Chapter 111, Chapter Twelve: The Lost Manor
The first wave of people who drove away have been gone for several hours, but the rescue team has yet to arrive.
The crowd grew increasingly restless.
Song Xiaona tried to contact the outside world to no avail. Looking at her phone, which had no signal or network, she felt more and more uneasy.
In this day and age, it's not some undeveloped wilderness; it's just a suburb of a city, and a tourist attraction that's about to open. There's no way the internet could be cut off so completely.
The most scientific explanation is that someone placed a signal jammer here.
But Song Xiaona glanced at the copy of "The Covenant" she had brought with her—after twenty-eight years of modern education, her intuition pointed to ghosts and superstition.
Putting down her useless phone, she reopened the Covenant and began reading it word by word from the beginning.
That night, Song Xiaona read the Covenant countless times, focusing particularly on the third rule:
[The remnants of Eros's assassination attempt on the goddess have not completely dissipated. A lingering shadow remains, like a burning pain felt while sleeping at night. Do not open your eyes! If you have already opened your eyes, please leave the room immediately!]
The events of tonight perfectly conform to this rule.
There are two exclamation marks in this rule.
According to the rules, those who are fast asleep and do not open their eyes are safe.
According to the rules, anyone who wakes up suddenly and immediately flees the room is in danger.
A rule that is contradictory... It's just like the Greco-Roman mythology system, full of chaos and contradictions.
Take Eros, the protagonist here, for example. In the original version of the myth, he was one of the three creator gods. In terms of seniority, even Zeus, the third king of the gods, was only his grandson.
However, in later myths, Eros became the son of Aphrodite, who in turn was the daughter of Zeus.
The contradictions within the mythological system are reflected in this rule.
What exactly is this "Covenant," and why have its contents come true in reality?
If it were truly a "bible" or "prophecy," that would be one thing, but its contents, like the mythological system, are contradictory, making it difficult to discern which parts are believable and which are not.
Tonight was a lucky night; in a moment of crisis, Song Xiaona remembered the contents of the second page.
The second page contains an unusual version of the love story of Psyche and Eros. In this version, Eros, scalded by oil, awakens and tries to leave, but Psyche breaks his knees and wings, imprisoning him in the palace.
Upon seeing the lamp in the shadowy figure's hand, Song Xiaona immediately thought of Eros's fate on the second page and refrained from making any rash moves.
She thus escaped unharmed.
But what happens next...?
Three hours have passed, and the rescue team still hasn't arrived...
Will anyone else come...?
Song Xiaona shifted her gaze slightly, observing the crowd present.
The anxious crowd huddled together like startled birds, some trembling, some muttering curses, and some arguing loudly.
A motley crew.
Is there no one here I can discuss things with...?
Song Xiaona's gaze unconsciously fell on Li Yufei.
Although Li Yufei is all brawn and no brains, she's surprisingly strong; tonight she even tore a ghost apart with her bare hands... That's really outrageous.
Being stupid has its advantages; she won't play tricks on her, and she won't betray her on matters of principle.
If she has no other choice, she can collaborate with Li Yufei.
Song Xiaona got up and was about to walk towards Li Yufei when she saw Li Yufei looking down, frantically rummaging through her bag for something.
What is she looking for?
Song Xiaona tilted her head, and then she saw Li Yufei take out a comb.
Cushion comb.
She waved to Zheng Jianbin beside her, and the bronze-skinned man bent down.
She held up the pink cushion comb and combed his hair, her face beaming with joy, her voice carrying intermittently through the crowd:
"Goodness... hair quality... the one I recommended in the video..."
Song Xiaona immediately sat back down.
Barring any unforeseen circumstances, this kind of person will soon die. She should avoid getting involved with clueless idiots to prevent being dragged down.
Cheng Yuzhou wandered around outside for a bit, and his hair got a little messy from the wind. Li Yufei took out a comb and combed it for him, then was very satisfied.
"Good, you were smart enough to sit still this time."
In the past, when she tried to apply sunscreen to him or comb his hair, he would always look disgusted and refuse to comply; but this time he was quite obedient and even knew to thank her.
"But what's wrong with your hair? It's suddenly gotten so much better. Did you secretly use the hair mask I recommended in my video?"
She remembered that Zheng Jianbin's original hair texture should have been a bit stiffer.
Cheng Yuzhou paused, then smiled and said, "Yes, I've only used it a few times. I plan to tell you more about it in a while."
Li Yufei chuckled, "When I asked you to use it, you looked at me with disdain. Zheng Jianbin, when did you become so arrogant?"
Something so bizarre happened tonight. The crowd gathered, which certainly gave them some confidence, but negative emotions also spread like a virus.
Li Yufei should have been anxious, but for some reason, after Zheng Jianbin pulled her into a small room and said a few comforting words, she was no longer afraid.
She was only a little worried during the hour Zheng Jianbin was out, but that worry immediately disappeared when he returned to her side.
He was just her boyfriend of a year and a half, and they almost broke up yesterday. But now, sitting next to each other, smelling the familiar cool scent of roses on him, Li Yufei felt inexplicably relaxed.
Where did this cool rose scent come from? It smells very similar to the scent Cheng Yuzhou used to have.
He just went to the rose garden in the back and picked up the fragrance of the flowers.
Li Yufei didn't think much of it. For some reason, she felt lazy and couldn't concentrate whenever she thought about it.
She liked his new scent; it made her feel at ease.
It felt as if she had already carried her most important possessions with her, and could go anywhere with them.
She felt so at ease that she started to feel sleepy.
Li Yufei rubbed her eyes, and Cheng Yuzhou reached out to support her shoulder. "Want to sleep for a while?"
"I'm not that carefree, okay!" Li Yufei retorted stubbornly.
She opened her fox-like eyes wide and looked around to keep herself alert.
After looking at the victims not far away, Li Yufei thought of something and tried to pass the time by chatting; "Zheng Jianbin, have you noticed that their injuries are the same as the statues in the square?"
Tonight, all the victims' wounds are exactly the same, all replicas of the statue of Eros.
“It is very similar,” Cheng Yuzhou agreed.
“That statue’s two knees and wings are ruined, while these people only have one knee and one side of their back damaged, the other side is still fine.” Li Yufei frowned, then suddenly said, “Isn’t it a bit like Mario, who has three chances?”
Her adorable analogy made Cheng Yuzhou want to laugh: "It is very similar."
"You only have one sentence! Don't just leave me to think for myself." Li Yufei pushed him. "They can get injured again now, but what about a third time? What will happen if they encounter a ghost again after injuring both knees and their backs?"
Following her request, Cheng Yuzhou provided a new dialogue: "The game ends after Mario dies for the third time. I guess that by the third time... they'll have ended the game."
Li Yufei's heart sank, and she lowered her voice: "You mean, they'll die?"
Cheng Yuzhou did not answer.
Li Yufei then thought, "What if, by the time I encounter a ghost for the third time, my injured knees and back have already healed from the first injury?"
Cheng Yuzhou couldn't hold back any longer and covered his lips with his fist. "Feifei, I don't think those ghosts' goal is to harvest knees and backs."
"So what's their purpose?"
Before Cheng Yuzhou was brought into the company at the age of 15, Li Yufei would do her homework at Cheng Yandong's house whenever Cheng Yandong was not home.
When he was in elementary school, he tried to please Li Yufei. Whenever Li Yufei didn't want to write, Cheng Yuzhou would let her copy his own. When they entered junior high school, there were entrance quotas, and since the two had become more familiar with each other, Cheng Yuzhou often tutored Li Yufei.
He habitually guided her: "Feifei, have you read the second page of that book, 'The Covenant'?"
"Why bring this up all of a sudden? It's just a love story about Cupid."
Cheng Yuzhou had told her the story of Eros when he brought her to this manor. Li Yufei remembered the gist of it.
Cheng Yuzhou anticipated that she hadn't looked closely, so he got her a copy. "It is indeed the story of Cupid, but it differs from the more widely circulated versions."
Li Yufei didn't understand why she was watching a romantic myth here. She glanced at it impatiently, and when she got to the second half, she said "Hmm?" before starting to read it carefully from the beginning.
After reading it, she nodded in satisfaction, "It's much better than the original."
The original version is utter rubbish. A princess, just for taking a glance at what her husband looks like, why should Eros be angry?
What's even more infuriating is that he abandoned her and left, and the princess had to risk her life to go through trials and tribulations just to apologize to him and beg him to come back.
nerve.
At that time, Li Yufei frowned as she listened, while Cheng Yuzhou spoke with great enthusiasm.
She's long past the age of enjoying melodramatic romances, but his greatest hobby is still reading love stories. He doesn't read sweet and fluffy novels; he only reads mindless ones.
A man in his twenties secretly keeps a copy of "The Caged Bird" on his office desk. Just from the title, you can tell it's a book full of melodramatic clichés.
This version makes much more sense—that's how a princess should be.
“That’s right,” Cheng Yuzhou said, shifting his gaze to the square. “The statues in the square, and the people who were injured tonight, all seem to resemble Eros in this version of the story. And the shadow that appeared tonight seems to be holding a candle.”
Li Yufei was taken aback and looked up at the ceiling.
The 23-meter-high chapel on the first floor features magnificent murals of the gods on the ceiling, depicting the Olympian gods gathering to celebrate Psyche's resurrection and godhood, and his union with Eros.
Psyche's paintings and sculptures are everywhere here; Li Yufei can see them as soon as she looks up.
"You mean, that ghost is Pu..." she began, her voice trembling with fear, before her mouth was suddenly covered.
"Shh." Cheng Yuzhou turned a page of the Covenant with one hand, pointing to the second rule on the third page:
No one may defame or oppose the goddess in any form.
“That’s not a ghost,” he whispered, covering her face. “Feifei, that’s a ‘messenger of the gods,’ the ‘shadow’ of the goddess Psyche.”
Li Yufei stared wide-eyed in astonishment.
Even the fandom's attempt to cover up their mouths wasn't this absurd.
"But I've said it several times already." Others have been saying it too, and she even made one.
"Perhaps the criteria for judging the derivatives of the goddess aren't so strict, or perhaps there's a limit to the number of times. Just to be on the safe side, let's be more careful in the future," Cheng Yuzhou said.
Li Yufei felt something was wrong, but hearing the groans and howls coming from not far away, she silently swallowed her curses.
"That doesn't make sense either." She realized, having the same question as Song Xiaona, "If it really is the shadow of the goddess, then why does this 'Covenant' make people see ghosts...and then the messengers run away?"
“That’s where the cunning lies,” Cheng Yuzhou said. “The rules in the Covenant aren’t just something you can follow verbatim; they’ve set traps so that only the most devout believers can escape unscathed.”
Li Yufei looked at Zheng Jianbin suspiciously: "Are you sure?"
He seems to be very intelligent.
Of all the boyfriends Li Yufei has dated, only Cheng Yuzhou has this kind of mannerisms.
Cheng Yuzhou said, "We can observe further."
"It's five o'clock!" someone suddenly shouted in the lobby. "The shopkeepers should be arriving soon, let's go check!"
The rescue was delayed, and as soon as this was said, the people who had been trapped for half the night immediately responded.
"We don't need too many people. Leave some here to take care of the injured and wait for the hotel staff to arrive. We'll come back and let everyone know when we have news."
At five in the morning in this season, there is already light. The light brings courage, and the outside world is not as terrifying as the night, so many people are eager to go out and investigate.
Cheng Yuzhou shielded Li Yufei from the rushing crowd, asking, "Feifei, should we stay here or go out and take a look?"
"Let's go, let's take a look." After sitting all night, her butt was numb, and Li Yufei couldn't wait to leave this awful place.
Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed that Song Xiaona was also among the crowd going out.
Holding her phone and the book "The Covenant," she didn't glance at Dean, but she did look at Li Yufei several times.
Li Yufei looked back, their eyes met, and Song Xiaona rolled her eyes at her.
That's insane, it's inexplicable.
They followed the crowd to the town. The shops were not yet open, but the back doors of a few shops were open, and some shop assistants were preparing to open.
From the crowd, a man in his early thirties stepped forward to negotiate.
He explained the situation to the shop assistant, "My phone has no signal. Is there any way to contact the outside world, or could you lend us your delivery truck?"
The young male shop assistant unloaded the goods from the car and stacked them one box at a time on the cart without saying a word.
The older brother couldn't help but reach out and pull him, "Hey bro, did you hear what I said?"
The shop assistant then turned around and looked at him expressionlessly: "What do you want?"
"Get out!" he pleaded after all that effort. "We want to go home!"
He was in a great hurry, but then he saw the shop assistant smile.
“Then you don’t need to leave.” He stared at him, the corners of his mouth turning up symmetrically. “Home is where the goddess is.”
"No, buddy, we're not playing a murder mystery game," the leader said anxiously. "Someone of us is injured and needs to go to the hospital for treatment, understand?"
The shop assistant still smiled: "Let the injured person go to the statue to pray and repent. As long as they are sincere enough, the goddess will respond to the believer's wishes."
"Fuck your goddess!" The guy got angry and grabbed the shop assistant by the collar. "I'm not playing cosplay with you! We need to call the police! We need emergency medical services! We need to get out of this fucking place! Can't you understand human language?!"
Song Xiaona narrowed her eyes, her fingers twitching slightly as she held the "Covenant".
The moment the man finished speaking, a series of clanging sounds of armor suddenly came from afar.
The crowd turned around and suddenly saw two medieval-looking knights in golden armor walking towards them in the morning sun.
The golden armor didn't seem to be a prop; it made a clanging sound as it moved, indicating that it was quite heavy.
They wore helmets, obscuring their facial features. They were tall and robust, their armor gleaming brightly in the golden sunlight, with ornate and ancient rose patterns carved on the edges and breastplates.
Despite their heavy armor, they moved quickly, reaching the man carrying the shop assistant in the blink of an eye.
"What is that?" the man asked, bewildered.
The next moment, he cried out and saw two knights reach out and twist his arms behind his back.
A crisp sound of bones breaking rang out, and the man's face turned crimson as he screamed in agony, "What are you doing! Let me go! What are you?!"
The two knights paid no heed; they were terrifyingly powerful, over two meters tall, with chests almost the size of two women at their widest point, and easily lifted the man away.
"What are you doing!" Several people in the crowd boldly stepped forward to stop him. "Put him down! You're completely lawless! Stop right now, we're calling the police!"
The male passenger's arm was bent into an unnatural arc; this was definitely not an act to interact with tourists, it was a real fracture!
Li Yufei was shocked. What era is this? Is there no law anymore?
She turned to complain to her boyfriend, but he covered her mouth tightly.
The fox's eyes widened in disbelief.
Covering her mouth again?
Is he addicted to covering up? Did he wash his hands?
The knight remained silent in the face of the tourists who tried to stop him.
They kept moving forward, one step, two steps, each step causing their armor to creak and clang.
The cold, metallic smell filled the air, and the imposing, wall-like figures silenced the indignant crowd.
Unexpectedly, the tourists fell silent, but the knight reached out and grabbed the three people who stood in his way.
Four large hands, one in each hand, grabbed the back of their collars and easily lifted the four people off the ground.
This outrageous behavior caused the crowd to erupt in uproar once again: "What are you doing!" "What are you trying to do!"
The knight paid no heed to the shouts behind him or the four struggling and cursing men in his arms. As long as there were no obstacles in front of him, he silently and straightened up toward the square.
Li Yufei pulled the hand off her, glaring at Cheng Yuzhou, "What are you doing now!"
"Feifei, let's go." Cheng Yuzhou took her hand and led her back to the castle.
Li Yufei was completely confused. "Where are we going?"
She glanced at the crowd chasing after the knight, then at her boyfriend with a serious expression. "Let's go see what they're up to."
Cheng Yuzhou glanced at the crowd that was about to reach the statue in the square and said urgently, "I have something very important to do, Feifei, let's go back first."
"What's up?"
Cheng Yuzhou put his hands on her shoulders and looked down at her closely: "It's very, very important. We must go back to the castle immediately."
A dark light flickered in his eyes, and Li Yufei was momentarily dazed by the strange gleam.
She murmured dazedly, "Okay... alright..."
Cheng Yuzhou breathed a sigh of relief and said apologetically, "Thank you, Feifei, it won't take long."
He took her hand and walked in the opposite direction from the crowd.
After walking a few meters, a probing gaze fell on Cheng Yuzhou.
He turned his head and met Song Xiaona's gaze, who was following in the crowd.
Everyone was chasing after the two strange knights; Cheng Yuzhou and Li Yufei's departure was quite unusual and abrupt.
Song Xiaona frowned in confusion and called out, "Li Yufei, where are you going?"
Li Yufei, who usually retorts with three words for every one of her remarks, ignored her and walked hand in hand with Zheng Jianbin towards the castle without looking back.
Song Xiaona became suspicious and turned her gaze, which met Zheng Jianbin's dark eyes.
Those eyes were dark and lifeless, appearing dull and cold even under the early summer sun, making Song Xiaona extremely uncomfortable.
In that instant, she seemed to see—
Cheng Yuzhou's gaze.
The man who had been dead for six years had such eyes—a deep, numb, and hopeless abyss, unable to let in a single ray of light.
When Song Xiaona was a child, she didn't understand and instinctively felt it was bad luck, so she taught Cheng Yuzhou a lesson on the first day she met him.
Looking back now, that was actually the most vibrant period of Cheng Yuzhou's life. After he turned seventeen, he became more and more silent and withdrawn.
That look startled her, and the words of calling out to Li Yufei stuck in her throat.
In the brief moment of Song Xiaona's hesitation, the two had already walked far away.
She looked back at the crowd, deciding to check the situation on her side first.
Song Xiaona walked towards the crowd, and more and more people gathered in the square.
She didn't pay attention at first, until she turned around and was shocked to find that the people behind her were not the tourists she was traveling with, but shop assistants and staff from the town.
They stood in several layers, blocking the tourists in front.
Looking back, everyone was expressionless, solemn and dignified.
Behind her, twenty or thirty identical faces lined up, and Song Xiaona inexplicably got goosebumps.
Looking further ahead, the priest I saw yesterday appeared under the sculptures of Psyche and Eros.
Suddenly, the sound of heavy hooves echoed from all directions.
Song Xiaona looked around, and suddenly, all she saw was golden armor.
Dozens of knights appeared out of nowhere and marched in unison toward the square.
They lined up behind the priest, guarding the perimeter of the square. The blinding golden light and cold, imposing aura instantly silenced everyone.
A moment of silence fell over the crowd, and a sense of foreboding panic slowly overwhelmed their resentment.
The tourists gathered together, and the four captured people were thrown in front of the statue. Several golden-armored knights roughly pushed them to the ground.
The priest, holding the Covenant, stepped forward.
He took off his large hood—
Beneath the long black robe was not a man, not a woman, not a child, not an old man, but an ant.
An ant that looks like it came from a cartoon, with wings on its back, a round head and face, and a pair of big, cute eyes, is as adorable as a character from the animated film "A Bug's Life".
The cartoon-like ants and the golden-armored knights are completely out of place, as if they don't belong to the same world.
It stood before the four people and proclaimed to them: "Today, under the guidance of the Goddess of Souls, we see the light. We are filled with gratitude and joy!"
"The goddess's light shines on the earth, but shadows often accompany it."
“A vile demon has infiltrated our ranks, attempting to sow discord!”
The giant ant suddenly raised the Covenant in its hand, its two antennae standing straight up. Its voice was impassioned and high-pitched: "To remove the shadows from the earth, for the Goddess, we have gathered here to execute the demons who slander and oppose the Goddess!"
Behind the tourists, the manor staff, standing in a line, immediately raised their fists and shouted, "For the goddess, execute the devil! For the goddess, execute the devil!"
The sound waves created a sonic boom, and every expressionless face turned red, with eyes shining.
The priest turned and knelt before the statue in the center of the square, raising his forelimbs and spreading his wings: "May the goddess guide the lost back to the right path and bring the devil to justice!"
An incredible scene was born.
The enormous Psyche statue reflected a blood-red light, and rose bushes spread out from the goddess's feet.
Thorny brambles crawled up to the four people on the ground, binding their bodies and conjuring strange machines.
The four men stood in a row. The eldest brother, who was the shop assistant, knelt under the statue, his broken hands bound behind his back with thorns. He tried to call for help, but a clump of rose thorns rushed into his mouth, the sharp thorns immediately tearing through his flesh.
He let out a muffled cry from deep in his throat from the pain.
The thorns gathered together and transformed into a slender, pear-shaped vessel in his mouth.
The metal utensils are dark reddish-rose in color and have five vertical seams.
The pear-shaped insertion. In the man's mouth, the pear stem protrudes outwards.
The pear stem protruding from the mouth slowly rotates, and as it turns once, the pear inside emits a crisp, mechanical sound.
It splits into five petals like a flower bud, slowly opening outwards.
As the stem turns, the petals open a little more.
The man's mouth was slowly forced open, his cheeks bulging like a frog's, and saliva dripped from his unable-to-close mouth.
He stared in horror at the metal pear stuck in his mouth, his jaw aching and feeling a slight tearing sensation.
The oral mucosa and facial muscle and skin tissues quickly reached their limit, but the pear stem continued to rotate unhurriedly.
The bright red pear petals slowly opened outwards. He was sweating profusely and struggling desperately. His hands and legs were tightly bound by thorns, and his struggles only made the thorns penetrate deeper into his flesh.
He looked pleadingly at the other tourists, making urgent shouts, but his mouth was forced open, and no one could hear what he was saying.
Someone tried to step forward, but the three men who had protested for the man were also bound with thorns and forced to lie on their backs on the ground.
The emerald green brambles formed a tripod over their bodies, and a bunch of them pierced into the lower bodies of the three men, pulling out their intestines amidst their shrill screams!
The intestines, detached from the body, wriggled in the air. The three people who witnessed this scene went limp and were terrified into silence.
“You have only been bewitched by evil spirits, and there is still room for repentance.” The ant looked down at them indifferently. “Confess to the goddess, and you may be able to obtain her forgiveness.”
Simply for obstructing those knights from "enforcing the law" was punishable by intestinal torture, and for a time, no tourist dared to step forward to help.
Almost the instant the priest finished speaking, the three of them immediately cowered and pleaded, "We were wrong, we were wrong... Please, Goddess, have mercy on us..."
"Continue!" the ant roared, "Repent for your sins!"
"We know we were wrong...we were wrong!"
"Goddess, save me! I'll never do it again!"
"My intestines... they're coming out! Goddess, I know I was wrong, I dare not offend you again!"
“Show your piety!”
The gurgling sounds of intestinal peristalsis and the friction of flesh echoed in the three men's ears, and they cried out in despair:
"Spare me! I'll burn incense and kowtow to you every day from now on!"
"I'll offer you 100,000, 200,000... Please have mercy and let me go!"
"I...I will have my whole family believe in you, and we will put your image by our bedside. Please, have mercy on us!"
The ant priest turned and looked in the direction of Psyche, which was also the direction of the castle.
"God, will you forgive these lost sheep?"
Beside Psyche, Eros, with his broken knee and feathers, took in the scene in the square and transmitted it to the rooftop terrace of Psyche Castle.
Cheng Yuzhou leaned against the railing of the terrace, and a huge black swallow stood on the railing not far from him.
Even from this far away, the swallows could hear the painful cries.
A massive amount of negative emotions erupted from the square like billowing volcanic smoke.
The gray-black energy permeated the sky above the pure white statue, condensing into black clouds that continuously flowed into Cheng Yuzhou's body.
Cheng Yuzhou raised his hand, and thick black smoke swirled in his palm, so much so that it almost overflowed from between his fingers.
His eyes shone with a black light.
Through Eros's eyes, he looked at the crowd at the feet of the goddess, some repenting and some in awe.
“I see—” he gazed into the distance, “This is the ‘power’ you spoke of.”
With his five fingers closed, the black smoke was drawn into Cheng Yuzhou's body.
*Pfft*
The pear-shaped petals burst open, and the five metal petals shattered the lower half of the man's face, causing fragments of bone and flesh to fall off.
Cheng Yuzhou lowered his eyes and met the gaze of the priest who was looking in this direction.
He moved his lips and whispered, "Purify the demon."
A wisp of smoke rose slowly from the square, soaring into the sky.
Firewood was lit before the pure white statue of a god, and crimson roses bloomed from the warm light, piercing through the gray-black mist, climbing up human skin in strands and pillars.
The demon who slandered the goddess was strangled by the rose, his soul scattered in the vibrant morning.
The ant opened the Covenant: "The devil has vanished, and the poor soul has entered the embrace of the Goddess, gaining eternal happiness. Let us recite the Covenant, repent of our sins, and praise the greatness of the Goddess!"
A powerful shout erupted from the square as the excited staff and the burly golden-armored knights shouted in unison: "Praise the goddess! Praise the beautiful, brave, righteous, kind, resilient, and powerful Princess Psyche!"
The swallow couldn't help but shrink back.
Suddenly, from nearby came the same low murmur: "Praise the goddess."
The swallow suddenly turned its head, its scarlet eyes reflecting the young, deceased spirit on the terrace.
A gust of wind carrying gray smoke brushed against his face. The man's eyes reflected the distant firelight. He smiled shyly and recited to himself on the terrace: "Praise be to the beautiful, brave, righteous, kind, resilient, and powerful princess."
These words, spoken beside her, sent a sudden chill down Yanzi's spine.
Visible black smoke rose straight into the sky;
Unseen by humans, billowing black smoke connected the plaza and the terrace, rapidly entering Cheng Yuzhou's body.
He gave a stern warning to the villains who slandered and defied the goddess, then turned and went back into his room.
In a luxurious palace adorned with gold and red, a beautiful woman sits on the bed.
She sat motionless, her gaze vacant, like a mindless doll.
Cheng Yuzhou walked slowly to her, held his breath, and carefully knelt on one knee beside her feet.
He looked up, gazing at her.
After a while, the last flame in the square went out, the golden armor and roses faded, the crowd returned to their places, and Cheng Yuzhou closed his eyes.
The strange black light in his eyes dimmed, and at the same time, a divine light shone in the woman's alluring fox-like eyes.
"Have you finished your urgent matter?" She stood up from the bed, then looked down. "Zheng Jianbin, why are you kneeling? Did you drop something off the bed?"
"Yes." Cheng Yuzhou stood up. "It's all better now."
"What urgent matter brought you back?"
“This.” Cheng Yuzhou reached out, and a pink diamond earring lay in his palm. “Feifei, you lost your earring.”
"Huh?" Li Yufei touched her ear and exclaimed, "It really is! Luckily you reminded me, these earrings are very expensive."
This was one of the few gifts from Cheng Yuzhou that she hadn't sold.
Li Yufei immediately took it, tilted her head and put it on, praising, "Not bad, when did you become so thoughtful?"
Cheng Yuzhou smiled shyly, his eyes crinkling.
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Author's Note: This article is purely fictional and does not promote or criticize any real-world religious content.
Please forgive me if I have offended you in any way.
Putting everything else aside, this unit is still quite novel, isn't it?
It's rare to see a story in the "Rules of the Strange" where the supporting characters are investigating clues and making progress, while the protagonist goes back to their room to fall in love.
Let's talk about whether there's any innovation or not.
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