Chapter 29: Cowardice Is the Way to Stay Alive, and Tan Zicheng’s Fate

Daybreak was just beginning.

More than two hundred Black Armor Army soldiers, along with a large force dispatched by the Patrol Department, surrounded Jinglin District from every direction, completely sealing it off.

“Throw!”

A Black Armor Army captain built like a bear roared the command.

Twenty soldiers stood in two ranks.

At the same moment, they stepped forward and swung their right arms in perfect unison, hurling the short spears in their hands.

Woooo—

The shrill whistle instantly pierced the sky.

Twenty spears crossed nearly a hundred meters in an instant and struck a two-story house.

High above the building, nearly a thousand meters in the air, three night owls circled back and forth as though guiding the attack toward its target.

Boom! Boom!

A faint white glow flashed across the surfaces of the spears before they exploded violently.

The powerful shockwaves instantly blasted the house apart.

Then, in that very instant, a shocking change occurred.

A mass of ink-black mist surged from the ruins.

Dozens of pitch-black, grotesque vines shot out from within the fog and danced wildly through the air.

A piercing howl swept across the area.

Some civilians living within a two-hundred-meter radius immediately became innocent victims.

Blood seeped from their noses and mouths.

Mad whispers echoed inside their heads.

Their bodies convulsed uncontrollably.

Even the Black Armor Army soldiers who had destroyed the house felt intense discomfort, while terrifying hallucinations appeared before their eyes.

“Freeze!”

A stern shout rang out.

A huge cloud of bone-chilling frost descended from the sky.

The ruins, along with the black mist creature within, were instantly frozen into an iceberg.

Bitter cold spread outward.

The surrounding ground, flowers, grass, and even the surfaces of nearby houses were instantly covered by a thin layer of frost.

The temperature dropped at a speed completely beyond normal understanding.

“Shatter!”

A second voice barked.

The iceberg seemed to suffer the impact of a force weighing ten thousand tons and instantly exploded into countless fragments.

The black mist trapped inside vanished completely.

Shanyi District.

Cheng Han awoke from deep sleep.

Just as he was about to get out of bed and head to the bathroom, a howl suddenly reached his ears.

Wooo—

The sound seemed faint.

Yet Cheng Han’s mind buzzed violently.

His vision blurred.

The bedroom door twisted unnaturally, transforming into a monstrous mouth eager to devour him.

The wardrobe sprouted claws, as though trying to drag him inside.

At that moment—

Within his Sea of Spirit, a sphere of gentle white light automatically expanded.

It was the True Flame Fragment.

The hallucinations instantly vanished.

The door became a normal door again.

The wardrobe returned to its original state.

Cheng Han’s heartbeat quickened slightly.

“The gold coin I dug out of the drainage ditch contained the power of a dark cultist, and the True Flame Fragment easily destroyed it.

“Now it effortlessly suppressed these hallucinations as well.

“It seems this fragment is naturally the nemesis of powers related to evil gods.”

Checking his status, he discovered another pleasant surprise.

Perhaps stimulated by the howl, or perhaps due to accumulated progress, his Spirit Value cap had increased by another 0.1.

It had reached a new high of 14.7.

Thinking of the hallucinations just now, Cheng Han suddenly understood.

“Could it be that the Black Armor Army is currently hunting down Tan Zicheng, and that howl was his counterattack?”

Without hesitation, he focused his mind and initiated a deduction.

If the howl truly originated from Tan Zicheng, then it constituted an excellent connection, greatly increasing the chances of success.

The next moment, a vision emerged.

Among shattered walls and broken ruins, a battered figure leaned against a fragment of masonry and breathed heavily.

His face was young.

Only around ten years old.

His features were fairly handsome.

Unfortunately, his blood-covered face and tattered clothing severely damaged his appearance.

A man in a black robe stepped closer and spoke coldly.

“You hid yourself quite well, you little bastard.”

“Pah!”

The boy spat out a mouthful of bloody saliva and viciously cursed,

“The glory of the Sate Race will return! Blood and death are the true—”

Before he could finish, the black-robed man interrupted.

“Teach him a lesson.”

A soldier strode forward.

Without a word, he raised his sword and stabbed four times in rapid succession.

Two wounds pierced the boy’s hands.

Two more pierced his feet.

After the final thrust, the soldier did not withdraw the sword.

Instead, he drove it into the ground, pinning the boy in place.

“Aaaah!”

The boy screamed in agony.

Moments later, the vision vanished.

Without question, the boy was Tan Zicheng.

The corner of Cheng Han’s eye twitched.

“Brutal.”

A renewed sense of relief filled him.

“This place is nearly two kilometers from Tan Zicheng’s house, yet I was still affected.

“I completely underestimated his power.

“Fortunately, I didn’t overestimate myself just because I possess a little supernatural ability.

“If I had personally gone there to investigate, I’d probably have died without even leaving a corpse.”

There was no denying it.

Cowardice truly was the path to survival.

His thoughts drifted.

“I originally thought Tan Zicheng had picked up some special artifact and gained supernatural powers that way.

“But judging from the black-robed man’s words, that doesn’t seem to be the case.

“And what exactly is this ‘Sate Race’ he mentioned?

“I’ve never seen it mentioned in any textbook.

“The waters here seem much deeper than I imagined.”

He firmly memorized the term, intending to investigate it someday.

Opening the bedroom door, he immediately discovered the black cat lying weakly on the floor.

It seemed to have suffered from the howl as well.

The cat turned its head toward him and weakly meowed.

“Meow…”

Lacking any supernatural power of its own, it appeared to be in even worse condition.

Cheng Han quickly picked it up.

Activating the True Flame Fragment, he let a warm white glow bloom in his palm.

The negative effects were instantly dispelled.

The black cat immediately came back to life.

Its eyes widened in astonishment.

Clearly, it found its master’s methods incredible.

Cheng Han smiled.

“By the way, I’ve got good news.

“Tan Zicheng has been caught by the Black Armor Army.

“That bastard probably doesn’t have many days left.”

The black cat’s tail immediately began swishing.

It was delighted as well.

Cheng Han wore a smug expression.

“Tan Zicheng really was powerful.

“But in the end, a nobody like me still dragged him out into the open.

“He’ll probably die without ever knowing who actually brought him down.”

“Meow.”

The black cat rubbed its head against him.

Cheng Han scratched the cat affectionately before heading into the bathroom and relieving himself with great satisfaction.

The matter was finally over.

His mood had never been better.

At the battlefield.

Tan Zicheng had already been taken away.

The Black Armor Army was busy cleaning up the aftermath and treating injured civilians nearby.

Only two Mystics had nothing to do.

They quietly discussed the situation among themselves.

“The mysterious person possesses the ability to control flocks of birds. If we investigate that lead, we might discover their true identity.”

“I disagree.

“I think the mysterious person deliberately exposed that ability.

“If we follow that trail, we’ll probably end up finding other evil god cultists instead.”

“You make a good point.

“Judging from the mysterious person’s methods, they’re exceptionally calculating.

“With only a few simple tricks, they manipulated the authorities into doing all the work while causing devastating losses for the dark cult.”

“What do you think about the prophetic verses they left behind?”

“When I studied at the Mystic Palace years ago, I read some extremely ancient historical records.

“Personally, I feel that the style of those verses resembles that of the ancient Sate people.”

“Aren’t the ancient Sate people from tens of thousands of years ago?

“Just who is this mysterious person?

“How do they even know such things?”

“One of the verses mentions, ‘the endless land shrouded by shadow.’

“That old text recorded that, in a distant age, this world once possessed a vast continent beyond imagination.

“The ancient Sate people lived upon that land.”

“But without the support of a Divine Tree, how could such a massive continent remain stable?

“No wonder the ancient Sate people went extinct.

“It must be because they weren’t living on trees.”

(End of Chapter)