Chapter 358: The Very First Secret Keeper

“…the Deity of Records and Secrecy?” Annan was surprised when he heard those words, and then he asked, “Isn’t the Faceless Poet the Deity of Funerals and Records?”

“The Skeleton Crow, which Old Vasily summoned previously, was the Faceless Poet’s envoy. The requirement to summon the Skeleton Crow was “the Remains of the Silent Funeral”.

Speaking of which, the Geraint family emblem also seemed to be a crow.

“That’s a secret, Your Highness Annan.” Nolan smiled.

“Actually, there is no ‘Funeral’ realm in the Faceless Poet’s clergy. There is no such thing as the Funeral Deity.

“Burial is deemed a ‘gift to send off the dead’, which is close to the central realm under Bone Burying Grandma. Even the Bone Burying Church itself has rituals related to funerals.

“Only the subordinate deities of Bone Burying Grandma are allowed to hold the Truth in this aspect. There’s no way to get it. Even the Book of Truth doesn’t make an exception. The ‘Burial’ custom was established when the first civilization came about. Even though the Faceless Poet is old, He is not ancient enough to get into that.

“Those in other faiths consider the Faceless Poet the Funeral Deity because He generates ‘the Remains of the Silent Funeral’. But in fact, His focus is not on the ‘burial’ itself but on the essence of ‘being the audience of the burial’ and ‘keeping silence’.

“The ‘silence’ aspect falls under the realm of secrecy. Since the Faceless Poet is the founder of the Transcended tradition of ‘secret keeper’, He became a deity because of this. Therefore, all his believers will also have to keep this secret for Him.”

I see.

Annan got it.

The truth “Secret” itself is a “secret” that the believers must keep.

Sure enough, getting many of his believers to keep the secret will reinforce the Truth.

Thus, the Faceless Poet is much better than the Venerated Skeleton who made His believers betray others and the Rotten Man who made believers castrate themselves.

However, Annan quickly realized something was wrong, “Then, why are you telling me about this?”

Annan didn’t adopt the faith toward the Faceless Poet, and he easily got this answer: the secrets the Crows were supposed to keep.

Facing Annan’s question, Nolan replied calmly, “In this respect, it is because ‘secret keeping’ itself is a contradictory Truth. If you want to ‘keep secrets’, you must obtain the secrets first. However, obtaining the secrets itself conflicts with ‘keeping secrets’, which the first-hand secret holders have to comply with.

“Thus, the secrecy is in the act itself, but not in the outcome. The more people know the secret and are willing to keep silent about it, the stronger the power of our faith.”

“On the other hand, the Faceless Poet has told me to do my best to protect you.” Nolan smiled and replied gently, “So don’t worry about it. I had plans previously arranged for Her Royal Highness Kafni, but our Geraint family will try our best to protect you in the royal capital.

“Of course, if you let us ‘protect Her Royal Highness Kafni as you did’, we will comply with that order.”

The old man promised so.

What?

Why does Faceless Poet do that?

Annan frowned in confusion.

He didn’t remember having any connection to the Faceless Poet.

In his memory, the only thing he would be related to the Faceless Poet was when he led the players to destroy His Skeleton Crow.

So are we acquainted just because of that?

Isn’t that an ill-fated relationship?

Annan was lost in thought.

Just then, Annan heard a loud crow chirping from outside the house.

The sound even penetrated the basement wall and reached Annan’s ears.

At the same time Annan heard the crow’s chirping, he felt a strange vibration coming from the tips of his fingers, quickly spreading to his arms.

It was like touching a roaring machine with his hand. The soreness was accompanied by a warm current that quickly ran through Annan’s body.

An invisible power flowed through Annan’s body, seemingly going through Annan’s muscular and blood circulatory systems.

When the peculiar power flowed from Annan’s fingertips to the soles of his feet, it turned into a comfortable and even slightly drowsy warmth. It felt the warmth coming from the campfire after curling into a ball next to it when he was drenched because of the rain.

[You are blessed with the Faceless Poet’s gift. The required exercise time to promote each point in Strength, Agility, and Constitution attributes is deducted by -30%. The effect will be lost once the designated attribute reaches 20 points.]

[You are granted a mark, “Advanced Influence: Caw of the Faceless Crow”.]

[If you don’t remove the mark in time, you will fall into a random nightmare with the keyword “record” after seven days (Difficulty: Distorted).]

Annan suddenly saw black liquids flowing in through the gap of the basement door from the outside.

A peculiar pressure felt upon Annan.

Annan was confident with what he was feeling at the moment. It reminded him of when he first met the Venerated Skeleton—the strange sensation after encountering the false deity’s true body.

Strangely enough, the upright deity wasn’t too nerve-racking.

After these liquids flowed into the room, they gathered together again. It became vicious at speed visible to the naked eye and piled up into a human figure.

“I haven’t seen you for a long time.” The black humanoid’s voice was thick and turbid, as if multiple different voices were ringing simultaneously. The figure flickered on and off like a TV image with a poor signal.

This is so strange.

How come it’s a bit like Valtore, the senior’s shadow?

A wild thought popped into Annan’s mind.

[TN: A quick reminder that Sal refers to Senior Salvatore himself, while Vatore refers to the shadow.]

Facing this strange black human figure, Nolan took Eugene to stand up from the sofa. The old man respectfully put one of his hands on his chest and bowed quietly to the black figure.

After about two seconds, the black mud successfully morphed into a human form.

She looked short, only about 150 meters. She wasn’t wearing anything, but only Her long satin-like hair draped down like a black waterfall behind Her. Her hair was seemingly alive, wriggling, and covered Her body completely.

The only accessory She had was the black crow mask on Her face.

“Long time no see, Annan!” Unlike her youthful appearance, the strange and magical young girl spoke in a bright and sharp but not so pleasant voice, “I almost forgot what kind of body I should use to greet you!

“Why did you come to Noah without notifying me?”

“Faceless Poet?” Annan whispered the name.

Not many people could make Nolan feel nervous just by showing up in the heavily guarded basement of Geraint’s mansion.

Seeing Nolan’s respectful expression now, Her identity was quite apparent.

But the problem was that Annan didn’t know Her at all.

He had never seen Her before!

Strangely enough, the Faceless Poet was familiar with him.

Could it be that the one who became affiliated with this false deity was the past Annan?

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