Chapter 553 Gathering at the Tower
How long have you been walking on these endless, repetitive platforms and stairwells?
Yu Sheng felt as if he had lost his sense of time, and even his sense of space—the spacetime structure inside the broken tower extended infinitely in a strange way, many areas seemed to repeat themselves over and over again, and some areas seemed not to be directly connected to each other, but were suddenly “teleported” to the other end of a platform or staircase after taking a step.
The direction of progress seemed to have lost its meaning, and the time that passed in the process gradually became a concept that could not be accurately grasped. Sometimes, Yu Sheng would even have a kind of illusion similar to "time jump". He felt that his next step seemed to have been taken a long time ago, and his current action seemed to have been repeated just a few minutes ago.
But he remained certain that he was still moving in the "right" direction—in a direction where he seemed to feel some distant...call.
That was the echo of "Irene" and "Omen" 3,700 years ago left at the end of this tower.
Yu Sheng looked up and saw another large, open platform in front of him. The arc-shaped platform floated in the darkness, surrounded by chaotic mist. Broken steps floated in the chaos, connecting to the other end of the platform.
In the distance, one can vaguely see some huge pillars standing in the darkness, magnificent walls, and arches that are cut in half by a crack in time and space. Deep in the crack, the starlight from some distant time and space is shining brightly.
Yu Sheng climbed onto the platform, intending to take a short rest.
There were many strangely shaped "junks" piled up on the platform. Some kind of "distortion" caused by crossing the world made them lose their original form, and instead piled up here in chaotic clumps and colors. The surfaces of some clumps were constantly flickering like holographic projections with interfered signals, and they made slight squeaking sounds.
And among those miscellaneous items... there was a pile of things that looked like embers from a campfire.
Yu Sheng walked over to the pile of embers from the campfire and sat down on a pile of grayish-white material with the outlines of books.
He glanced at his palm and saw the wound he had just cut slowly healing, while the blood splattered along the way was conveying chaotic, fragmented, and complex information and "knowledge" to him.
Yu Sheng closed his eyes slightly, carefully immersing his mind in the chaotic information, picking out any potentially useful fragments.
He was trying to understand this "tower" and the space-time structure within the boundary bridge.
After an unknown amount of time, he suddenly had an idea and opened his eyes abruptly in the dim light.
Tiny lights flickered in the "bonfire" before us, as if a real flame were burning. A nearly transparent little "flame" rose from the chaotic pile of matter, bringing a false warmth.
Yu Sheng blinked and saw a small figure appear beside the campfire—a petite doll squatting in front of the small flame, carefully poking at the ashes with a stick, watching intently as the flames danced.
“Ai…” Yu Sheng hesitated for a moment, then realized what he was saying, “An ominous sign?”
“The ominous sign is gone,” the little doll raised its head, its scarlet eyes flickering with a faint light like flames. “She’s asleep, sleeping and sleeping…”
Yu Sheng hesitated for a moment, then reached out to the small figure in front of him—the latter neither flinched nor avoided him, but stared at him with wide eyes. When Yu Sheng placed his hand on her head, she even poked the other's elbow with the small stick in her hand.
When the remaining blood on his palm touched the doll, confused "thoughts" instantly appeared in Yu Sheng's mind.
Yu Sheng was momentarily dazed, then suddenly realized that what was standing in front of him was not a complete mind, but rather a thought echo that had seeped into the boundary bridge, the source of which should be the little doll that usually made a ruckus beside him.
The reason he made this judgment was that in his muddled thoughts, he saw many fragments of memories related to daily life at No. 66 Wutong Road—the remaining half was mainly spent passionately arguing with stupid netizens.
"That silly fox stole some of C-Cut's succulents from the balcony," the doll's mental projection continued poking Yu Sheng's arm with the stick, muttering incoherently as it did so, "and C-Cut secretly smeared chocolate sauce on the succulents..."
Yu Sheng frowned, and after a brief moment of surprise, it suddenly dawned on him—could it be that Eileen had actually been maintaining contact with this "boundary bridge" all along? Was there some level of communication between them all along?!
The little thing sometimes stares blankly for no reason... Could it be that it's reading the data sent to it from the boundary bridge? But she's never mentioned anything about it... and she herself hasn't noticed the process?
The little doll poked it again: "That silly fox secretly licked your face while you were asleep last time, and she wouldn't let me tell you..."
Yu Sheng's expression became subtle, and then his gaze suddenly fell on the "little wooden stick" that the chaotic mind was holding in its hand, which it had been using to poke itself.
That's not some stick.
That's the end of a spider limb!
With a thought in his mind, Yu Sheng subconsciously reached out to grab the limb.
The sharp ends of the limbs easily pierced his fingers, and a chilling sensation instantly spread from his fingertips. Yu Sheng felt as if half of his arm had been thrown into a block of ice. Then, he saw the "mind entity" in front of him blink.
As if connected to a network, the previously dazed doll's face quickly regained its vibrant color, and then her gaze fell on Yu Sheng's face, and she visibly became happy: "Hey! Yu Sheng! Good heavens, I finally found you! We've been wandering around here for ages... Hey silly fox! C-shaped button! I found Yu Sheng!"
The next second, Yu Sheng saw the space-time around the platform distort and shake. The transparent flames in the campfire suddenly expanded to cover nearly a third of the platform, and then instantly contracted and dissipated. Before he could react, a silver-white figure pounced over with a "whoosh" and a familiar headbutt almost made him vomit up last year's New Year's Eve dinner!
"My benefactor, my benefactor, my benefactor~~" The fox girl's tail was wagging like a five-speed electric fan, and she jumped and danced while holding Yu Sheng. "Erin really didn't lie! She said she could find you, and she really did. The roads here are a mess. No matter where I go, I feel like I'm just going in circles. Luna also said she had some kind of navigation function, but the navigation system froze for a long time when I turned it on..."
"Okay, okay, I know, put me down first..." Yu Sheng rolled his eyes as he was held by this silly fox's arms, which were as strong as steel hoops. He finally managed to break free a little, and then quickly comforted her before turning his gaze to Luna and Eileen, "Why are you here? What's the situation outside?"
Eileen then began to ramble on and on: "What else could be going on? The border is ablaze with fighting, the space station is right on top of the council tower, the boundary bridge has already pierced the large shield, and there are invaders everywhere in the city—luckily, the Special Operations Bureau seems to have some kind of black technology that swapped the real boundary city and the fog city, so now all the battlefields are in the fog zone. Little Red Riding Hood is leading people to help reinforce the defenses in the old city, Shuji sent over a batch of weapons, and Grandpa Yun led people to block the bridge in front of the orphanage..."
The doll rattled off a long explanation of the current situation at the border, leaving Yu Sheng listening in stunned silence. Finally, he broke out in a cold sweat: "This sounds ominous..."
“So we need to solve this ‘bridge’ problem quickly!” Eileen said as she effortlessly climbed onto Yu Sheng. “There’s no up, down, left, or right in this place, do you know which way to go next?”
Listening to the little doll's mumbling, Yu Sheng did not speak for a while, but looked at his hand.
The spider leg was now in his hand.
Compared to the enormous body of the goddess of omens in his memory, this fragment of limb was so small—but at this moment, the holiness and guidance it exuded were truly real.
Is this also the fragment left after the Goddess of Omen was shattered?
Yu Sheng thought about it and handed the limb fragment back to Irene.
Eileen seemed to have no recollection of using this thing to poke the campfire and Yu Sheng just moments before. Then she exclaimed in surprise, "Hey, what's this? A spider leg?"
“Take it,” Yu Sheng said, “and walk in the direction you think is right.”
Eileen scratched her head in confusion.
She didn't understand why she did that.
But Yu Sheng must have his reasons for saying this.
The little doll happily nodded: "Okay!"
She jumped off Yu Sheng's shoulder and strode toward the broken steps at the end of the platform, waving her "little stick" as she went: "Let's go this way! At the fork in the road up there, let's go left... or maybe right? I prefer the right!"
“My benefactor,” Hu Li leaned closer and whispered to Yu Sheng, “is this reliable?”
“She walked this road once many years ago,” Yu Sheng said softly. “Now she just needs to follow her intuition to find her way back—and only she can do that.”
This was not a blind judgment, but based on the "knowledge" he had just gained through the blood connection—although he had not yet fully understood the information related to the boundary bridge, his intuition had already told him what to do at this moment.
Hu Li nodded thoughtfully.
Irene's small figure climbed between the towering stairs and platforms, sometimes even having to use her hands and feet.
But she didn't seem tired at all, didn't complain at all, and didn't get tired after a few steps like usual, insisting that Yu Sheng carry her. On the contrary, she seemed particularly happy, even humming a bunch of random, off-key songs as she climbed up, and occasionally waving her "little stick" around, poking and probing here and there, as if she were experiencing a happy adventure in her own home.
Yu Shengze keenly noticed the changes in the surrounding environment.
The spatial rifts outside the broken staircase are increasing, the gravity inside the tower is tilting at a slight angle, and the distant starlight diffusing in from outside the tower is trembling unsteadily, as if... the spacetime structure inside the boundary bridge, which was originally broken in many places, is being reorganized and reconstructed into a whole as Eileen walks.
Then, the little doll's steps suddenly stopped.
"Yu Sheng!" Eileen stopped high up on the broken stairs, turning back to wave the fragments of arthropods in her hand. "There's no way forward! But there's a huge crevice!"
Yu Sheng immediately looked up.
The shattered tower has reached its end; all the structures above—the spiral staircase, the pillars, the high walls, and the platforms—have been severed in half by a massive rift filled with distorted light and shadow.
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
