Diana and the others had reason to believe Gu Nan because like he said, why would he deceive them?
Sylvia's introduction of him was very clear—as a person from a foreign land who held no grudges against anyone here, Gu Nan had come to help solely because of Sylvia.
Therefore, after Gu Nan's "testimony", the focus of the search would undoubtedly shift to Atalante.
Of course, that wasn't to say they wouldn't search the other main planes. After all, Goro was still alive, so it was entirely possible that he was in Atalante a while ago and then ran off to somewhere else.
Gu Nan only encountered him by chance earlier; it wasn't as if he predicted what would happen in advance and then kept an eye on Goro all the way.
However, it wasn't like no one suspected him.
"Hey, did you really see Goro?" Sylvia asked, looking at Gu Nan with a face full of disbelief.
At this time, everyone else had already left after being assigned search areas, so Sylvia finally had a chance to voice her unspoken doubts from earlier.
"Of course," Gu Nan replied firmly, not ashamed at all at telling a lie, "I previously investigated some mortals, and the focus was on Atalante. Lingyang can testify to that."
Sylvia naturally didn't have the time to find Daoist Lingyang to corroborate those claims and was forced to leave skeptically.
There were a lot of main planes, and every main plane needed a god to search it, so even if Atalante was the focus of the search, only four gods were on this plane.
Gu Nan himself didn't need to be mentioned, and with Diana going to a nearby plane, among the three remaining gods in Atalante, only one was Tier 8—Luke, the God of Recovery.
As for the last two, Sylvia was not one of them. Diana herself assigned the gods to various search areas, distributing the power as evenly as possible without any time to take into account their respective relationships.
"Only one Tier 8—it's just right." Only when Sylvia left did Gu Nan reveal a smile.
For gods, crossing between planes wasn't a difficult task, but going from one main plane to another always took some time.
There was only one Luke in Atalante, which was undoubtedly Gu Nan's favorite situation.
Goro was at most Tier 7 right now, perhaps still Tier 6 even, and this bit of meat on a mosquito's leg certainly couldn't satisfy Gu Nan. From the very beginning, his target was the group of gods that came to search for Goro.
Among these gods, no one could've imagined that Gu Nan was actually targeting them, because they couldn't find a motive.
What kind of case was the most difficult to solve? Of course it was the kind where no real motive for the crime could be found.
However, Gu Nan still needed to make some preparations before he could actually do anything—the current him didn't plan to completely expose his identity.
...
Atalante, Ian City.
Ian was the capital of the Dark Empire, and with the Dark Empire's unification of the continent, this place had rightfully become the political center of the entire continent.
Gu Nan calmly strolled through the streets, his eyes skimming over the familiar streetscape.
Of course he was familiar with this place. As the continent with the most substantial plotline in the game, Atalante was the main plane that 70% of players first came into contact with, while 100% of the players had done missions in this plane.
Gu Nan had also started from the Dark Empire map on more than one occasion, so not only was he familiar with Ian City, he was also very familiar with Goro.
This predetermined protagonist of the game's storyline had been screwed over by players countless times, and some players even took pleasure in bullying Goro.
Gu Nan wasn't so bored as to bully Goro for fun, but he definitely knew Goro's weaknesses better than that group of high and mighty gods.
Just like this, Gu Nan walked through the streets step by step until he slowly entered the palace, but none of the guards or passersby around him noticed his presence, as if he didn't exist at all.
Only when he walked up to a woman did everyone suddenly come back to their senses, feeling as if a silhouette had flashed through their minds, but for the life of them, they couldn't remember what this person looked like.
"Your Excellency… who are you?" Natasha did her best to keep herself calm and asked in a low voice.
Even though she wielded great authority for a long time and the entire empire had been under her control ever since her father left, authority and power in the mortal world was ultimately a mere illusion.
Natasha, who was a Legend Rank powerhouse herself, was perfectly aware of this.
Therefore, she also knew that the person before her was absolutely not someone she could oppose. Resistance was futile. All she could do was to figure out the other party's goal as soon as possible.
"No need to be nervous, I'm not looking for you," Gu Nan replied with a smile.
Before Natasha could return to her senses, a small pitch-black dagger emerged out of thin air and shot straight at Natasha's forehead.
Natasha was completely unable to guard against this dagger. She only felt a flash in front of her eyes as the tip of the dagger shot over, and then a curtain of night jumped out in front of her, barely blocking the dagger.
It wasn't accurate to say it blocked it, because the curtain of night only blocked the dagger for a split second before it shattered.
But thanks to this delay, Natasha had time to leap to the side in a hurry, glancing over in fright.
"Your Excellency, who are you?"
It was the same question, but this time, it didn't come from Natasha's mouth, but from a male voice from the depths of the room—it was Goro's voice.
Of course Gu Nan couldn't possibly know where Goro was, and he didn't have the time to search all over Atalante, but he knew how to find Goro.
The reasoning was also simple: as a key figure in the rise of the Dark Empire, Goro was none other than the husband of Imperial Princess Natasha. This sentimental and righteous Dark Warrior could never sit back and watch his wife die.
By relying on the locator spell he placed on Natasha in advance, Goro rushed to the palace as soon as possible and stared at Gu Nan with a dark expression.
He was indeed in Atalante, but he was hiding in an obscure corner. A cunning rabbit had three burrows; searching for him was most certainly not an easy task.
Now that Gu Nan forced him to show himself, the risk of his exposure was much greater.
"Give me the Blade of Night," Gu Nan said calmly.
Without any half-hearted hesitation at all, Goro drew the long blade from his waist and threw it in front of Gu Nan before saying, "Can I take her away now?"
"I'm afraid not yet." Gu Nan took the Blade of Night and sensed the law of night inside, then smiled.
"In the end, you still affected the law of night inside it. I'll have to wait for Diana to see it herself. She can decide what to do with you." Gu Nan had an It's not up to me; I was just entrusted with this look.
Goro didn't really suspect him. Of course his punishment had to be decided by Diana, the victim herself—this was a matter of course.
He just felt that he was too unlucky. There was actually such a shameless person among these high and mighty gods who knew so much about him and knew to threaten him with Natasha.
Gu Nan waved his hand and summoned a shadow to trap Natasha in place, ensuring that no one could break through and take her away, before he leisurely disappeared with the Blade of Night.
The next second, he appeared at the other end of Atalante, in Luke's search area.