Even though Annan still had doubts, he followed the Paper Princess’ instruction to “stay silent”. Thus, he did not ask questions immediately.
Under the sunlight, “the Silent One’s Ointment” was slowly drained. As they flowed out of the blood vessels, Annan felt that the strange feeling of having dust stuck in his throat was quickly relieved.
It was not until about 80 ml of the “black sesame paste” poured out of Annan’s wrist that Finally, the ointment-like blood stopped draining out.
After the Forgetting Blood was drained, Annan’s blood did not flow out and contaminate the liquid.
Although the bright red scar was still there with the blood within visible, the blood seemed to stop by a transparent preservative film. It accumulated on the wound but stopped flowing out.
Then, an eraser appeared between the Paper Princess’ fingers.
She took the eraser and rubbed it on Annan’s wrist, wiping away his wound directly.
At this point, the Forgetting Blood had filled up the fish tank for at least two fingers’ height.
The liquid in the fish tank could no longer be called blood.
It was a mass of gray ink that seemed to have come to life.
To avoid the sun, the mass of gray ink shrank to the shady side of the fish tank, shivering.
“Okay, now you may talk.” The Paper Princess breathed a sigh of relief, indicating that Annan did not need to remain silent any longer, and asked again, “By the way, can you sell the Silent One’s Ointment to me? I can use them to paint a picture for you, which may help bring back some of your memories or get some kind of new influence.”
“Sure, but I’m just wondering what it’s used for.” Annan frowned slightly and asked probingly, “Or what’s its purpose? It’s not that I won’t sell it to you. It’s just to satisfy my curiosity.”
“That,” Alexander stood by, folded his arms in thought, “I’ve heard of it.
“The Silent One’s Ointment can be used to make poison. For example, it can make a person mute. Some Black Widow’s church members will use this poison to make themselves mute to win the sympathy of others. Then, they will take the antidote when needed and get their voices back.”
“Not an antidote.” The Paper Princess explained, “It’s the ritual I just performed. That’s the only way to get the ointment out. If Annan spoke just now, the remnants of the Silent One’s Ointment in his body would immediately turn into a gaseous state and evaporate quickly.
“The ointment is not poison, but a gift from the Silent Lady after directly begging the Silent Lady to ‘make me forget something’. After recalling the memory, there’s a chance to acquire it by cutting the wrist. Unfortunately, the source of this material is limited and scarce.”
Then, the Paper Princess glanced at Annan with complicated eyes.
Annan vaguely realized something.
Sure enough, the Paper Princess explained, “Since it is the ‘rejected memory’, the memory you can’t remember has been entirely dissolved by the Silent Lady’s power within you. The more thorough the memory is erased, the greater the amount of ointment.
“Its realm lies within the ‘negation of silence’ concept, which can neutralize the toxins accumulated in the blood. After neutralization, the toxins are excreted from the body over time. From this point of view, it is equivalent to a liver.
“When the ointment is diluted with the Mysterious Ritual, it can be made into the [Mixture of Lost Things]. The significance of this is that the mixture can still be 1/12 or even 1/10 as potent when diluted a hundredfold. The purpose of diluting it is because the material is too precious.
“After the injection of the mixture, the victim won’t be able to speak, but at the same time, they won’t get drunk and be immune to truth serum and sleeping pills. This allows the spies to keep calm at all times. Its biggest advantage is the difficulty in resolving the mixture. It doesn’t rely on the toxicity of the new reagent but its dosage. Only when the new reagent surpasses the active ingredient of the ointment will the new reagent take effect.
“Generally speaking, the lethal poisons that can kill people quickly are quite expensive. Thus, the poisoner won’t simply inject a hundred folds of the lethal dose. At the same time, the active ingredients of the mixture will neutralize with the poison and then simultaneously lose the ‘mute’ effect.”
“Even if the target is afflicted with a strong curse or injected with a strong poison directly, it will only turn the ointment into a dormant state of detoxification for a long time. Although the efficacy of this part of the ointment is ineffective, losing the ‘mute’ ability temporarily. However, those poisons won’t be able to hurt the target. In a sense, the mixture is even more advanced than the liver.
“Thus, the Black Widow’s believers injected the Forgetting Blood not to gain sympathy but to improve their tolerance to poison. This way, they can store some poison in their bodies or keep themselves safe from being poisoned to death.”
“So that’s the case?” Alexander’s eyes widened slightly, obviously thinking of a lot of things in an instant.
The Paper Princess explained to Annan what kind of deity Black Widow was.
The evil deity was not a class but a name.
An innocent deity or church in one place might be an evil deity in another country or even another region. Taking Black Widow for example, she was the deity many lurkers had their faith in, the Deity of Poison and Spider.
Regarding profession strength alone, choosing the advancement as the “Spider Whisperer” and the “Spider Walker” were excellent choices.
No matter it was the spider’s ability to crawl silently on the ceiling or wall, or the spider’s ability to spit out viscous cobwebs and the varieties of poison-making techniques, they were highly practical. Thus, many people would pick the faith in Black Widow, particularly lurkers who sought to master poison skills. There were also wizards and wizard apprentices, who had no hope of advancement, picking up this faith too.
But She was also the Deity of Poison.
Black Widow’s body was a massive poisonous spider. She was one of the very few deities who would request a living sacrifice. She would impose a passive curse on Her believers, making them kill one person every month with the designated poison She bestowed.
After poisoning the person, the believer had to find a way to take a certain part of the victim’s body as proof of the ritual. This area must be poisoned, so it would usually be the liver. Sometimes, a highly effective poison would require only the hair, neck, or nails as evidence.
When this poison almost killed the murderer, the Black Widow would detoxify him personally and give the believer a complete immunity to this poison. She would also provide a reward according to Her mood. It could be ritual, divine art, holy light engraving, mutation toward a spider, or a new poison.
That was the believers’ “mission”.
Therefore, the Black Widow was considered an evil deity in the Noah Kingdom, the United Kingdom, the Austere-Winter Dukedom, and the Papal Kingdom.
Only in the Underground Federation that Black Widow was not alienated but existed as a common false deity. So, Black Widow’s churches were established underground.
However, considering everyone who worshiped the Spider Cult had someone around them die every month, their density was limited. Otherwise, they would be easily discovered.
So even in the excluded Three Kingdoms, there would be many people who worship Black Widow. If other believers find that people of the same faith had strayed into their “web”, even they would poison the brothers and sisters in the same faith.
Worse still, they often target those of the same faith first.
That was because every Spider Deity worshiper with unknown origins might expose their initially stable life.
Silver Sire’s priority had always been the mission of uprooting these evil deities, arresting and executing the evil deity believers.
Hearing this, Annan suddenly thought of a person.
Joseph Buckel…
