Chapter 177: 174 Fate

Expecting humans to remain rational at all times is a luxury.

It was as if a highly infectious virus called fear was diffusing through the human world along with the expansion of the black clouds. When the people living in the city noticed the sky to the northwest of the magic capital, they saw the black clouds pressing down on the city; huge, twisted, pitch-black organs and a massive, amorphous mass of flesh and blood of unknown composition were grappling and tearing at each other, like a moving pillar of heaven and earth. That blasphemous and abominable filth was sweeping toward them like a destructive tornado.

Mad roars, desperate screams—the horrific scene before their eyes was rapidly devouring the fragile rationality of the humans. The instinct for self-destruction and despondency was occupying the high ground of their consciousness, and mass hysteria and collective self-destruction were constantly playing out in the streets and alleys of the city.

This city was falling...

Hum—

Suddenly, a strong, ear-piercing sound of a plucked string rang out, and almost all the humans in the metropolis were startled back to their senses by this violin sound that struck the heart. Then, before their fragile nerves could lose their composure again due to the abnormal scenery on the horizon, a piece of violin music filled with the medicinal scent of a witch hooked everyone's mind away to "Jiuxiaoyunwai." They would find that they had arrived at a magnificent concert, where a great violinist wearing bladed gloves was waiting for their arrival in the center of the stage.

They would temporarily forget the despair in reality and no longer have to suffer the cognitive destruction unconsciously spread by the Alien God, but in return, they would have to listen to the eerie, insane music brought by a mad musician who pursued the ultimate music theory.

Survival comes with a price.

The earth was tearing apart, the sky was twisting, light was being swallowed, and all vitality beneath the black clouds was rapidly withering.

"Captain Yu... wake up quickly..." Drake looked at the two massive Alien Gods fighting so fiercely that they were destroying the world, sighing incessantly in his heart. Powerless, he could only lie paralyzed on the ground, calling out Yu Lianyun's name over and over, hoping that Yu Lianyun could wake up from the cognitive destruction brought upon her by the Empty Demon as soon as possible.

Yu Lianyun was different from their group of mixed freaks who had merged with the Abnormal and could long ago casually discard the concepts of life and death of ordinary people; she was a normal human. They could readily agree to the bait plan proposed by the crazy reporter Chen Xiaolin, but Yu Lianyun had only agreed in the end because she possessed the certainty of being able to repel the Alien God Empty Demon; standing from the position of protecting humanity, she could never have agreed otherwise.

Therefore, Drake was certain that Yu Lianyun had a way to handle this situation.

But right now, knowing full well that the solution lay with Yu Lianyun, Yu Lianyun herself had been the first to fall.

As if hearing Drake's call, Yu Lianyun, who had still been in a state of numbness and madness, suddenly slowed her twitching movements and crawled up from the ground. She reached into her bosom, her voice trembling as she muttered: "Not belonging to... this era..."

Drake watched Yu Lianyun's actions in astonishment. Although he did not fully understand, he understood that Yu Lianyun seemed to be chanting some kind of Incantation, as if she wanted to summon something or trigger something.

He looked at Yu Lianyun with expectation; if she could create a miracle, then let him witness it!

As the Incantation Yu Lianyun was chanting reached its end, Yu Lianyun also seemed to have regained her strength and reclaimed control of her body. She stood up, her face pale but her eyes determined, and pulled a black goat hoof wrapped in bronze chains from her bosom: "Get out of this world!"

The moment the black goat hoof appeared, the Empty Demon, which was constantly revealing its true form from the expanding black clouds, seemed to have smelled something terrifying. Its intestines and stomach sacs hanging from the sky went taut and motionless, and its pitch-black, rotting color seemed to darken even further, as if it had shown signs of retreating.

Miss Zhao, who had revealed the posture of the Daughter of Gluttony, seized this opportunity. Her entire body suddenly split into a huge mouth, and with a fierce snap of her sharp teeth, she directly severed the wrinkled intestines and stomach, crazily chewing, crushing, and digesting them.

Suffering heavy damage, the Empty Demon immediately let out a miserable shriek. The parts of its body exposed outside the black clouds quickly retreated behind the clouds, and finally, only a lake of dead water remained, hanging upside down in the sky. Ripples appeared in the center of the lake, and sounds of pain, grief, and resentment were constantly emitted from the black clouds.

As the black clouds slowly dissipated, the roars from the alien dimension also slowly disappeared, until the sky presented a clear blue color.

The Empty Demon was expelled from the world, just like its fate the last time it appeared in the human world, as if this were its destiny and reincarnation—a miserable fate from which even an Alien God could not escape.

A hundred years ago, that crazy scholar known as Ye Gong, in Jinma Mountain, used the "goat hoof" of the cub of the Dark Young of the Woods—the messenger of the Inverted Creator—and bronze chains stained with the blood of the Transcendentalist of All Things to create the Old Seal specifically designed to restrain and repel the Empty Demon. As long as it was combined with a specific Incantation, the Empty Demon could be completely expelled from the human world.

The miracle created by the human predecessors back then was carried forward once again by their descendants.

Witnessing the pitiful sight of the Empty Demon finally retreating while cursing, Yu Lianyun laughed in relief.

"... Is everyone okay?" Yu Lianyun collapsed to the ground again. Her brain's thinking was sluggish, and she was powerless to engage in more complex thought, but she still did not forget to care about the condition of others.

"Hehe." The huge mountain of flesh that had risen from the ground disappeared without a trace, leaving only a burst of giggling that gradually faded into the distance. Miss Zhao left with Xin Junmao, who was protected inside her body.

Drake patted the withered earth, making sound to prove that he was still alive. His gaze turned to Li Duojin, whose limbs were a bloody mess, and Chen Xiaolin, whose figure was shriveled, beside him. He was slightly stunned and remained silent.

Yu Lianyun also saw this scene and sighed, silently closing her sorrowful eyes.

Li Duojin and Chen Xiaolin, dead.

Yu Lianyun could feel that the Empty Demon was no longer in this realm, but there was still a terrifying existence peeking at all of this from a crack invisible to people. She reached out her hand and took away the precious souls of Li Duojin and Chen Xiaolin, but she was already powerless to stop it.

The Strange Array was damaged, the Sacrificial Person was dead, and the sacrifice had also vanished; this entire ritual was no longer perfect. Although the perfectionist Inverted Creator would no longer have the possibility of descending, she still took away the souls of two humans and sowed evil seeds into this world—a kind of evil biological spore.

The spores would parasitize all things, becoming alien kin walking and hiding in the human world...

In that dark and damp Heian-senlin space, surrounded by the wailing of the netherworld, viewed from afar, a thick, twisted, giant multi-eyed "tree" growing something similar to a black goat hoof stood between the forests. A pair of long, strip-like organs, resembling tree vines but covered in tiny suction cups and fine, dense barbs, extended from the giant tree's body, tightly gripping two souls that had lost their spirituality.

A Dark Young of the Woods, with a trunk growing a face approximating that of Zheng Yu, revealed a ferocious grin upon seeing those two souls: "You have come, you have finally come too!"

Subsequently, all the "trees" in the silent Heian-senlin emitted the sound of goat hoof trampling, along with strange, overlapping bleats.

The black giant tree, the mother of the Dark Young of the Woods, the Inverted Creator, was watching the souls of the man and woman with cold yet inclusive eyes, and then wrapped the "tree vines" around their bodies.

Boom! Boom!

Suddenly, two huge red Fire Tokens flew through the air, pinning the tree vines in the void. The souls of Li Duojin and Chen Xiaolin were each bound by a pair of Shackles, and in the blink of an eye, they were pulled out of the Heian-senlin, disappearing into a vortex that had suddenly appeared in the Heian-senlin dimension.

The giant tree roared incessantly at the black vortex, but a young man with the smile of a living Buddha walked out of the vortex with his hands behind his back, seemingly unfazed by the sound that could shatter the vitality of all things and cause space to tremble and break just by roaring.

"Too noisy." Linlingxu gave a wave of his hand, and the giant tree, along with the dimension where she resided, was slapped away to the end of the universe, leaving behind a chaotic mist. It turned out that behind the Heian-senlin dimension closest to the center of the universe, there was actually a patch of chaotic mist carrying scarlet, black, and eerie starlight.

Uh-uh-ying-ying... ah... #￥@#

Sounds of unknown meaning were emitted from the chaotic mist, as if an awakened infant were letting out an instinctive cry.

"Shut up, go back to sleep." Linlingxu's smile was kind, but the words he spoke carried an unquestionable coldness.

Upon hearing this, the chaotic mist indeed calmed down.

"Heh, that old bald donkey asked you to be his successor, and let me... hehehe, let that 'me' be your nanny, but I haven't had enough fun yet. Sleep a little longer." Linlingxu laughed lightly as he walked back into the black vortex.

The chaotic mist continued to sleep, ignorant and unconscious.