“Mm?”
Su Bingyao saw a look of sudden realization mixed with confusion cross Luo Shang’s face.
What, it wasn’t you?
Su Bingyao had developed a knee-jerk habit of assuming that any anomaly must be Luo Shang’s handiwork. But this time, it didn’t seem to be the case.
Of course, he thought. Luo Shang was determined to follow the Plot to completion, and in Su Mingyao’s memories of the Recognition Banquet, there had been no scene of a Bone Claw crashing down from the sky and smashing through the glass windows.
—Then who the hell was it?! Su Bingyao stared at the Bone Claw, his heart aching with despair.
It was finally almost over—why did something like this have to show up now? You could’ve waited until after the event wrapped up!
He could see it clearly: guests were already passing out from sheer terror. At first there had been screams, but once the Bone Claw thrust in from outside the window, silence fell over the room. Everyone held their breath, not daring to make a sound lest they disturb the colossal bone creature lurking beyond the walls.
To cover up this Anomaly, Luo Shang would surely wipe out the world again!
Su Bingyao’s heart filled with anguish. He felt no fear of the massive Bone Claw itself—after all, the world-destroying Luo Shang was right here.
Luo Shang was the ultimate safeguard. With him present, the Bone Claw was harmless. The real problem was that it would force Luo Shang to reset the world, inflicting fresh psychological wounds on him all over again.
Who could’ve foreseen this? Su Bingyao knew it was beyond his power to fix. He’d done everything humanly possible: he’d handled Li Qingshu, bonded with Su Mingyao, persuaded Shen Changqing. The first event was on the verge of success—only for a gigantic Bone Claw to shatter the window and snake into the hall!
It was as ridiculous as one of those classic wuxia tales where heroes and villains are locked in a standoff, ready to clash—until a meteor plummets from the heavens and flattens them all.
Could anyone fight off a meteor? No way! No amount of training, strategy, or scouting the enemy mattered when something as utterly unreasonable as that struck without warning!
Aaaahhh!! Su Bingyao felt like howling at the heavens.
A claw… made of bones? There was no such thing in his last life! Su Mingyao jolted in shock. He’d been all set to bow out, figuring the drama had peaked with Luo Shang’s name-change announcement. All that was left was to wait for tomorrow’s Eight Trigrams headlines.
He never imagined a Bone Claw would come crashing down from the sky, upending everything.
This had to be Luo Shang—absolutely his doing! And only he could’ve pulled it off!
The icy grip of death closed around Su Mingyao.
Why… what is this…
The scroll—right, the System had mentioned that the Corpse Manipulation Scroll “hasn’t arrived yet.” Judging by the name, didn’t it perfectly match this bony, yet still-moving claw?
Could it be…? Su Mingyao stared at Luo Shang in disbelief, waiting for his Heart Voice to provide answers.
I’m done for!
If Su Mingyao could piece that together, then the Original Work’s protagonist top, Shen Changqing, could certainly do the same—and go even further.
For instance: if the Corpse Manipulation Scroll had arrived, didn’t that mean it was his turn to die?!
Luo Shang had spent so long brooding in his mind about killing him and puppeteering his corpse with the scroll that it had carved a deep psychological scar into Shen Changqing. Now he was on the verge of a full-blown panic attack.
Who wouldn’t panic in his shoes? Being eyed with murderous intent by a being capable of annihilating worlds? The miracle was that Shen Changqing hadn’t cracked completely—he was a cut above the rest.
But even the elite stood no chance against monsters.
He was human, damn it! And that enormous Bone Claw outside the window? Clearly not!
So cold… so weary… I just want to sleep…
Li Qingshu longed to shut her eyes.
The eerie wind swirling around her no longer felt chilling; it had softened into a soothing coolness, like a gentle breeze whispering through the shade on a summer afternoon. It tempted her toward slumber, toward that quiet, eternal peace.
“Pa!”
It hurt! Who hit me?! Li Qingshu snapped her eyes open in fury, only to find Su Tiancheng staring at her in wide-eyed horror.
“You…”
She followed his gaze downward.
To her horror, the flesh had peeled away from her fingertips, revealing sinister white bones emerging from the dissolving skin.
Li Qingshu opened her mouth to scream, but Su Tiancheng swiftly crammed a nearby apple between her lips, stifling the cry in her throat.
“Shh…”
Don’t provoke whatever’s out there!
“Sigh.” Luo Shang gazed at the enormous bone claw and let out a breath.
He was puzzled not because this wasn’t his doing, but because he hadn’t expected her to come striding in so brazenly, without the slightest attempt to hide herself.
“What I meant was don’t skimp on the cost—use the fastest express service. Not for you to deliver it in person, Sophia.”
A delivery girl? This horrifying entity was nothing more than a courier dropping off a package for Luo Shang! The thought exploded in everyone’s minds.
Just how terrifying must Luo Shang himself be? Was he even human?
No one dared meet his eyes anymore. They all bowed their heads.
Shen Changqing, watching the scene unfold, felt a strange surge of schadenfreude—like finally, they were all tasting the same madness he’d endured. “You’re experiencing this nightmare with me now, aren’t you?” his heart crowed.
He wasn’t alone in his suffering anymore! With that realization, the fear of ending up as a corpse eased considerably.
“There are still plenty of ordinary folk here,” Luo Shang said from his wheelchair, glancing down at the guests.
Not a soul dared hold his gaze. It was a far cry from earlier, when his name-change announcement had made him the center of everyone’s prying stares and whispers. Now he had become an existence far beyond their reach.
Su Mingyao noticed something else: a golden ring had formed around Luo Shang’s eyes.
“Tone it down a notch. The Wind of the Dead from your landing is about to rouse every old skeleton buried underground around my estate. The last thing I need is the neighbors reporting wandering undead to property management tomorrow.”
As his words faded, a ripple of golden light spread rapidly from him, sweeping away every negative effect afflicting those present.
“Old bones?” The girl’s voice let out a mocking snort.
“To me, those kids are still fresh-faced. None of them over three hundred years old—babes compared to you or me.”
“Besides, you wanted it delivered fast, and no shipping company beats my speed.”
“I’ll cover all the fees, so you didn’t need to pinch pennies and make the trip yourself,” Luo Shang replied.
“Who said anything about the fees? Ridiculous. Sure, your place is in the middle of nowhere, but Quantum Express would still run a cool ten billion Spirit Energy Points… ten billion. That’s three months of operating my entire Mage Tower…”
Even beings like her griped about shipping costs? Su Mingyao caught the subtext and nearly rolled his eyes.
For all her power as lord of a Plane, Sophia suffered from the age-old mage affliction: chronic poverty.
Necromancers were mages, after all!
Did a Mage Tower run on goodwill? Training new Necromancers? Acquiring spell tomes? Sourcing corpses from exotic species? Hunting down veins of life-rich Spiritual Energy?
No coin, no craft. No research.
Even a grand Half-Lich like Sophia—a supreme power sheltering countless Planes—remained perpetually broke.
The higher they climbed, the deeper the pit of poverty grew. The more power they chased, the more it cost.
Luo Shang knew her weakness well, which was why he’d stressed “fast” in his message, signaling top-tier urgency and the priciest space logistics option.
He just hadn’t figured she’d deliver it herself!
What kind of bulk discount was she fishing for?
Luo Shang stared in astonishment at the bone claw.
“Truth be told, I wanted to talk face-to-face. Your Native World is so damn remote—messages barely get through.”
The girl’s voice shifted gears, dropping the fee complaint to gripe instead.
“Your hall’s too cramped. My White Bone Dragon can’t squeeze in. Don’t you keep a dragon too? Does it even fit in a shoebox like this?”
“You could always tear off the roof. And I didn’t bring any people or pets home this time,” Luo Shang said, craning his neck from the wheelchair to eye the ceiling.
“Nidhogg has a disguise form anyway. It can pass as a regular dog.”
“Fair enough. Mine can too.”
The bone claw extending into the hall suddenly disintegrated, bones clattering to the floor. Then they poured through the windows like a grotesque fountain, tumbling across the ground. Nearby guests recoiled in horror, desperate to avoid touching them.
Su Bingyao saw frost creeping along the edges of the table’s dishes. The fruit platters had withered completely, drained of all life.
Once the White Bone Dragon’s final tailbone slipped inside, a little girl hopped in through the window from outside.
She looked extremely young, probably no more than ten years old.
But no one in the room dared underestimate her. Miss Sophia’s eyes burned with twin clusters of crimson soulfire.
Her tiny hand clutched the tailbone of the white bone dragon. The other scattered bones of bone dragons, which had been rolling aimlessly across the floor, now drew toward her as she entered. They nuzzled at her feet like eager puppies.
“Your true form isn’t this one,” Luo Shang said, gazing down at Sophia in her little girl guise.
“Didn’t you originally choose the half-lich slime form?”
“You told me everyone here was just an ordinary human, so I shifted into a shape more suitable for human eyes before coming in,” Sophia replied.
That was thoughtful enough. But hadn’t she considered that when her white bone dragon had stretched out a claw to tap on the glass window, it had already shattered any pretense of human-friendly spectacle? Su Bingyao ranted furiously to himself in silence.
“I still managed to scare them before,” Sophia said. She stood in place and scanned the room, taking in the guests huddled and trembling like frightened quails.
She drew a deep breath, drawing in the negative emotions radiating from them.
“Your native world really is out in the sticks… There’s hardly any aura in the air. It’s hard to believe a backwater place like this could produce someone like you.” Sympathy gleamed in Sophia’s eyes.
She had to lean in close just to taste the potent fear wafting from the guests. By all rights, she should have sensed it from outside the house. This world’s sheer mediocrity was to blame!
Exactly—so how the hell is he this powerful? Su Bingyao and Su Mingyao exchanged a glance and sighed without a word.
“Fair enough. I didn’t expect you to have kept yourself hidden away in your own native world,” Sophia said, tilting her head.
Luo Shang was no lowly player from the Reincarnation Space. Those novice players always concealed their supernatural abilities upon returning home. Their powers weren’t enough to stand against the machinery of the state or all of human society—they’d end up vaporized by nukes or hydrogen bombs. Staying hidden was the smart play.
But Luo Shang had reached a level where he could crush worlds with ease. He alone outmatched hundreds of entire races. Even if he revealed his powers, the authorities would be powerless against him. He could turn this world into his personal back garden if he pleased, and no one could stop him.
So what had she stumbled upon?
Luo Shang, masquerading as an ordinary human among these people?
Sophia caught the scent of their terror toward him. She reached out at random and seized a nearby guest, delving into the surface layers of his brain to extract recent memories.
Luo Shang made no move to stop her.
“What game are you playing?” Sophia asked once she’d finished sifting through the memories. She stared at him in bewilderment.
“This doesn’t look fun at all.”
“That’s not your concern, Sophia,” Luo Shang replied.
“Hand over the scroll.”
From a pouch that looked like mere ornamentation on her person, Sophia drew forth a scroll far longer than the bag itself. Several bones from the bone dragon at her feet whirled into the air, assembling into a white bone bat.
The bat snatched the scroll from her grasp and fluttered it over to Luo Shang before crumbling back into scattered bones rolling across the floor.
“Thank you. I need this Corpse Manipulation Scroll right now,” Luo Shang said.
“Your impulsive display let them glimpse things they were never meant to see.”
He glanced down at the quaking guests.
“Now, let’s take care of them.” He gave a slight lift of his chin.
“As a necromancer, this should be right up your alley.”
To the ears of the other guests, his words twisted into a chilling command: “Kill everyone here.”
In an instant, they all fixed gazes of mingled horror and disbelief upon him.
“No—please, no!” one of them screamed, breaking the silence.
The Su family members, Shen Changqing included, had yet to speak when Shen Zhulin piped up first.
She tugged at Shen Changqing’s sleeve and whispered, “Bro… maybe you should go talk to your fiancé?”
Shen Changqing quietly withdrew his sleeve and asked her, “Did you catch sight of that Corpse Manipulation Scroll?”
Shen Zhulin blinked in confusion.
Shen Changqing went on, “It’s meant for me, your brother.” Talk him down? That’d be suicide!
Shen Zhulin’s eyes widened. What?!
Holy crap, was his fiancé really this ruthless? Looked like he wouldn’t need any backup after all… His fiancé could handle Su Mingyao all on his own!
Wait—is his fiancé about to kill his own husband? Was he angling to make him a widower?
Meanwhile, Li Lingran gazed at Luo Shang with eyes full of turmoil, his heart churning with doubt about himself.
Luo Shang… how did he possess supernatural abilities? Why had he never known this side of him?
I didn’t even understand the real him—did I even deserve to like him? I hadn’t even noticed such a massive change in him. I wasn’t a qualified simp anymore!
Once Shen Zhulin spoke up, the others suddenly found their voices and started chiming in.
“Little Shang, Aunt Li held you in her arms when you were just a baby. Please spare me! I swear I won’t breathe a word of this!” That was Aunt Li, Li Fubo.
“Luo Shang, we’ve been best friends since we were kids. You wouldn’t kill me, right?” Li Lingran’s voice followed.
A chorus of desperate pleas erupted after that.
“Brother Shang, I topped off your car with gas once, remember? We were out racing, your tank ran dry, and I grabbed a can from my trunk for you!” That came from one of Luo Shang’s hazy drinking buddies he could barely recall.
“Old Su, we’re a rock-solid business partner for the Su Family. We can sign a contract right now—I promise I won’t leak a thing about what happened here today!”
This one was aimed at Su Tiancheng.
“Sister Li, from now on, the Song Family will only do business with the Su Family. Here’s our official seal—take it! Just get your son to let me off the hook, and we’ll agree to anything.”
That was pleading with Li Qingshu.
Li Qingshu: ?? Wait, why are you carrying the company seal on you?
“Brother Yao, I got dirt on this punk—he’s badmouthed you behind your back! For reporting him, can you ask your little brother to go easy on me?”
This bootlicker was targeting Su Bingyao.
“Fine by me, you little rat. Didn’t you chime in when I was cursing him out? Now you’re playing innocent!”
The accused flew into a rage and started trading insults with his accuser.
Su Bingyao: …
Begging me won’t do you any good. What can I even do about it?
“Spare me, and I’ll give you five million!”
“That’s chump change. I’ll pay ten million! That’s what my life is worth!”
What is this, an auction? Shen Changqing was speechless.
If you could really buy your life with money, he’d have done it ages ago!
The scene descended into utter chaos, leaving Luo Shang and Sophia both stunned.
Sophia watched as these people forgot to even fear her. They turned on each other, biting and clawing in a frenzy, desperately pledging their loyalty to Luo Shang and the rest of the Su Family.
She couldn’t help but feel curious. “…Are people in your world always this quick to lose it?”
“No idea,” Luo Shang replied, his face a mask of ice.
Even with Mage Sophia here, who could handle this mess with her mental spells, he still felt that familiar itch to bring the world to ruin.
It’s not that we’re quick to lose it—the facts are just too absurd!
Su Bingyao thought.
“But I do know you’ll be losing it soon enough,” Luo Shang said.
Sophia: ?
“You autonomously drained the life force from everyone here, so I had to use that Peach of Immortality Core to replenish it.”
“In other words, your peach pit is gone.”
Sophia’s eyes went blank. She tilted her head back, mouth agape in a silent scream.
The Death Banshee’s voice shattered every window within ten meters—thankfully, Luo Shang’s presence kept it from spreading further.
Luckily, with Luo Shang suppressing the fluctuations, this half-lich’s emotional outburst didn’t suck dry every soul for a hundred miles around. What a relief.
They’d dodged a bullet. Hearing Luo Shang’s inner voice gloat about saving lives yet again, Su Bingyao quietly wiped the cold sweat from his brow.
~~~
Beyond shattering glass and stirring the white bones buried beneath the Su Family Manor into restless motion, Sophia’s arrival had other effects on the world.
Far away in the Capital, inside a secure cabinet in some underground research lab.
A golden wine vessel instrument, etched with eight dragons representing the cardinal and ordinal directions, suddenly trembled. The small orb in the dragon’s mouth facing B City tumbled free, dropping into the gaping maw of the Golden Toad below with a resounding thud.
The vibration rippled through the entire cabinet in an instant, triggering a long, piercing alarm.
“The second time already…”
Researchers in white lab coats hurried down the corridor toward the room housing the massive golden wine vessel.
They swiped their cards to open the door and peered through the glass screen.
There, on the floor among the eight Golden Toads, one now held an extra golden orb in its mouth.
“The Anomaly Detector has triggered twice in a single day!”
Director Zhao shouted.
“For decades, it hasn’t budged except when the Nine Tripods surfaced and when Qin Shi Huang’s Mausoleum was excavated!”
And now it was going haywire like this!
What in the world was coming in the future?
