Chapter 51: Awakening
It's not over yet.
Almost the moment the beaver's words fell, Yu Sheng realized what the other party was talking about when he said "it's not over yet".
He heard a rise and fall of misplaced hisses from the dense forest, heard the sudden echoing of a horrible, hollow wind in the valley, and the treacherous, eerie aura that pervaded the whole foreign land did not diminish with the demise of the bloody beast just now, but instead became steeply several times more intense, and a certain thick, almost stagnant sense of malice and watchfulness surged frantically from every direction, as though something had been awakened and was falling into a Rage.
"What the heck is this?!" Yu Sheng asked quickly as he looked towards the demon fox girl who seemed to know something.
"I don't know, but it, appeared," the beaver, with a panic-stricken face, said while hiding behind Yusheng, "Immortal, the day he died, that's how it was, something woke up, Immortal took the rest of the people to go, outside, and didn't come back, and then only the corpses were found ..."
The demon fox girl's body shivered slightly and lowered her head, "My mom and dad ... hid me in a hole and wouldn't let me look outside, I don't know, what was it, I drilled out and everyone was already dead ... "
Yusheng quickly understood the situation from the beaver's topsy-turvy and crippled account.
The truly terrifying thing in this valley wasn't the flesh and blood beast!
Or perhaps it wasn't just the flesh and blood beast-some more powerful contraption slumbered in the depths of this darkness, and it was feared that the thing had been gradually awakening since the time he and Erin had entered this valley.
Yu Sheng gritted his teeth, and after quickly weighing his options immediately ran towards Erin who was not far away.
"We can't keep fighting," Yu Sheng said quickly, "There's something more sinister in this valley - Option 2, retreat first, I'll open the door. How are you doing? Can you still move?"
Erin tried bracing her hands on the ground, trying to stand up, but just as she did, she heard a slight clicking sound as her arms snapped off from the elbow position, and the broken portions fell to the ground, shattering.
"I can't, and the legs are damaged, so I'm afraid they'll break even if I force myself to stand up," the little mannequin lifted his arms in frustration, "I told you this thing you built wasn't strong ... You're mixing sand with your clay, aren't you? ..."
To be honest, at the moment of seeing Irene's arms broken Yu Sheng was really shocked, after all, he hadn't dealt with living dolls before, not to mention he didn't know how serious this kind of situation was, but at this time he heard Irene's complaint he in turn instantly put down his heart, "It can still be repaired is it?"
Erin nodded, "Yes, but it definitely needs to go back."
Relieved to see that Erin was no longer able to stand under her own power, Yu Sheng unhooked the picture frame behind the figurine, and after adjusting the rope clasp and carrying it behind his back, he reached down and picked Erin up again, so that she could sit on his left arm.
Irene protested slightly, as if she felt that this was a bit humiliating, but the mannequin with the broken arm had no deterrent effect, and most of all, she could only be honest and obediently sit on Yu Sheng's arm.
Instead, Yu Sheng probed into the air with his free right hand, and after a brief moment of concentration, a large door floating with illusory light appeared at the end of his arm.
He noticed that the three strangers not far away who had appeared out of nowhere (the young man among them looked a little familiar for some reason) had looked a little strange the moment they saw him open the door, and cast a glance in unison.
But he couldn't be bothered to think about it, and once he confirmed that the passage was established, he pulled open the illusory doorway as soon as he could.
Opposite the door is the living room of 66 Sycamore Road.
"The safe passage is here, everyone hurry and retreat," Yu Sheng said quickly, "before that monster regenerates!"
He looked over to the demon fox girl who was standing a short distance away, looking a bit nervous and stumbling, "Hwoarang, you're the first one - don't be afraid, there's a safe place across the door."
Then he turned his head to Li Lin's three: "You three, although I don't know who it is, thanks for the help just now - come with me later."
Encouraged by Yu Sheng, Hu Beaver finally stepped forward boldly and took a step towards the illusory doorway.
However, the moment she was about to touch the passageway, a strange whistling sound suddenly came from not far away, and immediately afterward, Yu Sheng felt a blast of wind swooping in from behind her!
A myriad of information from nowhere instantly surfaced in his mind - several gazes that were focusing on the ruins of this broken temple, perspectives that stretched out from the distant skies and the depths of the valley, a chaotic, cold touch, and ... the joy of being about to feed.
Yu Sheng turned around violently and saw that a bloody beast had appeared in the night at the edge of the ruins at some point, and the middle of that beast was hideously cracked, and a long arrow-like tongue shot out from it, piercing through his chest in the blink of an eye.
He only had time to push Erin in his arms aside, and he didn't even manage to dodge before the blow pierced his heart.
The creature has regenerated? That fast? Or is ... another one?
Several questions flashed through Yu Sheng's mind in a flash, and along with his consciousness rapidly sinking into darkness, he heard the terrified cries of the beavers, the screams of Eileen, and the howls of the wolves beside his ears.
The illusory door in midair flickered twice and quickly dissipated, while Yu Sheng's body fell backward, and in the crooked and darkened vision, he saw that the edge of the ruins was floating up in layers of shadows, and deep in the trembling depths of each shadow, there was a monster stacked with flesh and blood slowly being generated, countless greedy mouths opened in this valley, the distant woods were full of tentacles foraging for food, and the peaks of the faraway mountains were full of sharp teeth and fangs , and the sky ... is gradually cracking a slit from the edge.
"Eun Gong!!!" Hu Beaver was the first to jump up and jumped to Yu Sheng's side, despite having seen Yu Sheng come back from the dead before, her long ago chaotic and unclear mind obviously failed to react at this time, seeing Yu Sheng fall, her first reaction was still horror, "You you you ... how do you ..."
"What else could it be, it's dead at this sight!" Erin's loud beeping quickly interrupted the demon fox girl's cries as the little figure dropped to the ground and shifted laboriously, "It shouldn't be the first time you've seen it either, calm down!"
The beaver was then stunned for a moment, his sluggish and chaotic mind reacting slightly, before staring blankly at Yu Sheng's corpse.
The demon fox girl scrunched her face and wore a tangled expression that seemed like she wanted to cry but knew she didn't need to, but the atmosphere was here and she felt a bit sorry for Enko- crying out was even worse.
On the side of the Li Lin but obviously do not know Yu Sheng is a situation, he saw not far away after the flesh and blood beast the whole person is instantly tense, at this time while alert to the monster's next move while consoling the fallen mannequin on the ground and next to the Demon Fox: "I'm sorry, but a person can't be resurrected from the dead - -The first priority is to solve ..."
As a result, before he could finish his sentence, he heard the miserable mannequin reply, "It's okay he'll be alive in a little while - but we'll have to hold out for twenty or thirty minutes until he comes back and opens the door. That fox next to me, help get me up, and don't forget the painting on the floor."
As soon as the beaver heard this, he hurriedly drew out the oil painting frame that was pressed underneath Yusheng's body with his hands and held the immobile Eileen in his arms again.
Li Lin's trio, however, watched the scene with stunned expressions, only feeling that the mannequin's reaction was completely incomprehensible, and even suspecting that it was some sort of sadness overload.
But they soon had no extra energy to focus on such things.
Rising and falling chaotic hisses rang out from the darkness near the ruins of the broken temple, a palpitating aura of madness appeared continuously, and even the battle-experienced Xu Jiali's expression instantly stiffened after taking in the surrounding situation.
Hideous monsters made of stacks of flesh and blood were being created one by one in the darkness.
Hissing sounds filled the entire valley.
"Crap!" Leylin exclaimed out of breath, "How did so many of them pop up? Didn't the information say that only one Hungry Entity is generated at the same time?!"
On the side, Xu Jiali slowly raised her head and swallowed hard before breaking the silence, "What if this valley has already been parasitized by 'angels'..."
"What do you mean ...," Li Lin said subconsciously, and immediately afterward, he noticed the direction that Xu Jiali's line of sight was looking at.
He saw it, the valley was slowly creeping and undulating in the night.
There are sharp, toothed structures that appear on the contours of the mountains in the distance.
But even more terrifying than that, was the sky - the sky opened up.
As if covered with a thick curtain, the foreign sky, which was in a perpetual state of chaotic night, was changing, and one of its edges gradually cracked open a slit in everyone's sight, and a shimmering light appeared at first from the slit, followed by the truth of what was in that curtain.
It wasn't a curtain at all, nor was it a dark, dark cloud.
That's the eyelids.
It was an eye that stayed closed, covering the entire area over the foreign land, causing an eternal night here.
Now it opened, its eyes staring indifferently down, its hollow, sunken pupils filled with chaotic lines and flickering shimmering lights, as if it were scrutinizing its prey in the valley, and those shimmering lights even dispersed to a certain extent the perpetual night in this foreign land - the Light. "The Light had come, and had bestowed its horrors.
The howling cold wind startled Leylin out of his fear, and he heard murmurs from beside him.
It was Chia-Li Hsu, a veteran deep-diver with more than a decade of service, who softly muttered a term-
"Angel of the Obscure ..."
Chapter 52 Connections
The moment he heard those four words, Leylin felt his blood run cold.
One moment he was feeling sorry for Yu Sheng, who had died from a sneak attack by a monster, and the next moment he felt that he probably wouldn't outlive the other party either.
"How could ... the information never mentioned that there was an Obscure Angel parasitizing this place ah ... "Leylin muttered, under that cold gaze from the sky, he felt that his mind was surfacing more and more noisy noises, "How could ..."
"Sleeping state, each obscure angel characteristic is different ... This TM might as well continue the firefight with the angelists in the wasteland!" Xu Jiali couldn't help but spit out fenfang, he couldn't figure out how the situation had taken a sharp turn into this mess when he was properly returning on official business and performing a relaxing stakeout mission in the Junction.
All the things are so unexpected - suddenly fell into the foreign land, suddenly saw the "open door monster" that he had met once before on the wasteland planet, and also saw the other side stood a half-meter tall doll and a demon fox that looked as if it had been exiled for a century. Before he had time to say a few words, the mysterious "Open Door Freak" simply died in front of his eyes, and the mannequin's reaction was also too outrageous, and then there were more hungry entities, and an obscure angel appeared in the sky. ...
He couldn't put his imagination together in his life to simulate today's wicked string of events!
The uneasy low growls of the wolves came from all around, the wolves made up of shadows balked and circled around, the gaze from the cold eye in the sky made all of these weird creatures feel a great pressure and even fear, yet Little Red Riding Hood, who was riding on one of the wolves, frowned, "... Strange, those monsters How come none of them are coming over?"
Erin, who was being held in the Beaver's arms, froze at the words, and then noticed the out-of-place situation as well.
Those flesh and blood giants gathered around the ruins of the broken temple were still hissing and balking chaotically, but bizarrely, a while had passed since just now, yet not a single monster had taken a step forward, not a single one of them had launched an attack.
The cold one-eye floating in the sky was also just quietly observing, and didn't seem to have any intention of taking further action.
"I think we'd better run while we're at it," Leylinbroke the silence, "Don't think about why these monsters are glowing just yet."
Little Red Riding Hood interrupted Leylin as she spoke calmly, "Where to?"
The cold, single eye in the sky was watching every inch of the valley, and this entire foreign land was changing as if it were coming to life; under the gaze of that eye, the thought of escape would instantly be shattered by the despair of having nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.
But just then, Erin seemed to remember something and raised her head in the Beaver's arms, "Did you just say that a similar situation happened before? The day the Immortal died as well, and your mom and dad hid you in a hole at that time?"
Beaver froze for a moment and nodded in a panic.
"Where is that hole?!"
The Beaver finally reacted and turned around with Erin in his arms, "I remember! It's near the back of the mountain, I'll take you there!"
But suddenly, she stopped again and hesitantly looked at Yu Sheng's body on the ground.
Eungyo's eyes are still open now, and he looks quite dead.
"What about Enkong ... Enkong?" The Demon Fox Maiden asked, somewhat at a loss for words.
Although she knew about Yu Sheng's "resurrection from the dead", she didn't understand too many details because Yu Sheng didn't have time to explain much to her during our last time together.
"Just leave it here, don't worry about it," Erin said immediately, she had interacted quite a bit with Yu Sheng and obviously knew more information than the fox, "It'll be gone in a few minutes, he has a way of finding me."
The beaver froze and nodded in a daze.
Eileen, on the other hand, immediately remembered what, hurriedly added: "Right, I just that kitchen knife where ... oh, on the ground over there, help pick up. Hey you first hang the oil painting on me, I can not be separated from this painting ... knife is not bad, right? Not bad on the line, this thing lost he must turn around and say I - the corpse will not want, not much use ..."
The little mannequin crackled with commands, the demon fox girl froze and executed, but the Li Lin trio on the side looked and felt weird to the extreme, they watched Hu Beaver carefully pick up the kitchen knife that was placed in the supermarket for at most a hundred or ten dollars, but directly ignored the remains of his companion on the ground, after holding his tongue for half a day, Little Red Riding Hood finally couldn't hold back, "You guys just left him here? "
Erin poked her head out of the Beaver's arms, "It's not good to run away with!"
Little Red Riding Hood opened her mouth as if she was about to say something, but was interrupted by a roar that came from the depths of the valley.
The mountains in the distance cracked open, countless dark boulders tumbling down from the tops, and in an ever-widening fissure, there was actually flesh and blood being generated from the mountains, with sharp teeth grinding against the mountain rocks, emitting a chilling roar.
The woods shook as a large tree fell, as if shedding its camouflage, and countless sharp-toothed tentacles grew from where those trees had fallen, hissing in unison.
And those giant beasts that were originally balking around the ruins of the broken temple, stuck in a bizarre state of sluggishness, also seemed to have been stimulated and began to emit uneasy agitation.
Erin let out a gasp when she saw this and raised her arm, which was only broken stubble, and slapped the beaver's shoulder vigorously, ''OMG! It's not a good idea to stay long! We'll withdraw first, you three over there will follow us if you like!"
As Irene's words fell, Beaver had already turned around with Irene in his arms and rushed towards the back of the broken temple ruins, darting towards a gap at the bottom of the valley.
The three of them, Li Lin, looked at each other, and despite being filled with question marks, there was still only one option left at this point.
They quickly followed the fox, who was already running away, and ran towards some "shelter".
Little Red Riding Hood turned around one last time and looked in the direction where Yusheng had fallen.
She gritted her teeth as one of the wolves in the pack broke away from the group and rushed towards what was left of Yu Sheng.
However, the wolf had just run out a few steps when it stopped as if it had forgotten its mission all of a sudden, then wandered in place for two seconds before turning around and returning to the wolves around Little Red Riding Hood.
Little Red Riding Hood didn't look back either, just drove the wolves along, escorting the rest of the group while keeping up with the silver-haired fox demon up ahead.
She had forgotten about the puddle of blood she had thrown behind her.
And around the ruins of the broken temple, those restless flesh and blood giants gradually quieted down again at some point.
These entities derived from "hunger" seemed to be in a daze, standing among the broken walls, their deformed and proliferated eyes scanning around, their hideous and ugly limbs swinging aimlessly in the air, and their huge mouths open, with mumbles like dreams coming from their sharp-toothed mouths.
Suddenly a clear word mingled with the muffled grunts of those flesh and blood giants--the
"Smells good."
A will that is speaking through their mouths.
It smells so good.
Should eat.
The behemoths shifted, those eyes that had been scanning around gradually stopped their blind rotation, and one eye stabilized as their gazes fell on each other.
Eating, but not due to hunger.
That which devours all and is above all ... feeds, yea, should feed at this moment.
And after that, a cold peace, and a merciful eternity - for it is ultimately the devouring of all, the most extreme fairness and doom.
The first flesh and blood behemoth moved, staggering over to the other entity without any fancy attacking maneuvers, it simply opened one of the largest mouths on its body and bit down greedily enough.
The gnawed ones, however, didn't hide or even wail.
As if it didn't even realize that it was being devoured by its own "kind", the creature just shook its body and stepped towards the nearest entity with one of its own "kind" hanging on its body and eating it.
None of the Entity-Hunger tried to chase after the prey that had escaped, as if in a single moment their nature had changed - drawing on the power of hunger had become unimportant, and the sublime task of eating had become their only mission. their only mission.
In the center of the ruins of the broken temple, the last bit of blood remaining after Yu Sheng's death was slowly seeping into the soil, and where the bloodstains were spreading, the color of the soil was gradually changing, slowly, but gradually accelerating, irresistibly.
However, the cold eye floating in the sky seemed to be unconcerned about these changes on the surface - it just hung high in the sky, without any sign of emotions or thoughts that could be understood by human beings in its huge eyeballs, and it continued to observe the valley because its scale was so huge that it was impossible to determine where the "focus of sight" was from the perspective of the surface. It continued to observe the valley, so large that it was impossible to determine from the surface viewpoint where its "focus of vision" was.
If there really is a "focal point" for that transcendent mortal sight.
But Yusheng sensed this "focus", because the center of attention was now on him.
After floating in the darkness for some time, he was awakened by an indescribable sense of "connection". At first, he thought he had been resurrected, but soon realized that he was still "dead", but this time it was not the same as before. But this time, the "death" seemed to be different from the previous one.
He found himself in the darkness of an additional layer of "perspective", at first, this perspective makes him very confused, because the strange angle of observation and multiple layers of overlapping information make his mind confused, but gradually, he realized something .
He is responding to the gaze from the sky with the gaze of this "foreign land".
He made a connection with this valley.
Chapter 53 - The Feast
In a way of "perception" that he could not yet fully understand, Yu Sheng felt that he had established a connection with the valley, and his consciousness flowed between the rocks and soil, penetrated into the depths of the writhing and undulating woods, submerged the water and wind of the place, and then, through countless pairs of deformed and distorted eyes, observed the sky above the valley.
The eye, huge enough to cover the entire sky, gazed calmly and indifferently at the earth, unchanged from the beginning, as if it were a transcendent mortal observer of things in a petri dish.
But Yu Sheng could feel that the eye had noticed him - the moment he had just established a connection with the valley, the eye's gaze had accurately landed on his "body".
The eye was confused, curious, although it did not show any emotion or "eye change", but Yu Sheng almost directly "read" these thoughts - some kind of huge "thoughts" vibrated in this space. Though it didn't show any emotion or "eye change", Yu Sheng almost directly "read" these thoughts - some kind of huge "thought" was trembling in this space, and every thought of Ta set off shocking waves here, but ordinary people couldn't perceive these reverberations in the foreign realm, and even Yu Sheng, with the help of the entire foreign realm's senses, only vaguely sensed that there was thinking activity behind that eyeball.
But strangely enough, Yu Sheng didn't feel the slightest bit of hostility - or kindness - from that eye.
Then after another moment, he realized that the focus of the eyeball's vision had shifted away from himself, or rather, it was no longer gazing at the entire valley, but rather focusing its gaze on a certain place in the valley.
The eyes scanned the earth slowly, as if tracking and searching for something.
And Yu Sheng's consciousness gradually diffused, and in the next few minutes he gradually understood something ...
The entire valley was on the move, some kind of weird and horrifying "vitality" that turned this whole alien land into a hungry living thing.
Leylin watched as rows of sharp teeth sprouted from the distant ridge, and between them were ghastly tearing trenches, those rows of fangs rolling and undulating like waves, their depths emitting a thunderous roar.
He also saw entire groves of trees in another part of the valley come to life, black tentacles replacing the trees that had been there, and they spread along the rocky beach at the bottom of the valley, swarming out like a swarm of predatory bugs to overwhelm everything in their path.
And all of this, under the icy gaze of that huge eyeball in the sky, was treacherous and terrifying, like a nightmare.
Little Red Riding Hood's wolves howled around them, constantly biting off and forcing back the tentacles and eyestalks and tongues that grew out of the dirt, yet as hard as the wolves tried, the group's foothold continued to shrink.
The young Secret Service agent couldn't help but despair a little, he turned his head to look ahead, and saw that the girl with a large pile of tails was running in the forefront holding the mannequins, she was arching her back, and even if she was carrying something in her arms, her movements when she was running were incomparably agile and swift, like a nimble beast in the mountains - and he, as a human being, was on the verge of not being able to catch up with that He, as a human, could not catch up with the "beast" anymore.
But just then, the Beaver finally slowed down.
She carried Erin (and Erin's chopper) to a depression at the foot of the mountain, then stood on a large rock, craning her neck to look around, a pair of large, fluffy ears on the demon fox girl's head twitching slightly in the wind as if catching the breeze around her, and then she shrugged vigorously, finally settling her gaze in a certain direction.
"This way! The entrance is here!"
Before the words were out of her mouth, she had jumped to the ground with Erin in her arms, and the others scrambled to follow her, running after her towards the mountain wall and meeting the hole that could only fit two people through.
"It's spacious inside!"
The Beaver turned around and shouted to the others, and had taken the lead into the cave.
The ghostly blue Demon Fox Spirit Flame flared up out of nowhere, floating from the tip of the Hu Beaver's tail and rising into midair, illuminating the scene in the cave.
This looks like a plain and primitive cave, seems to be a part of the mountain, part of the walls have traces of artificial excavation and widening, in the corner of the cave, you can also see some rough and simple utensils, apparently there have been people living in it for a period of time.
Xu Jiali removed a palm-sized black device from her waist, cautiously scanned through the cave, and spoke in a low voice, "No toxicity, stable material structure, no signs of erosion."
For her part, Little Red Riding Hood waved her hand, placing a few wolves near the entrance of the cave, while the other wolf shadows returned to her, fading into the shadows at her feet.
The Beaver carefully carried Erin to a stone platform near the entrance of the cave and set the little figure down, a somewhat worried look on his face.
"Are you ... okay?"
She raised her hand and pointed to Erin's broken arm and her right leg, which wasn't in the best shape.
Just from the looks of it, the state of Erin was now simply miserable as hell - second only to the dead and dying Enkou just now.
The fox girl obviously didn't know much about "living dolls".
"It's okay, this body is also temporary, some parts are not strong," Irene is very generous, this time also comforted the beaver, "Don't worry, go back to Yu Sheng will fix it for me - I'm this body is what he built! Well, although the craftsmanship is well ... more than adequate."
The Demon Fox Girl's eyes widened slightly, "Sounds like Enkou is very powerful?"
"... Probably?" Erin said this with a bit of hesitation, "I don't even think he's human sometimes, he's got a bunch of weird abilities and ideas ..."
Just halfway through her words, as if she sensed something, the doll girl suddenly raised her head again and looked in the direction of the cave entrance.
Looking out through this position, you can barely see out of the cave.
"What's wrong?" Beaver asked curiously.
"Will you ... carry me to see outside? Just at the mouth of the cave," Erin spoke up a little hesitantly, "I can't see out here at all, I'm not sure."
The Beaver was a little puzzled, but didn't think anything of it, and reached out to pick up Erin and carefully make his way to near the entrance of the cave.
Erin stretched her neck out of the Beaver's arms and looked boldly to the sky.
The massive eye still floated over the valley, the grand scale of the eyeball as if the sky itself had surfaced as a pupil structure, regal.
"It always feels like ... this eye has been looking this way since just now," Erin quickly retracted her neck and muttered with a nervous expression, "Why isn't Yu Sheng back yet... ..."
Beaver was stunned and looked down at the little figure in her arms, "Eunuch, it's going to be okay, right?"
"I'm sure he's fine," Erin lowered her voice, glanced back at the three "temporary comrades" in the cave, and muttered to the Beaver in a low voice, "Don't mention the incident of Yu Sheng's 'death' to them later, they should have forgotten about it by now. Don't mention to them about Yu Sheng's death, they should have forgotten about it by now."
The beaver cocked his head, his big furry ears twitching twice, and he wasn't sure if he understood.
Li Lin curiously looked up at the demon fox and mannequin hiding near the cave entrance, he frowned slightly, he didn't know whether it was an illusion or not, he always felt that he seemed to have overlooked something just now in the process of following those two people all the way to this place in a frenzy, there was a very important thing that had unconsciously disappeared from his mind.
He looked to nearby Seo Jia Li and Little Red Riding Hood, but didn't see any different color on their faces.
Xu Jiali was cautiously searching and probing the situation in the depths of the cave at this time, while Little Red Riding Hood was sitting on one of the stone benches with her arms wrapped around her, her eyes fixed on the several shadow wolves that stood guard near the entrance of the cave.
Her red jacket had been torn in the earlier battle in the woods, one sleeve torn to shreds, and now her entire right arm was exposed, an arm that was now streaked with fine blood-colored lines, as if the flesh and blood had once been torn apart and was now just barely reunited and stained to its original form.
The blue foxfire burned silently in the upper part of the cavern, casting Little Red Riding Hood's shadow on the ground, which wavered and occasionally twisted and distorted abruptly for a moment, becoming the same as the wolves that had burrowed out of the shadows.
The whistling and strange noises in the valley came from outside moment by moment, making the silence in the cave seem more and more oppressive and heavy .
Leylin stood up and walked towards Beaver and Erin, who were guarding the entrance to the cave - he felt it was time to at least introduce himself.
But just as he was halfway there, a strange noise made him jerk to a halt.
It was an irregular scuffling sound, as if sharp teeth were striking and the noise created by the friction.
And immediately afterward, his psychic instincts jumped even more.
Xu Jiali, who was inspecting the depths of the cave, and Little Red Riding Hood, who was sitting on a stone bench trying to calm her state, also subconsciously raised their heads.
The "breath" in the valley changed.
After another two or three seconds, there was a sudden silence outside the cave, so quiet that it was as if the whole world had fallen into a dead silence.
But this silence lasted only a few moments, and then there were again strange scuffling noises and whimpering noises outside that were different from those chaotic hissing noises that had preceded them, and which reached everyone s ears and became clearer and ... louder and louder.
The fox that was sitting on the ground near the cave entrance instantly stood up and looked out with nervousness and unease, and Erin made to brace her tattered arm against the beaver's arm to make sure of what was going on outside the cave - and it was at that moment that the doll girl heard Yu Sheng's voice- "Erin."
"Yu Sheng?!" Erin was shocked in her heart and hurriedly responded, "You've come alive? Where are you now? Can you sense my location? Hurry up and open the door and come over! We found a safe hiding place, it's not safe outside right now, the valley is in big trouble ..."
Before she could finish, however, a voice from her head interrupted her next words, "Erin, don't panic - it'll be over soon."
Erin was stunned for a moment, "... huh?"
The strange scuffling noises coming from the valley were even more intense than before.
Yu Sheng's voice then continued to resound from the bottom of Erin's heart, "Erin, do you remember what happened when we contacted the Beaver through the dream world earlier and tried to find the 'frequency' of this valley with the help of her perception?"
Of course Erin remembers.
"You were in direct contact with the 'Hunger' essence, and it took root in your mind!" The doll girl flew off the handle, "What, what happened? Did something happen now? You can't come back to life?"
The strange rubbing sound in the valley was getting denser and denser, even as if it had filled the entire foreign land, and that disturbing sound echoed in the cave, causing everyone's nerves to gradually tighten.
Yet in the back of Erin's mind, Yu Sheng's voice was calmer than ever.
"Don't worry Erin, I'm fine, I just realized something-"
Erin's eyes slowly widened as she seemed to gradually discern what the scuffling sound echoing in the valley was.
"Hunger has not taken root in my mind."
She heard Yusheng's voice coming from the back of her mind.
She heard Yu Sheng's voice coming from the whole valley.
"Rather, I've taken root in its depths."
She finally heard it clearly - it was the sound of chewing, echoing throughout the valley.
The sublime feast opens.
The entity-hunger that is ensconced in this alien realm begins to devour itself.