Devouring (revised): Devoured pride...

What's wrong with the Ability Control Bureau? Aren't there any parasites in the Ability Control Bureau?

[Hey, can you stop bringing up the Ability Control Bureau? With such a venomous tongue, you might be the next one to have your powers taken away!]

[I'm not in City A! I'm perfectly safe. Besides, I'm of high moral character, unlike those parasites in the Ability Control Bureau!]

[Pfft, didn't you say this was God's will? If it really was God's will, then why would God have geographical limitations? Does being able to control only one city make our God seem a bit incompetent? Isn't that a contradiction?]

[...]

In a private apartment in City A, a superhuman was engaged in a heated battle in the chat area using their Ability System: [Get lost! Why drag God into everything? Does God have so much free time? If God really exists, describing Him as so incompetent is utterly disrespectful; you'll be the first to be punished by Heaven!]

The superhuman unleashed their full power, leaving their opponent speechless before finally stopping.

Click, a soft sound came from next door. The superhuman paused, turned his head, and saw a young man sitting on the balcony of the apartment next door, his hands on the railing, his legs dangling casually and swinging gently.

Who is this person? When did he arrive?

His neighbors were clearly an ordinary middle-aged couple, and they didn't have any children at all!

The superhuman became alert, secretly putting away the screen of the Ability System, his finger lightly resting on...

On the Blood Moon symbol, he prepared to attack. Just then, the boy turned his head and their eyes met.

"Friend, what does romance mean to you?"

"..."

What the heck?

The superhuman didn't answer, but shouted, "Who are you? Why are you trespassing on someone else's property?"

The boy gently swung his legs. "I didn't trespass, I was just passing by and sat down to rest my tired legs."

He tilted his head slightly, a strand of his soft curly hair was lifted, and he looked completely harmless.

The boy was bored.

The competition was suddenly suspended, the wilderness was closed off, and he hadn't seen his sister for several days with nowhere to go.

Bored, the boy's interest in asking humans for answers diminished considerably. Even though the superhuman next door didn't answer his question, he didn't become dissatisfied; instead, he chatted with the other person, muttering under his breath, "Isn't it okay to sit here?"

The superhuman remained silent.

He sensed that the other person meant no harm, so he softened his tone. "Rest in a place like that would cause misunderstandings, after all, it's territory owned by someone."

"Oh." Dong Zhen said listlessly, not insisting, "Then I'm leaving."

The superhuman was about to suggest that they could rest in the community recreation area downstairs, a public area that wouldn't cause any misunderstandings. However, he had only opened his mouth slightly when the boy sitting on the next balcony suddenly vanished, so quickly that he was caught completely off guard. The boy disappeared without a trace right before his eyes. The superhuman was startled and belatedly broke out in a cold sweat.

This boy...

Fortunately, he meant no harm.

Dong Zhen hadn't gone far; he had simply moved from the balcony to the rooftop terrace. The sun was shining brightly, but he couldn't muster any energy.

He leaned lazily against the railing, the sunlight casting a long, narrow shadow around him. One foot tapped lightly on the ground as he muttered to himself:

"... Go find your sister."

"... I'm not going to see my sister."

"... Go find your sister."

"... I'm not going to see my sister."

His eyes hardened. "Go find my sister!"

He suddenly straightened up from leaning against the railing, his eyes shining brightly. He had made up his mind; he was going to find his sister!

Just about to leave--

"Um?"

Something seemed to have slipped into his shadow, instantly merging with it.

That seems to be the case.

He crouched down, and the shadow beneath his feet shrank as he moved. He reached into his own shadow and pulled out a palm-sized black shape.

He squeezed it.

The shadow struggled in his hand.

What's this?

In the underground of the Ability Control Bureau, under the bright white light, the man in the isolation room suddenly looked up, his eyes filled with panic.

"Awake?"

Outside the isolation room, the operations captain of the Ability Control Bureau asked in a calm voice.

Yun Hua forcibly suppressed her intense heart palpitations, forced herself to hide the shock in her eyes, and slowly blanked out, gradually returning to a state of mental instability.

Qin Daichuan watched his performance quietly. "Captain Xiao is right, you're putting on quite a convincing act."

Ye Jiang leaned against the windowsill, looking outside. She had returned home very late the night before, but after lying in bed, she couldn't sleep a wink. The faces of several people kept replaying in her mind: the heir of the Miao Family, and two members of the Ability Control Bureau. Their pale faces rotated in her mind, finally settling on the image of Xiao Pei looking up at the moon. It was this scene that kept her awake.

What was the boss thinking at that moment? Was he wondering if this incident of the superpowered individuals being downgraded was related to the moon?

Ye Jiang felt inexplicably depressed.

Frustrated, she shifted her position, resting her face on her hand.

The air ahead rippled slightly, and with a "chirp," a musical note appeared out of thin air, wriggling joyfully as if it had come to life. Then another one appeared, chirp-chirp-chirp--- Soon, the air was filled with musical notes, wriggling and colliding to produce crisp sounds, forming a wonderful melody. Ye Jiang was surrounded by the music.

Several musical notes lined up and landed on Ye Jiang's windowsill, twisting and dancing energetically.

"Is your sister unhappy?"

A clear, youthful voice came from above. Ye Jiang looked up and her gaze met that of the boy who was leaning over the rooftop railing, looking down at her. The boy asked, "Are you happier now?"

Ye Jiang didn't reply. She poked at the dancing musical notes with her finger. "You really do like these things."

"Yes, I like it very much." Dong Zhen grabbed the railing, did a somersault, and leaped into Ye Jiang's room. Then, he leaned against Ye Jiang, mimicking her pose on the windowsill, his fingers strumming dancing musical notes. "Don't you like it, sister?"

"I like it," Ye Jiang replied.

She liked it too, and even wanted to use the illusion magic in the interior design.

She likes it, but that's not what she's interested in right now.

Dong Zhen turned his head to look at her. Although the human next to him always had a blank expression, he could already tell her emotions from that face.

"What happened to your sister?" he asked. "I'll be your listener."

Ye Jiang didn't encounter anything wrong, she just felt inexplicably annoyed.

She had nothing to say.

Dong Zhen looked at her, and after a while, he grabbed a musical note. The next second, the musical note in his hand turned into an ugly doll with a wide-open mouth, twisting its body and making babbling noises. Ye Jiang watched calmly, not amused.

Dong Zhen: "..."

He dejectedly crushed the ugly doll into pieces, and then conducted the musical notes to play a cheerful melody.

He started talking to himself, telling Ye Jiang what he had done in the wilderness these past few days.

"I killed a lot of Polluted, but it's a pity they don't count towards my score anymore, otherwise I might have been able to win an award with my sister," Dong Zhen said.

"You killed a lot of Polluted?" Ye Jiang said. "Weren't you selling boxed lunches because your combat strength was too weak?"

Dong Zhen: "..."

Ye Jiang was just saying it casually and didn't delve into it. It's perfectly normal for people to have secrets, and it's also normal for Polluted to have secrets.

Ye Jiang still believes that Dong Zhen is just a somewhat special Polluted.

Dong Zhen reluctantly changed the subject. "Why is my sister unhappy?"

He brought the topic back.

Ye Jiang was lost in thought. Yes, why?

She refocused her attention and pondered the question seriously.

"Ah."

The boy next to her suddenly exclaimed, and Ye Jiang's attention was immediately drawn away after only a second of seriousness. She wondered what he was exclaiming about. Dong Zhen's eyes brightened, and she reached into her pocket, pulling out a wad of something.

"Sister, cheer up! I'll get you a pet to raise!"

Ye Jiang lowered her gaze and landed on the other person's palm. What was being held in that palm was not some cute little trinket, but a dark, murky object.

"A pet?" she asked skeptically.

If she doesn't misunderstand, pets mostly refer to small, living animals, but this thing...

"It's alive!" Dong Zhen squeezed it, and the lump immediately struggled, just like a living thing.

Ye Jiang blinked.

She took it with surprise, examined it closely, and found it looked familiar. Where had she seen it before?

This thing has no feel to it at all; it feels like squeezing a ball of dark air.

It is indeed an intangible thing, but it has consciousness. Its consciousness is trapped by Dong Zhen's illusion, and it thinks it is trapped in a cage, which is why it is controlled by someone.

Ye Jiang looked at it for a while and then showed a disgusted expression. "I don't want it, it's not cute at all."

Human pets all have their own endearing qualities, but this thing has absolutely nothing endearing about it.

Dong Zhen pinched and pulled at the shadowy mass, shaping it into two long ears.

"Now? Sister, don't you think it's kind of cute?"

Ye Jiang remained calm, her expression revealing her thoughts. So Dong Zhen started fiddling with it again, stretching a long tail out of that shadow.

"And now?"

"..."

"And now?"

"..."

Dong Zhen gave up, grabbed the thing, and said with disdain, "A worthless thing!"

In the underground isolation room of the Ability Control Bureau, Yun Hua coughed up a mouthful of blood, furious.

Chapter 75 Devouring (Revision) The Pride of Being Devoured...

He is special.

From the moment he awakened his special ability in the trial grounds, Yun Hua believed this to be true. He possessed a rare light-based ability, and light could overcome Pollution, which was a very special ability in itself. However, what made Yun Hua firmly believe that he was the most special existence was his other ability—shadow.