Chapter 594: The House of Vitality Has No Vitality

But thinking carefully, isn't raising Paimon because she's emergency food? Yet she doesn't gain weight either.

And incidentally, she can also serve as a guide—however, readers haven't seen her guide much; arriving at a place means asking for directions once.

No matter from which angle, raising Paimon seems like a losing deal.

The only advantage is that as the best companion, Paimon has indeed accompanied the Traveler for too long, ensuring the Traveler's journey isn't lonely.

Just like college students bringing only their phone to class—mainly for companionship.

And now, under Paimon's companionship, the night gradually darkened; the story describes strange sounds indeed appearing nearby.

[Paimon: "Eh? What sound?"]

Yeah, what sound? Readers say let us hear it too!

Unfortunately, books can't transmit sound, but text can—for example, 'The only path left for us is the path of Shabrak!'

Now, the only path left for the Traveler and Alhaitham is the path leading to the basement.

Crying and wailing sounds came from the basement—it seems the problem is down there, but Paimon said:

["Eh?! But we can't go down here?"]

Readers were all stunned—though books can't transmit sound, books can have illustrations.

In the illustration, it's very obvious: on the ground, there's a conspicuously out-of-place spot that doesn't match the surrounding floor—at a glance, it's a wooden trapdoor.

We're not blind—such a big wooden trapdoor, Paimon, you can't see it?

Though your education might be questionable, your eyes shouldn't be, right? Are your eyes also in inches?

Paimon's eyes might have issues, but Alhaitham's don't—he single-handedly lifted the massive wooden trapdoor and entered.

This left readers speechless again—always claiming to be a frail academic, which family's frail academic single-handedly opens such a large trapdoor? This thing looks heavy.

The three entered the underground; now readers finally witnessed the true face of this 'hospital.'

Dilapidated, cold, dark, rundown—such an environment could drive people mad just from staying in it long.

Just seeing this environment, readers realized: this place is definitely not legitimate—who makes a legitimate place look like this!

Collei trembled a bit seeing such a scene, sweat on her forehead.

Tighnari wiped Collei's sweat and soothed her emotions.

And behind Collei, Lucian was also guiding spells to suppress the power of the abyssal remnants on her; there was a faint green glow on Collei's body—clearly Nahida's handiwork.

Wearing the void terminal is great—Nahida can influence with her power even if not nearby.

This is the benefit of everyone reading together—no unexpected incidents.

And from this scene, one could also see how favored Collei is—if someone harms her, Sumeru won't tolerate you.

So now the Doctor fled early, handing Sumeru affairs to The Knave.

It just so happens that the one in the Fatui responsible for docking with Lucian is Arlecchino—both matters handed to her.

But the Dendro God's Gnosis and the Thunder God's Gnosis seem to need re-discussion and exchange with Lucian—in the end, it's still one matter.

And now Lucian has no plans to hand over the Gnoses yet; both sides are still discussing subsequent cooperation.

Nowadays, Lucian's strength is far beyond before—Cloud Retainer taught him elemental power and spells, Ei treasure taught him martial techniques and arts, Nahida serves as his supercomputer, personal AI assistant.

Now Lucian is simply World · Lucian—fully qualified to demand more privileges.

But this isn't the focus—back to the story.

This underground hospital is so dilapidated and cold because it has been abandoned.

But in this abandoned hospital, there is still one person—he's curled up in the corner wailing.

At a glance at this person's clothes, one knows he's a scholar from the Akademiya.

This person can no longer speak now—just hugging his head, curled in the corner crying and shouting, unknown what he experienced.

[Alhaitham: "I never thought I'd encounter you here."]

["This person is named Razak; he's my senior from the Akademiya."]

Razak at this moment can't see the prophecy book because he's squatting in prison.

If he saw it, he'd definitely break into cold sweat—there's no Tighnari beside him wiping sweat and doing psychological counseling; better not to see.

In fact, not just Razak would be scared seeing it—other scholars would be too.

In previous stories, it was always mad scholars suffering, but most of them didn't crave communicating with gods or connecting to divine consciousness.

Scholars who never did such practices—how could they become mad scholars?

Everyone was just the most ordinary scholars in the Akademiya; it seemed the mad scholars' disaster wouldn't reach them.

But at this moment, Razak's state tells them—they might also become victims.

That previous mindset of 'it doesn't concern me' completely vanished; scholars trembled in fear to the point their lips quivered—if the Akademiya hadn't been overthrown, this might have been someone's fate.

Razak in the story is already mad—he can't speak, so no clues from him, but his existence is living proof.

Readers felt this place was likely conducting inhumane experiments, and the experiment content might be contacting canned divine knowledge, understanding its contents?

This analysis was actually wrong—getting the cause and effect of canned divine knowledge reversed.

These people didn't go mad because of canned divine knowledge—they are the source for creating canned divine knowledge.

Alhaitham analyzed the entire incident from various traces around.

[Alhaitham: "The Akademiya sent people to spread the fake news that the Scarlet King is about to revive, emphasizing that the 'village guardians'—that is, the mad scholars exiled to Aaru Village—will be key."]

["This stimulated radicals everywhere; those in Aaru Village immediately took action, secretly helping deliver that batch of scholars into the Akademiya's hands."]

["Spreading this rumor not only maximally mobilized the radicals but also had a clever point: shifting the risk onto the Scarlet King's believers."]

Readers who had been thinking and analyzing suddenly blanked out.

Is this what having an external brain feels like? We hadn't analyzed clearly yet, and he already told us the conclusion.

Even more outrageous—Alhaitham noticed more points than most readers with god's perspective; what's left for us to think about.

Alhaitham said that even if exposed, others would only think it's racial conflict, faith issues.

No one would suspect the Akademiya—this method is simple, but very effective in the current Sumeru.

Because in the 'current' Sumeru, contradictions between people are too great.

But no problem—after the later Scarlet King story comes out, the contradictions will disappear.