Chapter 61: Infant Demon

Chu Zhu narrowed his eyes, recalling the diagnosis of Li Kang made by Nuwa-17 that he had seen earlier—
Contamination level: High Risk.
Li Kang shook his head, his gaze sweeping across everyone present one by one. His expression was complex, but in the end, a smile crept onto his face as he said, "You are still young!"
"So, start explaining!" Chu Zhu urged.
But this time, Li Kang couldn't even be bothered to open his mouth, looking as though he had made up his mind.
After a brief moment of thought, Chu Zhu sighed sentimentally, "It seems next time I see Minmin, I must..."
"3-181! The Infant Ghoul." Li Kang blurted out decisively, his righteous demeanor making it seem as though everything he had said before was complete nonsense!
"The exact details of its birth are unclear... but its use is this: once opened, say to it: I am your mother! Mother has been hurt."
"The next second, it will plunge into a berserk state, attacking anyone who might potentially harm its mother! However..."
Chu Zhu listened with rapt attention. "However what? Go on!"
"If it cannot be shoved back into the box the very moment it dispatches the enemy!" Li Kang's face twisted slightly. "The Infant Ghoul will rip open 'Mother's' belly and curl up inside the abdomen... just like an infant returning to the womb!"
"Generally speaking, if it really manages to enter the maternal body... the contamination will spike off the charts! There is a high probability that by then, I... However, if it can be shoved back into the box instantly, then it's not a big problem. There will still be some contamination, but it's acceptable!"
Chu Zhu: "..."
One has to admit, merely listening to this thing's behavioral logic made Chu Zhu feel as though he had suffered a severe psychic shock.
That was simply absurd!
No wonder Li Kang, who usually carried himself like a proud eagle, shook with fear just looking at it. The contamination aside... it even came with the bonus of accidentally becoming an unwed male mother! Who could possibly endure that kind of thing?
Wait.
"This thing is alive?" Chu Zhu realized belatedly, feeling shocked.
"...Hard to say." Li Kang deliberated for a long time before spitting out those two words.
Chu Zhu: "?"
"If you say it's alive, it certainly doesn't count as living! But if you say it's dead, somehow it still looks kind of alive." After much rumination, Li Kang summarized, "It's practically undead!"
After a brief silence, Chu Zhu cupped his hands in salute toward Li Kang. "I never expected that an elder like you would also be a master of uttering nonsense."
"Not at all, just mediocre, ranking third in the world!" Li Kang felt no shame, taking it as a badge of honor instead.
Chu Zhu rolled his eyes, sat down on the sofa, and silently began counting down the time in his heart.

Time ticked away drop by drop.
Li Kang transitioned from his initial caution to boredom, and finally to yawning.
Suddenly, a piercing alarm sound blared out.
"—What?" Li Kang's expression shifted slightly. He flipped a tablet out from behind him and scanned it for a couple of seconds. "Six kilometers away, an ordinary person has discovered the existence of transcendents! We must..."
Li Kang's voice cut off abruptly, and he fell into deep thought.
Chu Zhu's thoughts raced like lightning. This was different from yesterday... The butterfly effect? Because he had pulled off such a massive stunt today? Or perhaps...
"Did the enemy use a diversion tactic this time?" Chu Zhu's mind spun with countless possibilities. He sincerely hoped it was a diversionary tactic rather than the butterfly effect, because if a diversion was genuinely necessary, it meant the enemy's strength was completely insufficient to take down the people present here by force.
"What should we do? Should I go? But..." Guan Fei furrowed his brow tightly, repeatedly glancing at Chu Zhu. After all, he wasn't a fool; having been through so many missions, he now realized what was happening.
"Right, let Bixuan go." Ning Linglong possessed a nimble mind; she pulled out her phone and directly placed a call right in front of everyone.
"That works too! If it's just this kind of matter... but what worries me is—" Li Kang's gaze deepened. If this truly was a diversion, then even if Bixuan successfully resolved the situation, there would likely be other places "catching fire" next.
Taking a deep breath, Li Kang patted his cheeks. "There's no need to worry excessively! If they really go around broadcasting the news without any bottom line, once it gets reported to the Capital Guard... Hmph! Even if he has the Jade Emperor himself standing behind him, he's going to die."
After all, this was the greatest taboo of the current dynasty—
This was the matter that the deity residing within the Imperial Ancestral Temple frequently issued divine decrees to have resolved!

After Bixuan set out, Ning Linglong never hung up the phone, maintaining a continuous connection primarily out of concern that something might happen to him.
Soon, Bixuan gave his report, "Memory erased... Nothing major! I'm heading home now..."
The crowd waited quietly until Bixuan confirmed he had arrived home and hung up the phone, only then letting out a collective sigh of relief.
And then, they continued to wait.
To their surprise, however, no further news of transcendent leaks surfaced.
"Looks like," Li Kang muttered with a slight sense of relief, "it really was just a coinci—"
The next instant, black light flashed.
It wasn't Chu Zhu's first time encountering such an incident; his reaction was as swift as lightning. His body tensing up, he directly tumbled backward off the sofa.
"Rip!"
The sofa was shredded. The black light pierced straight through the upholstery...
"Damn it!" Guan Fei's pupils dilated. The muscles across his body bulged once more in that instant—or rather, at that moment, he no longer resembled a mountain of flesh, but rather a mountain of pure muscle.

The world in his eyes slowed down to an extreme degree. He could see that streak of black light, which had torn the sofa apart, making a loop in mid-air and plunging directly toward Chu Zhu's back.
"Run!" Guan Fei threw his massive body forward like a collapsing peak, heavily pinning Chu Zhu beneath him.
Blood splattered!
Chu Zhu: "?"
Are you out of your mind? Chu Zhu was practically on the verge of laughing in exasperation. It wasn't that he wasn't touched by Guan Fei's reflex to protect him, but the crucial point was... he was wearing a heavy down jacket! When it came to withstanding damage, he could definitely take much more punishment than Guan Fei.
"!" Li Kang directly unlocked the safety case, speaking at a rapid-fire pace, "I am your mother, Mother has been hurt!"
The infant, withered like blackened wood, opened its eyes at that very moment.
Those eyes were crimson, devoid of any other color.
A sharp, piercing screech burst forth into the air! The glass shuddered violently, faint cracks spreading across its surface.
Berserk power was wantonly unleashed.
Fast—it was fast to the absolute extreme!
In that moment, the infant transformed into a divine radiance of interwoven black and crimson blood, violently colliding with that streak of black light in the void!
Chu Zhu shoved Guan Fei away with a single palm strike, stood up, and solemnly stared at the two streaks of black light. By now, he was finally beginning to discern the forms of both lights. The infant went without saying, but as for the other one...
"...A shadow?" Chu Zhu murmured. It didn't quite look like a human being, darting back and forth through the void with lightning speed, swift as a flying sword. At the same time, its form shifted constantly every single second: transforming into a black sword one moment, a black shield the next, and morphing into a beast shortly after.
Yet these transformations occurred three times every single second!
Seeing this, Ning Linglong swallowed hard, her expression turning severe as she loudly chanted:
"The Dao that can be told is not the eternal Dao!"
"The name that can be named is not the eternal name!"
Chu Zhu: "!"
Chinese! It was Chinese again.