Chapter 52: Connection

Chapter 52: Connection

The instant he heard those four words, Li Lin felt his blood turn cold.

A moment ago, he had been lamenting Yu Sheng’s death after being ambushed by monsters. The next moment, he felt that he probably would not outlive the other man by much.

“How is that possible... The records never mentioned a Dim Angel parasitizing this place...” Li Lin muttered. Beneath the indifferent gaze from the sky, he felt more and more noisy static rising in his mind. “How...”

“A dormant state. Every Dim Angel has different characteristics... Fuck, I’d rather be back on the wasteland trading fire with Angel Cultists!” Xu Jiali could not help cursing. He could not understand how what had started as a routine return trip and a relaxing surveillance assignment in the Boundary Zone had suddenly gone so catastrophically wrong.

Everything had caught him completely off guard.

They had suddenly fallen into an Other Domain, suddenly encountered that “door-opening weirdo” he had once met on the wasteland planet, and then seen a half-metre-tall doll and a demon fox who looked as though she had been exiled for a century standing beside him. Before they could exchange more than a few words, the mysterious “door-opening weirdo” had abruptly dropped dead right before their eyes. The doll’s reaction had been bizarre beyond belief. Then there were even more Hunger entities. And now a Dim Angel had appeared in the sky.

Even if he gathered together all the imagination he had accumulated in his entire life, he still could not have envisioned this absurd chain of events.

Uneasy growls from the wolf pack echoed all around them. Wolves made of shadow prowled in circles nearby. The gaze of the indifferent eyeball in the sky filled even these strange creatures with immense pressure and fear. Yet Little Red Riding Hood only frowned.

“...Strange. Why aren’t those monsters coming over?”

Irene, who was currently being carried in Hu Li’s arms, froze for a moment upon hearing that. She soon noticed the abnormality as well.

The flesh-and-blood behemoths gathered around the ruined temple continued their chaotic roaring and prowling, but strangely enough, quite some time had already passed, and not a single monster had taken a step forward. Not a single one had launched an attack.

The indifferent giant eye floating in the sky merely observed quietly, showing no intention of taking any further action.

“I think we’d better run while we still can,” Li Lin broke the silence. “Forget figuring out why these monsters are spacing out.”

Little Red Riding Hood interrupted him.

“Run where?”

The indifferent eye in the sky watched every inch of the valley, while the entire Other Domain was undergoing transformations as though it had come alive. Under that eye’s gaze, any thought of escape was instantly crushed by the despair of having nowhere to flee and nowhere to hide.

But just then, Irene seemed to remember something and raised her head from Hu Li’s arms.

“You said something similar happened before? The day the immortal died was like this too, and your parents hid you in a cave?”

Hu Li froze, then hurriedly nodded.

“Where is that cave?!”

At last, Hu Li seemed to understand. Carrying Irene, she immediately turned around and started moving.

“I remember! It’s near the back mountain. I’ll take you there!”

But suddenly she stopped again and hesitantly looked toward Yu Sheng’s body lying on the ground.

Her benefactor’s eyes were still open. He looked distinctly unwilling to rest in peace.

“B-Benefactor... what about Benefactor?” the demon fox girl asked helplessly.

Although she knew about Yu Sheng’s “death and resurrection,” she did not know many details. Their previous meeting had been brief, and Yu Sheng had never had the chance to explain much to her.

“Just leave him here. Don’t worry about it,” Irene immediately replied. Having spoken with Yu Sheng extensively, she clearly knew more than Hu Li did. “He’ll disappear after a while. He has a way to find me.”

Hu Li stared blankly for a moment before nodding.

Then Irene suddenly remembered something else and quickly added, “Oh right, where’s that kitchen knife I had earlier... Ah, over there on the ground. Help me pick it up. Oh, hang the oil painting on me first. I can’t be separated from it... The knife’s not broken, right? Good. If we lose that thing, he’ll definitely complain later. As for the corpse, don’t bother. It’s useless.”

The little doll rattled off instructions nonstop while the demon fox girl carried them out with simple-minded obedience.

The trio beside them found the scene bizarre beyond words.

They watched as Hu Li carefully picked up a kitchen knife worth perhaps a few dozen yuan from a supermarket while completely ignoring the corpse of her companion lying on the ground. After holding it in for quite some time, Little Red Riding Hood finally could not bear it any longer.

“You’re really just leaving him here?!”

Irene poked her head out from Hu Li’s arms.

“It’s hard to run away while carrying him!”

Little Red Riding Hood opened her mouth as though wanting to say more, but a rumbling sound from deep within the valley interrupted her.

The distant mountains split apart.

Countless pitch-black boulders rolled down from the peaks. Within the widening fissures, flesh began growing from inside the mountains themselves. Teeth ground against stone, producing terrifying thunderous noises.

The forest shook violently. Trees toppled one after another, as though shedding disguises. Countless tentacles lined with teeth sprouted from the places where the trees had fallen and released synchronized roars.

Meanwhile, the behemoths that had been wandering sluggishly around the ruined temple suddenly seemed stimulated by something and began displaying signs of restless agitation.

At the sight, Irene immediately cried out. Raising the stump of her broken arm, she slapped Hu Li’s shoulder repeatedly.

“Good grief! We can’t stay here! We’re leaving now! As for those three over there, follow us or don’t!”

The moment Irene finished speaking, Hu Li had already turned and sprinted toward the rear of the ruined temple, racing toward a gap leading deeper into the valley.

Li Lin and his companions exchanged glances.

Although their heads were full of questions, they had only one choice left.

They quickly chased after the fox girl who was already far ahead, sprinting with all their might toward the so-called shelter.

Little Red Riding Hood looked back one final time toward the place where Yu Sheng had fallen.

Grinding her teeth, she sent one wolf out of the pack.

The wolf charged toward Yu Sheng’s remains.

Yet after only a few steps, it seemed to suddenly forget its mission. It stopped, wandered aimlessly in place for two seconds, then turned around and returned to the pack surrounding Little Red Riding Hood.

Little Red Riding Hood did not look back again. She simply drove the pack onward at full speed, protecting the others while keeping pace with the silver-haired fox spirit ahead.

She had already forgotten the pool of blood left behind her.

Around the ruins of the temple, the restless flesh-and-blood behemoths gradually quieted down once more.

These entities born from Hunger seemed to have fallen into confusion.

They stood among the broken walls and rubble. Their grotesquely overgrown eyes swept the surroundings. Their hideous limbs waved aimlessly through the air. Great mouths hung open, and from between rows of sharp teeth came indistinct mutterings like dream-filled sleep talk.

Then suddenly, a clear word entered those incoherent murmurs.

“Smells good.”

A will was speaking through their mouths.

Smells good.

One should eat.

The behemoths swayed.

The eyes that had been scanning aimlessly gradually stopped their blind movements. One by one, the eyes steadied, and their gazes settled upon each other.

To eat, but not because of hunger.

That which devours all things, that which stands above all things...

Eating.

Yes.

At this moment, they should eat.

And afterward would come cold tranquility and merciful eternity.

For it ultimately devours all things.

It is the utmost fairness and the final destination.

The first flesh-and-blood behemoth moved.

It staggered over to another entity.

There was no fancy attack.

It merely opened the largest mouth on its body and bit down with extreme greed.

Yet the one being devoured did not dodge.

It did not even scream.

As though completely unaware that it was being consumed by its own kind, the monster simply staggered onward with another of its “kind” hanging from its body and feeding upon it, walking toward the nearest entity.

Not a single Hunger entity attempted to pursue the prey that had already escaped.

It was as though, at some moment just now, their very nature had changed.

Drawing strength from hunger had become unimportant.

The sacred act of eating had become their sole mission.

At the center of the ruined temple, the last traces of blood left behind by Yu Sheng’s death were slowly seeping into the soil.

Where the blood spread, the colour of the earth gradually began to change.

Slowly.

Then faster and faster.

Irresistibly.

Yet the indifferent giant eye floating in the sky appeared completely unconcerned with the changes occurring on the ground.

It merely hung high above.

Within that enormous eyeball were no emotions or thought patterns that humans could comprehend.

It continued observing the valley.

Its scale was so immense that from the ground it was impossible to determine where its gaze was actually focused.

Assuming that transcendent gaze even possessed a focus at all.

But Yu Sheng could sense that focus.

Because that focus was now resting upon him.

After drifting in darkness for some time, an indescribable feeling of connection jolted him awake.

At first, he thought he had already revived.

But he quickly realized he was still in a state of Death.

Only this time, his death seemed different from before.

He discovered that within the darkness he had gained an additional perspective.

At first, this perspective confused him greatly.

The strange angle of observation and the multiple overlapping streams of information threw his thoughts into chaos.

Gradually, however, he realized something.

He was answering the gaze from the sky through the eyes of this Other Domain.

He had established a connection with this valley.