You Really Are Full of Surprises

Square...

Yu Xing squinted, trying to make out the name on the sign.

But there was just too much dust.

He pondered for a moment, then a wisp of cursed power drifted from his fingertips and slowly brushed towards the sign.

It stopped just before it reached the other side.

Yu Xing wanted to blow away the dust on it. Normally, he could sweep away the invisible curse aura with just a thought.

Faced with this memorial tablet, he didn't want to be so casual, so he used this wisp of curse as a brush, trying to carefully brush it away.

Even so, he still felt a sense of repulsion as the curse approached the sign.

The repulsive force wasn't strong; if he wanted to, such a small sign couldn't stop him from doing anything.

The power of the curse was acting in accordance with his subconscious, making him unwilling to forcibly touch the spirit tablet.

Regardless of who Yu Xing was, after hearing about the deeds of this general from the Fang family and now personally experiencing the lingering influence of this general after his death, he was willing to give this plaque a certain degree of respect.

The black mist sank back into her body, Yu Xing curled her lip. "Impressive, impressive."

He grumbled softly, but still bent down and, in the dim light of the surrounding candlelight, used his fingers to carefully wipe away the ash from the sign.

After a few strokes, his fingertips were completely black.

But the name engraved on the sign gradually became clearer.

[General Zhenxi]

[Fang Xunsheng's memorial tablet]

Fang Xunsheng.

That's the general's name.

Yu Xing looked at the three words and tilted her head.

The general's military achievements back then must have been considerable.

Otherwise, it wouldn't have been able to protect this piece of land of the ancestral hall from the clutches of Qianjie's clone after so many years, even though it was just a memorial tablet.

That's right, Yu Xing has figured it out.

The reason the ancestral hall is abandoned is precisely because it is not shrouded in any supernatural power. Qianjie could not possibly have the emotion of "respect." It is not related to this place; it is simply that she cannot enter, not that she does not want to enter.

Xiao Qianjie's power is strong enough that she shouldn't be unable to deal with General Fang's memorial tablet. Therefore, it must still be related to the Fang family's bloodline rules.

It's understandable that Xiao Qianjie's true form isn't afraid of ancestral tablets, but the Fang family controlled by it are negatively affected by the ancestral tablets.

In short, there should be some kind of rule so that as long as Xiao Qianjie wants to control the Fang family, she cannot do anything bad to the Fang General's memorial tablet.

If the controlled members of the Fang family sense General Fang's presence...

Yu Xing glanced at the futon at her feet and her eyes flickered. "Besides Fang Xiao's help, was Fang Xing also able to walk so smoothly because of your protection?"

The memorial tablet remained silent, and naturally no one answered him.

"The only member of the Fang family who wasn't deeply affected is gone. The others, under the distorted perception of that snake, won't come, so no one will worship you anymore—"

Yu Xing spoke, he glanced at the rows of memorial tablets below and changed his words: "I'm offering my respects to you."

"You can't understand them even if you talk to them."

Suddenly, a man's voice came from behind, which was absolutely terrifying for Yu Xing, who was certain that no one from the Fang family had returned.

Yu Xing's expression turned serious, and he abruptly turned his head.

Through the crack in the ancestral hall door he pushed open, a white medical coat came into view. Only half of the face was visible; the features were unremarkable, but the eyes were a pair of unfathomable, dark eyes that made one afraid to look directly at them.

The sunlight behind the Doctor made him stand backlit, giving him an indescribable eeriness.

It was just a fleeting impression; Yu Xing blinked, and the Doctor's face became indistinct again, impossible for the brain to analyze and capture.

But he probably still had a smile on his face.

"Squeak--"

The Doctor reached out and pushed the door wider, stepping over the threshold without any hindrance and entering the ancestral hall.

Footsteps echoed in the empty, quiet room, tap, tap, each step at the same frequency.

Judging from the Doctor's appearance, he seemed completely calm and unaffected.

"This plaque only possesses a slight protective aura because of its nominal connection with the general; it is neither the general's spirit nor his soul."

He walked up to Yu Xing and stood beside her. "No matter what you say, it can't respond to you."

"... Why are you here?" Yu Xing's wariness faded, and she turned her head back with an annoyance. "Weren't you trying to sabotage someone at Fang Deming's place?"

The Doctor sighed, "I'm Doctor. I came to the Fang Mansion to treat and save lives. Please don't put it so harshly."

Yu Xing scoffed. "Oh? Cured?"

"No," the Doctor said sincerely. "Mr. Fang's illness is incurable. All I can do is try to prolong his life."

Theoretically speaking, he did indeed heal and save Fang Deming's life by extending his life.

In reality, extending Fang Deming's life only gives Fang Xiao and his gang more time to torture Fang Deming.

Yu Xing was too lazy to play these word Yugi. He turned to face the Doctor and said, "I already know that you've been keeping Mingzhu conscious."

The Doctor said casually, "Really? You caught me doing a good deed. No need to thank me, it's just part of my job."

Yu Xing smiled and said, "You're welcome. It's what you should do."

"..."

When it comes to empty talk, none of the Doctor can compare to Yu Xing.

The Doctor fell silent. Yu Xing mood, continued the conversation, "Why did you help her?"

The Doctor turned around to face him.

"I was just an ordinary Doctor, hired by the hospital, doing ordinary work."

"Until the false Nanshui Town was fully formed, meeting the requirements of an independent 'copy,' [her] clone descended upon 'me,' forming the me I am today."

"I am both human and an avatar of an evil god. These two realizations have merged into one in my mind. I understand my mission, and the day when this body is abandoned is still a long way off."

The Doctor must have laughed again. Yu Xing looked directly at his face. "So?"

"So I can't let myself get too bored." The Doctor stood ramrod straight. "One day, I sensed a second thing related to [her] appearing in Nanshui Town, so of course I had to come and take a look."

"Mingzhu is related to [her]?" Yu Xing raised an eyebrow. "How could that be?"

"That's fate," the Doctor said calmly. "Humans are a group with infinite possibilities, so no matter which evil god it is, they are all inextricably linked to humans. Even the little snake in town... it excels in the realms of consciousness and cognition, and that power was born primarily from humans."

If it were aliens, humans might not be able to understand their physical structure and thought processes at all. In fact, their "body" might not even be called a body, and their "thought" might not even be called thought.

No matter how powerful the evil god Qianjie was, she was powerless against "beings" that had no cognition or consciousness.

"Because only the human system can generate concepts like gods and faith, then..."

The Doctor slightly raised his head, Yu Xing felt the Doctor's gaze fall on him as well. "Every human being has the potential to acquire the abilities of evil gods without any contact with any medium."

This was the first time Yu Xing had heard this kind of statement.

However, upon closer reflection, it's true that some people possess special abilities even without joining the Absurdity System.

For example...

The girl with the power of words I met in the snowy mountains.

She was special from a young age, but she wasn't a predictor.

"The possibility is very small. You might not find one in every world, but as you know..." The Doctor raised his hand to adjust his cuffs, "There are always exceptions among millions of worlds."

"Mingzhu was an accident?" Yu Xing crossed her arms.

"Yes, in a moment of extreme fear, her brain suddenly glimpsed a corner of [herself], and then it was corrupted. Without me, she would have transcended the realm of humanity, becoming an indescribable creature, disrupting the trajectory that Nanshui Town was meant to follow."

The Doctor said, "In that case, I will also be discarded prematurely. [She] has sent this alter ego of mine to curb the pollution of the Mingzhu."

"When she told me this, I thought you had shielded her from Qianjie's cognitive distortion." Yu Xing understood. "So she had already become immune to cognitive distortion from that moment on. What you treated her with was pollution."

The Doctor smiled and acquiesced, then took out a recording board from somewhere. At the top of the board was a large gripper, which held a stack of files neatly in place.

He flipped through the pages, stopped at a certain page, and read aloud, "Mingzhu's pollution is in its early stages. The source of her pollution comes from her imagination, far removed from the actual source, and without physical contact. Therefore, as long as she leaves the dangerous environment and stops imagining the source of pollution, the pollution has a chance to stop."

In short, she can still be saved.

"Oh, why are you telling me this?" Yu Xing asked calmly, seemingly unconcerned.

"I thought you had something to do related to her." The Doctor put away the whiteboard and smiled at him.

Yu Xing remained noncommittal.

He had just heard that Mingzhu had been corrupted by [her] power, and it did remind him of his Side Quest.

One of the rules is to take Mingzhu away from Nanshui Town.

Clearly, this mission for Mingzhu is a rescue mission. If Mingzhu survives after the problem in Nanshui Town is resolved, she will have the opportunity to start a new life.

This is a good ending—for Mingzhu.

But if Mingzhu has already been polluted, and this pollution will worsen without the Doctor's intervention every three days, then it's just jumping from one hell to another. Mingzhu probably wouldn't want to watch herself gradually turn into a monster.

He had just been thinking that rather than giving hope only to plunge into despair, it would be better to let Mingzhu die in Nanshui Town, at least she could die as a human being and not have to endure any more suffering.

Fortunately, the Doctor said in the end that she could still be saved.

This revealed the Doctor's level of understanding of the system's existence. At first, the Doctor mistook it for a symbol placed there by another evil god, but quickly realized that, presumably, after a night, the Doctor had completely figured out the tour group's identity.

They even guessed his mission.

Yu Xing wouldn't let the Doctor get too much confirmation from him. He didn't respond to the Doctor's statement, but instead changed the subject. "In other words, even if you weren't going to follow me, you would still come to the Fang Mansion often."

"Yes," the Doctor replied matter-of-factly. "Even when tour groups aren't coming, time still flows here. As Doctor at the hospital, it's only natural that I should treat the people of town."

"After Fang Xiao got rid of Fang Deming, he invited me here to put on a show for the townspeople. As the only outsider in the town with medical skills, since settling in Nanshui Town, all the illnesses of the outsiders have to go through me."

Nanshui Town is indeed fake, but before the ice melted again, about one-fifth of the people coming and going were real.

Some people come here as tourists, some are passing through the port, and some simply stumble upon this place while hiking in the mountains surrounding Nanshui Town.

Lucky passersby treat this place as just an ordinary town, coming and going in a hurry.

Another group either developed feelings for a resident and decided to marry and settle down there, or were drawn to a particular ability by Fang Xiao, who twisted his perception to keep them there.

The created actors proved they wouldn't get sick and didn't need Doctor, but real people do.

It's easy to deceive this tiny minority of real townspeople; just put on a show and they won't notice anything amiss.

"Are there any outsiders still living in the town now?" Yu Xing asked for a moment, puzzled.

With the arrival of cold weather, most of the real residents would probably freeze to death. Unlike the actors who are just ordinary people and only have a certain probability of malfunctioning, they are just ordinary mortals and probably cannot withstand the sudden drop in temperature.

Qianjie certainly wouldn't let anyone leave at this time; it clearly didn't want the outside world to notice anything more unusual.

Besides, yesterday was one thing, but today the whole town is full of evil spirits. Wouldn't the real residents be terrified? The route he, Medusa Yan Li took passed through several neighborhoods, and when they spread their senses to look for the doll, they didn't detect a single living person.

"Now..." the Doctor brushed off imaginary dust from his collar, "Back when the freezing began, all the real people flocked to my hospital. When you went to see them yesterday... didn't you see someone trying to escape?"

The scene at the hospital entrance that Yu Xing had seen yesterday instantly flashed through her mind: a woman trying to sneak out of the hospital but being caught by the security guards and dragged back, leaving a trail of blood in her wake.

The woman exuded a heavy aura of death. Yu Xing was focused on the route to the hospital and didn't pay much attention to her. So, does that mean...?

That's a living person!

"Don't even think about it, the person you saw has already been beaten to death by the security guard," the Doctor said quietly.

"With the tour groups coming, the most unpredictable thing is the local residents. Anyway, those people are useless now. To prevent them from coming to you and saying anything, that snake has confined everyone who hasn't frozen to death to the hospital. Anyone who tries to escape will be killed by the guards."

The Doctor spoke these cruel words so casually, even shaking his head at the end. "I'm just a Doctor, what can I do? So far, to avoid attracting the snake's attention, I've only turned the nurses and other Doctor it created into my puppets."

"I wouldn't dare touch a security guard, a role that's been given special responsibilities and requires specific rules."

Yu Xing: "..."

He lowered his brow, but ultimately said nothing.

Things have come to this point; the number of people still alive in the hospital can probably be counted on one hand. If those people can hold on until he ruins the "movie," they will be the most powerful eyewitnesses to the Nanshui Town scam. But if they can't hold on, no one can help them.

The Doctor is not a good person; he only does what he has to do and has no sense of right or wrong.

Yu Xing wasn't a good person either. He couldn't risk being discovered by the Fang family by going to the hospital to find those survivors and give them a chance to live.

If he says that what the Doctor did was not very good, then he's just blaming others for his own faults.

Only one point.

"From what you've said, anyone who didn't know better would think Qianjie hadn't noticed your special abilities." Yu Xing composed herself and chuckled lightly. "In its eyes, you're an outsider, yet you haven't been affected by the cold. On the contrary, you frequently come to the Fang Mansion to treat Fang Deming. That just doesn't make sense. Although it's not very smart, it's extremely suspicious."

"Yes, it knows what I am." The Doctor didn't deny it. "However, my presence here doesn't get in its way. On the contrary, I can provide it with some medical assistance. As long as it doesn't discover that I've hollowed out the hospital's Doctor and nurses, it will consider me a friend."

There are so many strange things in the world, but Qianjie isn't afraid of the Doctor.

Since the Doctor had been well-behaved for many years and seemed quite content with his life in town, Qianjie treated him as a docile lodger.

Today, before General Fang's memorial tablet, the Doctor finally bared his fangs, brazenly declaring, "That's why I said I can help you."

He glanced at the silent memorial tablet. "This ancestral hall is the only place in the entire town that is not under any control or surveillance; it's exceptionally safe, which is why I'm telling you so much."

"I already guessed what you were going to do. This is a conflict that has nothing to do with me. I only sided with you because of you, but your journeys are ultimately going in different directions, and I don't have much time left."

The Doctor took a few steps closer and placed his cold hand on Yu Xing's shoulder. "Now, I need an answer."

Where is my child?

We've come full circle back to this issue.

He had previously assumed that he could keep travelers no matter how many days they wanted to stay, so he offered to protect and help Yu Xing in exchange for her telling him the answer before she left.

Now things are different. Having guessed what Yu Xing would do next, the Doctor can't wait until the very end—if the fake Nanshui Town is destroyed, his clone, which only exists because of the Nanshui Town instance, will also be rendered useless.

But then Yu Xing would be nowhere to be found.

"I'm sorry, I have a new idea." The Doctor's hand slowly moved from Yu Xing's shoulder to Yu Xing's neck, tightening slightly, making a very threatening gesture.

"You need to tell me the answer now, give me the answer, and then I'll help you achieve your goal. If you try to delay or refuse, I'll stand against you and help this snake."

He pressed one finger on a vein in Yu Xing's neck, applying significant pressure that caused the vein to swell slightly.

"Ah, could it be that you want [her] to threaten me?" Yu Xing didn't move, her lips curving upwards. "Even if she comes, I'll just crumble into a bloody mess in front of her. Haven't you already seen that?"

"But you probably don't want your plans disrupted right now," the Doctor chuckled strangely. "If you suddenly die or escape, you'll be under special scrutiny from the entire Fang family, making it difficult to regain the snake's trust. You won't be able to go where you want to go."

"Not only you, but your system must be worried too, right?"

"How was it? This threat... did it work on you?" The Doctor tilted his head, unlike a normal person who would just tilt their head to show doubt; his tilt almost made Yu Xing think his head was about to fall off.

[Say yes.]

A female voice suddenly appeared from the system. The tone was not urgent, but the fact that it spoke at this moment proved that the Doctor's method had worked.

By moving Yu Xing's body after his death, the Fang family would undoubtedly believe that he had escaped. What would follow would be a frantic search to find him, imprison him, and give him no chance to escape again.

In that situation, it wouldn't be realistic for him to expect Fang Xiao... who also controls most of Fang Xiao's thoughts, to take him to the East District Port on his Qianjie initiative.

Yu Xing wasn't in a hurry; he still had seven days left before he had to leave. But the system was definitely anxious. If it couldn't destroy the filming equipment at the port within the allotted time, all the effort and resources the system had invested would be wasted.

Yu Xing remained silent, lowering her gaze as if weighing the pros and cons.

Only the system knew that he was waiting to negotiate terms.

The system had overheard Yu Xing's conversation with the Doctor at the hospital. Regarding her child, only one person in the broken mirror met the requirements. By connecting the information, it was difficult for the system not to know who the Doctor was looking for.

Yu Xing's teammate, Zhao Yijiu, possesses Persona Mask called "Cold Wine."

If the clues are given to the Doctor, she will go to look for the child. No matter what she does after finding the child, it will not be a good thing for Zhao Yijiu.

Therefore, this request would harm Yu Xing's interests, and the system knew that Yu Xing's silence was giving it time to make demands.

Moreover, this period of time is limited, and the Doctor who has caught it red-handed is not so easy to talk to.

[Promise it, and I'll give your teammate Zhao Yijiu a life-saving sacrifice.]

[This offering will strengthen his willpower, giving him greater control over the other personality within his body. Furthermore, before entering the Yin Yang City, he will be marked by me, ensuring [she] will never find him.]

I can guarantee that.

Yu Xing's eyes crinkled at the corners, and her voice was cheerful. "Okay."

The word "good" was interpreted by the system as acceptance of the transaction, and by the Doctor as agreement to the conditions.

The Doctor graciously removed his hand from Yu Xing's neck. "So, the answer?"

Yu Xing lowered her head slightly and whispered in the Doctor's ear.

His lips moved slightly, and a few seconds later he straightened up.

The Doctor stared at him, as if he were thinking, or perhaps engaging in some unique thought process characteristic of their indescribable existence.

[So you already knew how to tell him.]

Whispering was useless to the system, which heard it clearly, and the user immediately felt cheated.

[Even if I didn't offer sacrifices as a condition, you would still give him the same answer, Yu Xing. You're only remaining silent to get a promise from me.]

"A promise made is a promise kept," Yu Xing said with a smile.

He replied to both the system and the Doctor with the same sentence.

What he whispered in the Doctor's ear was...

"You don't need to search everywhere; I will bring your child directly to Yin Yang City."

She just wanted to find her child, constantly asking about his whereabouts—wasn't it all to bring her lost child back to her?

This is precisely why uncertainty arises; she might help the child completely take over Zhao Yijiu's consciousness and take Zhao Yijiu's body away as a vessel.

It's also possible to separate the child from Zhao Yijiu's consciousness, which would be tantamount to stripping Zhao Yijiu of all consciousness, resulting in her immediate death, given that the child has already merged with her.

In the best-case scenario, she wouldn't care about the child's appearance, as long as it was her child, and would take Zhao Yijiu away intact.

Even in the best-case scenario, Zhao Yijiu would lose her status as a diviner and enter Yin Yang City prematurely. By the time the diviners enter, Zhao Yijiu would be long gone.

Therefore, the only option is to turn a passive situation into an active one.

Yu Xing promised to take the child directly to her.

With such a promise in place, even if Zhao Yijiu were to be discovered by [her] after entering Yin Yang City, the people around her would be prepared, and there would be six other evil gods to restrain her, making it better than other options.

As for the life-saving offerings and special markings mentioned by the system, the former was something Yu Xing had gotten for Zhao Yijiu, and the latter... Yu Xing didn't believe it at all.

What if the system just can't stop [her]?

What if there are also clones of her in the real world? The system's control over the real world is actually the weakest, while she can be any form. How can the system defend against her?

Not to mention that the offerings have real data, but the markings are entirely based on the system's word, and it might not even fulfill the transaction after using Yu Xing to retrieve the book from Nanshui Town.

Such security is insufficient; Yu Xing cannot rely on the system, this "Sixth Brother," at all.

"Does it really take this long to think about, Doctor?" Yu Xing's conditions were very real, so she was quite confident. "You evil gods should all have some kind of contract mark or something, right? Put a mark on me, and if I lie or ultimately fail to fulfill my promise, you'll be punished."

"Okay." The Doctor finally finished thinking.

He looked at Yu Xing, whose face gradually became clear.

The surrounding air grew cold and murky. Yu Xing's body stiffened, and she could only stand there, watching as the Doctor became more and more like an "ordinary person."

This feeling is the same as last time, which means that [she] has descended upon this body belonging to the Doctor.

However, the feeling of collapse within Yu Xing's body weakened. Presumably, she had learned to conceal her aura after her previous mistake. Yu Xing subconsciously turned her head to look at General Fang's memorial tablet, where a thick black mist surged out and blocked the tablets.

He didn't want the protective aura emanating from General Fang's plaque to be dissipated by [her] presence.

"You still have the energy to deal with such trivial matters."

A cold hand gripped Yu Xing's chin, turning his head back.

The Doctor's face was fully revealed, and his tone had changed. With those chaotic eyes and the upturned corners of his mouth on his human face, Yu Xing felt as if her head was about to explode after just one glance, and heard a crackling sound of tearing.

"We meet again." She saw the bloody cracks on Yu Xing's face, then suppressed her breath, swallowed back some of the words she wanted to say, and went straight to the point, "As you said, to remind humans to keep their promises, I usually leave a mark on them."

"Then I'll mark you too. If you change your mind and don't bring my child to Yin Yang City, you'll always see my figure, hear my voice, and endlessly endure the pain of disintegration, eventually turning into an irreversible blob of pollutants."

Her tone was extremely strange, yet every word was deeply imprinted in Yu Xing's mind. Yu Xing endured the excruciating pain of her collapsing body and slowly uttered two words: "Come, imprint."

She pulled down Yu Xing's collar.

The Doctor raised his hand, and countless eyes and mouths appeared in his palm. The eyes blinked in unison, and the mouths opened and closed, babbling incomprehensibly.

Then, tiny tentacles emerged from the eyes and mouth, growing longer and longer, and burrowing into Yu Xing's body.

It's clear that she originally intended to imprint the mark on Yu Xing's chest.

This is a place very close to the human heart. Imprinting a mark here usually means that the mark is very important, and the price of violating it is particularly severe.

But as soon as the tentacles touched Yu Xing's skin, they saw the Qianjie- Knotted Serpent ticket mark that had already occupied the very center of Yu Xing's chest.

"..." She expressed her dissatisfaction with Doctor's face, released Yu Xing's collar, and then pinched Yu Xing's cheek to force him to open his mouth.

The tentacles stretched out again, their tips pointed and surrounded by tiny round suckers. They pliably and nimbly burrowed into Yu Xing's mouth.

"Ugh." Yu Xing frowned uncomfortably. He felt those strange things gradually filling his mouth, slippery and sticky, reminding him of an octopus. Several thin tentacles wrapped around his tongue, eagerly pulling it out.

Tsk.

If you want to put the mark on his tongue, just tell him. Can't he just stick his tongue out himself?

Her tongue, which was longer than normal, was pulled out. Yu Xing endured the strange feeling without resisting, but when she saw the red eye pattern on the tip of her tongue, she stopped.

"..."

The tongue is the only part of the human skull located inside the brain, symbolizing secrecy. Marking one's mark here is no less important than marking it on the chest.

But it was occupied again.

Not only that, Yu Xing's senses were so preoccupied with those tentacles that she didn't notice her tongue starting to act out again, defiantly licking one of the tentacles.

She, wearing the Doctor's face, suddenly smiled.

The tentacles released Yu Xing's tongue and withdrew from her mouth. Yu Xing instinctively tilted her head and gagged, then heard the Doctor, who seemed to have descended from an evil god, say, "Your body is truly... colorful."

"Um, sorry, I don't really understand the intricacies of this. I didn't know you all preferred similar locations when branding yourselves." Yu Xing swallowed, noticing her gaze fixed on her right hand, and added casually, "That won't do either, Ghost Tree already has it."

"That was wonderful." She maintained her smile. "Is there anything else?"

Yu Xing noticed that the evil god's mood seemed to be becoming subtle, and after thinking for a moment, said, "That's all."

The real [her] would certainly not be this human, but since she has now descended into the body of Doctor, her ideology has been greatly influenced by the Doctor himself, and she has even acquired some human emotions.

"Then, here it is." She didn't want to waste too much time; if she didn't hurry, Yu Xing would explode again.

This time, the tentacles finally found a clear direction. A few wrapped around the hem of Yu Xing's clothes and lifted it up, while the rest swarmed up and slid around his navel a couple of times.

Yu Xing's taut muscles betrayed the fact that he was a little nervous. He babbled on, "What are you doing? Why is it so troublesome for you to leave your mark? I didn't even feel the Qianjie mark -- uh!"

Before he could finish speaking, the sharp tips of those tentacles suddenly pierced his skin and drilled into his body, surging and moving inward. Yu Xing opened his eyes wide and looked down. Each tentacle was spaced a little apart and pierced into his flesh. The middle tentacle burrowed in from his navel, pulling his hand, which was covered with eyes and a mouth, toward that spot.

The pain was not obvious, or rather, it was as if she was numb. Yu Xing only felt a tingling sensation in her abdomen. The already thin tentacles seemed to split into countless finer threads under her skin, merging into her blood vessels and naturally becoming one with them.

The tentacles burrowed deeper and deeper, finally pulling her hand and Yu Xing's abdomen together seamlessly. A cold and strange feeling arose from the bottom of his heart, bringing a shiver. It was as if the surroundings had darkened, and he had fallen from the ground into an infinite abyss.

Beneath the abyss lay tentacles—no, tentacles—magnified a hundredfold. These tentacles writhed wildly and erratically, their sheer number stretching as far as the eye could see.

His tiny human body was entangled by tentacles from one place to another, each tentacle seemingly interested in touching him before handing him over to its companions, as if he were some novel object that everyone wanted to see.

A bright red moon rose in the distant sky, gradually growing larger and closer until it enveloped Yu Xing.

Then, the red moon blinked.

He blinked.

Yu Xing then realized that the enormous moon, which occupied half the sky, was actually an eye staring at him.

Its eyes, devoid of emotion, or perhaps containing every emotion a human could comprehend, gaze upon him; without a word, this is the most terrifying warning.

Remember your promise.

Yu Xing felt like she had "heard" them.

If you break the contract, you will be forever consumed by endless madness.

[■■■■]

The tentacles cheered.

The sky seemed to be cheering too.

Unable to think clearly due to the noise, Yu Xing's vision blurred for a moment, and the images gradually overlapped. The terrifying, hellish scene slowly faded away, and he returned to the ordinary ancestral hall.

He gasped for breath, only to realize that he was biting his hand hard, his whole body drenched in cold sweat, and beneath his feet was a vast expanse of solid branches that stretched out with his raging emotions, twisting and tangling around his body, supporting his limp form.

Fortunately, an invisible barrier enveloped him, preventing anything on his body from disturbing the memorial tablets and the space outside the ancestral hall, and the branches also gathered within this area.

"Considering your strength and the number of high-ranking beings within you, [she] left you with the deepest imprint."

The Doctor, whose face had been restored to its original shape, looked at him with a smile.

"It seems this kind of stimulation is indeed not easy to handle. You're already very capable. If it were someone weaker, they would probably be a madman by now, right?"

Yu Xing slowly regained his strength in his limbs. He made all the branches ethereal, then pressed them back into the other dimension, his legs buckling as he half-knelt on the ground.

His mind quickly cleared, he let out a long breath, and lifted his clothes to take a look.

The branding is complete.

A finger's width below his navel, a twisted line appeared that was hard to describe, even its color was difficult to decipher. The line seemed to be flowing until his strength was fully restored, at which point the line settled down.

"Your methods are indeed hard to accept." Yu Xing pressed her temples, propped herself up to stand, her chest still heaving with deep breaths, feeling that her shower had been a waste.

She has left; now standing before him is the Doctor.

"Only the highest-grade branding is done this way. If you're just an ordinary person, the branding can be done with a simple 'smack.'" The Doctor seemed to want to emphasize this point.

"Okay, okay, I got it. You don't need to keep reminding me." Yu Xing was speechless. The Doctor had only known him for a day, yet he seemed to have made great progress in understanding human emotions—especially in being annoying.

He calmed himself down, squinted, and asked, "I just saw a scene..."

The Doctor said, "As the person who branded you, I saw it too. She completed this step through my consciousness."

"Was that the real [her]?" Yu Xing was somewhat shocked. The red moon in the image should be one of her eyes, the eye of her true self.

The Doctor said, "Yes, that's her, located in Yin Yang City."

Yu Xing covered her forehead to calm herself down.

Even just one eye was infinitely more powerful than the [she] who had descended upon the Doctor.

Yu Xing hadn't experienced that feeling of being unable to resist for far too long.

Standing in the jungle of tentacles taller than himself, gazing at the moon-sized eyes above, he could only wonder how insignificant humanity truly is.

Like an ant trying to shake a tree.

Like a drop in the ocean.

Calling it an evil god, or referring to it as a god, is... not an exaggeration at all.

Has the evil god of Yin Yang City really reached this level...? It seems he has always underestimated his opponent.

If Qianjie is considered an evil god on par with [her], then what kind of terrifying being is the real Qianjie?

The snake they encountered in Nanshui Town, and Qianjie, were probably as different as heaven and birds.

Yu Xing couldn't help but think of the cryptic conversation between Yan Li Medusa. To be honest, he could guess some of what the two were up to.

But now, having truly glimpsed a corner of the evil god's power, he began to worry about the choice of the predictor.

He is already very strong, but it's far from enough, and so are the others.

The two are not even on the same level. If the system is also one of the evil gods, then when they go to Yin Yang City, what awaits them is the complete "system"...

If they truly wanted to dethrone the evil god, or even just rebel against something, they would probably only become a laughing stock with their current abilities.

Just as Yu Xing unconsciously thinking in this direction, the Doctor seemed to sense something, turned his head with a smile, and asked, "What are you thinking about?"