Chapter 33: His Name

The think tank’s tests revealed that if Xu Chen transmitted a single character or word, the message would be distorted. If someone exhaustively enumerated all possible characters and words, Xu Chen’s altered cognition would mistakenly believe that a certain word was what he intended. This cognition seemed to be shaped by Xu Chen’s own knowledge and was fundamentally unavoidable, requiring assistance from experts in psychology.

As for the research conducted by Elder Ge, his students continued the work, but without a leader, the outcome remained uncertain.

Just as everyone was at a loss, Captain Chu received a forwarded landline call. Shortly after, he brought a package and handed it to Xu Chen.

“This is a package from Director Yang Tianyou. It has been inspected—no dangerous items inside. He asked me to deliver a message to you: read the letter first.”

Xu Chen was puzzled but nodded and took the package. Inside, there was indeed a letter and a tightly wrapped small item.

He first pulled out the letter and began to read.

“You know what you need to know. Your anchor is firm, but others’ is not. You are not afraid of the erosion, but others will be swept away.

You have already seen those who have been eroded—they are disfigured, their bodies wasted away, begging for death but unable to live, all because they knew the name!

Once the name is known, they are observed; once the name is called, they are seen.

Do not spread the name! Do not spread the name!

Enclosed is a jade pendant; wearing it wards off evil and misfortune. All will be well!”

Xu Chen frowned deeply. Although he had met Director Yang only a few times, he had never heard him speak like this. Judging by the letter, Elder Yang seemed to know what was happening here and had even sent him a jade pendant.

He then picked up the tightly wrapped item. It was clear that Director Yang was very afraid of damaging it—there were multiple layers of thin foam wrapped around it, secured with several rounds of tape.

Even if he threw it hard on the ground now, the jade pendant inside would probably remain intact.

Xu Chen cut through the tape with a key and opened the small package. Inside was a roughly teardrop-shaped pendant, about the size of an ornament.

He carefully picked it up with his hand and found that the pendant was not made from high-quality jade; it was opaque with a hint of green, carved from stone, and seemed to have been handled for a very long time, its surface extraordinarily smooth.

He scrutinized it carefully and, recalling his own forgotten knowledge, realized it resembled a Hongshan Culture jade pig-dragon-shaped pendant. If it was genuine, its age would be quite ancient, and this might not simply be a jade pendant—the original owner must now lie somewhere in an archaeological excavation pit.

He just didn’t know why Elder Yang had given this to him.

Xu Chen clicked his tongue. “A real antique…”

His voice was abruptly cut off, leaving him stunned.

Finally, he cleared his throat and muttered to the air, “Six six six.”

The sound was smooth, without a hitch.

Xu Chen scratched his head and quickly realized it was probably the jade pendant causing this—after all, he had only touched the jade pendant before trying to speak.

He tried putting the pendant down, and sure enough, his throat was silent again.

He quickly looked around and found a piece of cord. Improvising, he made a necklace out of it and hung the pendant around his neck.

With limited options, this was the best he could do for now.

He then looked at the letter again, this time reading it more carefully. It seemed Elder Yang also believed that Xu Chen was not afraid of the erosion—but what exactly was this erosion?

Xu Chen was confused.

From the letter’s context, the erosion referred to people he had once seen who had been eroded, with hardly any intact corpse remaining. They couldn’t survive if they wished to die... had he really seen such people?

Suddenly, Xu Chen was struck by a realization.

Those who had been eroded were humans infected by yellow aspergillus—in fact, it was the intern group arranged by Elder Yang.

Those patients’ bodies were decayed and hollowed out; the fungal mats growing on them voraciously consumed the tissues and nutrients. Their bodies looked as if they had been bitten repeatedly by predators. No medicine could halt the fungus’s growth or spread—it was truly incurable.

According to Elder Yang, their infection was not a simple contagion but seemed to stem from knowing a certain name of Cthulhu.

Cthulhu spreading His name?

Xu Chen suddenly sensed something was off. If Cthulhu’s goal was to spread His name, then why had he been silenced? And if this silence was not cast by the Cthulhu consciousness itself, then why had it happened?

Could there be a second supernatural entity?

Xu Chen stared blankly at the open package, unable to fathom what was really going on.

If Cthulhu was chaotic and mad enough to randomly cast silencing spells, it might not be impossible.

Then Xu Chen realized that this silence might have saved his life—without it, he might have kept shouting Cthulhu’s name, not only summoning the Great One but even dancing under His watchful eyes.

If the silence hadn’t been cast by Cthulhu, whether it was done out of malice or goodwill was hard to say.

Then Xu Chen called out loudly, summoning Captain Chu.

Captain Chu looked at him with delight. “You can speak now? It really worked…”

“No time for chatter. I need to write a letter. Bring me a couple more sheets of paper.”

Captain Chu nodded and quickly returned with stationery and a pen.

Xu Chen tried writing a few lines and was able to clearly express himself. Then he began writing rapidly.

This letter was addressed to Director Yang. Since Xu Chen had escaped this bizarre state thanks to the jade pendant, he first sent his regards, then directly asked how Elder Yang knew about these matters, where the pendant came from, why it had such effects, and other questions.

He asked Captain Chu to deliver the letter.

After Captain Chu left, Xu Chen locked the door behind him. Holding the extra sheets of paper, he carefully wrote.

He wrote the three characters: “Cthulhu.”

In an instant, the pristine white paper turned pitch black, its texture transforming into a smooth, monstrous hide—something born only in darkness or underwater.

It writhed, twisted, and squirmed beneath the water—crawling, kneeling, worshipping, kneeling, worshipping…

Its kin clawed open its back, peeling off its skin.

When Xu Chen came to his senses, he found the paper with the word “Cthulhu” had been shredded into fragments no larger than fingernails.

Xu Chen felt a chill run down his spine; every hair on his body stood on end.

He had merely wanted to test if he could record and transmit the name through writing, but once again, he had fallen victim—this time seeing something even more abstract.

Fortunately, the disturbance was minor, perhaps due to the small number of people present.

He considered using pinyin or English words to record the name, but he sensed that writing it down would lead to the same result.