All the black spider silk tensed at once. The enormous flesh monster let out a string of hoarse, ear-piercing hisses, while Eileen poured all her strength into controlling the pitch-black threads, constantly changing their weaving directions in midair and combining them into tow ropes that dragged the monster bit by bit toward the gate.
Yu Sheng desperately braced the gate, which was wider than ever before, trying to make it a little wider and a little steadier.
The "gate" possessed the property of isolating the environments on either side. Merely opening a gate couldn't directly "release" the harsh environment on the other side into this one. To burn the monster to death, he had to throw its entire body inside.
Under normal circumstances, this isolation was naturally a good thing. It prevented Yu Sheng from causing a catastrophic accident by accidentally opening a passage to a dangerous area. But right now, Yu Sheng sincerely wished the gate could merge the two environments without any protective measures.
Then he could simply open the gate in a lava lake, and the magma gushing out of it would roast the monster directly. He wouldn't have to go to so much trouble.
But that was all he could do—think about it. He had only just begun mastering the power of the "gate." Being able to ensure that he opened it in the right place was already difficult enough. He couldn't possibly expect to use it as a flexible and varied offensive weapon.
As his thoughts raced, the monster had already been dragged in front of the gate. Some of its limbs had even been forcibly shoved inside. Through the gate, Yu Sheng saw the parts that had crossed the frame rapidly dry out, then ignite and carbonize in the infernal heat...
In his daze, he even felt as though his own limbs were burning.
The flesh monster's struggle suddenly became nearly frantic. Even "hunger," which acted entirely on instinct, sensed immense danger and fear at that moment. All its limbs trembled violently in the spiderweb, while countless gaps split open across its body. Eyes of all sizes, mouths, sharp teeth, tentacles, and even mimicked structures resembling human facial features and limbs all burst out at once!
Even more ear-piercing hisses came from its savage, twisted mouths. The roar at such close range made Yu Sheng's ears buzz, and a deafening uproar seemed to surge through his thoughts. He felt dizzy and disoriented, but still gripped the handle of the illusory gate with all his might, watching the monster being stuffed bit by bit into the passage leading to Hellfire.
But at that moment, he heard a series of unsettling cracking sounds.
Yu Sheng abruptly looked up toward the source of the cracking.
It wasn't Eileen's threads that had broken. The little doll had given it everything this time and hadn't slipped up at all.
What had broken was the flesh and twisted limbs covering the monster's body.
It began tearing itself free from the spiderweb in midair, ripping its body apart until it was covered in mangled flesh. It seemed completely insensible to pain. The limbs most tightly bound were even torn off its body whole, after which new limbs grew from the flesh and clung to the nearby rocks, speeding up its escape.
It had nearly become a shapeless mass of flowing flesh, rapidly changing form between the gaps in the spider silk and rapidly "leaking" out.
It was adapting to Eileen's spiderweb. It was learning a new physiological structure.
"I can't hold it!" Eileen's scream came from nearby. "My body can't take it either! Think of something, Yu Sheng!"
Yu Sheng turned around and saw fine cracks rapidly spreading across Eileen's arms and cheeks. The doll's body was gradually splitting apart.
"Damn it!"
He couldn't help cursing under his breath. He had no choice but to brace the gate with one hand while reaching for the monster that was about to break free with the other.
But in the next second, a howling wind suddenly reached his ears, carrying with it... the howl of a wolf.
A wolf howl?
Yu Sheng looked up in astonishment and saw shadows suddenly sweep across the night sky. Wolf-like silhouettes took shape within them. A pack of wolves howled and ran through the air, then crashed into the monster one after another, tearing at its flesh and slowing its writhing transformation.
Right after that, a loud shout came from behind him, deep and powerful: "I'm here to help!"
The next instant, a figure nearly two meters tall charged over from behind like a violent gale. In midair, he delivered a flying kick that struck the monster like a boulder, producing a muffled thud.
The flesh monster's body "fell" uncontrollably toward the gate. Its frantic struggles, writhing, and hisses could no longer delay the process.
The burly man who had delivered the flying kick vaulted through the air, spun around, and landed stylishly. Turning toward Yu Sheng, he said, "Luckily, I made it in ti—"
Then he saw Yu Sheng's face.
The expression on the burly man's face instantly turned blank with astonishment. Shock filled his eyes, and his entire body looked as if it had been struck by lightning.
He radiated the bleakness of someone whose idiot boss had sent him from one frontline to another under the guise of leave.
Yu Sheng had no idea why the burly man's expression had suddenly become so complicated after seeing him, and he had no energy to think about it. He discovered that the flesh monster had begun struggling again. Even with half its body shoved into the gate and burned to charcoal, the other half remained firmly wedged against the gate's edge and had begun regenerating at astonishing speed.
Some inexplicable connection let Yu Sheng sense... anger and hatred.
Primitive "emotions" and the faint glimmer of thought began to appear in those trembling eyes.
The unknown burly man also sensed the movement beside him. He hurriedly looked up, then cried out in alarm, "Crap! This thing can still fight back!"
Immediately afterward, Eileen screamed, "It's snapping!"
The doll's arms were covered in cracks. The black threads snapped inch by inch in the blink of an eye, and the spiderweb let out a series of sharp explosive sounds before breaking apart and vanishing.
The monster had escaped.
Just as Yu Sheng felt that all was lost and prepared to tell the others to run, a dazzling burst of blue flame suddenly erupted from the corner of his eye.
Huli, who had been hiding behind a nearby battlement, had somehow mustered her courage and run out. She glared viciously at the monster struggling before the gate, crouched on the ground like a beast, and spread her silver-white fox tails across the night sky. Vast patches of blue spirit fire blazed fiercely at the tip of every tail.
The fox girl let out a low growl.
Almost at the same moment, black spikes and fragments of bone burst from all four of her limbs and her entire body, pinning her to the ground.
Seeing this, Yu Sheng shouted anxiously, "Don't worry about—"
Before he could finish, he saw Huli, still crouched on all fours, force herself one step forward, snapping the spike-like restraints. Then she abruptly shifted her posture—
Foxfire exploded. A dazzling flash suddenly tore through the darkness, and ghostly blue flames gushed from behind a silver-white cone. It shot toward the flesh monster struggling to break free of the gate like a rocket.
Yu Sheng had no time to see what the thing was. He only saw a violent flash erupt across the monster's back. Although Huli had deliberately constrained the blast's range, Yu Sheng, standing so close, still felt as though the explosion had nearly shattered his bones. The monster struck directly by the silver-white cone lost its balance on the spot. The flesh monster, already at its limit, staggered twice before finally falling completely into the gate.
As the hisses rapidly faded into the distance, Yu Sheng abruptly released his control over the gate.
The illusory gate vanished in the blink of an eye.
The ruins of the ruined temple fell silent. The abrupt silence was almost unreal.
Eileen simply collapsed onto the ground. Her cracked arms could no longer even be lifted.
A red-clad girl riding a phantom wolf walked over from outside the ruins, astonishment on her face. Beside her followed a black-haired young man who looked rather ordinary.
The young man saw Yu Sheng from afar and suddenly froze, as though recalling something. His brows gradually furrowed.
The burly man nearly two meters tall stared wide-eyed at the place where the gate had vanished, seemingly lost in astonishment and thought.
Yu Sheng had no time to greet these "temporary allies" who had appeared from who knew where. Instead, he immediately turned toward Huli.
The fox girl was struggling to rise from the ground. The foxfire behind her had dimmed considerably, but she was still alive.
Yu Sheng froze. So what was that thing that just flew over? It wasn't a headbutt?
Then he noticed that one of Huli's tails seemed to be missing.
Yu Sheng: "..."
So what the hell did she just launch?!
It can actually be used like that?!
Yu Sheng was too shocked for words. When he realized that the silver-white cone wreathed in blue fire had actually been Huli's tail, he was completely dumbfounded. For a moment, that astonishment even overwhelmed the excitement of defeating a powerful enemy.
He didn't understand immortal arts or demonic techniques, but instinct told him that neither kind of technique should include the clause, "A Nine-tailed Fox can launch her own tail as a missile"...
Huli had no idea what had caused her benefactor's expression to become so wonderfully complicated for an instant. She only struggled to stand. The wounds where the black bone spikes had pierced her body had somehow already vanished completely. She stumbled toward Yu Sheng, her face full of urgency. "Benefactor..."
Yu Sheng quickly reached out to support the fox girl, who could barely stand. "Rest for a while first..."
Huli urgently interrupted him. "We can't rest, benefactor. It's not over yet!"
Yu Sheng froze.
Before you continue