In a spacious and rather luxurious hall in Aiguyi Town, a group of about thirty people in strange attire sat together. The expressions on their faces were a mixture of frustration and helplessness.

Yun Ze and the Poet of the Myriad Springs Division were among them.

Poet Mei Yige, a tall woman, stood up and asked with a frown.

“Everyone, we’ve been here for three days now. Has anyone found any 【Relics】?”

The ten seconds of dead silence that followed, along with the awkward, sheepish looks on everyone’s faces, provided the answer.

No. Absolutely none.

“That’s right,” Poet Mei Yige sighed. “Not only are there no 【Relics】, but this place is also fraught with danger. Harming others is forbidden, but the laws here are excessively harsh. The slightest misstep can lead to imprisonment or even death.”

In Aiguyi Town, all uncivilized behavior was forbidden. Theft, robbery, and even verbal insults were met with zero tolerance. Fighting or any action that endangered the physical safety of others was strictly prohibited.

For players like them, getting information was a challenge. They usually resorted to sneaking into restricted areas or using various methods to extract information from the Townsfolk.

But those methods were now off the table.

One Rogue Player had watched in horror as another was caught for simply climbing a wall. Their crime? Trying to observe the locals’ ritual offerings to 【Suffering】.

After being discovered, the trespasser was strung up, their hands and feet cut off.

They were turned into a “human swine” and hung on the 【Pillar of Shame】 in 【Dedication Square】. This town even had a special area for displaying those who violated its rules.

Besides the Pillar of Shame, you could also choose to be hung on the town’s main gate. That was where Yun Ze had seen the dried corpse when he first arrived.

That’s right. You got to choose.

The absurd reason given by the Townsfolk was that even if you were a disrespectful person who had to be punished, they still had to respect your individual free will.

Therefore, you could choose where you were hung. You could also choose whether to be made into a human swine or have all the blood drained from your body.

So polite, it was sickening.

After hanging a player on the Pillar of Shame, they would even kindly place your severed hands and feet next to you.

Then, they would offer you comfort.

“As long as your desire to return to normal is strong enough,” they would say, “as long as your faith in the 【Spirit Venerable of the Sea of Desire】 is pious enough, or if your understanding of 【Suffering】 is profound enough, you will be able to recover on your own.”

If you succeeded, the Townsfolk would forgive your transgression. They would believe you were fated to be with them, and your status in the town would skyrocket, making you a guest of the highest honor.

They knew all this because one of the players had actually done it.

After being carved into a human swine, she had managed to reattach her own limbs in just half an hour.

She had achieved a 【Miracle of Suffering】.

Unfortunately, that player was not here exchanging information with the others. Not that they really wanted her to be.

Her name was Zhuge Yue.

She was a player who inspired pure, unadulterated hatred. There was no love in any love-hate equation involving her; only hate.

“Sigh… I have something to say.”

Yun Ze stood up, his sigh drawing everyone’s attention. He cleared his throat.

“Everyone knows about the two bronze statues in the center of 【Dedication Square】, right? The High Priest of Suffering and the Saint Son of Desire.”

The others all nodded. The statues were the most iconic structures in town. After the nuns led the players into Aiguyi, the first thing they did, besides showing them to their lodgings, was to make them pay respects to these two figures.

But that was a legendary tale from a hundred years ago. What was the point of discussing it now?

Yun Ze and the other two poets shared complex expressions. Only the three of them knew the truth.

The Saint Son of Desire in the statue wasn’t an NPC. He was a player.

The Poet of the Myriad Springs Division and Poet Mei Yige hadn’t even told their own comrades from the Tower of Order. Competition existed even within the same organization, and unfortunately, they belonged to a marginalized faction.

They chose to conceal the information, hoping to uncover the mystery themselves.

As a Rogue Player, Yun Ze was even less likely to reveal such a secret to strangers.

“I learned from a townsfolk that the Saint Son of Desire went missing during a battle to save the town,” Yun Ze explained. “Afterward, the High Priest of Suffering discovered a treasure vault containing a large number of items with taboo powers.”

“To commemorate the Saint Son, she took all the treasures onto a Ghost Ship and sailed into the depths of the sea. The rumor is that she performed a sea burial out of love.”

He paused for effect.

“If I’m not mistaken, those ‘items containing taboo powers’ are the 【Relics】.”

The crowd burst into an uproar. They pressed Yun Ze to confirm his story, their desperation palpable. They couldn’t do anything in this damnable town and had no idea how to leave.

Now, finally, there was a glimmer of hope. Everyone felt like a wanderer dying of thirst in a desert who had just spotted an oasis.

Yun Ze thumped his chest, promising the information was solid. He refused to reveal his source, however.

The others had no objections. They were all in the same boat now; otherwise, they wouldn’t have gathered to share what little they knew.

To be honest, it wasn’t that Yun Ze didn’t want to tell them.

The truth was just too embarrassing.

No one would believe him if he said he had slept his way to this information.

On the night of his second day in Aiguyi Town, the nun Chen Xiuxiu had quietly come to his residence. She asked if he was satisfied with her care over the past two days, explaining that his answer was very important to her.

How could he possibly offend an NPC in a place like this? Yun Ze had nodded vigorously.

In the next second, Chen Xiuxiu had blushed and quietly asked if he would sleep with her for a night.

She explained the local custom. The residents would entertain an Outlander with the utmost enthusiasm, but in return, the Outlander had to satisfy one of their desires within three days.

Some Townsfolk wanted to hear adventure stories from the outside world. Some wanted a souvenir. Others wanted to learn crafts like planting or weaving. Most requests weren’t too excessive.

This tradition was said to be the foundation of Aiguyi Town’s development, a method taught to them by the 【Believers of Desire】 who had stayed behind from the High Priest’s Ghost Ship.

Chen Xiuxiu’s Desire, however, was to sleep with an Outlander for one night to satisfy her curiosity about a certain matter. Having grown up in the church, she was completely ignorant about such things.

And so, hoping to learn more about the Ghost Ship and the Believers of Desire she mentioned, Yun Ze had tearfully sacrificed his body for the cause.

In the end, the two of them really did just sleep.

Literally. Nothing happened.

From beginning to end, Chen Xiuxiu just lay beside him, trembling shyly, and slept soundly through the night. In her mind, this was the pinnacle of intimacy. She believed she had already drowned in the Sea of Desire, her reason lost.

But for Yun Ze, how was he supposed to tell the other players?

At the very least, they would curse him for being a prude.

“The townsfolk who gave me the information also said the High Priest left two farewell letters when she departed,” Yun Ze continued, pushing the embarrassing memory aside.

“The first letter read, 【Want my treasure? If you want it, you can have it all. Go and find it! I’ve left all my treasures there!】.”

“The second letter read, 【Uncover the crystal coffin that has traversed the corridor of time, and you will witness the birth of a Divine Miracle. He will bestow upon you endless Relics. This is his mercy and greatness.】”

The message was clear. They had to go out to sea, find the Ghost Ship, and locate a crystal coffin. The 【Relics】 were all stored inside. Opening it would grant them everything.

This major clue shocked and excited everyone. They had hoped to just find a way out of this godforsaken place. They never expected to find the actual location of the 【Relics】.

It was just that the words in the first letter sounded a little familiar…

Just then, Tangqian Yan, a female player who had been in the room with Yun Ze before, muttered softly.

“Looks like the One Piece is real after all.”

Everyone was stunned.

Before they could process what she had said, a strange sound echoed through the town.

Wooo—wooo—

It was a sound they had never heard in their three days here, massive and soul-shaking.

Some of the players recognized it, but it was impossible. It couldn’t appear in this traditional, sealed-off town.

It was the horn of a large ship.

An unbelievable thought surfaced in their minds.

The Ghost Ship. It was back.