Chapter 47: The Road Splits in Two Directions

Chapter 47: The Road Splits in Two Directions

“We’ve landed on our feet!”

Standing atop a dark boulder, Irene hugged the cleaver with both hands and struggled to strike what she believed was an imposing pose against the night wind while shouting into the empty valley below.

Yu Sheng poked the doll on the head with one finger, nearly knocking her off the rock.

“Stop making such a fuss. We haven’t found Hu Li yet. You’re going to attract Hunger’s attention ahead of schedule.”

“That thing doesn’t detect people through hearing anyway,” Irene grumbled as she jumped down from the rock. She tightened the straps holding the picture frame on her back before looking around at their surroundings. “It really is desolate. And just like you said, it’s creepy as hell. It’s like there’s some sort of layer covering the sky.”

“Be careful,” Yu Sheng said, glancing at Irene’s tiny figure, which looked almost completely devoid of combat capability. Although he knew the doll possessed many strange abilities, he still could not help reminding her. “If anything happens, make protecting yourself your top priority. I’m not afraid of dying, but you’re different. Neither of us can be sure whether your soul would survive if this temporary body were destroyed.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll protect myself. And honestly, Hunger isn’t that much of a threat to me,” Irene said, lifting her head. “Dolls generally aren’t affected by mental influences. More importantly, I don’t get hungry.”

“Right, you don’t get hungry, but you’re certainly greedy. Every time I drink water, you have to stare at it for a while first,” Yu Sheng muttered as he glanced down at his feet.

The large plastic bags they had brought were all still there.

He instantly let out a sigh of relief.

The caution and precision he had exercised while opening the door had been justified. He had successfully transported all the “cargo” through the door. At least the beginning had gone smoothly.

Bending down, Yu Sheng easily lifted the food supplies, which would have been fairly heavy for an ordinary person, and looked ahead.

The collapsed and ruined temple stood quietly beneath the night sky, little changed from when he had left.

“Let’s head over there first. Hu Li should be nearby. I can feel it,” he said softly as he stepped into the darkness.

After taking only two steps, he heard Irene shouting behind him.

“Hey, wait! Slow down! I can’t keep up!”

Turning around, Yu Sheng saw the 66.6-centimeter-tall doll dragging the cleaver in one hand while using the other to maintain her balance. She struggled around several large rocks like a mountaineer crossing dangerous terrain and staggered across the valley floor covered in loose stones.

Obstacles that an ordinary person could step over in a single stride either required her to climb them or spend half a day walking around them.

Watching this scene, Yu Sheng fell silent.

After a moment, he sighed and crouched down in front of Irene.

“You should just ride on my shoulder. And don’t say ‘giddy-up.’”

Irene immediately brightened up and ran toward him with the cleaver raised.

“Hey! You’re the best!”

Yu Sheng instantly shouted.

“Put that thing away first! At least point the blade in a different direction!”

Good grief.

A red-eyed living doll charging at his neck through the darkness while brandishing a cleaver was genuinely terrifying.

Yu Sheng wasn’t afraid of death.

But he was afraid of that.

“Where the hell have we ended up?” Li Lin shivered as a cold wind blew through the forest. An increasingly strong sense of unease lingered in his heart. “Is this still the Boundary Zone?”

“Other Domain, Nightfall Valley, current Depth L-3, currently sinking toward L-4. Danger Level assessment...” Xu Jiali’s voice came from nearby. At some point, the nearly two-meter-tall man had connected a portable depth scanner to his eyeball. As he surveyed the surroundings, he rapidly recited information from memory. “This Other Domain is classified as Wilderness type. We’re in serious trouble.”

Li Lin’s eyes slowly widened.

Prompted by Xu Jiali’s reminder, he finally recalled the training materials he had studied before.

Wilderness-type Other Domains were enormous. They lacked clear boundaries and obvious exits. Leaving them generally required meeting specific conditions or departing at a particular time or direction.

A Depth of L-3 meant the area was already almost completely isolated from reality and operated according to rules that violated reason. Long-term exposure carried an extremely high risk of mental and cognitive corruption.

Danger Level Three meant obvious malice existed here. Something lurked within this place, something that would actively attack and attempt to kill intruders. Its threat was lethal and could not be avoided or countered simply by “following the rules.”

Operations in an Other Domain of this level typically required at least a full Special Operations Bureau team.

More than ten fully armed agents equipped with heavy gear.

And even then, only for investigation missions.

In other words, their objective would merely be gathering intelligence and escaping alive, not confronting the entities within. That required even more personnel or far more experienced specialists.

Li Lin looked around.

Including Xu Jiali, there were only two Special Operations Bureau agents present.

One of them was a Deep Diver, a specialist trained specifically to combat entities. Unfortunately, the incident had happened so suddenly that the giant of a man had barely brought any equipment.

The third person present was an underage freelance spirit world detective who supposedly specialized in reconnaissance.

Their fate was completely screwed.

“Give the food you’re holding to that girl over there.”

At that moment, Xu Jiali, the most experienced person present, broke the silence and issued his orders with a serious expression.

“Li Lin, you and I will use this.”

Li Lin immediately snapped out of his thoughts about their doomed fate.

Without hesitation, he obeyed the veteran agent’s instructions, handing both bowls of instant noodles to the still somewhat bewildered Little Red Riding Hood before accepting the item Xu Jiali passed to him.

It was a needleless injector.

Inside, pale green liquid emitted a faint glow in the darkness.

A rationality blocker.

Li Lin looked up in shock at his colleague, who had already pressed his own injector against his arm.

“The entity generated here is Hunger. It has a tendency toward mental attacks,” the large man said calmly. “You can probably guess the details from the name alone. Take the injection first. The side effects are worse than the aerosol inhaler, but at least for forty-eight hours it will ensure you don’t lose your judgment.”

Li Lin nodded.

With a soft Hiss, the rationality blocker was injected into his body.

Meanwhile, the moment Little Red Riding Hood heard the name Hunger, she immediately reacted.

“Wait. Then you should eat the food right away. Your bodies are still ordinary human bodies. I can endure it much better than you can. Besides, I brought snacks...”

“Listen to me.”

Xu Jiali interrupted her directly.

The nearly two-meter-tall man stood beneath the night sky, almost two heads taller than the girl before him.

Looking down at her, his expression was extraordinarily serious.

“I know your situation.”

Little Red Riding Hood opened her mouth, then finally said nothing more.

Xu Jiali patted her shoulder.

His deep voice carried a reassuring strength.

“This is for our sake too. Your wolf pack is our greatest hope for fighting the entity. You need to preserve your combat effectiveness.”

Watching Little Red Riding Hood crouch beside a nearby rock and silently begin eating the now-cold instant noodles, Li Lin turned toward his colleague with a puzzled expression.

Xu Jiali shook his head gently and lowered his voice.

“If she falls into hunger, her wolves will eat her.”

In the night, the wolf pack let out restless whimpers from within the forest.

In the cold wind, malicious gazes were spreading throughout the valley.

Within the ruins of the broken temple, Yu Sheng and Irene searched cautiously.

The omnipresent stench of decay had grown even stronger.

It almost seemed alive, burrowing into their nostrils and creating intense discomfort.

Irene simply stopped breathing.

Yu Sheng found himself rather envious of that ability.

“You’re sure that fox is here?” Irene asked while sitting on Yu Sheng’s shoulder. One hand held the cleaver, the other gripped his hair. She stretched her neck and peered around. “I can’t see anything...”

“I’m sure,” Yu Sheng replied casually. “There’s a faint connection between us, established through blood. There’s one between you and me too, although you probably can’t sense it.”

“R-really?” Irene looked at him suspiciously before lowering her head to examine her own hand, apparently trying to figure out what this “faint connection” might be.

At that moment, a faint rustling sound suddenly echoed through the silent ruins, interrupting both Irene’s pondering and Yu Sheng’s movements.

Both of them raised their heads almost simultaneously and looked toward the source of the noise.

A white figure cautiously emerged from behind a collapsed section of wall.

A silver-white fox tail swayed gently in the darkness.

Fluffy ears twitched in the wind.

The demon fox girl who had emerged from the ruins stared wide-eyed at the figure standing in the distance. When she finally recognized who it was, she immediately broke into a delighted smile.

“Benefactor!”

Hu Li ran out from behind the ruined wall.

Like a gust of wind, she swept across the broken bricks and rubble along the way, circled around Yu Sheng twice at high speed, and only then stopped in front of him.

Pure happiness and a trace of disbelief filled her face.

“You... really came! Benefactor, really?”

“It’s me, it’s me. It’s real,” Yu Sheng replied with an equally happy smile.

Then he immediately set down the supplies he was carrying.

“I brought you lots of good food. Starting today, you won’t have to go hungry anymore.”