Players are coming, fortunately I have a time travel simulator

The nearest workhouse is not far to the southwest, south of the University of Victoria campus.

Sure enough... it was a building of the same style as the one used in the Ritual of the Ascender. Zhou Ning stood at the entrance of the alley and observed quietly for a while. From time to time, people in tattered clothes, looking tired, with empty and numb eyes, carried textile materials in and out. There was also a guard standing at the door. When he saw someone slowing down, he immediately drove them away roughly.

"Most of them are plagued by bad luck and are severely lacking in vitality. If you want to investigate, I suggest starting with the ancillary facilities here, such as whether there are any statues, altars, alchemy arrays, etc. that are not specified. Many demons and evil gods do not have high demands and do not intend to destroy the world, but they are very interested in human resentment and vitality." Jasmine said in her mind.

"I understand."

Zhou Ning nodded cautiously. Through the art of observing qi, he could also tell that these people's lifespans were indeed not long.

In fact, he also thought so. Through the previous two simulations in the apocalypse world, it can be seen that the revival of the evil god Nyastra requires a large number of dead bodies, blood, disease and hatred, preferably a large number of deaths at the same time.

The first revival came from a man-made mining disaster, where the Cult of the Cursed God sacrificed 2000 miners in the Darklan Mine to summon the evil god Nyastra; the second time was when the self in this dimension purged thousands of rebels through an armed coup, causing countless people to summon Him with unwilling resentment.

The collusion between the Curse God Cult and the Life Alchemy Society must have been based on this consideration.

Changing his title to a thief suitable for infiltration, Zhou Ning's figure suddenly turned into an elusive shadow, and he unknowingly climbed over a corner of the wall.

The interior of the workhouse was lined with rows of low houses on both sides, and in the middle was a large factory building. Although it was already night, the lights were still on inside. The factory was filled with smoke and pungent dust everywhere. Many ragged workers sat in front of the looms, working tirelessly and coughing violently from time to time.

There is a narrow staircase on the right side of the factory leading to the second floor. There are two guards guarding at the bottom of the stairs. At the top of the factory is the roof that can hold crystals.

The low houses on both sides should be used as staff dormitories. There are several thin female workers washing clothes at the door.

Zhou Ning's eyes scanned the interior of the workhouse for a while, and locked onto the innermost lighted room on the second floor on the west side of the factory.

Through the ultra-long-range vision, Zhou Ning could see a label with the Dean's Office on it.

Walking to the shadows, Zhou Ning released the hook towards the railing on the second floor. The hook dragged Zhou Ning up and landed silently on the side of the dean's office.

Through the window, you can see a fat middle-aged man hugging a call girl wearing a hawk girl COS costume, and they are having quite a bit of fun.

Not him. Zhou Ning shook his head slightly in disappointment.

The fat man before him was frail and had kidney deficiency. He wasn't even a transcendent. He was completely different from the cruel, calculating, and powerful demon he had imagined.

Wait, there seems to be another door in this room!

Through his powerful observation Haki, Zhou Ning could feel that there must be a secret space inside the room.

With a thought in his mind, a silent and domineering aura swept over. The middle-aged man and the eagle-like girl's eyes turned white and they fainted.

Zhou Ning jumped lightly into the room from the window and hit each of them on the back of the head to ensure that they would be unconscious for a longer time.

Zhou Ning walked to the wall and fumbled around for a while. He accidentally pushed one of the bricks, and with a click, a secret door opened.

Suddenly, a strong smell of decay and mildew came from inside.

Inside was a rather large hidden space, with a small black altar in the middle, similar to the one found in Rivers' house before, on which were placed some rotten food for offerings and a small statue of Nyastra.

On the wall, there is a dark mirror hanging in each place, facing the entrance of each passage.

From where Zhou Ning stood, he could see dark shadows moving about. He had encountered them before when he escaped from the Elf King's mausoleum—creatures called mirror demons. They could mirror the person looking in the mirror, reflecting their opponent's strength and being used for surveillance and observation.

Zhou Ning suddenly stepped forward, his palm merged into the mirror, and he pulled out the mirror demon facing the entrance.

Because Zhou Ning had the same stealth effect as Kaito Kidd, and his hand speed was extremely fast, the mirror demon didn't have time to transform into Zhou Ning in the first place, and was ignited by the ripples and turned into a pool of ashes.

[You killed the Mirror Demon (lv60), and you gained 27000 experience points! ]

He didn't have much experience, and nothing had exploded. Zhou Ning loosened his fingers, scattering the ashes from his fingertips, and clapped his hands lightly.

In addition to the black altar, there is an intricately patterned alchemy array carved on the ground. It is very large and covers the entire ground of the space.

Alchemy arrays belong to the advanced field of applied alchemy. Zhou Ning currently has only a limited understanding of them, let alone this super-large complex alchemy array. I'm afraid even Professor Weasley might not be able to understand it.

But things were already very clear, and it really confirmed his worst guess. This place should be one of the seven Ascendant Ritual Altars.

These lunatics actually wanted to use the entire civilian population of Darkland City to complete the Ritual of the Ascendant.

Zhou Ning couldn't help but shudder when he thought of the terrifying scene in the mural where all the civilians in the Elf Capital were transformed into shadows and undead at the same time.

He squatted down with a serious expression and tried to destroy the integrity of the alchemy array, but for some unknown reason, the silver liquid that made up the entire alchemy array had a strong resilience. Just as he had destroyed its patterns, it was restored to its original state in a short time.

As for using a larger formation to completely destroy this place, it is not impossible for him to do it, but it will easily arouse the vigilance of the forces behind the scenes, alerting them, causing subsequent operations to go awry. He can only give up for the time being.

There is a wooden escalator on the inside near the wall, leading to the top of the ceiling, where there is a secret door that can be opened outwards.

Zhou Ning nimbly avoided the monitoring range of the mirror and climbed up the escalator. After opening the secret door on the ceiling, he saw an altar spire that could hold crystals. There was an inconspicuous groove on the spire. Although he didn't know how to activate the alchemy array, he thought that as long as he placed the crystal on the spire, he could instantly activate the alchemy array below.

Zhou Ning then went to the three workhouses in the old city and the welfare home on Jinmuhua South Road that he had located the day before. The result was: the building layout and specifications were exactly the same, even the secret rooms inside were identical. Still no sign of Chris Fisher.

This is a bit strange. There are only seven Ascendant Ritual Altars in total, and there are 18 newly built poorhouses and welfare homes in total. How come I only found five of them?

With doubts, Zhou Ning came to Xilin Grocery Store. Leonardo had not returned yet, and only Ian was on duty there.

Zhou Ning greeted Ian, chatted casually, and sat there waiting for news from Leonardo.