But the Ancestral Essence Blood, usually so obedient to his commands, was now sluggish, as if hindered. The transformation was abnormally slow.
The outstretched blood threads reluctantly retracted back.
Zhang Rongfang’s expression turned grave.
He focused his mind once again.
Invisible ripples emanated from his body, resonating in a peculiar manner with all the blood around Zhang Zhenhai.
After repeating this several times, the blood threads finally returned to Zhang Zhenhai’s body. Everything was calm again.
Zhang Rongfang sighed softly. He had previously thought Zhang Zhenhai was alright, and even after checking his body, everything seemed normal. He didn’t expect a new anomaly to appear now.
The entire city was under his surveillance, and although there was a delay, he was well aware that Zhang Zhenhai hadn’t done anything unusual recently, only practicing Martial Arts and nurturing his body. Occasionally, he’d pay attention to the situation after the departure of the Blood Offspring.
Yet even so, an unexpected incident occurred...
If it weren’t for the newly acquired Eye of the Netherworld, he might not have even discovered the key point of the affliction.
These blood cells had transformed into a form he hadn’t been able to detect, a form akin to a ghostly spirit.
Standing inside the room, Zhang Rongfang looked at the tiny blood threads that had returned to Zhang Zhenhai’s body, with many thoughts flashing through his mind.
He reached out and gently tapped a few points on Zhang Zhenhai’s body.
After checking the operation of the main organs and ensuring there were no problems, he finally relaxed.
"It’s okay now. From now on, I will stay with you throughout to ensure no more accidents happen." He comforted softly.
"Mm..." Zhang Zhenhai, at this moment, was mentally exhausted and appeared fragile. "Actually, there’s something strange too...before you came back."
"What is it?" Zhang Rongfang gestured for everyone around to leave.
When the others had left, only the two of them were left in the room.
He asked once more.
Zhang Zhenhai’s expression was peculiar.
"It’s just...it’s strange that even though I’ve produced so many Blood Offspring, my body doesn’t feel overly exhausted. It’s just my spirit that was scared. They don’t seem to have physical bodies of flesh and blood at all?"
Zhang Rongfang glanced at the remaining Blood Offspring on the ground, his eyes narrowed slightly.
"I will check again. If there’s any problem, I will destroy all the Blood Offspring immediately!"
"But..." Zhang Zhenhai’s expression changed, as he was about to speak.
Suddenly, a violent thumping sound erupted from her abdomen.
Thump!
A tangible spiritual shockwave spread out from her abdomen.
The shockwave touched the furniture, which instantly turned gray, taking on an air of decay and decline.
It was as if this newly furnished furniture had already been used for decades.
The ripples touched the floor, the ceiling, the lamps, and everything displayed signs of wear and cracking on the surface.
Zhang Rongfang, who was closest, was also caught in this wave of impact.
His body aged rapidly, but just as signs of old age emerged, he quickly rejuvenated.
The blood in his body began to boil, glowing as if resisting this intangible aging.
Zhang Zhenhai stood motionless, her expression frozen like a statue, losing consciousness.
However, in her abdomen, a gray light pulsed constantly, growing brighter and more dazzling.
"&*@&#￥" A cacophony of bizarre noises resounded, as if countless voices were simultaneously shouting, screaming, and whispering.
There was no information conveyed, only an outburst of emotions.
But this outburst was a form of information itself.
Among the voices were beastly roars, men and women, young and old, the sharp scraping of miscellaneous objects, and even wind, crashing waves, cries of numerous animals, and more.
Countless sounds blended together.
Creating an extremely terrifying resonant effect.
Zhang Rongfang raised his hand, but his movements now were extraordinarily difficult and slow.
Everything else around had turned gray, increasingly decayed and decrepit.
The nearest floor had even started to blacken and crumble into dust as if several centuries had passed.
"Stop!" Zhang Rongfang pushed with all his strength the ancestral ability of the Blood Race—Ancestral Bloodline Suppression.
But this suppression was growing weaker and weaker.
Obviously, inside Zhang Zhenhai, it seemed there was a presence akin to the Decaying World, growing stronger and larger, swelling and expanding.
Within that presence, it was as if something was trying to break out.
At that moment, the countless voices became sharper, then suddenly, they fell entirely silent.
But it wasn’t a cessation, as the decaying area under Zhang Zhenhai’s feet began expanding even faster.
She remained like a sculpture, standing motionless.
Meanwhile, holding her, Zhang Rongfang’s body aged rapidly, only to rejuvenate just as swiftly.
The side of his body next to Zhang Zhenhai turned old and frail, with white hair everywhere.
But with the spine as the dividing line, the other half of his body remained young and robust.
’What exactly is this!?’ At this moment, even he hadn’t foreseen.
Suppressing Zhang Zhenhai’s mutation would lead to such a change.
He didn’t know whether the power of the Decaying World chose Zhang Zhenhai or if her bloodline was autonomously evolving, absorbing too many spirits and causing this situation.
But regardless of the situation.
The current problem is that something extremely troublesome and terrifying is trying to be born through the Blood Offspring within Zhang Zhenhai.
He didn’t know what it was.
But he knew it came from the Decaying World.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump!!
The sound of a heartbeat grew increasingly intense.
The gray light in Zhang Zhenhai’s abdomen became brighter and brighter.
Boom!
The lotus flower on Zhang Rongfang’s back simultaneously spread and covered his entire body, amplifying the immense power that allowed him to break free from his current restraints, landing a palm strike on Zhang Zhenhai’s abdomen.
And at the same time he struck.
In the air, two layers of transparent films appeared out of thin air around all the gray light in the room.
These two films completely restrained all the decay and decline caused by the gray light, halting them.
A low, deep song, sung by countless voices, simultaneously echoed in Zhang Rongfang’s ears.
The song was in an incomprehensible language, or perhaps it was not language at all, merely syllables arranged for chanting.
The deep song and the high-pitched noise within the gray light counteracted each other.
The two forces gradually clashed, and coupled with Zhang Rongfang’s palm directly striking the area near the gray light.
A special ability unique to soul salvage activated at full speed, not capturing any souls, but effectively disrupting the transmission of the gray light.
Finally....
The gray light slowly dimmed.
And the corresponding low, deep song in the air also lowered and weakened.
This song seemed to be a corresponding resistance mechanism, triggered only by special stimuli.
A full half-minute passed.
Until all the gray light completely vanished.
Zhang Rongfang finally exhaled heavily, recovering from prudence and tension.
The confrontation on the mental and soul level was entirely different from the intense battles he had before.
This level is not about physical size equaling strength.
At this moment, his hand resting on Zhang Zhenhai’s abdomen, he could still feel a mass of gray within, motionless, always solidified there.
From within, tiny chaotic, confusing whispers occasionally emerged.
Among these sounds, the most frequent was a single syllable—Yi.
Zhang Rongfang called this gray light privately—Yi.
This gray light had an extremely powerful decay and corrosive nature, with a strong desire to infect external objects.
It seemed to be a chaotic will, a will continuously inclined towards silence.
It was an indescribable feeling.
Like someone falling into an abyss, endlessly falling, falling, falling.
But this process was stretched infinitely.
That Yi was like this.
Numerous fearful, painful, chaotic noises, all continuously inclined towards silence.
They tried desperately to pull everything around down into the silent abyss.
They seemed to persist forever in this state, exceptionally eerie.
"What happened to me!?" Zhang Zhenhai returned to consciousness from being frozen.
"Nothing, just a small matter, I’ve already dealt with it. You just need to rest well." Zhang Rongfang remained outwardly calm.
He would handle these matters.
"Really nothing happened?" Zhang Zhenhai opened his eyes wide, uncertain and suspicious.
"With me here, it’s fine. Even if something happens again, I’ll make it disappear." Zhang Rongfang promised seriously.
"Mm!" Zhang Zhenhai nodded heavily, burying her head in Zhang Rongfang’s embrace.
She trusted Zhang Rongfang more than she trusted herself.
Hugging Zhang Zhenhai tenderly for a while, Zhang Rongfang continually pondered the gray light from the Decaying World.
If at first, he thought this was a commotion caused by his own strong bloodline, now he was clear.
Blood Princess was indeed a product of her bloodline, but that gray light seemed more to have gathered powers of the souls, stirring a force from the Decaying World.
This force attempted to be born onto this land through Zhang Zhenhai’s nurturing.
This increasingly made him frown.
Because this was completely different from what Long and Ra initially said.
’If this world itself is heading towards destruction, then why does this force, this chaotic will from the Decaying World, want to descend here?’
’Moreover, due to the extreme difficulty of opening long-distance channels, does it mean that the Decaying World, itself, is very close to this world, making it so easily attempt to descend?’
’And what were the two forces that just joined me in blocking the Yi from the Decaying World, where did they come from?’
Doubt arose in Zhang Rongfang’s heart.
At first, he thought the world beyond the celestial canopy was simple.
Spirit Eye Race, Chana Tower, Eternal Palace, everyone’s goal was clear, to escape world destruction.
Everyone just needed to open the long-distance channel and successfully flee.
But gradually, as time passed, he realized that matters were not that simple.
This world seemingly hid deeper secrets.
Though the Spirit Eye Race wished to escape, why choose to depart by spaceship instead of opening a spatial channel?
No, they did not only refuse to open spatial channels, they even added three locks to this method of opening.
Until their eventual extinction, leaving no answers.
Striving to survive, yet destroying the method that offers better survival chances.