Chapter 27: How about we team up to take her down first?
Under the night sky, in the outskirts of Huacheng, sporadic snowflakes silently fell into the silent mountains.
“Whoosh—!”
Accompanied by a howling wind, two figures rapidly traversed the mountain crevices hidden in the dense forest, the fierce wind kicking up large amounts of dry leaves that scattered around.
It was a man and a woman. The man wore a black outfit, his face pale, with a slightly thin physique, and his vacant eyes made him appear somewhat listless.
The woman wore a white dress, her long legs visible beneath the skirt, not fragile but rather toned, with muscle lines faintly visible beneath her fair skin, silently conveying the terrible explosive power of those legs.
They rushed to the mountain peak and looked down at the foot of the mountain.
At the foot of the mountain, the toll booth on the Huacheng section of the Spring Jin Expressway was brightly lit, but at this moment, night had fallen, and the toll booth staff had long since left, leaving the toll booth empty and deserted.
In fact, as the night grew longer, bizarre white phantoms chasing vehicles, sudden thick fog obscuring vision, or pedestrians suddenly appearing in front of cars had frequently occurred on expressways around the world, leading to tragic accidents. Consequently, very few people stayed on expressways after dark.
Thus, the expressway toll booths became virtually useless after nightfall, having transformed into leisurely jobs from nine to four as early as two or three years ago.
After observing the toll booth from a distance and confirming that there were no barriers blocking the way, Shuo E let out a sigh of relief. “That’s good; the Siye Society has not yet taken action, and the Huacheng Barrier has not been activated. We can still get in from here. If we wait any longer, it might be too late.”
As he spoke, he turned to look at Miss Rabbit behind him, his gaze landing on her face, which was not exactly stunning but was refreshingly pure, like first love. He paused for a moment and quickly averted his eyes.
Noticing Shuo E’s unusual behavior, Miss Rabbit furrowed her brow, crossing her arms in front of her chest, and finally could not help but ask, “Hey, do you have something to say? Just say it, don’t play tricks.”
She had sensed Shuo E observing her from the shadows throughout their journey, and that strange gaze felt creepy, making her uneasy. She felt as if Shuo E might suddenly turn against her at any moment and deliver a lethal backstab.
Now that they were about to enter the Huacheng area, the life-and-d*ath battle between her and Mu Se was about to ignite. Before that, she thought it necessary to eliminate the risk of backstabbing from an ally.
“Uh, well…” Shuo E was suddenly caught off guard by Miss Rabbit’s question, stammering for a while before weakly asking, “Actually, I’ve always…”
Hearing Shuo E’s hesitant tone, Miss Rabbit’s heart tightened, and she hurriedly interrupted, “Wait! Think carefully about what you want to say. I’ve always considered you my best partner.”
And, the humanoid mobile spirit energy emergency storage device… Miss Rabbit added in her mind.
“No, no! You’ve misunderstood.” Shuo E quickly denied, “I was just worried about you since you’ve stepped into a legend related to the Rabbit King Sesa. You’re female, so I was a bit concerned.”
“…” Miss Rabbit pondered briefly and asked curiously, “Concerned? Concerned about what?”
“Have you heard the legend, ‘There are no male rabbits in the human world, and female rabbits conceive by gazing at the moon’?” Shuo E asked.
Miss Rabbit, “…” What is that?
Seeing that Miss Rabbit didn’t respond, Shuo E continued, “This legend is related to Sesa. In the legend, after the Rabbit King perished in the fire, the Buddha welcomed him to the moon…”
Upon hearing this, Miss Rabbit looked up at the sky. She saw a crescent moon slowly peeking out from behind dark clouds.
“Later, on the night of the new moon, the rabbits would gather in open places on the mountaintop…” Shuo E continued.
Miss Rabbit looked around. The mountaintop… seemed quite open.
“On the mountaintop, the rabbits prayed for offspring by gazing up at the Rabbit King, that is, Sesa, and then…”
“Don’t say any more!” Miss Rabbit finally couldn’t help but interrupt. “How can you believe such baseless legends?”
I merely gained part of Sesa’s powers, not the powers connected to her rabbit consorts. It shouldn’t be that serious, right? Miss Rabbit thought to herself.
“That’s good! That’s good!” Shuo E nodded in relief. “I’ve been worried about this all along. What if you suddenly gave birth to a little rabbit? What would we do?”
Miss Rabbit’s eyes flickered slightly, and her voice softened as she asked, “So what were you planning to do?”
Upon hearing this, Shuo E’s murky eyes brightened. “Of course, I would take it back to the Elders’ Council! The way legends give birth to offspring through such miraculous means is simply incredible…”
Before he could finish his sentence, Miss Rabbit rolled her eyes, shook her head, and with a flicker of light, she vanished from the spot, reappearing several dozen meters away.
“Hey! Why did you leave? Wait for me!”
From a distance, Shuo E’s voice came from behind, but Miss Rabbit seemed not to hear it at all, completely focused on racing toward the center of Huacheng. Shuo E gave his all but could only barely keep up.
A few minutes later.
The green hills receded, and at the edge of the city, a dilapidated building housed a woman in a white dress, gazing deeply toward the center of the city, a faint mark on her forehead glowing slightly.
Though the influence of Mu Se on Miss Rabbit had diminished significantly after several progressions, the subtle connection between them had not completely severed.
As soon as she was within a certain range, she could feel the other’s presence.
Thus, upon reaching this point, Miss Rabbit sensed it.
“Whoosh—!”
With a gust of wind, Shuo E landed behind Miss Rabbit, observing her hesitating figure, puzzled. “Why aren’t you moving? Isn’t this what you always wanted to do?”
Miss Rabbit smiled slightly. “You’re right, this is what I’ve always wanted to do.”
But I didn’t even think I would still be afraid when this moment truly arrived. Miss Rabbit thought to herself.
The fear that Mu Se had instilled in her was too deep, so deep that it had become a disease. Until Mu Se was hunted down and completely exterminated, this disease would never heal.
—
Meanwhile, on the long street not far from the Happy Neighborhood, Gu Qiqi faced off against Mu Se.
Amidst the dead silence, crude words echoed.
“d*mn it! Who the hell are you, you foul old hag! Do you know how serious the consequences are for offending our witch lady?”
Mu Se, “…”
Gu Qiqi, “…”
Both of them turned to see the source of the voice and spotted an eyeball bouncing furiously on the ground, exuding aggression.
Beside it, False Teeth kept biting the eyeball, trying to drag it away, the pale tissue being stretched, yet it seemed frozen in place, unyielding.
“Eyeball bro, don’t say it! It’ll end badly! Do you know who that is? That’s Mu Se!” Mafun cautioned in a low voice.
“I don’t care who she is! With this sort of junk, we can handle her without our witch lady even needing to step in!”
“You guys?” Mu Se looked at the long street behind the eyeball, which was completely empty, cocking her head and curling her lips into a faint smile. She let out a wave of spirit energy that spread outward, her gaze growing cold.
Feeling the powerful spirit energy wave threatening to lift it off the ground, the eyeball struggled to move backward, its movements suddenly stiffening.
Behind it, a large group of urban legends had already fled, leaving only a few individuals who were hiding timidly in the bushes, exposed and trembling under the protection of Meng Meng, surrounded by several black-robed figures.
Eyeball, “…”
In the next moment, a silver light gathered in Mu Se’s palm.
The part of the spirit energy that Jiang Li used to seal her remnants also began to decay as she awakened and freed herself, forming a glimmering silver long kn*fe that she swung at the eyeball.
A shrill scream erupted.
From Gu Qiqi’s hand, the metallic bat was swung forward, blocking the trajectory of the long kn*fe slice.
“Clang——!”
The sharp sound of metal colliding shattered the air as the metallic bat and long kn*fe separated upon contact.
“Power of Kua’er, turning the skies upside down!”
Seeing Mu Se being knocked back, Gu Qiqi seized the opportunity to fully unleash the spirit patterns, surrounded by layers of heavy yellow light that emanated in ripples as she stepped forward, twisting her wrist, the metallic bat elegantly slicing through the air as it swung down.
This time, the speed and strength of the metallic bat’s swing drastically increased.
Mu Se couldn’t evade in time, lifting the long kn*fe upward to clash with the metallic bat. The collision caused the air to explode with a deafening roar.
“Boom——!”
In an instant, the asphalt road beneath Mu Se’s feet cracked inch by inch, and a searing pain shot through her palm.
Seeing this, Gu Qiqi wasted no time giving her any breathing space, stepping forward, gracefully spinning, and sweeping again horizontally.
One hit after another came crashing down like a drum.
The piercing sounds of metal colliding and the explosive sounds of spirit energy constantly erupted as Mu Se retreated in a disheveled manner, while Gu Qiqi pressed forward step by step, wielding the metallic bat with complete ease.
Mu Se continued to retreat.
Once, twice, three times…
But the more she dodged, the more she clearly felt the overwhelming brute force and spirit energy wave carried by the metallic bat.
It seemed that the initiative had already been seized by Gu Qiqi from the first time she began to retreat.
She felt as if she were facing a landslide, with the collapse of tens of thousands of tons of earth and stone, with the momentum becoming increasingly overwhelming over time.
However.
A landslide will eventually stop… Mu Se thought to herself.
At the moment that this thought flashed through her mind, she distinctly felt the power diminish upon the collision of her kn*fe with the metallic bat, and a mocking smile appeared on her lips.
After all, it was just brute strength. The battles among urban legends are not that simple, little sister! Mu Se thought.
Seizing the opportunity when Gu Qiqi’s spirit energy wave temporarily weakened, she suddenly gathered all her strength and forcefully swung her kn*fe forward.
“Clang——!”
Gu Qiqi’s seemingly powerful attack at its last gasp was deflected.
She staggered back, steadied herself, and adjusted slightly to charge forward again. Just then, the system’s alarm rang out in her ear.
“Gu Qiqi, don’t move!”
However, it was already too late.
“They were once buried alone on the mountain ridge where wildflowers bloomed…”
As Mu Se softly spoke these lines, a cluster of wildflowers quietly blossomed beneath Gu Qiqi’s feet. By the time she received the system’s warning and noticed it, the tip of her shoe was already touching one of the wildflowers.
The touched flower trembled slightly, causing the whole patch to quiver, and the petals began to fall in a visibly rapid manner, disintegrating into a pool of scarlet bl**d upon touching the ground.
“Ah——!”
A scream akin to a girl being brutally murdered suddenly erupted in Gu Qiqi’s ear, flooding her mind with intense negative emotions.
In a daze, a slanting sunset seemed to flicker before her eyes, and that glow grew immense; suddenly her view was consumed by a world painted in a deep hue of pink.
“Clang——clang——!”
The sound of sharp metal dragging across the ground drowned out the approaching footsteps. In the next moment, a chilling gust with a strong, bloody aura surged toward her.
—
In the dead dream city.
Luxianbei received a reminder from the Proxy Player Sister. After she left, she hurriedly checked on her two dependents’ situations.
Missing the opportunity to turn into an urban legend at sunset, she believed that sharing power and perception with her dependents in the dream was the most reliable way to help them resolve their crisis.
In a rush to provide support, she was unsure whether she would make it in time, and if they could not become urban legends, it would be a case of buying one, getting one free.
She briefly checked in and found Du Sixian staying up late to go over the rent collected yesterday, counting the money with the risk of counting herself to d*ath. Aside from that, there was no immediate danger.
She suppressed the urge to share the experience of counting money and immediately shifted her attention to Meng Meng.
“Ahem! TESTING TESTING 123! Hey! Meng Meng, can you hear me?”
After a moment, Luxianbei heard Meng Meng’s response, “Master, I’m here.”
Getting a response eased her anxious heart slightly. She pressed further, “Are you in danger over there?”
“Danger?”
On the other side, Meng Meng observed those who were initially very resistant, then resisted slightly before happily joining the black-robed figures playing in the dream she had woven, looking puzzled.
“Reporting to the master, there is no… Uh oh!”
“Ah?” Luxianbei was taken aback.
What suddenly went wrong?
While deep in thought, she hurriedly focused her will on Meng Meng, forcibly sharing her spirit energy and perception as instructed by the Proxy Player Sister in the “Dependent Operation Manual.”
In an instant, the two spirit energy waves, connected by an invisible thread, fused into a phantom whirlpool that wildly absorbed her spirit energy.
Her consciousness felt as if it were being pulled by some force, separating from her body. After a wave of excruciating dizziness, her vision gradually became clear.
This sensation felt somewhat like the legendary soul leaving the body, attaching to Meng Meng? And with spirit energy too… Luxianbei considered while experiencing this marvelous feeling.
Soon after, when she could see the scene before her clearly, she suddenly realized that her gaze was fixed on a certain direction, reminiscent of peering into the past through dreams, the image slightly yellowed.
Could it be that the visions I’d seen before were also shared with me through some means?
A thought flashed through Luxianbei’s mind, and before she could probe further, she spotted Gu Qiqi lying motionless on the ground and the puddle of crimson bl**d beneath her, sending a jolt to her heart.
“What’s going on with Meng Meng? Is Gu Qiqi dead?” Luxianbei asked urgently.
While speaking, she quickly noticed the two women facing off nearby, one clad in red, exuding a seductive aura, exactly like the “poisoning” woman she had seen not long ago in the dream.
The other woman wore a white dress and bore a somewhat familiar face, as if she had seen her somewhere before.
The two stood together, maintaining a tense standoff, resembling a “White Rose versus Red Rose” scenario.
However, Luxianbei wasn’t fond of roses; she preferred chrysanthemums.
Uh, those Persian daisies…
“Master, Miss Gu is not in major trouble. She’s merely lost her ability to act temporarily after being defeated in battle; her breath is still stable,” Meng Meng replied to Luxianbei’s inquiry.
“That’s good. But…” Luxianbei nodded, “How did you both end up entangled? What are you doing?”
“Reporting to the master, we…”
Just as Meng Meng was about to answer Luxianbei’s question, the two originally confronting women suddenly turned their heads toward Meng Meng’s direction, a brief flicker of panic in their eyes, then murderous intent emerged.
Luxianbei, “…”
What is this?
Why are you looking at me when you’re fighting?
Could it be that in your tradition, there’s a bloody custom to sacrifice innocent bystanders for fun before a duel?
While Luxianbei pondered this, affected by the dual suppression of spirit energy from Mu Se and Miss Rabbit, Meng Meng weakly said, “Master, in this situation…”
“…”
After contemplating for a second or two, Luxianbei responded, “Don’t worry, just leave it to me later!”
—
Miss Rabbit appeared when Mu Se approached Gu Qiqi with the long kn*fe.
The traitor’s spirit energy wave got surprisingly close, and she hardly noticed it. Mu Se immediately felt a pang of fear for her negligence.
The matter of killing Gu Qiqi was immediately pushed to the back of her mind.
Following the direction of Miss Rabbit’s spirit energy wave, without any pleasantries, sudden attacks, or even time to speak, Mu Se was astonished to find the much more powerful Miss Rabbit standing before her.
Before she could swing her kn*fe down at Gu Qiqi, the blade was slowly lowered.
Thus, in a situation where neither knew the other’s true state, the former master and servant faced off like mortal enemies.
Until a wave of spirit energy that alarmed them both came from Meng Meng’s body. In horror, they both turned their gaze toward it.
Mu Se, “…” Is that the witch lady they speak of? She seems to possess some strength.
Miss Rabbit, “…” How did an unexpected player like her show up? This is problematic.
As they pondered, they suddenly heard Meng Meng clear her throat and say earnestly, “Ahem, both of you, I’m just a bystander, not intending to interfere in your grievances. How about… you just continue?”
Mu Se and Miss Rabbit, “…”
A bystander? Who would believe that?
Such a high-level urban legend spying unnoticed must have ulterior motives. It’s quite possible she would attack from the shadows during the battle.
How about we team up to take her down first?
As Mu Se and Miss Rabbit secretly plotted to eliminate Luxianbei as a threat, a very concerning phrase drifted into their ears.
“By the way, you probably don’t know what she usually says about you, do you? Tsk, tsk, it’s quite ugly. If it were me, I wouldn’t be able to stand it!”
