Chapter 51: Awakening

It wasn't over.

Almost the instant Hu Li's voice fell, Yu Sheng realized exactly what she meant by "it wasn't over."

He heard a succession of chaotic roars echoing from the dense forest; he heard a terrifying, hollow whistling of wind suddenly reverberating through the valley. The eerie, sinister atmosphere permeating this exotic realm had not diminished with the death of the flesh beast from moments ago; instead, it had abruptly intensified several times over. A heavy, almost stagnant sense of malice and scrutiny surged from all directions, as if something had been awakened and was descending into a frenzy.

"What the hell is that?!" Yu Sheng asked quickly, looking toward the fox girl who seemed to know something.

"I don't know, but it... it has appeared before," Hu Li said, her face filled with terror as she hid behind Yu Sheng. "The day the Immortal died, it was just like this. Something woke up, and the Immortal took the rest of the people to the outside... they never came back. Later, only corpses were found..."

The fox girl's body trembled slightly as she lowered her head. "Papa and Mama... they hid me in a cave and told me not to look outside. I don't know what it was. By the time I crawled out, everyone was already dead..."

Yu Sheng quickly grasped the situation from Hu Li's disjointed and fragmented narration.

The truly terrifying thing in this valley was not that flesh beast!

Or rather, it wasn't just that flesh beast—something far more powerful lay sleeping in these dark depths, and from the moment he and Eileen entered this valley, that thing had likely been gradually awakening.

Yu Sheng gritted his teeth, weighed his options, and immediately ran toward Eileen, who was not far away.

"We can't keep fighting," Yu Sheng said rapidly. "There's something even more sinister in this valley—Plan B: retreat first, I'll open the door. How are you? Can you still move?"

Eileen tried to prop herself up with her hands to stand, but the moment she exerted force, a faint *crack* sounded. Her arms snapped at the elbows, and the severed parts fell to the ground, shattering.

"No, and my legs are damaged too. If I force myself up, they'll probably break as well," the little doll said dejectedly, lifting her arms. "I told you this thing you made wasn't sturdy... did you mix sand into the clay...?"

To be honest, Yu Sheng was genuinely startled the moment he saw Eileen's arms break. He had never dealt with a living doll before and didn't realize how serious the situation was, but hearing her complaints actually put his mind at ease. "So you can still be repaired, right?"

Eileen nodded. "Yes, but we definitely have to go back."

Yu Sheng breathed a sigh of relief. Seeing that Eileen could no longer stand on her own, he unstrapped the picture frame from behind the little doll, adjusted the straps, and slung it onto his own back. He then reached out and picked Eileen up, letting her sit on his left arm.

Eileen protested slightly, seemingly feeling a bit embarrassed, but a doll with broken arms possessed zero intimidation factor; she eventually settled down and sat obediently on Yu Sheng's arm.

Yu Sheng reached his free right hand into the air. After a brief moment of concentration, a door floating with illusory light and shadow appeared at the end of his arm.

He noticed that the three strangers who had appeared from nowhere (the young man among them looked strangely familiar) cast strange glances his way the moment they saw him opening the door, their eyes converging on him.

But he had no time to dwell on it. Once the passage was established, he threw open the illusory portal.

On the other side of the door was the living room of No. 66 Wutong Road.

"The emergency exit is here, everyone get out quickly!" Yu Sheng said hurriedly. "Before that monster regenerates!"

He looked toward the fox girl, who was standing nearby looking nervous and hesitant. "Hu Li, you first—don't be afraid, the other side of the door is safe."

Then he turned to Li Lin and the other two. "You three, I don't know who you are, but thank you for the help just now—follow me in a moment."

Encouraged by Yu Sheng, Hu Li finally mustered the courage to approach and stepped toward the illusory door.

However, just as she was about to touch the passage, a strange whistling sound suddenly erupted from nearby. Immediately after, Yu Sheng felt a gust of wind strike him from behind!

Countless pieces of information flooded his mind from unknown sources—multiple gazes focusing on the ruins of this broken temple, perspectives extending from the distant sky and the depths of the valley, a chaotic and cold sensation, and... the joy of an impending meal.

Yu Sheng whipped his head around and saw that a flesh beast had appeared in the darkness at the edge of the ruins at some unknown time. The beast's midsection split open grotesquely, and a long, arrow-like tongue shot out from within, piercing through his chest in the blink of an eye.

He only had enough time to shove Eileen aside; he couldn't dodge at all before the strike pierced his heart.

*That monster already regenerated? So fast? Or is it... another one?*

Several questions flashed through Yu Sheng's mind in an instant. As his consciousness rapidly sank into darkness, he heard Hu Li's terrified cries, Eileen's scream, and the howling of a wolf pack.

The illusory door in mid-air flickered twice and quickly dissipated. Yu Sheng's body fell backward. In his tilting, darkening vision, he saw layers upon layers of shadows rising from the edge of the ruins. Deep within the twitching of every shadow, a monster made of piled flesh was slowly generating. Countless greedy maws opened throughout the valley; the distant forests were filled with foraging tentacles, the far-off mountain peaks were covered in sharp teeth, and the sky... was beginning to crack open from the edges.

"Benefactor!!" Hu Li was the first to rush forward, throwing herself beside Yu Sheng. Although she had seen people return from the brink of death before, her already muddled mind failed to react properly. Seeing Yu Sheng fall, her first instinct was pure terror. "You... you... what happened..."

"What else could happen? He's clearly dead!" Eileen's loud chirping quickly interrupted the fox girl's cries. The little doll tumbled to the ground, struggling to move her body. "This shouldn't be the first time you've seen this, calm down!"

Only then did Hu Li freeze. Her slow, chaotic mind caught up, and she stared blankly at Yu Sheng's corpse.

The fox girl's face contorted into a conflicted expression—looking as if she wanted to cry, but knew she shouldn't; but since the atmosphere was like this, not crying felt disrespectful to her benefactor—yet crying felt even more disrespectful.

Li Lin, on the other hand, clearly had no idea what the situation was with Yu Sheng. Upon seeing the flesh beast nearby, his entire body tensed instantly. He stood guard against the monster's next move while simultaneously comforting the doll on the ground and the fox girl. "I'm sorry, but the dead cannot be brought back—the priority is to deal with..."

Before he could finish, the pitiful doll retorted, "It's fine, he'll be alive in a bit—but we have to hold out for twenty or thirty minutes until he comes back to open the door. You, the fox next to him, help me up. Don't forget the painting on the ground."

Hearing this, Hu Li hurriedly scrambled to pull the oil painting frame out from under Yu Sheng's body and gathered the immobile Eileen into her arms.

Li Lin and his two companions watched this scene with expressions of utter bewilderment. They found the doll's reaction completely incomprehensible, even suspecting it was some form of extreme grief-induced delirium.

But they soon had no extra energy to focus on such things.

Chaotic roars erupted one after another from the darkness near the temple ruins. Heart-pounding, frenzied auras appeared continuously. Even Xu Jiali, who was highly experienced in combat, felt her expression freeze the moment she saw the surrounding situation clearly.

Grotesque monsters made of piled flesh were generating one after another in the darkness.

The roaring filled the entire valley.

"Holy crap!" Li Lin cried out in shock. "How can there be so many?! Didn't the files say only one Hunger Entity generates at a time?!"

Beside him, Xu Jiali slowly raised her head. After a hard swallow, she broke the silence. "What if this valley has already been parasitized by an 'Angel'..."

"What do you mea—" Li Lin said instinctively, but immediately noticed the direction of Xu Jiali's gaze.

He saw it. The valley was slowly undulating and heaving within the night.

Sharp, tooth-like structures appeared on the silhouettes of the distant mountains.

But even more terrifying than that was the sky—the sky had opened.

The exotic sky, which had always been in a state of chaotic night as if covered by a thick veil, was changing. An edge of it was gradually splitting open before their eyes, a faint light glimmering through the crack, followed by the truth behind the veil.

It wasn't a veil at all, nor was it dark storm clouds.

It was an eyelid.

It was a single, perpetually closed eye that covered the entire exotic realm, creating the eternal night.

Now, it had opened. The eyeball gazed down at everything below with indifference. Its hollow, sunken pupil was filled with chaotic lines and flickering light, as if it were carefully observing the prey in the valley. The light spilling out even partially dispelled the permanent darkness of this realm—"Light" had descended, bestowing infinite horror.

The whistling cold wind jolted Li Lin from his terror. He heard a murmur beside him.

It was Xu Jiali. The veteran diver with over a decade of service was whispering a single term under her breath—

"The Gloom Angel..."

(End of Chapter)