Chapter 115: The Ineffable Invader

Invaders.

To be honest, before hearing those three words, Yu Sheng's heart had already been in turmoil—after learning that the Dark Angels could appear in the real world, and after hearing the words "another planet" from Song Cheng's mouth, he had already realized that those twisted beings crowned with the name "Angel" might be far more bizarre and powerful than he imagined, but he never expected that those things could possibly be invaders from... outside the world.

He had originally always thought that thing was like the entities in the Otherworld, some kind of bizarre phenomenon of this world, at most a more dangerous "Super Entity".

"... No wonder Little Red Cap advised me to avoid getting involved with Dark Angels as much as possible."

Yu Sheng muttered unconsciously in a low voice.

Song Cheng heard Yu Sheng's low mutter, but he said nothing, simply continuing to place more files on the coffee table before him: "I also brought files on several other Dark Angels, but not all of them—some Dark Angels possess the trait that knowing their name causes a 'leak', so they can only be mentioned and studied within the Special Agency's 'Safe House', and some other Dark Angels are listed as taboos for other reasons, and I don't even have clearance to access them, but you can look at these; looking at them itself poses no harm."

Yu Sheng did not reach for the files on the coffee table immediately as he had just now, but suddenly curiously threw out a question: "Why are you so concerned about me? I guess you wouldn't directly bring out files of this level when facing other Spirit Realm Detectives—even if the other party has already come into contact with a Dark Angel."

Song Cheng thought for a moment: "Because we suspect you have the power to expel 'Angels'."

Yu Sheng instinctively sensed this might be a reason, but not the whole reason.

However, he did not probe deeper, simply seriously refuting with one sentence: "That big-eyed thing in Nightfall Valley wasn't expelled by me—it left on its own."

"But it left after seeing you; although there were others present at the time, you were the most special one," Song Cheng said, his tone somewhat helpless, "I know this statement has no persuasiveness, but the fact is—we are completely powerless against Dark Angels.

"No one can summarize their weaknesses or patterns of action, and no one can communicate with those things; up to now, looking across the entire world, whether inside or outside the Borderlands, cases where a descended 'Angel' was successfully expelled are few and far between, and they have no reference value to each other; every time an 'Angel' leaves, it seems as if it simply 'stayed long enough and left on its own', so we can only try our luck like this; perhaps the departure of that 'Eye' really has nothing to do with you, but... what if?"

Speaking of this, Song Cheng paused, then added another sentence: "This is also Director Bai Liqing's judgment. Without her approval, I would not be able to bring these files to you."

"Bai Liqing?" Yu Sheng raised an eyebrow, then his gaze finally fell upon those new files.

However, he did not read them carefully, simply picking them up and scanning them quickly.

"Truly... all kinds of strange," looking at those bizarre, even describable as abstract and chaotic images on the files, and the notes attached below the images, Yu Sheng couldn't help but sigh, "A shadow, a ball of fire, a huge cube silently flying across the night sky... how is there also a sphere?"

"Its diameter is approximately four thousand kilometers."

Yu Sheng's expression was a bit dazed: "... What?"

"You heard correctly, 'Star of Hecate', named after the initial discoverer and martyr, with a diameter of approximately four thousand kilometers, it is the 'Dark Angel' with the largest confirmed physical size to date; its surface is neatly covered with countless lattice-like hexagonal honeycomb structures, with strong life reactions inside; it will suddenly break into star systems where life exists, constantly 'broadcasting' strange radio signals at a safe distance; although there is no clear evidence, we believe the broadcasts of the 'Star of Hecate' will cause intelligent life to gradually fall into madness; many notorious wars and terrorist coups may be related to the approach of the Star of Hecate."

Yu Sheng put down those files, looking at Song Cheng with an incredulous face: "I fight this thing? For real?"

"No, no, of course not like that," Song Cheng quickly waved his hands, "Things of this scale cannot be 'fought' down; we just hope... to let you understand more knowledge about Dark Angels, in case it comes in handy in the future, right?"

Yu Sheng pouted, directly moving past this topic: "Let's talk about something else; do you have any other understanding of these 'Angels'?"

"Regarding their influence," Song Cheng said seriously, "although Dark Angels are all kinds of strange with different characteristics, almost all Dark Angels share one commonality, which is the connection with the 'Otherworld' and the influence on the Otherworld.

"Just as I said a moment ago, although Dark Angels can appear in the real world, relatively speaking, they will more often 'descend' into the Otherworld, and influenced by them, Otherworlds suffering 'parasitism' by Angels will be activated, entities become more dangerous and ferocious, and even the operational rules of the entire Otherworld change accordingly, and even the depth changes—you should still remember the situation in Nightfall Valley, right?"

"I remember that very well," Yu Sheng immediately spread his hands, "theoretically, the Hunger Entity that generates only one at a time suddenly became scattered all over the mountains and fields, and later even the entire valley turned into a huge 'Entity'—fortunately our luck was relatively good."

"In most cases, people trapped in the Otherworld do not have this 'good luck', so those encountering Dark Angels rarely survive; even if the 'Angel' itself does not attack them, victims will die at the hands of entities or Otherworld rules due to catastrophic environmental changes caused by the Angel's descent," Song Cheng said seriously, "we have been studying the patterns of action of Dark Angels; regarding the phenomenon that their appearances in the Otherworld are significantly higher than in the real world, some scholars speculate this is because something in the Otherworld is 'attracting' them, or..."

"Or?"

"Or it is because the 'Otherworld' itself belongs to some kind of 'spacetime weak structure' of our world; in the Otherworld, the power of order is weak, giving these 'Angels' the opportunity to drill in. I said just now that Dark Angels are 'invaders' from outside the world; they will drill holes one by one in our world, and the 'Otherworld', for these invaders, might be some kind of... 'natural hole'."

Yu Sheng pondered, and at this moment, Erin, who had been quietly listening on the side for half a day, suddenly spoke up: "Then talk about those 'Angel Cultists'; why would a group of madmen willingly follow these sinister 'Angels'? These 'Angels' cannot be communicated with and probably don't respond to the so-called prayers of believers, right?"

"We have captured many Angel Cultists; you might not believe it, but the distribution of these 'madmen' is far wider than you imagine; it includes not only the Borderlands—basically wherever a Dark Angel has descended, these madmen influenced by them will appear," Song Cheng's expression became significantly gloomier when speaking of these, "some of them gradually fell due to obsession with power and mysterious knowledge, but the most core and fanatical group insists they were 'guided'."

"Guided? Guided by whom? These..." Yu Sheng said, raising his hand to point at those files on the coffee table, "these abstract Angels? Aren't they unable to communicate?"

"They are unable to communicate, but cultists insist they can truly hear the voice of the 'Dark Angel', and it is not that kind of chaotic meaningless noise, but true 'guidance' and 'teachings'. I have interrogated some stubborn elements; most of them describe the 'voice of guidance' they heard like this—"

"Gentle, tolerant, full of love and compassion; those voices show them the end of all things in the universe, but will also firmly encourage them, telling them how to find a way out, and how to seek redemption together with the 'Angels', side by side."

Song Cheng, speaking to this point, organized his language and continued: "Through analyzing the mental state of those cultists and conducting hypnotic induction on them, we can roughly reconstruct the process by which Dark Angels exert influence on them; this 'guidance' process should be extremely immersive; huge and continuous hallucinations will completely drag a person's mind into a non-human 'perspective', and spend long years in this perspective; ordinary human minds simply cannot withstand this influence; after the guidance ends, they are completely transformed—looking human on the outside, but their minds have long since become non-human things.

"This is also the point that confuses scholars the most—Dark Angels are all kinds of strange, different in ability and appearance, looking nothing like the same race, but those Angel Cultists, no matter which specific Dark Angel they follow, the 'guidance' they hear when influenced by the Angel seems to be roughly the same; all include a 'dark apocalypse', and include 'seeking a way out for redemption', and many details in these two elements are highly consistent, forcing us to re-examine the questions of 'whether Dark Angels have sanity at all' and 'whether Dark Angels are actually a unified race'."

"Sounds like research in this area is quite dangerous." Listening to Song Cheng's narration, Yu Sheng couldn't help but sigh with a remark.

"Yes, very dangerous; the biggest difficulty lies in the fact that your research on Dark Angels cannot be too deep—superficial understanding, and you cannot unlock their secrets, but if you understand too much, you will unknowingly be influenced by them; even during the process of contacting those cultists, you might accidentally 'see' those 'guidances' in their minds. Many scholars who originally fought against Angels were thus subtly transformed into new Angel Cultists."

(End of Chapter)