According to what was said on the internal forum, there were some devil materials in Nanwu County that, during processing, ended up with the numbers not matching—some parts went missing.

Then, in the last two days, over in Europa, rumors started circulating from inside the Church's holy sanctuary: someone was hawking devil materials inside the Holy Land, and some people had already gotten their hands on them.

There were even rumors that said someone had a whole intact Devil's Body stashed away—a real heavy hitter reserved for desperate times.

Especially since, outside the sanctuary, they found someone from another sect using a devil's skull as a magic artifact. He caught the guards off guard and managed to escape in the chaos.

Eyewitnesses claim that the skull was only a half-finished product, not yet made into an artifact. The guy just had no other choice, was forced into a corner, took it out for a one-time use—and paid a pretty heavy price for it.

Anything discussed on the internal forum obviously isn't the kind of top-secret stuff only a handful know about.

Even though that late-night post disappeared pretty quickly, once folks matched it up with intel from the outside, all those people who'd just arrived in Nanwu County flocked straight to check it out.

The whole point of coming to Nanwu County was to get their hands on devil materials anyway.

But no matter what, it's pretty much impossible to get a full Devil's Body straight from the Scorching Sun Department in Nanwu County.

By today, this whole thing can't really be hidden internally anymore anyway.

There's a lot more people talking about it on the forum now—even some guy posted a little schematic, speculating why the internal inventory only showed missing bits and pieces, while there's a whole Devil's Body floating around out there.

The schematic just jumbled up a bunch of parts, slapped them back together, and sure enough, the missing pieces could be cobbled into a full Devil's Body.

Just like the detective stories on TV—now suddenly everyone gets it, and people are all guessing that maybe there really is something out there.

They've already started internal investigations about how this all happened.

Cai Qidong sold off some stuff himself, and now he's using this as an excuse to investigate the organization. Someone already got taken in for questioning today, and word is, to dodge the blame, that person confessed to a bunch of other things...

And because of all this, everyone who came into Nanwu County got cleverly lured out, and the outsiders' attention all shifted to that Devil's Body, so they'd stop staring at the Scorching Sun Department.

The batch of devil materials the Scorching Sun Department snagged in Nanwu County is now being used for experiments, scientists pulling overtime day and night.

If you try to drag those researchers out of their labs, they're not having it at all.

Even without any top-secret sources, Wen Yan already knew all about this stuff—which basically means everyone who needs to know knows now.

Old Meng, that shameless merchant, is seriously ballsy: running off to someone else's Holy Land to hype up a Devil's Body—dude's not even scared of getting beaten to death.

But to be honest, Wen Yan was totally fine with it.

Because these last few days, he'd seen foreigners around Virtue City—they really stand out, and the moment they speak, their accent gives them away instantly.

Unlike Gauss—Gauss's accent was more standard than most locals, plus he had a legitimate ID, just passing for a regular ethnic minority from Divine Land.

Wen Yan totally couldn't stand those people snooping around for info—they're all potential threats.

Anything out there connected to devils was nasty stuff, and hell knows what sort of chaos these people might stir up if they actually got their hands on something.

As for how this whole thing was handled, he actually agreed with Minister Cai.

But that doesn't change the fact that Wen Yan just felt like Cai Heizi was going to screw everyone over again.

Grabbing his stuff, Wen Yan got out without a second thought.

Cai Qidong stood by the window, watching Wen Yan leave, his eyes narrowed in a constant smirk.

...

Gauss clocked off work, ignored the girls who asked him to dinner, and tagged along with two guys from the office to a foot massage place.

From what his coworkers said, getting your feet rubbed was legit painful, but you'd sleep like a baby that night, and everything just felt so much better afterward.

It's that whole "pain and pleasure all in one" kind of feeling.

At first, he didn't take it seriously—thought it was some low-rent Sect of Suffering trick.

The kicker was, you had to pay for it.

But later, he heard it wasn't about the pain at all—it was about healing and wellness—so he figured it was worth a shot.

It never really occurred to him before that pain could be good for your health.

So, he got talked into signing up for a membership—heard there was a "pay a thousand, get a hundred free; pay three thousand, get five hundred free" deal, so he dropped three grand on the spot.

After giving it a shot, he felt like he'd found a new direction—or maybe, it already fit his worldview perfectly.

This kind of pain deserved to be spread far and wide, and the really wild part was, everyone could accept it: not just followers of the Sect of Suffering—his coworkers all thought it was normal. Incredible.

The version here is way ahead of what he ever managed before. He'd never pulled this off back home.

After the foot massage, without using any power at all, he could still feel waves of mild pain in his feet, mixed with a warm energy, like all his blood and qi had been activated.

He figured there was a lot he could learn here—he'd have to come back regularly for these foot massages.

None of his old ideas for spreading pain had ever managed to be so widely accepted.

Walking down the street, he bantered and joked with his coworkers, promising next time it'd be his treat.

This time, after all, they'd paid for him.

As he walked, he glanced up ahead and spotted a foreigner, sensing a power on the guy that he really didn't like—and that instantly reminded him of a few days ago, when someone had tried to use a magic array to summon him...

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