Chapter 55
Chapter 55
Mingjiang City.
Inside a quiet apartment building, every resident had locked their doors. The citywide emergency broadcast had already warned them that anomalies such as the Knocking Corpse were running rampant.
At that moment, an old man dripping yellow fluid struck one door with stiff, mechanical movements.
Suddenly, a sharp whistle tore through the air behind him. A crossbow bolt shot toward the old corpse. The Knocking Corpse’s head twisted around a full one hundred and eighty degrees. One arm bent backward as well, catching the Anomaly Suppression Bureau’s specially made bolt in midair.
The Bureau operative who had fired it immediately withdrew without lingering.
The Knocking Corpse blankly raised the bolt. A strip of cloth had been tied around it.
A brief message was written across the cloth:
“Tomorrow afternoon, the Water God and her teacher await you at Mingjiang No. 7 Special School.”
…
At the same time, Anomaly Suppression Bureau teams appeared elsewhere in the city.
In a public square, a group of elderly women with half-rotted bodies were performing a bizarre square dance in the middle of the night. Anyone who passed nearby would join them as though possessed, then rapidly begin to rot as well.
Bureau operatives fired several bolts from a distance.
Inside a nightclub, several dripping-wet female anomalies were devouring the flesh of their patrons. They suddenly turned toward a nearby wall, where a bolt had already buried itself.
…
Shi Xuan and Xu Changjiang had no way to determine which anomalies were under the control of the Hall of Anomalies or the Eclipse Organization.
But as long as they spread the message widely enough, it was guaranteed to reach the people behind them.
Their prediction proved correct. Not long after the Bureau’s teams moved out, one of the cloth strips was laid before Cao Yi, Li Dao, and the others.
“So they’ve finally shown themselves!” Zuo Yuanshan said coldly. “They really are hiding at Mingjiang No. 7 Special School!”
“You knew that already?” Li Dao asked.
Zuo Yuanshan looked faintly embarrassed. “There were some anomalies in that place before, but even I didn’t realize it was Rain’s lair.”
The divinity-nurturing ground at Mingjiang No. 7 Special School was enormously useful. He had planned to keep it secret from the others and seize it for himself once everything else was over.
He glanced at Sun Xingsheng.
“That place also has deep ties to Qin Shiyu of the Hall of Anomalies.”
The others immediately grew wary and turned toward Sun Xingsheng.
If the Hall of Anomalies was involved, they had to consider whether the whole thing might be a trap laid by the Hall of Anomalies.
Sun Xingsheng understood their suspicions and shook his head.
“To be frank, Qin Shiyu never reported any of this to the Hall of Anomalies. She has already betrayed us.”
He even showed them a report he had sent to the Hall of Anomalies the previous day. It clearly stated that Qin Shiyu had defected and that he would seek an opportunity to kill her.
Only then did everyone relax.
“Our people investigated Mingjiang No. 7 Special School as well, but their instruments found nothing,” Li Dao said. “Now that they’ve revealed themselves, shouldn’t we make our move?”
“I say we gather our forces and storm the place right now!”
His eyes had begun to shine with eagerness.
Cao Yi shook his head.
“I see no need to rush.”
“This message is suspicious. We should send people to investigate first. Shi Xuan, that old fox, is still in the city. Who knows whether this is another one of his tricks?”
Sun Xingsheng nodded. “I agree. We have all of Mingjiang City under our control. A steady advance is our safest choice.”
Even Yin Rumei, who had said little throughout the banquet, gave a faint smile. “I don’t believe we should rush either.”
Li Dao frowned, but could only nod. “Very well. We’ll send people to investigate Mingjiang No. 7 Special School thoroughly first.”
The banquet soon came to an end.
After Cao Yi left and climbed into his car, he immediately ordered,
“Send word to Guo Shoubo at once. Tell him I’ll steer every faction into Mingjiang No. 7 Special School together tomorrow. He needs to be ready.”
The reason he had opposed Li Dao’s proposal to attack immediately was to buy Guo Shoubo time to prepare.
The two had already reached an agreement.
If Cao Yi sold out the Eclipse Organization and the Hall of Anomalies for a good price, the Cao family could secure a place aboard the Xu family’s ship.
…
Elsewhere.
“Still no word from Nightmare?” Sun Xingsheng asked, his expression dark. “Where is Abyss now?”
His subordinate Liu Ying replied,
“He should be only three hundred and fifty to four hundred kilometers from Mingjiang City. At Abyss’s speed, he’ll arrive tomorrow.”
Sun Xingsheng thought for a moment.
“Go meet Abyss. That ancient deity had some dealings with the Hall Master many years ago.”
“Wait for my signal tomorrow. If anything goes wrong, we’ll draw Abyss into the game with us!”
Liu Ying’s expression changed.
“You think… it’s a trap?”
Sun Xingsheng nodded. “Guo Shoubo, Shi Xuan, and even the people from the Eclipse Organization are all seasoned schemers. To play against any one of them, we need both a trump card and a contingency plan.”
“Communications are down, so it’s too late to ask the Hall Master for reinforcements. For now, Abyss is the only card we can play.”
Nightmare had suddenly stopped responding. Xu Guoguo had suddenly left. And now the Water God anomaly had revealed herself of her own accord. All of it left him deeply uneasy.
That top-tier SSS-class wild deity was his greatest source of confidence.
If the situation went awry, he would draw Abyss into the conflict. Once an anomaly of that caliber arrived, every other faction would have to step aside.
Liu Ying nodded and departed at once.
…
“What’s happening at the Anomaly Suppression Bureau?”
At the same time, inside a luxurious hotel room, Yin Rumei sat languidly before the floor-to-ceiling windows and activated a special communicator.
This device did not rely on communications networks or satellites. It was only used in exceptional circumstances.
Wang Zhong’s voice came through.
“From what I can tell, Shi Xuan and Xu Changjiang are very confident.”
“But my investigation suggests Li Que has nothing to do with that place. Every trace of his work and personal life looks perfectly ordinary.”
“My guess is that he obtained a Divine Seal Fragment by sheer chance and became an anomaly wielder. At most, he’s S-class.”
Wang Zhong had spent all this time secretly investigating Li Que.
He had combed through every file he could find.
Yin Rumei’s elegant brows drew together.
That differed completely from her earlier speculation.
But if Li Que was merely S-class, accompanied only by Rain-another S-class who had just obtained the Water God’s Authority-what gave them the courage to do this?
How could they dare challenge so many enemies at once?
Something was wrong.
“Forget it. If that’s all he is, we’ll simply find a chance to take the Divine Seal Fragment back.”
If Li Que had nothing to do with that place, he was not worth her attention.
…
Elsewhere.
“The Water God anomaly and the person holding the Divine Seal Fragment have finally shown themselves,” Guo Shoubo said with a chuckle.
“Miss Guoguo, you’ll have what you want tomorrow.”
“But many different parties will be taking part. Should we have Cao Yi make a few arrangements in advance, just in case?”
Xu Guoguo took out a ragged scrap of gray cloth. Dark-red scabs of dried blood seemed to cling to its surface.
Guo Shoubo stared at it in a daze.
“Is this… the legendary Burial Shroud?”
The Burial Shroud was an SS-class anomalous entity, the sort of thing only the Old-Grave Clans could produce!
Even as director of the Provincial Anomaly Suppression Department, this was Guo Shoubo’s first time seeing it.
“Have him take this inside,” Xu Guoguo said, her voice utterly calm. “The fiercer the battle, the better. The Burial Shroud will absorb the auras of every anomaly wielder and anomaly on its own. Once that’s done, I’ll use joss paper that was offered before our old grave to set the Burial Shroud alight. Every anomaly wielder and anomaly whose aura it recorded will burn to death with it.”
Guo Shoubo listened, spellbound. His hands trembled faintly as he accepted the Burial Shroud, taking care not to expose even a trace of his own aura.
“Very well. I’ll deliver it to him at once.”
His manner grew even more deferential. Then another thought occurred to him.
“What about Abyss? How should we deal with him?”
Every other faction had already entered their trap and remained firmly under control. Abyss alone… was giving him a headache.
He was an ancient SSS-class wild deity. There were only a handful of beings at his level in the entire country!
If he truly descended upon them, no one in Jiangdong Province could stop him.
“All he wants is divine investiture,” Xu Guoguo said. “Once I have the Divine Seal Fragment, I can grant him divine investiture. That will settle the matter.”
Guo Shoubo nodded and quickly departed.
…
That night, dangerous currents churned beneath Mingjiang City.
Countless figures flitted through the darkness outside Mingjiang No. 7 Special School. Yet every one of them had misgivings, so they watched only from a distance. No one dared force their way inside yet.
“Your teacher is in trouble.”
In the dorm supervisor’s room in the boys’ dormitory building, a shadow slowly took shape. Nightmare glanced outside.
“I hope your teacher isn’t too weak.”
A mocking smile touched his lips.
As Nightmare saw it, Li Que had probably just been lucky enough to enter that place once and obtain a few anomalous entities. His own strength was unlikely to be anything impressive.
Nightmare was still nursing a grudge. He was a mighty SS-class wild deity, yet Li Que had been so arrogant that he refused even to meet him. Worse, Nightmare was now stuck working as a dorm supervisor at this run-down school.
With so many enemies gathering outside, Li Que would finally be forced to reveal his true colors.
Nightmare was already looking forward to it.
“Stop bothering me,” Meng Mo said impatiently from Room 203.
Since both of them were dream-related anomalies, they communicated through highly unusual means.
“I’m busy figuring out how to contain the Dreamcatcher…”
Meng Mo held the black Dreamcatcher in his hands, lost in thought.
After all his recent study and experimentation, he had grown thoroughly familiar with the Dreamcatcher.
“Containing it requires sacrificing a huge number of dreams. And ordinary people’s dreams aren’t enough. They need to come from powerful anomaly wielders, or anomalies…”
Meng Mo scratched his head. “Where am I supposed to find those?”
Beside him, Nian Youyu munched on potato chips.
“You really don’t need to worry. Since Sir gave it to you, he’ll naturally help you figure something out.”
…
In the girls’ dormitory.
“I can sense lots of little cockroaches. Should I get rid of all of them?” Lin Xiaoyu asked.
She had already reached SS-class and could now wield the Water God’s Authority with ease.
As long as moisture existed somewhere, she could effortlessly observe and sense what was happening there.
None of the prying eyes outside the school had escaped her notice.
“Ignore them,” Bai Lu said. “Sir will have his own arrangements.”
Lin Xiaoyu nodded, then asked, “Big Sister Bai Lu, what are you reading?”
Bai Lu was still reading in the darkness.
“Mortuary makeup,” she replied. “Killing someone is easy. Making sure they die looking beautiful takes a surprising amount of work.”
Lin Xiaoyu fell silent.
…
Elsewhere, Li Que was also thinking about tomorrow’s “visit” and how he should handle it.
After a long while, a clear plan finally began to take shape.
…