Rainy Night at the Old Altar, Another "Her" Appears

After they approached the outskirts of the Sun-Moon Military Camp, rain suddenly began to fall.

It was no ordinary rain. Every drop carried an incredibly fine soul guidance interference wave. It made no sound when it struck the leaves, yet it caused brief double images in one's Spirit Detection.

Huo Yuhao withdrew his extended spiritual power, a faint ache forming between his brows. Seeing this, Wang Dong'er immediately raised a barrier of light. She moved quickly, almost on instinct.

Huo Yuhao looked at her.

"Don't overthink it." Wang Dong'er's voice was soft. "I'm just afraid you'll collapse and affect the mission."

Those words were like cold water. Yet both of them knew that the more she spoke this way, the more it proved she had never truly let go.

Ma Xiaotao said softly from behind them, "This rain's a little annoying."

Her evil fire flickered beneath the rain, brightening and dimming as though something were repeatedly stirring it. Ye Guyi raised her sword, holy light shining toward the treetops.

"There are lingering Holy Spirit Cult souls in the rain."

The next instant, pairs of grayish-white eyes lit up in the forest. They were not living people, but shadows of emotions left behind after their souls had been cleansed. They had no physical forms and merely slowly raised their heads in the rainy night, looking at Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao stopped. Those shadows did not attack him.

They only repeated the same sentence over and over.

"Collect samples."

"Living subjects prioritized."

Wang Dong'er's expression turned cold. Ye Guyi drew her holy sword, and holy light swept across the forest floor. The gray-white eyes went out one by one, yet before vanishing, all of them turned toward the Sun-Moon Military Camp.

"They're using lingering souls to test your spiritual algorithms," Ye Guyi said.

Huo Yuhao nodded. "They're also testing each of your soul power and soul skill characteristics."

Wang Dong'er said coldly, "Then let them test us."

Her wings of light unfurled, blue-gold radiance overwhelming the curtain of rain and driving every lingering soul out from the shadows of the trees. Huo Yuhao acted almost at the same time. Ultimate Ice froze along the path of the fleeing souls, forcing out a miniature tracking spike hidden beneath the mud.

That tracking spike had not been meant to kill anyone.

It was meant to gather samples.

It collected the fluctuations in soul power produced when Huo Yuhao's group came into contact with the residual frequencies of evil souls.

Ma Xiaotao stepped forward, her red clothes soaked through by the rain and clinging to her in sharp, dangerous lines. She glanced at the tracking spike, the smile on her face fading.

Huo Yuhao had just bent down when Ma Xiaotao lifted her foot and pinned the tracking spike beneath it.

"Don't touch it."

She looked at him, firelight swaying in her eyes.

"The moment you see something like this, you want to pick it up and inspect it. The moment you see someone hurt, you want to save them. The moment you see a woman, you want to take responsibility. Junior brother, aren't you tired?"

Wang Dong'er's fingers tightened slightly.

Ma Xiaotao moved half a step closer, lowering her voice.

"Didn't sleep well last night?"

Huo Yuhao's throat tightened. "Sister Xiao Tao."

"Don't be nervous." Ma Xiaotao smiled lazily. "I'm not asking what you and Dong'er did."

Wang Dong'er's ears instantly turned red.

Ye Guyi said coldly, "Ma Xiaotao."

Ma Xiaotao spread her hands. "Was I wrong? His soul power circulation is more chaotic than yesterday, and Dong'er's aura of light is sharper than usual. Can't your angel martial soul see that?"

Ye Guyi closed her eyes briefly, clearly disapproving of Ma Xiaotao's behavior. For the first time, Huo Yuhao felt that Ma Xiaotao's mature bluntness was truly difficult to deal with.

She loved seeing through him, then laughing.

The rain grew heavier and heavier. The group could only stop at a half-collapsed old hunting camp. Bei Bei and Sanshi held the perimeter, Ye Guyi guarded the eastern side, and Ma Xiaotao guarded the west. Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong'er temporarily remained in the main tent to examine the tracking spike and Orange's soul guidance paper slip.

The tent was very dark.

Rain rolled down the tent cloth outside. Both of them were soaked through. There was only one soul guidance lamp, its light low and dim, bathing everything in the tent in a damp, warm color.

Dong'er removed her outer garment first and wrung out a thin stream of water. Her movements were quick, but Huo Yuhao happened to see it all: the thin, light blue inner garment she wore. He swallowed instinctively, his Adam's apple bobbing. Seeing this, Dong'er cursed under her breath, "Pervert." Then she turned away.

Huo Yuhao also hurriedly turned around, tense.

Wang Dong'er looked at his back, the expression on her face easing as a smile appeared.

"Here." Dong'er tossed him a towel.

"Dry yourself. We still have to infiltrate the Sun-Moon Military Camp tomorrow, and follow them to the Soul Guidance Tower. Don't make yourself sick again."

Huo Yuhao caught the dry cloth, his fingertips brushing her hand.

The rainy night was too cold.

Yet her hand was warm.

That trace of warmth made them both pause for an instant.

Wang Dong'er pulled her hand back first.

"Pervert."

Huo Yuhao said quietly, "I'm not."

"You are." Wang Dong'er looked at the soul guidance paper slip on the table. "You're the best at making all kinds of women feel sorry for you."

Those words stabbed painfully into Huo Yuhao's chest.

Thunder rolled outside the tent. The tracking spike on the table suddenly lit up. Silver-blue patterns projected an extremely brief image into the air.

The Sun-Moon Soul Guidance Tower.

Orange.

And a transparent core sealed by golden chains.

Huo Yuhao abruptly raised his head.

Wang Dong'er saw it too.

In the image, Orange raised a hand and pressed it against the transparent core, as if she knew Huo Yuhao would definitely see it. She said nothing, merely tapping the tabletop three times with her fingertips.

Three taps.

An old code used among Sun Moon soul engineers.

It meant: Don't trust the main entrance.

Wang Dong'er suddenly said, "She understands you very well."

Huo Yuhao did not deny it.

The tent was once more filled with nothing but the sound of rain.

After a long while, Wang Dong'er softly said, "Huo Yuhao, when we enter and leave the Sun-Moon Military Camp tomorrow, be careful. Stop risking your life without regard for yourself."

"If something happens to you, I won't even be able to settle my score with you."

Warmth rose in Huo Yuhao's heart.

Before dawn, the fog around the Sun Moon camp suddenly dispersed.

It had not dispersed naturally.

It was sucked away by an abandoned altar hidden beneath the earth veins.

At the end of the forest, ancient stone steps slowly rose from the mud. Each step bore the long-blurred patterns of Soul Beasts. Rainwater ran along those patterns like lines of fate being awakened.

Wang Dong'er stood before the steps, her expression changing bit by bit.

She heard it.

Not a sound.

It was a pull from deep within her martial soul and bloodline. The Goddess of Light Butterfly silently spread behind her, and a faint ring of dragon-scale patterns appeared at the edges of her blue-gold butterfly wings before quickly vanishing.

Huo Yuhao noticed immediately. "Dong'er?"

Wang Dong'er pressed a hand to her chest.

"Someone is calling me."

Ye Guyi drew her sword. Holy light shone upon the first level of the altar. There was no shriek from evil souls, nor did black mist scatter. The holy light merely stopped on the stone steps, as if it had encountered something that should not have been judged.

Ye Guyi frowned. "This isn't something that belonged to evil soul masters."

Ma Xiaotao sneered. "It looks like an old thing bad people used to do bad things."

"More or less," Huo Yuhao said.

He crouched down and pressed his fingertips against the edge of the first stone step. A fragment of soul guidance equipment touched it, and dozens of old patterns immediately surfaced across its face. Some of those patterns belonged to ancient Star Dou clans, some were Sun Moon soul guidance inscriptions, while others were blood-red brands added later by the Holy Spirit Cult.

Three powers were tangled together.

Like an instrument of fate that had been contaminated.

Huo Yuhao's gaze darkened.

"They didn't modify the altar directly."

Ye Guyi asked, "What do you mean?"

"They made the altar mistake itself for something protecting a certain Return Flow."

Wang Dong'er's breathing caught. "Return Flow?"

Huo Yuhao did not answer immediately.

Because what surfaced on the soul guidance fragment was not a complete name.

It was two residual traces.

One resembled Dong, while the other resembled Qiu.

But the second was faint, so faint it seemed to lie far beyond the horizon.

Wang Dong'er looked at the residual trace of the character "Qiu," her fingertips turning slightly pale. Of course she knew who it was. Huo Yuhao knew too.

The first level of the altar suddenly lit up, and a pale golden pillar of light rose from underground, directly enveloping Wang Dong'er. Huo Yuhao immediately opened the Eye of Destiny.

"Dong'er, suppress the old pattern on the left!"

Wang Dong'er spread her wings of light, platinum radiance falling with perfect precision.

"Ye Guyi, use Holy Light Slash on the blood brands!"

Ye Guyi slashed out with her sword, holy light cutting through the blood-red lines added by the Holy Spirit Cult.

"Sister Xiao Tao, burn the Sun-Moon Conduction Patterns directly!"

Wang Dong'er stood within the pillar of light, the Goddess of Light Butterfly clashing head-on with the altar. The altar seemed to be confirming her identity, while also searching for the missing other half.

The fragment of soul guidance equipment in Huo Yuhao's palm grew scorching hot.

He finally understood.

Sun Moon and the Holy Spirit Cult had not merely wanted to collect Wang Qiu'er's auspicious beast aura. They also wanted to know why Wang Dong'er and Wang Qiu'er possessed a pull from the same origin. He had once dreamed of a fate connection between the three of them, and he had also conducted resonance experiments with Destiny Records in Shrek's soul guidance laboratory. He wanted to know as well—what connection did Dong'er and Qiu'er truly have?

Huo Yuhao forcibly shifted the altar's judgment.

The first deviation: shifting the name.

Within the altar's pillar of light, he forcibly moved the Return Flow designation of that ancient identity half an inch aside.

The second deviation: shifting the cause.

The altar had originally intended to draw out the strand of higher divine consciousness buried deep within Wang Dong'er, but Fate Deviation caused it to misjudge that strand as an external blood brand to be cleansed.

The third deviation: shifting the result.

The Sun-Moon soul guidance conduction patterns should have collected Dong'er's response to light, but Huo Yuhao redirected them into a blank soul guidance imprint.

Boom!

The first level of the altar shook violently. The blood-red brands exploded. The Sun-Moon Conduction Patterns shattered.

Wang Dong'er stepped out of the pillar of light, her face pale, but she did not collapse.

Huo Yuhao reached out to support her. She did not avoid him, yet neither did she lean into his embrace as she once had.

"I sensed her just now," Wang Dong'er said softly.

Huo Yuhao's heart sank.

"Who?"

Wang Dong'er looked at the residual trace of the character "Qiu" on the soul guidance fragment.

"Qiu'er. But I didn't see her herself. Even though I could feel that she was far away from me, there was a thread constantly pulling me closer to her."

For once, Ma Xiaotao did not smile.

Ye Guyi said quietly, "If this altar continues to awaken, that thread will be pulled even tighter."

Wang Dong'er closed her eyes. In that instant just now, she had clearly felt that if the thread were forcibly severed, some part within her body would be missing forever.

After a brief silence, the second level of the altar lit up.

This time, what surfaced on the soul guidance fragment was not the pattern of the Goddess of Light Butterfly, but a wisp of extremely faint pink-gold residual light.

Huo Yuhao's pupils contracted.

Dong'er.

No.

That did not resemble the Dong'er of today.

That phantom light was loftier than Dong'er, and more complete than the distant "Qiu'er."

Like a trace of remaining radiance falling from an immeasurable height.

From deep within the altar came a second toll of a bell.

Wang Dong'er raised her head. She heard a blurred syllable. It sounded like "Wu," yet also like light scattered by the wind.