Lord of the Mysteries

1364 Proactive Klein

Following that, he saw the blonde-haired Audrey, who had a light white silk scarf covering her eyes, appear on the ancient stone steps. Step by step, she landed onto his mind island via the sea of collective subconscious.

After some hesitation, Klein no longer allowed his consciousness to stay high in the sky. He gave up the corresponding control and allowed them to return and fuse together.

If he didn’t do that, he would maintain absolute rationality in the subsequent treatment, making him unable to be moved by all kinds of memories and lose the possibility of strengthening his humanity.

This meant that Audrey’s treatment was destined to fail right from the start.

After arriving at the mind island that resembled a dream world using her spiritual intuition, Audrey stopped and spread her arms slightly.

She recalled her parents’ love for her, the excitement she felt when she first became a Beyonder, and the joy she felt after helping others to change her emotions and emit corresponding fluctuations.

This was a method of awakening Gehrman Sparrow’s memories related to his humanity. It was a Beyonder manifestation of the effects of “empathy.”

Scenes that were worth cheris.h.i.+ng, or those hiding deep within, flashed across Audrey’s mind one after another. Beneath her feet, from the surface of the island that represented Klein’s mind, firefly-like light points seeped out of the “soil” and floated up.

Every point of light presented a different scene:

“A kid taking a stride forward with his short legs, receiving an ice-cream;

“A student secretly reading novels and comics under the cover of a textbook.”

“A teenager sitting in front of his computer and playing games with full focus. Hearing the sound of a key suddenly being inserted into a keyhole, he jumped up and performed a force shutdown on his computer. Rus.h.i.+ng back to his room, happy that his actions weren’t discovered, he had a bounce in his step. Going to the living room, he asked his mother for pocket money, before appearing beside his father to casually ask questions about his studies;

“A young adult and his companions pus.h.i.+ng a bashful friend to the corridor, right up to the person he had a crush on. Then, turning around, he laughed loudly;

“A young adult with some hint of adolescence to him stealing a glance downstairs, watching a figure leave, but unable to open his mouth no matter what;

“An employee with a slightly protruding belly waving his hand impatiently when he returned home for the holidays. After telling his parents not to serve him food or set up blind dates for him, he sees his parents’ white hair and loses himself in thought when he calmed down;

“A scholarly-looking man and his brother and sister moving out. When they saw the dirt and dust on each other’s faces, they laughed;

“…”

Klein sat at the round table at the veranda, one hand holding his top hat and the other hanging in midair, as though he wanted to cover his face.

Two transparent drops of water slowly slid past the two sides of his nose bridge and dripped into the void.

Klein closed his eyes, his expression soft and pained.

In his mind island, Audrey seemed to have transformed into a whirlpool of emotions as she pulled together similar memories.

After the entire island was covered in firefly-like points of light, a faint gray fog emerged.

In the fog, there was a door of light that was dyed bluish-black. It was formed from illusory and brilliant spherical light.

The main body of each spherical light was composed of transparent, ringed, or starlight-like worms and insects. They embraced each other and intertwined like mythical creatures.

The door of light looked a little odd at first glance, but if one looked closely, they would discover that its surroundings were dark. It was as though it was wearing a hooded black robe.

Thus, on a whole, it looked like an unknown mysterious person hiding under a robe.

In the next second, a slippery, illusory tentacle appeared under the deep black robe of the mysterious person.

At that moment, although Audrey’s consciousness couldn’t see or hear anything, her spiritual intuition gave her a strong sense of danger. She had a feeling that a sea consisting of corruption was about to drown her.

No, this isn’t an illusion! She believed that if things continued to develop like this, she would get infected with a severe mental illness, or even lose control and go crazy on the spot!

Audrey was just about to “Placate” herself with all her might, weakening the corruption ahead of her when the firefly-like light dots floating above the island rapidly gathered. They illuminated the grayish-white fog, diluting the darkness around the strange door of light, making the tentacles covered in mysterious patterns shrink back.

This was also the reason why Klein could receive psychological treatment only after barely suppressing the awakening Celestial Worthy’s consciousness.

This made Audrey sense the weakening of the danger, and she quickly did a Psychoa.n.a.lysis. Then, she immediately “Placated” the corruption, performing a true act of hypnosis.

After repeating it over and over again, Audrey took an unknown amount of time before she finally managed to obtain the initial results she expected.

She then left Gehrman Sparrow’s mind island and returned to her body.

This treatment was very difficult, so she didn’t use a “Virtual Persona” and directly used her Body of Heart and Mind.

After sensing the end of the treatment, Klein raised his hand to wipe his face, allowing The Fool’s memories “Grafted” above the gray fog to return to his true body.

A few seconds later, Audrey removed the white silk scarf wrapped around her eyes and nose, snapping herself out of her self-hypnosis.

She looked at Mr. World opposite her and muttered to herself poignantly, “Is this the mental problem brought by G.o.dhood?”

How terrifying…

Klein nodded slightly and said, “Yes, every angel has one. The only difference is whether it’s serious or very serious.”

“Saints have it too. Even Low- and Mid-Sequence Beyonders who aren’t demiG.o.ds will have it

too.” Audrey added with Gehrman Sparrow’s former explanation.

“To a Low- or Mid-Sequence Beyonder, the remnant mental imprint of the former owner of the characteristic is relatively more dangerous.” Klein picked up the gold-lined cup and took a sip. “This is the cruel law of the mysterious world. This is because our Beyonder powers come from external objects, from the Beyonder characteristics.”

Audrey nodded before shaking her head gently. As she contemplated, she said, “I don’t think it’s that pessimistic, just like the source of every human life comes from something else: air, bread, meat, water, etc.

“When we absorb them, we will also absorb their negative effects, acc.u.mulating all kinds of problems that eventually make us fall sick. However, this doesn’t mean that we have to completely resist them and treat them as external objects. Once they’re absorbed, there will always be some part of it that belongs to us.

“I didn’t express it well, but I believe you should understand what I mean.”

Klein was taken aback for a moment before replying thoughtfully, “A Beyonders acquisition of a Beyonder characteristic is like humans having food?

“Then, one should have peace of mind and not have too many repulsive thoughts; it’s about resisting it, but also working alongside it; and suppressing it, but also fusing together with it?”

“Roughly like that.” After Audrey said that, she laughed self-deprecatingly. “However, this also seems to imply a negative message: humans will eventually die, but Beyonders…”

She didn’t finish her sentence, unwilling to agitate the patient opposite her.

She switched topics and said, “Pay a visit another two times this week. I’ll be able to stabilize you under normal conditions. Yes, normal conditions.

“Also, you can reminisce about things when you’re free, or go somewhere you yearn to go.”

Klein nodded and said, “What do you have in mind about Wrath’s suggestion?”

The smile on Audrey’s face slowly disappeared as her expression gradually turned serious.

“Do you have any suggestions?”

Klein put down his teacup and calmly said, “Strictly speaking, the danger you bring is divided into two categories: One is when you actively or pa.s.sively involve yourself in certain matters, attracting powerful enemies to your side, implicating your family, relatives, friends, and the innocent. The other is that your very existence allows some factions to target the people you value the most, doing so to threaten you.

“For the latter, unless you’re dead, there’s no way for you to ever avoid them. Of course, most of these things are a result of the former.

“If you give up on all your current ident.i.ties in the mysticism world, and only be Mr. Fool’s believer and Miss Audrey Hall from now on, no longer taking the initiative to partic.i.p.ate in matters related to Beyonder or other matters with unpredictable elements, you can avoid most of the risks of the former and drastically reduce the latter.

“Under such circ.u.mstances, with the Evernight G.o.ddess favoring the Hall family, and Mr. Fool’s protection provided to you is enough to deal with the rare instances of dangers, ensuring your family’s safety.

“That’s why there’s no need to split off another ident.i.ty.”

Audrey fell silent for a while. She bit her lower lip indiscernibly and asked, “What if I do want to split off an ident.i.ty?”

“As long as you let that ident.i.ty believe in Mr. Fool, it’s not much different from what I said just now. The only difference is that, from this point forth, you’ll have to stay away from your family and friends and live with another ident.i.ty.” Klein’s voice sank slightly as he said in a serious tone, “Also, are you really fine with Hermes splitting off an ident.i.ty for you?”

Audrey’s emotions were disrupted by this question. Her eyes flickered as she said, “However, splitting ident.i.ties should be a Beyonder powers of a Sequence 3 Dreamweaver.”

She definitely wouldn’t be able to accomplish it by herself.

The corners of Klein’s mouth curled up as he suddenly asked, “You’re able to use that Pride mask to enter the Garden of Eden directly?”

As Audrey couldn’t take the initiative to mention the Psychology Alchemists, he very directly pointed it out.

Audrey nodded gently, surprised, puzzled, and guessed something.

“I’m unable to pay the equivalent price, and…”

Without waiting for her to finish, Klein said with a cold expression,

“On the one hand, Adam has drifted from Mr. Fool and nearly killed me. On the other hand, with the apocalypse approaching, Mr. Fool has prophesied something: when the time comes, ‘He’ might fall asleep again. As ‘His’ Blessed, I won’t be able to escape a similar fate. The payment you need to pay is that, when such an anomaly happens, perform certain dangerous things according to Mr. Fool’s instructions and try hard to awaken ‘Him."”

Without giving Miss Justice a chance to digest this sentence, Klein extended his right hand and grabbed a few times at the void ahead of him, pulling out a grayish-white, cold persona mask.

Using his status and Audrey’s trust in him, he forcefully summoned the projection of the Pride mask from the Historical Void.

“It’s connected to my mind, so no one else can use it.” Audrey subconsciously pointed out the problem when she saw this.

“Give me a strand of hair,” Klein said calmly.

Audrey didn’t think too much about it. She plucked out a strand of blonde hair and handed it to Gehrman Sparrow.

Klein took the strand of hair and wrapped it in the eye holes in the persona mask.

Then, he held his silk hat in one hand and the grayish-white mask in the other as he slowly stood up.

During this process, he mobilized Sefirah Castle and “Deceived” the rules.

Pa!

Klein wore the Pride mask without facing any resistance. Immediately, he saw human-clothed animals walking upright.

He had entered the Garden of Eden directly.

Looking at the black cathedral in the middle of the city, Klein curled his lips and took out the Staff of the Stars and wore the silk top hat over his head.