Crossing Worlds

Several days later.

Innsmouth.

Inside Doniya's rented apartment.

A strange ritual array had been drawn on the floor with "mermaid blood."

Doniya had bartered for this "mermaid blood" from Beyonders on the black market.

According to them, the blood came from a kind of "mermaid" in the ocean. It was a material rich in water spirituality, excellent for laying the foundations of all manner of rituals.

At the center of the formation, Doniya lit a candle and dripped several drops of essential oil onto it, letting the fragrance spread through the room.

This was rosemary essential oil. Ordinary people who smelled it would often fall into delirium.

"We beseech the Bronze King, Lord of Black Flame..."

Amid the dark, dense atmosphere, Doniya's hoarse, low voice rose. "You are the sovereign of talismans, the embodiment of charcoal fire..."

"We ask you... to open the gates of your kingdom..."

The candle flame abruptly surged more than two meters high, transforming into a door that seemed to contain every color and embrace countless mysteries.

Threads of pitch-black flame burned upon the door, causing it to suddenly crack open a slit.

Light!

A ring of dim light tinged with dark red scrambled to escape from within the doorway.

Then came a hand, white as jade.

Behind that hand was a deep-black Chu robe, patterned with dark golden mysterious designs—Chu people favored phoenixes. The imperial family generally embroidered phoenixes upon their robes; nobles embroidered Azure Luans and Great Pengs, while commoners used white cranes and peacocks...

Of course, all of those had now been changed to Jade Qilin patterns!

Behind the dark Jade Qilin robe was a Bronze Nuo Mask. Its features were twisted into a bizarre expression.

Only beneath its hollow eye sockets were a pair of black eyes, gleaming sharply as though they