Chapter 58
Chapter 58
The hidden chamber contained a dense crowd of zombies.
For one moment, Shengsheng could not decide whether to curse or run.
The corpses surged toward her in perfect unison, like dogs that had not smelled meat for three hundred years.
Shengsheng smiled.
Fortunately, they had gathered so neatly.
“Crowding together will get you bitten to death.”
After delivering her best impression of Kyoya Hibari, Shengsheng fired the lasers from her eyes at the floor beneath the zombies.
The beams swiftly cut a line through the stone.
The ground opposite her collapsed and began shaking violently. The zombies lost their balance and tumbled one after another into the void.
Admittedly, Shengsheng had taken a gamble.
If the space below had not been hollow, the result would have been extremely embarrassing.
But the path had climbed steadily upward as she traveled. The increasing slope suggested empty space beneath it.
She approached the cut edge and looked down.
Among a sea of green, she saw an abrupt flash of red.
Her expression changed completely.
What the hell?
***
Fusheng had suffered extraordinary bad luck.
Being caught by the hem when the stone floor closed was humiliating enough. Why had a crowd of green creatures suddenly begun raining onto his face like dumplings dropping into a pot?
He prepared to dodge.
Then a loose stone fell from above and struck the back of his head.
This entire region already suppressed his abilities. Combined with his appalling luck, the blow sent darkness across Fusheng’s vision.
He lost consciousness.
Before his eyes closed, the last thing he saw was an unbearably hot light descending from above, spreading across the ground like sacred radiance.
Then a familiar, clear female voice rang out.
*A thunderous crash splits the sky–this queen makes her dazzling entrance!*
Fusheng had no response.
Shengsheng reduced nearly every zombie to ash, then hurried to Fusheng and examined him.
While firing downward, she had remembered to redeem a single-use magic circle from the System and place it around him, protecting him from the attack.
Fortune had favored her.
She had no idea how she might explain her laser eyes to Fusheng. Conveniently, he had fainted.
Heaven itself was helping her.
No.
The author was helping her.
Shengsheng checked his neck. Finding no external injuries, she sat beside him and kept watch until he awoke.
Then she noticed that a section of his robe was missing.
Laughter burst from her.
At least the torn part was not a sleeve.
She had never seen Fusheng look so bedraggled.
Shengsheng held the shortened hem and studied it for a long time, unaware of how playful her smile had become.
It was like discovering that even an immortal needed to use the privy.
They appeared to be inside an abandoned palace hall.
Towering vermilion pillars rose around them, but the roof had collapsed. Nearly the entire structure lay in ruins, its original shape impossible to discern.
Shengsheng, the culprit responsible, sighed with regret.
Then something caught her eye.
She glanced at the unconscious Fusheng. After several moments of hesitation, she approached.
Curiosity was part of her nature.
Something glittered beneath the broken stones, seemingly calling to her.
Shengsheng dug through the rubble and pulled it free.
It was a small transparent vial containing an unknown pale-blue substance. A chain wrapped around the glass.
The moment she touched it, the ancient chain snapped and fell.
Shengsheng tried to catch it and missed.
As she leaned sideways, the vial’s stopper came loose. The liquid spilled out and splashed across her body.
Shengsheng froze.
Her dress!
At her anguished cry, brilliant light erupted from her body.
Then came a transformation so terrifying that panic seized her completely.
Fusheng Duan awoke to the sound of crying.
A dull ache throbbed at the back of his head. He opened his eyes with some effort. Once his vision adjusted to the light, the wailing beside him became clearer.
Was that a child?
Why would there be a child here?
Fusheng slowly pushed himself upright and looked down.
A little girl sat beside his leg, her hair hanging loose as she sobbed with her entire body. Tears filled her enormous round eyes. Both small hands cupped her cheeks as though attempting to catch them.
She had plainly been crying for some time. Her delicate nose was bright red, and her voice had gone hoarse.
An oversized dress hung haphazardly around her tiny frame.
Fusheng studied the distinctive red mole beneath the girl’s eye.
He remained silent for several seconds.
Only when the girl finally realized her hands could not catch her tears and seized the shortened hem of Fusheng’s robe to blow her nose did he speak.
“Where is your mother?”
The little girl froze.
Then she wailed even louder.
*Fusheng Duan, you bastard! You do not even recognize me! Why am I so sad?*
Fusheng had intended only to tease her. The violence of her sobbing gave him a headache.
He drew her into his arms and awkwardly patted her back.
“Do not cry. I was joking. Shengsheng is already such a big girl. No more tears, all right?”
Under his gentle coaxing, the child version of Shengsheng wiped her tears and runny nose across his chest before finally calming.
Fusheng went rigid.
His normally alluring eyes filled with disbelief as he stared down at the child in his arms.
She had wiped it all over him.
The realization brought him to the edge of collapse. Even his breathing became unstable.
Her inner voice made it clear that her mind had merely regressed with her body, while her memories remained intact.
Fusheng continued patting her back and asked, “How did you become like this?”
Shengsheng sniffled and slowly shook her head.
“I dun know. It just happened.”
*I am not telling you that strange liquid splashed me and turned me into this!*
Fusheng sighed helplessly.
Indeed. Shengsheng intended to keep the treasure for herself.
Having roughly guessed what she had used, he stroked her hair, now even finer and softer in childhood.
“You will return to normal in one month.”
Shengsheng sniffed and nodded.
Privately, she was confused.
*How do you know?*
Fusheng was truly strange.
He had brought her to this place for no apparent reason and knew it intimately, yet seemed to harbor a faint loathing for it.
Who exactly was he?
Even the original novel had never mentioned his origins.
He had simply appeared in the Zhu Kingdom, begun trying to disrupt the balance among the three nations, and eventually been moved by a speech from the heroine that even Shengsheng found unconvincing. Then he withdrew to live in the mountains.
Fusheng naturally offered no answer.
He carried her deeper into the ruined hall.
“Come, baby. Let us find Dead Uncle.”
Shengsheng stared at him.
Keep it up and she would cry again.