Chapter 433: The Great Way Is Simple
When an entire city's population suddenly woke from a long hallucination, realizing that the city they had seen as "perfectly normal" had actually been infested and occupied by a bizarre "planetary parasitic substance" long ago, and that even the entire planet had become a nightmare of grotesque horror, the ensuing chaos was predictable.
Frankly, waking millions of people up like this was not the best approach—if only the "Derived Star Entity" had given everyone a little more time, Yu Sheng would have considered having Ailin and Mo Ran cooperate to awaken Mo City from the collective cognitive barrier in batches and stages, making personnel arrangements in advance, and preparing the corresponding soothing and follow-up measures.
But the intelligent "Derived Star Entity" would not sit idly by and let that happen—punching through Mo City's cognitive barrier in an instant before its "Ascended Form" matured was the only way to tear open a passage; as for the subsequent chaos... Mo Ran would just have to find a way to deal with it.
Now, the curtain had fallen, and "reality" rushed in. The city's residents all snapped out of their "everyday life" of just a moment ago.
In the artifact-forging workshops on the outskirts of the city, countless craftsmen stared in shock as the surfaces of old, large furnaces were covered in thick, eerie crystals, with crystal clusters burrowing out from pipe gaps and growing wildly across the roofs.
Citizens waiting at home for the approaching storm suddenly looked up to see thick crystal clusters covering their windows. The fleeting nightmare covered in cobwebs from a second ago still lingered in their minds, forcibly maintaining their "wakefulness" in a far from gentle manner.
Inside the shopping mall, customers taking shelter from the rain fell into chaos amid shouts and screams as they suddenly saw a giant crystal tree piercing through the entire building. In reality, those enormous crystal branches had already broken through the walls and roof a hundred years ago, even becoming part of the building's structure.
An elaborately decorated mechanical flower boat, fully loaded with passengers, navigated precariously through the crystal thorns between tall buildings. Cries of terror rang out in the air, even though the boat had traveled that route hundreds or thousands of times. Only now did its passengers realize that each time they had come mere inches from those sword-sharp crystals, with sightseers on the deck finding their faces only a hair's breadth away from the pale blades...
Chaos began to spread throughout the city. In their panic, most ordinary people with shallow cultivation had no idea what to do, and even among the resolute cultivators, countless found their Dao hearts shaken and could barely maintain composure.
Mo Ran immediately stabilized the situation in the city lord's manor, then began contacting the heads of various departments in the city—time was tight, and there was no chance to explain the full story. She could only order all cultivators under Mo City's jurisdiction to immediately calm themselves and first go maintain order within the city, while also ordering the closure of all external transportation routes to Mo City; from that moment on, no one could enter or leave the city.
Her orders aroused confusion among many, but no one questioned the decree of the head of the Mo family at this moment.
Mo Ran's final order was to cut off all communication between Mo City and the other cities on Shuji, intercepting all external channels including folk long-range voice transmissions and spiritual message letters.
She wasn't sure how effective that would be, since no one knew how many transmission routes the Derived Star Entity's cognitive contamination had, but one thing she was clear about—the moment Mo City "awoke," it became the biggest "anomaly" on the planet Shuji. Until the incident was resolved, all "voices" and "gazes" on this planet directed at Mo City were harmful.
Even if those were just "compatriots" worried about Mo City's situation.
As for Yu Sheng, after that illusory "boom," he sensed a "gaze" from deep within the planet.
A "line of sight" carrying astonishing pressure swept over Mo City, its source being the very planet beneath everyone's feet. Ordinary people seemed unable to detect its presence, but Yu Sheng clearly felt it—his blood had once soaked into the "empty shell" left by the Derived Star Entity on Weishu-3, and now that blood-based connection allowed him to once again feel the "heartbeat" deep within Shuji.
The Derived Star Entity had detected the crack in the cognitive barrier. It realized that a city had awakened.
A silver-white nine-tailed demon fox streaked across the sky, leaving a dazzling trail of fire through the wind and rain.
Ahead of Huli, ancient refining towers wrapped in countless crystalline substances glowed with hazy brilliance in the rain curtain. The city defense formation rising from these towers was closing, and many anxious Mo family cultivators guarding the talisman nodes on the refining towers looked up in astonishment at the fire fox flying across the sky.
They had received orders from the city lord's manor: "Those riding the nine-tailed silver fox are allies of Mo City; all checkpoints must allow passage."
But in fact, it didn't matter whether they allowed passage or not, because the fast-moving fire fox had already pierced through the barrier above Mo City before the city defense formation closed.
Ailin gripped a tuft of fox fur beneath her, turned her head to look at the energy shield that had already closed above Mo City, and couldn't help remarking, "Amazing that their city defense formation still works... even though the whole city has been eroded by crystals like that."
Yu Sheng said casually, "During its pupation process, the Derived Star Entity will hide itself as much as possible. Causing too many inexplicable 'anomalies' in the real world would greatly increase the risk of the cognitive barrier being breached, so before becoming an Ascended Form, it actually won't destroy the city's basic functions."
"But on the other hand... a city defense formation like this is actually useless against the Derived Star Entity itself. It's normal for it to simply ignore it."
Ailin blinked. "Useless? Then what did Mo Ran raise this formation for?"
"...To keep people out."
"To keep people out?"
Yu Sheng's expression grew serious. "To keep people from neighboring cities out. To keep those still under the influence of the Derived Star Entity who want to 'help' Mo City out—they would bring the cognitive contamination back."
Ailin's eyes widened slightly.
At the same time, Zheng Zhi, sitting next to Yu Sheng, kept his eyes wide open, observing the scene on the boundless wilderness outside the city.
The wilderness was covered with forest-like crystal structures—far larger than the crystal forest on Weishu-3, and the entire forest undulated and writhed like a living thing.
"Ahead!" Zheng Zhi suddenly raised his hand, pointing in a certain direction deep in the forest. "There seems to be a rift over there!"
Yu Sheng pressed down on the fox's head and headed toward the direction Zheng Zhi indicated.
Just as they were halfway there, a startling fireball suddenly rose from among the crystals.
The fireball blazed like a sun, terrifyingly hot. The shockwave swept through the forest, crushing countless crystal giant trees into dust in an instant, and only then did Yu Sheng hear the belated boom—a thunderous roar rolled across the sky, even halting the wind and rain, causing the rain curtain over the forest to reverse and scatter, shattering the dark clouds, and even allowing sunlight to briefly illuminate the land.
Amid the rolling thunder, Yu Sheng faintly heard a voice—
"Take this Heaven-Overturning Seal!"
The next second, he saw another fireball rise from that direction, even larger than the last—though not as big as Huli's previous orbital headbutt, it was still a fine, perfectly round mushroom cloud rising into the air.
Along with the mushroom cloud came a second shout:
"Take my Hunyuan Demon-Subduing Dipper!"
"Boom!"
"Take my Haotian Demon-Suppressing Ruler!"
"Boom!"
"Take my Bafang Purifying World Seal!"
"Boom!—"
Explosions rose continuously in the crystal forest, dazzling fireballs and shockwaves crushing the earth like brutal beasts, halting wind and rain, shattering clouds, and the voice shouting amid the explosions sounded particularly familiar.
Yu Sheng stared at the earth-shaking commotion in the distance, stunned, then without hesitation slapped the fox's head. The nine-tailed silver fox transformed into a streak of fire, charging straight toward that construction site where bricks were flying everywhere.
From a distance, Yu Sheng could see Yuan Hao Zhenren standing in midair.
That handsome old man stood with his white hair billowing in the wind, his long robe fluttering, hands behind his back, floating in the air. Layers of profound and mysterious immortal talismans swirled around him, and tiny arcs of lightning behind him formed a massive formation as large as a city, within which wind, rain, thunder, lightning, metal, stone, fire, and earth cycled and transformed, as if manifesting countless heavenly Dao techniques in a self-sustaining, endless cycle.
And within that formation, hundreds of magical treasures floated—
Long ones, short ones, thick ones, flat ones, ones with air holes in the middle, ones with grooves on the edges...
Thousands of magical treasures swirled behind Yuan Hao Zhenren, forming another constantly changing and reorganizing great formation.
Yu Sheng even suspected this formation was called "Civil Engineering."
Huli, Yu Sheng, and everyone else on Huli's back were all stunned by the sight. Ailin stared wide-eyed for a long moment before blurting out, "Holy crap, it's Master Hao's AAA Building Materials Wholesale!—"
But the most shaken at the scene were not Yu Sheng's group, but another group on the ground below.
In the devastated crystal forest, Yu Sheng saw countless deep craters as if left by meteor impacts, each pit radiating waves of heat, with many black-robed cultivators lying dead within. Yet even so, some strong cultivators had survived—several protective arrays emitting weak spiritual light were scattered across the ground, and beneath the trembling shields were several severely wounded black-robed heretics. Even through their strange masks, Yu Sheng could almost see the terror in their eyes, and the madness born from that terror.
Just as Yuan Hao Zhenren was momentarily distracted by Yu Sheng's arrival, one of the black-robed cultivators who seemed in the best condition suddenly raised his hand.
A flying sword coated with a sinister purple light silently shot out from his sleeve.
It was clearly a natal treasure that would not be used lightly unless absolutely necessary. Who knew how much effort had gone into tempering it, how many bizarre and unpredictable powers it had accumulated. The black-robed cultivator was very confident in this strike. He knew this sword was not only extremely fast and powerful, but also had the special effect of concealing killing intent and breaking through spells. It also carried secret arts that could tear souls and disturb minds, and after each attack, it could leave behind bone-carving, marrow-corrupting...
Yuan Hao Zhenren did not turn his head. He casually pointed downward, and a brick came smashing down.
Haotian Demon-Suppressing Ruler, no special effects, attack power 1 trillion.