Chapter 102: Cracking The Code Of Death Feast

"All right, per usual, all of you can turn yourself into a ball and close your eyes~" Kuzunoha warned as she slightly loosened the arcane fabric, enough for everyone to shift their posture.

The Star Eater Stag ate another of its victims in the galactical sea, resulting in the disruption of space and time in this plane of existence before everything goes back to normal.

Now that the recruits have experienced it many times, they somewhat built a tolerance for the phenomenon. Someone like Erika was still affected by it, but it was no longer to a manic extent where she would scream and become uncontrollable for five minutes straight.

The phenomenon of the Star-Eater Stag was quite peculiar in that it acted more like a mass delusion instead of something physically happening in the real world.

With that hint, I ordered Verina to relay my solution to everyone in the fifth occurance of the star-eating session by the Stag around 3 hours ago, in which we all need to replace the concept of light mentally in our head with something of similar wavelength but not exactly the same.

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By that, I mean I told her to tell everyone to imagine that my golden figure is dispelling the evil and darkness that wrapped the land, acting like a guiding light amidst the chaos and confusion.

Which was surprisingly, was something that Verina and Kuzunoha did immediately after the first introduction of the Calamity Object. Hence why they weren't that much affected by it.

As of now, almost everyone should have my glowing figure to maintain their Sanity when the unnatural darkness arrives again. Combined with their tolerance, their Sanity shouldn't be depleted fast enough to reach zero.

And then we just ignored the fact that the 'star' was eaten, since we were currently in a much more eating-related crisis at hand.

"I hate to admit it," Naosi muttered, "But she's right. Without those ribbons, half of us would probably already be sitting at that cursed table."

Many of them nodded in agreement.

My mind is racing through potential solutions. The Pale Feast was, by nature, a trap of temptation. The answer wasn't brute force, but something that was hinted by its nature,

"None of you are sitting at that table, alright," I repeated, standing and pacing slightly, my eyes scanning the feast for any potential clues. It was also a good time to give the bastion's newbies some brain exercise. "We need to break the cycle without falling into its trap.

"If you have an idea on how to remove the Pale Feast from our bastion, you will be rewarded scrumptiously~"

I eyed Verina and Kuzunoha, giving my signal to not say anything.

Firstly, an attempt to destroy the banquet physically was rendered null. I already tried that. Otherwise, why would I want to keep this cognito-hazard of a phenomenon to stay in my bastion?

Secondly, arcane trickery was also ineffective against it. Kuzunoha said that she barely dealt with this kind of Calamity Object since her mental fortitude was already inhumane, and she was mostly wandering from place to place, even at night.

Of course, I could just use 200% of my brain like usual, but I want to see if there is anyone in this group who possesses enough critical thinking to replace me from time to time.

Yora raised a trembling hand. "But… how? You said that we need someone else to sit in our place. That's how we break away."

"And we're not doing that," I shouted, a little more harshly than I intended. "That's the point—it wants us to sacrifice each other. We don't play by its rules." Sёarᴄh the NôvelFire(.)net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

"Then what do we do!?" Erika asked, her voice tinged with desperation.

Lydia finally spoke, her voice cool and calculated. "The key is in the ritual itself. We don't partake, but we also don't leave empty-handed. There's always some kind of loophole with these Calamities. It's just a matter of finding it."

Callista grinned, her hazel eyes gleaming with mischief. "So, what, we steal from the table? Take a little souvenir and walk away?"

"Not exactly," Lydia corrected, her gaze sharpening. "We need to disrupt the feast without becoming part of it. We can't sit down, we can't destroy it, but we might be able to take something—shift the balance of the ritual."

"You mean like… sabotage it?" Kara asked, her arms still tense against the arcane fabric.

"Precisely," Lydia replied. "But it has to be with the right thing. If we choose wrong, it might retaliate. It's like finding the right key, the important piece of the puzzle that needs to be taken off more than the rest."

Kuzunoha, still twirling her parasol, smiled approvingly. "Now we're getting somewhere."

I glanced at the table, noting how the ghostly figures seemed to ignore us entirely, their focus solely on the rotting food in front of them.

A wide smile arrived on my face.

I turned to the group again, letting a slight smirk curl my lips. "I'm sure one of you has the answer already. You're all bright enough to figure this out, after all."

Yora shifted nervously, her hand twitching toward her weapon, as if she might still lash out at the table in frustration. "But what part of it do we take? Everything's rotting. It all looks like it's been here for centuries." She stared at the pale, bloated heart in front of one of the ghostly figures. "Wouldn't it just… curse us or something?"

Kuzunoha gave a soft chuckle, but I raised a hand to silence any further commentary. This was Lydia's moment to shine—or fall short.

Lydia's brow furrowed, her fingers tapping her chin as she stared at the table. I could practically see the puzzle pieces forming in her mind. "It's a balance," she murmured. "A ritual like this… there's always something that anchors it. Something small, but essential. A keystone."

I kept my eyes on her, waiting for that moment of clarity. Lydia was, after all, one of the more promising recruits—her mind honed for strategy and critical thinking. She just needed a little push.