Meanwhile, in a remote ravine, the bare Thousand-Child Tree trembled. Looking at the Coffin Lady standing nearby, it could not comprehend why a fellow powerful anomaly would associate with someone who was half-human and half-anomaly.
As if sensing its confusion, the Coffin Lady gently stroked its trunk. "Just accept it. Don't dwell on pointless thoughts..." She thought of her large red coffin and sniffled.
Shen Yue had indeed become the captain. Meticulous by nature, she quickly reorganized the Guardian squad. Strangely, however, their usually busy routine came to a sudden halt. The anomalies that used to appear almost every few days had all vanished without a trace recently.
Li Fei kept muttering that it had to be because of their captain. After all, the only one capable of pulling this off was Captain Fang Zhiyi.
Shen Yue remained noncommittal, at least until the remains of several anomalies were tossed into their stronghold.
Shen Yue understood that Fang Zhiyi was giving them a chance to claim the credit. She was not a moral purist; since it was a favor from their boss, she would gladly accept it. As a result, their squad lived far more comfortably than any other unit. Even when dispatched on missions, they only had to deal with newly spawned anomalies, which significantly lowered the level of danger they faced.
"Human, do you have a death wish?"
"Hehehe, fresh blood."
Two anomalies with similar builds constantly swapped positions, sizing up Fang Zhiyi who stood before them.
"No, wait. You are not human. You are a... hmm?"
The Nuo-masked Wuchang stared at the high-level anomalies appearing one after another behind Fang Zhiyi, both freezing in shock.
"What, do anomalies enjoy slaughtering each other now?"
"Hehehe, why don't you try us and see."
But none of the anomalies made a move. Instead, in their eyes, the Nuo-masked Wuchang caught a glimpse of pity and schadenfreude.
Why did they suddenly have a bad feeling about this?
Shen Yue received an urgent document from headquarters. The file noted that while anomaly activity had decreased across various regions recently, reconnaissance teams had discovered a suspected gathering place for anomalies. This location was quite close to Shen Yue's squad.
It could even be considered a city! This forced the human higher-ups to be on high alert. Anomalies usually operated independently, which was exactly why humanity had managed to resist them for so long. However, if anomalies began to amass, it would spell absolute disaster.
Shen Yue stared at the blurry photograph attached to the file. One of the vague, upright figures in the image looked incredibly familiar to her.
"Captain, what exactly are you trying to do..."
The Coffin Lady watched as Fang Zhiyi directed the other anomalies to build a house for her, her face filled with an indescribable excitement. She had assumed Fang Zhiyi was just brushing her off earlier, never expecting him to actually compensate her with a real house!
Who would want to live in a coffin when they could live in a house?
Besides, the area was quite lively. Anomalies of all shapes and forms were gathered here, making a racket. It was vastly better than the desolate loneliness from before.
"Coffin Lady, the boss is calling you for a meeting." A hideous paper effigy wobbled over, delivered the message, and wobbled away.
"A meeting?" The Coffin Lady was a bit bewildered. She was arguably the one most familiar with Fang Zhiyi, yet even to this day, she had no idea what his ultimate goal was. However, the world of anomalies was simple: whoever had the biggest fists called the shots.
The last one who dared to disobey was still hanging from the Thousand-Child Tree.
Even the pair of Nuo-masked Wuchang had now become Fang Zhiyi's right and left-hand guards. If anyone dared to stir up trouble, Fang Zhiyi wouldn't even need to lift a finger; those two would beat the offending anomaly to a pulp.
In a dilapidated school campus, Zhou Hao drew his blade and charged forward, watching a twisted corpse chase after several students. However, the bones of that corpse were even harder than the blade in his hand. A forceful slash only managed to make the anomaly pause for a brief moment.
Seeing the anomaly's hand swiping toward him, Zhou Hao hastily raised his blade to block, but the monstrous force slammed him violently against the wall.
He turned pale with shock, but the anomaly's ugly, twisted face merely stared at him, let out a few incomprehensible syllables, and then resumed its pursuit of the fleeing students.
"This..." Zhou Hao hurriedly reported the anomaly's location through his communicator.
Just as the screaming students were cornered at the end of a corridor, Shen Yue and Li Fei arrived. Their standard-issue weapons, trailing streaks of black light, slashed toward the anomaly.
The anomaly showed no intention of dodging. Instead, it continued to lunge at the students, seemingly intent on mutual destruction.
But right at that moment, the two arcs of blade energy were intercepted by two figures—one black and one white—that suddenly appeared.
Shen Yue was startled. She looked at the two bizarre newcomers holding mourning staffs. One wore a weeping expression, while the other smiled so broadly that its eyes curved into exaggerated crescents.
"High-level anomalies!" Li Fei exclaimed in horror.
Meanwhile, the twisted corpse was already about to crush a student's skull.
"Are you just going to stand there chatting?! Hurry up and save us! Don't you call yourselves Guardians? How can you just watch us die..." another female student screamed at Li Fei and Shen Yue.
"My dad is a government official! Aren't you afraid of the consequences if I die?" a chubby boy bawled.
Li Fei felt a surge of anger, but he kept his eyes locked on the two anomalies that had suddenly materialized. After blocking their blade energy, the black and white figures simply stood quietly on the railing, showing no intention of attacking.
"This isn't working. Notify Zhao Lei to activate the reaction device!" Shen Yue ordered. The reaction device functioned similarly to an array formation, capable of temporarily incapacitating anomalies.
"Zhao Lei!" Li Fei shouted, but Zhao Lei's voice drifted down from above him.
"Here..." he replied, still sounding utterly exhausted.
Li Fei and Shen Yue looked up simultaneously. Zhao Lei was standing up there.
"You..." Shen Yue wanted to ask why he wasn't at his designated position, but then she spotted a familiar figure.
"Not bad." Fang Zhiyi sat on the edge of the roof, his legs dangling over the side as he looked down at them with an expression of deep gratification.
"Boss?"
"Cap... Fang Zhiyi, why did you stop us..." Shen Yue quickly corrected herself.
Fang Zhiyi chuckled. This girl was truly rigid and by-the-book, bearing a striking resemblance to the original owner of this body.
"They killed that person, so it's perfectly reasonable for the victim to turn into an anomaly and seek revenge. Just because the world is in chaos doesn't mean murder comes without consequences, right?"
Zhou Hao arrived at that moment. Taking in the scene before him, he stood there in a daze.
"But anomalies killing people is wrong too!" Shen Yue stared at Fang Zhiyi, her mind a mess.
"Anomalies, to put it plainly, are ghosts—manifestations of resentment and twisted emotions..." Fang Zhiyi watched as the anomaly snapped a student's neck. "They can never be completely eradicated. As long as there is injustice and selfish desire in this world, anomalies will continue to be born. You don't honestly think humanity has managed to resist for over a century just by being tenacious, do you? It's because anomalies themselves are bound by restrictions. Only when one anomaly perishes can another be born."
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
ine. During your journey, you save an abandoned baby girl and become her elder brother】 【You rely on each other, becoming each other's support】 【At the end of the simulation, you shield the now-grown girl with your life, sacrificing yourself to block numerous demonic cultivators. You die, and the light in the girl's eyes fades】 …… 【Second Simulation: You are transported to a world where steam and magic coexist】 【You immerse yourself in the study of magic, obsessed with its research. One day, while out, you encounter a half-blooded demon girl wandering the streets. You take her in as your student】 【You teach the demoness what it means to be human, show her the beauty of the world, and nurture her into a miracle that surpasses even the gods】 【At the end of the simulation, you die of old age in front of the nearly immortal demoness due to your mortal lifespan】 …… One simulation after another, one encounter after another. Xu Xi suddenly felt something was off: "Wait, you said you're coming to the real world to find me?"
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
