Chapter 297: Clues from Xuan Che

Yu Sheng was quite surprised by Xuan Che's answer. He confirmed with him again and found that the other party was serious.

"You're a tourist from out of town; there's no need for you to get involved in a regional disaster investigation like this, right?" Yu Sheng frowned.

"Fighting against evil anomalies and protecting all living beings is the responsibility of us cultivators. Moreover, since its founding, our Thousand Peaks Spirit Mountain lineage has had the ancestral precept: 'Those with great power shall aid the world,'" Xuan Che said with a proud and gentle smile. "You needn't worry. Although our 'out-of-town' isn't as special as the Borderlands, we still have anomalies there. We cultivators also have much experience exploring anomalies and dealing with entities. We won't hold you all back."

"Uh, it's not that I'm worried about you holding us back or anything..." Yu Sheng said subconsciously, but since the other had already said this much, after a slight hesitation he swallowed back any further dissuasion. He only added a warning, "Then wait until I drive the house into the anomaly, and we'll go out together. This Misty City is strange; we need to be careful."

Xuan Che: "...?"

He felt as if he had heard another very novel combination of words, but he had already heard many such combinations today, so this time he simply couldn't be bothered to ask.

Yu Sheng ignored the subtle expression on Xuan Che's face. Instead, he stepped forward and grasped the doorknob, beginning to concentrate his mind like last time, controlling the entire No. 66 Wutong Road to change position and move toward the coordinates of "Misty City."

Xuan Che keenly detected some subtle changes. He seemed to hear a hollow, deep rumble from deep within the mansion, as if a huge, formless living creature was slowly moving its limbs. He also felt the "atmosphere" of the entire house undergo an instant transformation. Everything around seemed to come alive, even the light on the ceiling, the wallpaper on the wall, a tissue box on the table not far away... all cast a harmless gaze upon him.

But all the sensations only lasted a moment. Before he could truly react, everything had calmed down. Yu Sheng spoke from not far away: "Okay, we're here."

The door was gently pushed open, and a street filled with thick fog appeared outside.

Xuan Che stared in astonishment at the scene outside. At the moment the door opened, his spiritual sense finally broke free from the state of being isolated and suppressed, and he perceived the environment outside No. 66 Wutong Road—and then he understood what Yu Sheng meant by "driving the house into the anomaly."

He stared wide-eyed at Yu Sheng, with only a few words swirling in his mind: What an expert!!!

...How had the Special Affairs Bureau been able to accept this mansion and the "anthropomorphic" style and setting of the people inside?

However, the expert didn't notice the horrified and subtle expression on Xuan Che's face, because the expert was at that moment carefully selecting the Aline to bring out.

"Take one DPS, one control. Pro and Rebar come out with me; the other two stay home to watch the house," Yu Sheng quickly made the assignment. "If any weird scenes appear outside the window, you can contact me and Hu Li immediately."

"You can bring one more!" Aline (Lotus Root) stood at the door, tilting her head up. "The more the merrier when fighting!"

"I can't carry any more on me," Yu Sheng said helplessly, turning to look at Steel Aline and Pro Aline, who were already sitting on his shoulders without any shame. "Unless you come down and walk on your own."

As soon as he said that, the little doll on the ground burst out with a string of crackling words: "Have a safe trip, be careful outside, come back soon, if anything happens I'll contact you immediately!"

Yu Sheng: "..."

A moment later, Yu Sheng, carrying two Alines on his shoulders, along with Hu Li and Xuan Che, had already walked into the thick fog.

He still held in his hand that vicious Tetanus Rod—after the last fight with the artificial saint, this "battle staff" had been scarred by her fingertip blades, with nearly half of the blades and rebar shaved off. But later Hu Li had repaired and reinforced it, and now it had regained its vicious appearance.

The two Alines sat on Yu Sheng's shoulders, reminding him along the way: "Don't suddenly rest that thing on your shoulder! Don't forget both sides have me sitting here now!"

Yu Sheng said impatiently: "I know, I know. You've nagged about it eight hundred times since we left."

Xuan Che's gaze kept falling on the Tetanus Rod from time to time, and he repeatedly started to speak but stopped himself.

There was a trace of wariness and doubt in his eyes.

This did not escape Yu Sheng's notice.

"Interested in this spiked club?" Yu Sheng asked casually. "I've seen you staring at it for a while."

"Ex— Mr. Yu, please forgive me, but there is one thing I don't understand," Xuan Che finally spoke, his tone becoming unusually solemn. "Why does this weapon of yours carry such a heavy aura of bloodshed and slaughter? And even... layers of death qi wrapped around it?"

When he said this, his expression was somewhat strange, even carrying an aura of "I might die for saying this today, but if I don't ask, it will violate my dao heart." Yu Sheng was slightly taken aback for a moment, and before he could respond, he heard Aline on his shoulder laugh out loud: "Hahaha, he's taking you for an evil cultivator~~"

Yu Sheng helplessly twitched the corner of his mouth and shook the battle staff in his hand, explaining to Xuan Che: "Don't worry. The blood aura on it is all mine—I coated it with my own blood. It has a special effect against weaker entities. Of course, the downside is that the thing looks a bit creepy. As for the layers of death qi you mentioned... it's probably left from killing too many entities."

"Is that so?" Xuan Che muttered doubtfully, but he seemed to accept Yu Sheng's explanation.

Seeing this, Aline added a few more words: "Hey, don't overthink it. Our Bureau always acts aboveboard. Even if someone dies, it's definitely not a loss worth regretting..."

Yu Sheng felt something was off about that sentence: "Wait, is that implying something?"

"Oh, you're overthinking," Aline reached out and patted the back of Yu Sheng's head, then quickly and awkwardly changed the subject. "Actually, we don't really need to come and explore here in person, do we? The Special Affairs Bureau has already sent a lot of people in here to investigate. Isn't it the same to wait for their news?"

"It's not the same," Yu Sheng slowly shook his head. "The fact that this fog can appear directly outside the window of No. 66 Wutong Road is already something that bothers me, plus the artificial saint that escaped before..."

"Huh? What about the artificial saint?"

"It once appeared nearby," Yu Sheng said calmly, his gaze slowly sweeping across the surrounding fog. "And it hasn't gone very far."

Instantly, both Alines perked up simultaneously: "C-shaped buckle!"

Hu Li, upon hearing Yu Sheng's words, immediately pricked up her ears, alert to the surroundings while quickly observing the environment: "Benefactor, this place doesn't seem far from where we were ambushed last time."

"So that C-shaped buckle has wandered back to the edge of the old city district?" Aline hugged Yu Sheng's head, her little face full of seriousness. "Is there really something hidden here?"

"...It's hard not to suspect that," Yu Sheng frowned. "But the deep-dive team sent by the Special Affairs Bureau has already searched this area and found nothing."

Xuan Che had been silently listening to Yu Sheng and the others' discussion, and now he suddenly spoke: "You mentioned 'artificial saint'—is that the kind of mechanical puppet created by the Sacred Seclusion Conclave?"

"That's right," Yu Sheng nodded. "Have you dealt with that thing too?"

"I haven't seen one in person, but I've heard fellow disciples mention it. They said this evil thing is extremely difficult to deal with—its moves are bizarre, its speed is incredibly fast, and it can hide in shadows and teleport in an instant. Ordinary cultivators are no match for it," Xuan Che said seriously. "It requires an expert to handle it, or a siege by many people."

Yu Sheng was quite surprised to hear this: "...You cultivators, who can fly and dive after training, all find that 'artificial saint,' that iron shell, hard to deal with?"

"Ah, it's mainly that 'iron shell'," Xuan Che sighed. "As far as I know, it's made of material used for starship armor. Not only is it tough, its inner lining has many sinister secret techniques. Ordinary spells have almost no effect on that outer shell. And mechanical puppets aren't afraid of curses, illusions, or sealing techniques. Just that one aspect—'spell nullification'—renders most cultivators' abilities largely useless when facing her. The only remaining method is to charge in and fight at close range... A flesh-and-blood body clashing with a piece of warship armor—of course that's dangerous."

He paused, then added: "Of course, if the cultivator is powerful enough, they're not afraid. There are always ways to deal with that thing... it just might take some effort."

Yu Sheng listened very seriously, but then suddenly recalled something that Bai Liqing had told him recently—

The Sacred Seclusion Conclave has a relatively fixed area of activity and has been laying low for the last decade or so.

He frowned, vaguely remembering another thing Bai Liqing had mentioned before: the "Feather-13b" star region, where Thousand Peaks Spirit Mountain is located, is a relatively sealed star zone. Its "security" level might not be as high as the Borderlands, but it's not far off...

"Has the artificial saint also 'invaded' your place?" Yu Sheng frowned and asked subconsciously. "When did that happen?"

"In the past year or two, traces of that so-called 'Conclave' appeared on a few border planets, and twice an artificial saint showed up," Xuan Che said solemnly. "Although they didn't cause much damage—the local garrison cultivators drove those evil devils away in time—their appearance was indeed suspicious."

"What did they do there?" Yu Sheng asked quickly.

"They seemed to be smuggling something," Xuan Che thought for a moment, then shook his head. "Unfortunately, those evil devils are always cautious. By the time the mountain-guarding cultivators arrived, they only found many destroyed warehouses and machines. What exactly they were doing there is still unclear to this day."