Chapter 28: You Are Guilty

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【You have slain one of the gatekeepers of the Ghost Golden Sheep Gate, the Headless Gentleman. You have obtained a drop: Ghost Key.】
【Your act of slaughter has earned the appreciation of 'Khorne'. Khorne Points +100.】
【Your wit and keen insight in the face of mortal danger have caught the eye of 'Tzeentch'. Please continue your efforts.】
【Current Sin Level: lv3. Available Free Attribute Points: 10.】

The sky changed color, the earth collapsed, and Zhou Ke suddenly felt his body plummeting. In a daze, he found himself sitting back on the living room sofa.
If not for his tattered clothes and the wounds still oozing blood, he might have suspected that everything he had just experienced was merely a fleeting, dreamlike illusion.
"What a spectacular show for my first day of transmigrating. It seems life won't be boring from now on."
Zhou Ke felt none of the relief of a survivor; instead, he sucked on his blood-dripping finger and let out a sinister chuckle, much like a villain.
He used his other hand to pick up his phone from the sofa crevice and checked it. "September 7th, 6:30 PM. Five days and five nights passed inside the gate, yet only one day has passed in reality. The flow of time between the inside and outside is different."
After unlocking the screen, he saw several missed calls, all made just moments ago. The contact name was "Good Son Li Hua - Owes 20".
Zhou Ke called back. Immediately, he heard Li Hua’s booming, melodramatic wail—it was a mystery how such a tone could be so full of vigor, but that was just how he was.
"Ouch! It hurts like hell, you unfilial father! Why did you come out so late? I’m already lying in an ambulance. There are several pretty nurses here; do you want me to call one for you too?"
The siren’s "wee-woo" could not mask the air of sleaze surrounding Li Hua. One had to wonder, was this really someone who had almost had five holes punched through his kidney? He didn't sound like a man on the brink of death at all.
"I'm relieved to hear you're not dead," Zhou Ke said.
"Hey, I didn't expect you to care about me so much. Is it because you miss the days we spent eating together?" Li Hua sounded somewhat touched.
"I’m concerned about the 20 yuan you owe me for that meal. Please pay it back before you die. Thanks."
There was a long silence on the other end. Zhou Ke pulled the phone away and realized the call had been hung up.
"Tch," he huffed in annoyance, habitually opening a short-video app before suddenly remembering something and shutting the phone off.
"Ragnarök: The Jaws."
Accompanied by a low chant, the Truth tore through the void and hovered in Zhou Ke's palm.
He snapped his fingers with an intuitive grace. The book was instantly consumed by ghostly blue flames, and from the ashes emerged a wolf's head, filled with jagged, menacing teeth.

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The wolf's head was half-corporeal and half-ethereal, glowing with the same hue as the ghostly blue flames, its sharp mane trailing like a comet’s aurora.
"Fenrir, the giant wolf of Norse mythology. When it opens its mouth, its upper and lower jaws can hold up the heavens and the earth."
Zhou Ke stroked the sentient wolf head, which nuzzled against his palm obediently.
He now understood why the Truth titled "Ragnarök: The Jaws" manifested as Fenrir.
In the legends, the gods, at the cost of the War God Tyr’s arm, tricked the giant wolf Fenrir into being bound by chains, and placed the Sword of Victory belonging to the God of Abundance into the wolf’s mouth, preventing it from ever closing.
The saliva dripping from Fenrir’s maw dripped, and dripped, and dripped, eventually coalescing into a river of virulent poison.
Fenrir, nursing a deepening hatred, eventually broke free from its shackles and devoured the All-Father, Odin.
Its two demonic wolf offspring then devoured the sun and the moon, signaling the arrival of Ragnarök.
"Fenrir, the God-Eater... no wonder that Headless Gentleman, who looked so formidable, was swallowed by you without even a bone left behind."
Zhou Ke was actually quite astonished. The fairy tale he had improvised while inspiration was surging seemed to have sublimated into a formidable Truth.
"Let me take a closer look at your abilities." He tilted Fenrir’s chin, and the creature obediently opened its mouth, spitting out a line of text constructed from ghostly blue flames.
【Ragnarök: The Jaws: Consume all Aether to command the giant wolf Fenrir to devour the target. Valuable essences will be tempered in the poison river within its stomach, eventually forging a corresponding weapon.】
"Is it that simple? It doesn't sound like a scam, does it?" Zhou Ke raised an eyebrow, skeptical.
Before its sublimation, "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" had a limit on daily uses.
Louis’s "David" required exposing one's naked body.
Linghu Shiyu’s "The Shawshank Redemption" required the consumption of hope.
By this logic, the use of Truth usually requires paying a price.
This price could be large or small, but it was never generous enough to be non-existent.
He focused his gaze and finally spotted a line of ant-sized text in the corner at the end of the message.
【Please note: If the devoured object is insufficient to satisfy Fenrir’s hunger, it will randomly devour a part of you as compensation.】
"As I thought..."

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Zhou Ke wore a cold sneer of foresight. "It seems I have to thank the Headless Gentleman for being strong and nutritious enough; otherwise, I would be missing a piece of myself."
He squinted at the wolf head, which was wagging its tongue under his hand. "You look so obedient, yet inside you’re still thinking of eating your master?"
One shouldn't underestimate this innocent-looking 'husky'; this was Fenrir, the god-devouring calamity that dared to feast upon the All-Father, Odin.
"I won't settle scores with you for now. Let me check the other one."
Zhou Ke didn't recall Fenrir, letting it wander around; it was a good thing the idiot glowed, it would save on electricity bills.
Only someone who has been a writer knows the true limits of human frugality.
"Crime and Punishment."
Another book of Truth appeared in his hand.
The cover was pitch black, and underneath, countless blood-red hands entangled with iron thorns were climbing, radiating an eerie, malevolent aura everywhere.
After awakening his Truth at school, Zhou Ke had tried to summon this so-called second Truth many times, but there had never been a response.
It wasn't until Fenrir killed the Headless Gentleman and that chilling voice appeared that he felt a subtle connection forming in his heart.
Opening the pages, he saw text written with sin as the pen and evil as the ink. Each character seemed alive, like a multitude of suffering souls drifting in displacement.
【You are guilty.】
Just by glancing at a paragraph, Zhou Ke felt a tremor deep within his soul. His vision was covered by the dense, black characters, and indescribable whispers echoed in his ears.
It felt as if countless maggots were burrowing into his brain; the insane thoughts within the book were constantly corroding his spirit, seeking to reshape him from the inside out!
"Hmph!" Zhou Ke let out a muffled groan and fell to his knees, his clothes already soaked with a fine layer of cold sweat.
He wrapped his arms tightly around his body, the only way he could feel that he still existed in this space, that he still possessed a physical form, and that he was still himself.