Chapter 575: Let happiness start spreading

Jiang Yuan no longer contended with Lu Dou.

This person stood in the center of the square and had no intention to talk.

He wanted five thousand people.

He wanted a public experiment that could prove his theory.

Jiang Yuan raised his right hand.

Dark-colored cards rose one after another from the card bag.

Four.

Sixteen.

Thirty-two.

The card faces spread in midair, their edges showing a dark metallic hue.

Lu Dou held the white umbrella, standing in the gray mist without moving.

"Jiang Yuan."

"You actually understand too."

"The people here have no other way."

"Yes." Jiang Yuan interrupted him, "Hold you down, and a way will appear."

The words fell.

All the cards fell at once.

He held nothing back.

Jiang Yuan's shadow beneath his feet spread across the ground, crossing cracks, over fallen chairs, rolling upward along the crowd's perimeter.

The lights atop the square were swallowed.

The partition boards were swallowed.

The gray mist beneath Lu Dou's feet was also pressed back into the ground fissures.

The Dark Shadow Court might affect ordinary people.

But Jiang Yuan could no longer attend to it.

Lu Dou's rules are too troublesome.

We cannot give him time.

Cards were nailed into the ground one by one, with shadow connecting between them, forming layer after layer of black barrier.

Qin Zhixia watched Jiang Yuan's movements, her mechanical arm rising, the Tail-Head Snake positioned before her.

"Medical Team, fall back behind me."

"Ordinary people, don't run around."

"Whoever laughs, subdue them first, don't fire."

A young policeman swallowed his saliva.

"Qin Team, what if we can't subdue them?"

Qin Zhixia didn't turn back.

"Then keep subduing."

The policeman gripped his gun tightly.

He had just seen Lao Zhou bite his tongue.

He also saw that father weeping, begging Jiang Yuan to kill him.

He used to think those who dealt with the weird were far from him.

Only today did he realize that the weird is close to everyone.

Close enough that the person sitting beside you, who was just chatting about a child's name a second ago, would the next second laugh while tearing open the emergency exit.

The shadow had already pressed down onto Lu Dou's head.

Jiang Yuan clenched his five fingers.

"Gather."

The darkness closed in.

Lu Dou lifted his head, the white umbrella tilting slightly.

He did not dodge.

Instead, he raised his hand and lightly swayed the gray mist behind him.

"Come out."

From deep within the gray mist, a hand stretched out first.

That hand's skin was bluish, its five fingers overly long, with black dirt under the nails.

Immediately after, a tall figure crawled out from the fissure.

It had no face.

Around its neck hung several human faces.

Those faces were male and female, old and young, their mouths split open, emitting a uniform laughter.

Jiang Yuan's cards cut ahead first.

The weird tale raised its arm.

The card blades sliced its flesh, yet it did not stop.

It lowered its head and crashed into the shadow barrier.

The shadow rolled up, pressing down on its head and limbs.

In the next second, the ten‑plus faces on its body all opened their eyes.

Happiness.

Happiness.

Happiness.

A shadow showed a gap.

Jiang Yuan's pupils contracted.

Quasi‑S.

In Lu Dou's hand, there was even a Quasi S-rank monster tale.

Before he could fill the gap, something burst out of the Gray Mist on the left.

It was a woman wearing an old Patient Gown, her abdomen split open, filled with writhing arms.

On the right, a child with limbs bent backwards crawled across the ground, dozens of eyes sprouting on its back.

Third head.

Fourth head.

Fifth head.

Each head's weird fluctuation edged toward Quasi‑S.

They did not attack Lu Dou.

They showed not even the slightest resistance.

Lu Dou lifted the umbrella handle, and they lunged in the same direction.

Jiang Yuan felt his heart sink.

Monster tales have no concerns for humans.

They also do not require a symbiont to bear the backlash.

They were turned into tools by Lu Dou.

As long as Lu Dou gives a command, all the Rules can be forced out.

Jiang Yuan had previously let Shadow Ghost devour many weird phenomena.

He knew clearly how far this release, which requires no trickster to pay a price, could push monster tales.

Jiang Team!

Su Ming looked up from the edge of the passage.

There are more behind.

Gray Mist surged.

Monster tales emerged one after another.

There were long‑haired monsters draped in human skin, an old man whose whole body was covered with mouths, a woman dragging half a body, and a tall figure with a blank face.

They were countless.

At least dozens.

Even the weakest among them were B Ji.

Ordinary people cannot comprehend the ranks.

They only saw those things emerge from the mist, closing in on them.

Someone retreated while crying.

Someone clutched their family tightly.

The old patrol officer sat on the ground, his hand finding his fallen hat; he tried to stand, but his legs would not obey.

He stared at those monster tales, with only one thought in his mind.

Can this still be fought?

Can Jiang Yuan alone truly hold them back?

The Dark Shadow Court suppressed the first two monster tales.

The third head had already broken through the barrier.

When it charged, Jiang Yuan raised his hand, and a dozen playing cards stuck to the crowd's heads swept by, slashing at the monster tale's neck.

The monster tale did not dodge.

It reached out, grabbed the card, its palm cut open and turned inside out, yet it kept charging forward.

It feared no death.

It was never a living person to begin with.

Worse still, they do not kill people.

They surged into the crowd, using their bodies to overturn seats, break the barricade, and forcibly split the Night Watcher from ordinary people.

A woman was brushed on the shoulder by a monster tale and fell to the ground.

Qin Zhixia tried to move forward, but the Patient Gown monster tale blocked the way.

All the arms from its abdomen stretched out, reaching for the Tail-Head Snake.

Qin Zhixia swung a horizontal blade down.

A severed hand fell to the ground.

More arms tunneled out from its abdomen.

Damn, it can really reproduce.

Liang Wen swept by from the side, a fissure opening between his palms, swallowing two arms that lunged at Qin Zhixia.

He lifted his leg and kicked away a blank‑faced monster tale.

"You, White Umbrella brother."

"Did you bring the monster tale breeding farm here?"

Lu Dou gave Liang Wen a glance.

"They were in great pain before."

Liang Wen was stunned for a moment.

"So you gave them overtime?"

"I gave them a home."

"Then that home of yours is pretty deadly."

Lu Dou gave no answer.

He only raised his hand.

The monster tale group kept moving forward.

The joke on Liang Wen's face faded.

He discovered that the Dark Rift he opened, after swallowing a B Ji monster tale, had its edges unexpectedly propped open by the Happiness Rules inside the monster tale.

It wasn't suppression.

It was contamination.

All of these things had been modified by Lu Dou.

They aren't simple monster tales.

They are mobile propagation sources.

"Su Ming." Jiang Yuan said, "Don't let them touch anyone."

"Redundant."

Su Ming pressed both hands onto the ground.

The Time Marrow Worm's power spread along the floor tiles.

The monster tale group's movements slowed.

A long‑haired monster maintained a striking posture, hovering in midair.

But the next moment, Lu Dou looked at it.

Its back split open, revealing a smiling face.

That face faced Su Ming.

A vein on the back of Su Ming's hand twitched.

The Time Marrow Worm's power was pushed back.

He stepped back half a pace, a metallic taste rising in his mouth.

Lu Dou was supplementing each monster tale with rules.

Su Ming stared at the Gray Mist covering the ground, his mind calculating rapidly.

Can't hold back.

Jiang Yuan's Shadow was restrained.

Qin Zhixia and Liang Wen were blocked by monster tales.

Ordinary people were sliced into pieces, unable to see each other.

This is the scene Lu Dou wanted.

He wasn't in a hurry to kill.

He wanted to separate all hands that could save people.

Then let Fear Fermentation occur.

"Policeman." Su Ming grabbed the Communicator, "Fire Suppress Spook Bullet."

The outer policemen had been waiting for orders.

"Open fire!"

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

Flames spewed from the muzzle.

The Suppress Spook Bullet pierced the barrier and entered the monster tale's body.

The first faceless monster tale halted its steps, white smoke billowing from its chest.

The second monster tale's arm drooped.

The third was hit repeatedly, half its body beginning to crumble.

The policemen's eyes lit up.

This thing is useful.

Ordinary people can also fire.

"Continue!"

The old patrol officer leaned on the railing, stood up, and picked up an unknown spare gun.

His hand shook badly; he aimed twice before pulling the trigger.

A bullet struck the long‑haired monster's shoulder.

The monster's movement stalled.

The old patrol officer gasped.

It can be struck.

The next second.

Lu Dou walked through the Gray Mist, holding the White Umbrella.

He walked very slowly, and the White Umbrella's lower edge skimmed the ground.

Each time he passed an injured monster, he raised his hand to touch it.

The rules inside the monster, suppressed by the Suppress Spook Bullet, came back to life.

The wound closed.

The shattered limbs rejoined.

The long‑haired monster turned its head and walked toward the old patrol officer.

The old patrol officer fired three more shots.

The monster stopped three times.

Lu Dou raised his hand three times.

The monster moved faster than before.

The blood color on the old patrol officer's face vanished.

He finally understood that the monsters before him were not enemies that could be worn out to death.

Lu Dou was their logistics.

The kind that offers endless refills.

"Fall back to the second line!" Jiang Yuan shouted.

"Don't disperse!"

But the second line was already gone.

The monster horde barreled through the crowd, overturning chairs, barriers, and medical equipment.

They didn't touch ordinary people.

But they blocked everyone who tried to approach.

Qin Zhixia swung her blade to cut a path, and after taking two steps, a monster with a mouth full of monster tales lunged at her.

It opened its whole mouth.

"Happiness."

"Happiness."

"Happiness."

Qin Zhixia's mechanical prosthetic arm clamped its upper jaw and pressed down hard.

Her arm emitted an overload warning.

The monster's lower jaw kept closing upward.

She looked toward the other end of the barrier.

A mother holding a child was trapped in the crowd.

The child covered its ears, and tears soaked the mother's clothes.

The father was bound by shadow on the open ground, his mouth stretched to the limit as he desperately slammed his head into the ground.

Qin Zhixia clenched her teeth.

She intended to use ignorance.

But if ignorance fell, the ordinary people would be the first to disappear.

Lu Dou calculated correctly.

He placed the people in front of them.

He stuffed the monsters among them.

He turned the Investigation Bureau's best fighters into mere decorations.

Jiang Yuan's Dark Shadow Court was still contracting.

Those few Quasi‑S monsters burst into the shadow, forcibly tearing open more gaps.

More than half of the cards at Jiang Yuan's hand had disappeared.

He tried to drag the monsters into the shadow, but the shadow was eroded by the Happiness Rules.

If he kept dragging them, the court would collapse.

But he could not retreat.

If he stepped back, Lu Dou could reach the crowd.

Jiang Yuan looked up.

Lu Dou stood at the other end of the barrier, with the White Umbrella covering half his body.

Between them lay monsters, cries, and five thousand people awaiting rescue.

Lu Dou looked at him.

"Jiang Yuan."

"You are protecting them."

"But what you protect are the rules that keep them suffering."

Jiang Yuan gave no reply.

He merely slipped a dark‑colored card between his fingers.

Lu Dou didn't need an answer either.

He raised his hand.

A slender finger tapped lightly on the umbrella handle.

"Next, let happiness begin to spread."