Chapter 55: The Abomination

She took out her pocket knife and began to meticulously and slowly chip away at the wall.

At last, she carved out a small aperture. Peering outside through the tiny hole revealed nothing but an expanse of pitch-black darkness. She had no desire to dig any further; carving out the entire wall would undoubtedly exhaust a significant amount of her physical strength.

Moreover, the blackness outside indicated that this was merely a medium. Making contact with the dark space beyond was the true method of returning.

Why waste her energy excavating the whole thing?

She extended her finger through the small hole. After feeling a wave of dizziness wash over her, her entire body plunged into darkness.

Li Luyan curved the corners of her lips. It seemed she had won the gamble.

Her consciousness slowly trickled back, and her vision gradually cleared. She had returned to the familiar hallway.

The first thing Liu Qingye did upon seeing Li Luyan was to rub his eyes in disbelief, followed by a rapid dash forward to pull her into a tight embrace.

He buried his face in the crook of her neck, took two deep breaths, and murmured in a muffled voice, "Sister... I thought I'd never see you again."

The young man possessed a tall and sturdy frame. Had Li Lujun still been alive, he would have been just like this.

After letting him hold her for a moment, the terrified little bastard of a dog snapped back to its senses and slowly came to.

It froze momentarily before charging forward again, throwing its paws around Li Luyan’s lower leg and acting coquettishly. "Lord Luyan! I wish to pledge my allegiance to you right now! I swear my utmost loyalty to you!" Its tone was as earnest as loyalty could possibly sound, dripping with absolute wretchedness and self-pity.

Speaking like this was the only way to seek refuge with the Creator, wasn't it? It had specifically addressed her as Lord Luyan to express closeness. Perhaps when the time came for her to settle accounts with Them, she would spare its life.

Li Luyan hoisted it up by the scruff. The creature didn't even dare to kick its legs wildly; it tucked its tail between its legs and stared up at her with utmost obedience.

"What are you babbling about?" Intuition told her that this divine creation was acting strange—exceedingly strange.

Observing Li Luyan's skeptical and bewildered expression, the little bastard petrified on the spot. She hadn't died at all, nor had she awakened yet. It seemed it had completely misunderstood the situation.

As expected of the Creator! She was able to solo a female ghost even while stripped of all her divine power.

The bastard's canine brain whirred at lightning speed. It gave its tail a stiff wag and instantly put on an innocent, naive expression. "I was just so worried about you! I was afraid you'd die in the domain and leave me with no one to rely on. I just want to stay by your side!"

After finishing, it wagged its tail frantically, as though this would somehow curry favor with Li Luyan.

"Very well." She crouched down, gently setting the puppy back onto the floor. Noticing the foul-smelling black blood staining her hands, she frowned in disgust, pulled out a tissue, and meticulously wiped her fingers clean, leaving no single spot untouched.

Her sharp gaze swept over the dog, causing it to freeze in its tracks once more. *No way,* it thought. *Could the Creator have seen through my act?* It clamped its tail tightly between its legs, trembling too hard to meet Li Luyan's eyes.

"You."

Hearing Li Luyan's voice, the little bastard trembled so hard its legs nearly gave out.

Then it heard Li Luyan say in an eerie tone, "You'd better go find somewhere to properly wash yourself."

Hearing the rest of her sentence, the little bastard released a long breath, feeling as though the grip of a hand tightly choking its neck had finally loosened.

*Why didn't you say so earlier? You scared the dog half to death!* It had almost thought Li Luyan had seen right through it.

"Consider it done! That's easy enough." With that, the little bastard transformed into a refrigerator on the spot, then shifted back into a puppy a moment later. Its fur was now brand new and immaculate, leaving no trace of the feline blood whatsoever.

"Mhm." Li Luyan nodded in satisfaction, then looked past them, her gaze sweeping rapidly across the entire hallway. "Where are Yu Yue and the others?"

Liu Qingye shrugged, his expression unchanged. "They left. They were afraid that if you failed to defeat that monster, it would come out and retaliate against them."

"A bunch of cowards..."

Li Luyan raised a hand to cut him off, her face devoid of emotion. "That is entirely normal. If I were in their shoes, with teammates stalling for time, I would have fled as well."

As long as they didn't harbor malicious intentions to sabotage her the way Ye Zhouzhou had...

Li Luyan’s eyelashes fluttered slightly, a dark shadow flickering across her eyes.

Under these circumstances, any normal person would have made the exact same choice. Conversely, if she were ever backstabbed and killed by someone else, it would only prove she deserved it for not being strong enough.

The weak deserved to die.

Li Luyan stood in the dilapidated corridor, the tactile sensation of dust and grit from the wall still lingering on her fingertips.

She looked down at her fingers, still stained with black blood, frowned, and pulled another tissue from her pocket to continue scrubbing away the grime wedged between her joints.

"Sister, where are we heading next?" Liu Qingye stood by her side, his tall figure casting a long shadow in the dim hallway.

The bastard puppy squatted near Li Luyan's feet, its tail wagging tentatively while its bead-like eyes darted around, monitoring her expression.

Li Luyan balled up the used tissue and tossed it casually into a corner.

She raised her head, gazing toward the pitch-black stairwell. "To the safe-zone base." Her voice was soft. "We can find information about the Tongying Society there..."

The trio—if the little bastard could be counted as a person—hurriedly descended the stairs.

The little bastard transformed into a glittering, golden, two-seater convertible sports car, looking ridiculously cool.

"Change to an inconspicuous color." The base was right ahead. If they drove something as eye-catching as they had in Tongcheng, they would inevitably draw attention.

Attracting the notice of official authorities was by no means a good thing... She had no desire to see such a useful tool as the little bastard dragged away to be dissected.

A ripple of water-like patterns washed over the car's metallic exterior. The gold quickly faded, replaced by a drab, matte black.

"That's more like it." She pulled open the door and slid into the passenger seat.

"Sister, I can't stretch my legs..." Liu Qingye complained with a wronged expression after squeezing inside.

"Suck it up." Li Luyan took hold of the steering wheel, refusing to look at him.

The group drove aimlessly through the urban area. Since the little bastard only consumed objects and didn't require fuel, she figured she could check along the way for any overlooked supplies.

Though the odds of that were slim—this was, after all, the location of the safe-zone base—there was always a chance some inconspicuous supplies had been missed.

Before her words fully faded, the sports car jolted violently.

Li Luyan's head smacked against the car window.

She saw a behemoth crawl out from the drainage ditch at the end of the alley. The creature looked as though it had been stitched together from countless eyes, and its three deformed heads were dripping with viscous fluid.

It was chasing two individuals wearing identical uniforms. Across the backs of their jackets was printed a large hand, with the palm inscribed with the characters for *Tian'an Squad*.

Official personnel?

The little bastard's voice exploded from the car's audio system. "That's a stitched monster!"

This was the human world; why had a creature from the Dead Domain managed to slip out? Could it be that the God of Desire was drawing close to a complete awakening? The little bastard thought to itself anxiously.

Seizing the opportunity, the two individuals fired two shots backward. The bullets rapidly pierced through the stitched monster's body, but its wounds healed just as quickly.

The monster emitted a piercing shriek akin to an infant's cry and lunged toward one of the women.

The man released a vine-type ability, binding the stitched monster in place. Beads of dense sweat broke out across his forehead; it was glaringly obvious that he was overtaxing his abilities.

The stitched monster whipped its three large eye-covered heads around, a violent wave of purple energy surging around it as it strained to break free from the vines.