Bright! Glittery! Shiny! (1)
The Monster Management Bureau dispatched a rescue squad to Shi’s estate after receiving news of monsters appearing within the main house.
A tall woman with light brown skin dressed in combatant gear led the squad, her long hair tied neatly at the back. Behind her, one of her perplexed squad members asked: “This place is an exclusive residential area. How did the monsters get in?”
“This thing is tricky…… not one of those ordinary monsters.” Wen Yao looked towards the nearby banquet room and frowned.
Sounds of insects crawling around travelled past the walls and to the rescue squad, sounding dark and oppressive. Hearing those sounds, Wen Yao instantly decided. “Contact Chief Mu immediately.”
“Tell him that a creature highly suspected to have come from the Abyss appeared in the uptown district,” Wen Yao added.
“……!” What? The Abyss?!
In this day and age, humans had finished exploring the continent, except for one place——the Abyss.
The Abyss contained poisonous mists and endless darkness in its deepest part. Until today, no human had ever come out of there alive. Hence, humans had little knowledge of the monsters living in it. If monsters from the Abyss truly appeared in the main city area, the nature and severity of this rescue would be on another level.
“Roger!” The squad member complied readily.
Suddenly, an old man wearing a butler outfit recklessly rushed towards the rescue squad and pleaded with Wen Yao: “Please save my Young Master! He is still inside the room!”
“Pathetic!” Shi Ze Chun rebuked breathlessly. “Drag him back!”
Shi Ze Chun might have appeared discombobulated with his messy hair and clothes——his earlier elegance all gone. Nevertheless, he still maintained some respectability. Several Shi’s servants obeyed and dragged back the tearful old butler.
Wen Yao looked at the old butler for a second and gritted her teeth. “Move out!”
“We are not waiting for Chief Mu?”
Wen Yao grimly shook her head and took a deep breath. “There’s no time, rescuing the hostages comes first.”
*
Meanwhile, Shi An had reached the centre of the chaos. The strange guest’s corpse was now lying on the ground with his jaw torn wide open and his dry skin taut against the bones, displaying a peculiar image of death. Endless streams of monsters were currently coming out of the strange guest’s open belly.
He bent down and peeled away the corpse’s dry skin, revealing a huge cracked hole. There were no organs inside the big hole. Instead, thin blood red threads filled the big hole. Those threads were like blood vessels, covering the ribs and occupying the entire chest and abdomen.
A fingernail-sized insect could be found in the deepest part of the threads. This fingernail-sized insect looks like the monsters outside, except that it was much smaller. The insect’s pitch-black carapace shone with a cold and unyielding metallic lustre like a scale. On its head was a hideous humanlike face.
Sensing a dangerous existence, that hideous face contorted into a terrified expression and started screaming shrilly. The blood red threads vibrated and monsters started gathering towards the corpse as if obeying an order. However, because of Shi An’s presence, none of those monsters approached the corpse; they stood a few steps away, restlessly scraping against the carpet.
Shi An lowered his head to study the corpse and was surprised. The corpse’s chest exuded a sinister scent——cold and dark, like a finger silently caressing the air——that became clearer as he drew nearer to the corpse.
It was impossible to ignore.
The young boy breathed deeply, his eyes half-closed in pleasure. At that instant, his small pupils shrank into a thin line with hot red light skimming through it.
……So comfortable. Shi An fully closed his eyes.
In the darkness, a strange sensation arose from his soul. There was a faint itch in the fingers, spine and tailbone, like something was struggling to break through the flesh and bones of this fragile human body.
Not a silhouette created using magic, but real dragon scales, sharp talons and wings. Could it be that this tiny insect can help me restore my original body?! Shi An opened his eyes and stared at that tiny insect in surprise——he changed his mind.
He stretched out hands, where black dragon scales covering the soft and pale fingers. His nails, sharp enough to have light reflected off them, swiped across the corpse’s chest.
Rip! The threads broke at that sound.
The monsters, like a stringless puppet, fell down while the few that survived were running around like a headless fly.
The tiny insect was terrified when Shi An grabbed it. It squeaked, wiggled its body and thrashed frantically with its six legs, trying to escape.
How annoying. Shi An rubbed his fingers eagerly.
