bone spear with both hands and drove it heavily deep into the mud beneath his feet!