Chapter 880: Truly Became a Monster

Huo Huo pulled his hand back, moved it behind his body, and resumed the cocked‑head pose when looking at people.

The smile at the corner of her mouth remained, but her tone added a bureaucratic edge: "First, make it clear—you're in an unusual condition now."

She emphasized the words "unusual" even more.

"It's still not apparent as ordinary. Miss this shop—"

"—and it's gone."

She uttered the last three words lightly and quickly, as if humming a short tune.

Then she smiled gently while watching Qingque, neither urging nor pressuring, as if waiting for a tea to steep slowly.

Qingque stood still, those dim jade‑green almond eyes flickering quickly beneath the ash‑gray bangs.

She was thinking.

The Huo Huo before her was definitely off‑kilter, without a doubt.

Yellow light emanated from his eyes, a cluster of kneeling demon‑shadow bodies surrounded him, and the tone and inflection of his speech were completely different from the timid little Judge she usually knew; she could see all of this.

Yet this strange Huo Huo was currently the only one who could communicate with her normally.

He didn't lunge to bite her, didn't clutch his throat to whine after her, didn't swing a sword at her while calling her a Abundance Offspring; he simply stood there, speaking in a slightly odd yet at least rational manner.

Moreover, he voluntarily tried several times to restore her ability to speak.

In today's Luofu, such treatment already qualifies as VIP level.

She lowered her head to glance at her own hand.

It was normal.

She then looked up at the mercury mirror that Huo Huo had not yet withdrawn.

The monster with ash‑white long hair in the mirror also stared at her, its jade‑green eyes dim and lifeless, its tattered general's armor reminding her of a fact: whether she liked it or not, she was no longer the Tai Bu Si Xiao Bu Zhe from minutes ago still puzzling over "why the demon‑shadow bodies don't attack me."

Now she was a monster that couldn't even speak.

She took a deep breath.

Looking at Huo Huo's eyes glowing yellow, she nodded.

The motion was slight, but firm.

The yellow light in Huo Huo's eyes flickered deep within his pupils, and the curve of his mouth deepened a touch.

"Good!"

She stepped forward.

The small foot wrapped in white calf socks landed on the stone slab as lightly as a leaf touching the ground, then another step, another, stopping about an arm's length from Qingque.

The distance was close enough for Qingque to smell a faint scent on her—a ancient, dim fragrance, as if long‑buried sandalwood had been unearthed and reignited.

Huo Huo raised his right hand.

Five slender fingers spread and gently pressed against Qingque's left shoulder.

Through the fabric, Qingque felt the hand's temperature—cool, like jade soaked in cold water, yet not unpleasant.

Then the palm of that hand lit up with a swirl of dark‑gold light.

The light seeped from beneath the skin in fine threads, winding around Huo Huo's fingers, then spreading from the fingertips to Qingque's shoulder, radiating outward and permeating every corner beneath the skin.

Huo Huo's eyes lit up simultaneously.

The yellow light deep within those jade‑green pupils surged abruptly, expanding from two tiny points into two swirling nebulae, dark‑gold filaments radiating from the center of the pupils to fill the entire eyes.

Qingque only felt the hand on her shoulder growing ever colder, nearly icy, yet it didn't sting; it was more like a sudden mint leaf pressed to the skin on a hot summer day, giving a shiver that revived her spirit.

Then the sensation vanished entirely.

The dark‑gold glow faded from the shoulder, from the edges of her vision, and from the skin's surface.

Qingque blinked, lowered her head to look at herself—nothing had changed.

The monster in the mirror was still the same monster.

She looked up at Huo Huo, about to ask "Is that all?" when she noticed his eyes were closed, his mouth holding that inscrutable smile, and the hand pressed on her shoulder remained motionless.

Qingque waited a few seconds.

Again she waited a few seconds.

Huo Huo still made no move.

She tilted her head, gently prodded the hand Huo Huo had placed on her shoulder with a fingertip—ice‑cold and utterly still.

Fine.

It seems this "contact" isn't the kind she understood.

She sighed, tucked her lingering heart back into her gut, though now her stomach could hold nothing but confusion and fatigue.

At that moment, Qingque's mind started turning on its own.

Truly became a monster.

The thought broke free from a long‑suppressed corner of her mind, rose to the surface of consciousness, and then lingered there, refusing to leave.

She glanced at herself in the mirror, the withered flower bud peeking from a torn sleeve.

When she was being chased and slashed by Xue Yi in the Dan Ding Office, she could still explain it as a "misunderstanding."

When ignored by demon‑shadow bodies in an alley, she could still brush it off as "strange but convenient."

But now the mirror stood before her, and the monster with ash‑white long hair and a body covered in wilted flowers stood right in front of her, sharing the same posture, the same expression, the same face.

She had become a demon‑shadow body.

When did this happen? How did it change? Was it the "Jing Yuan" clip from the Dan Ding Office that infected her? Was there something wrong with Bai Lu's medicine?

Was it the Aftereffects of the dream‑duel with Shuhuo?

Or perhaps she actually died in that dream, and the current self is merely a lingering phantom?

A scene suddenly flashed in her mind: in the Tai Bu Si office, Fu Xuan sat behind a desk piled with files, brow furrowed, clutching her attendance record, muttering "Qingque has skipped work twelve times this month."

If I just vanished like this, or rather turned into a monster, would Fu Xuan write a line in Tai Bu Si's year‑end summary: "Our Diviner Qingque, for unknown reasons, fell into a demonic shadow body, current whereabouts unknown"?

That would be too tragic.

I might not even be able to get any consolation money, since whether falling into a demonic shadow body counts as a work injury is still a contentious issue.

And her parents.

No, don't think about her parents yet; just the thought of them makes her nose tingle with sourness, and now she can't even produce a sound, not even a cry.

Then another thought came to mind.

She hasn't handed that leave request to Fu Xuan yet.

She wrote it last Friday and tucked it into the back of her drawer; the reason reads, "Due to prolonged overwork causing physical discomfort, three days of rest are needed." The wording is proper, the justification solid, the format standard—it took her an entire afternoon to meticulously craft the request.

If Fu Xuan approves it, she can lie down for three days with a clear conscience; if he doesn't, she still plans to lie down regardless.

Now that leave request lies quietly in the drawer, waiting to be submitted, while its owner has already become a monster that can't even speak.

Life truly is so impermanent.

Qingque inhaled through her nose, forcing the sour sting down.

Huan Long drifted in this gray, deep sea of consciousness.

Her true form is Suiyang, a self‑aware energy sphere; entering another's mental space is for her like a fish returning to water—effortless, even a bit boring.

The Xiao Bu Zhe from Tai Bu Si nodded, and she seized the moment to slip her own consciousness in.

She originally thought she could gauge the situation in a few seconds; a little demon who fell into a demonic shadow body should have a chaotic, fragmented consciousness space, twisted beyond recognition by Abundance's contamination.

But after entering, she discovered the space was unusually clean.

Memory fragments were arranged perfectly, as if someone had measured the spacing with a ruler; the hues of emotion flowed smoothly between the gaps of Memory, with no raging undercurrents, no sharp breaks, only a uniform layer of gray‑green mist—traces of Abundance's contamination, yet so thin it was almost transparent, as if diluted or suppressed by something.

"Interesting."

Huan Long muttered to herself.

A person who fell into a demonic shadow body having a consciousness space cleaner than most normal people—that's abnormal.

Either this person's mental structure is inherently highly resilient, or some external force has shielded her from most of the contamination.

Either way, it's worth a closer look.

She began to traverse the Memory fragments.