Chapter 80: The Shadow Ghost and the Azure Moon

To be honest, among all the races, Guo Lang disliked dealing with the undead the second most, but his greatest aversion was reserved for the Void. The former were all perverts; the latter... complete lunatics! Can you imagine a race that disregards all rules, existing only to destroy for destruction's sake? The very essence of the Void is to devour, corrupt, and pollute—never anything remotely decent. Within the Void itself, there are three main factions as previously mentioned. The devouring faction are pure brutes, always seeking to consume powerful beings, absorbing superior genes to make themselves ever stronger. Due to their constant assimilation of others, their own genetics—and personalities—are wildly unpredictable: sometimes gentle or even cowardly, but at other times, unspeakably cruel or violently extreme!

Corruption and pollution are two distinct types. Pollution refers to the tainting of the land, with the primary goal of contaminating Gaia’s Heart. To the Gaia consciousnesses of other planes, such Void entities are like festering sores, ever spreading and seeking to infect and assimilate everything around them.

Corruption, on the other hand, targets the mind. These Voids promote fear, despair, rage, greed, lust, envy—a catalog of the world’s darkest emotions—gradually rotting a world’s spirit. When enough hearts have turned, Gaia, the consciousness of the plane, inevitably becomes one of their own.

Their existence is an enigma; by all logic, such a deranged race should have no place in the world. Yet, they persist, even possessing their own deities. From every perspective, they are the archetypal villains. In his previous life, the Federation government had even instituted conscious resistance against the Void race, with the military strictly forbidden from recruiting Voids.

As for those players who had already chosen to be Void—especially the truly fearsome among them—most people chose to keep their distance. Today, Guo Lang was seeking out one of the most notorious of these, one who ranked among the very top.

In her previous life, the name Shadow Ghost Cang Mingyue was enough to make even the most formidable leaders pale at its mention. Her methods were simply too ruthless. Whenever she set her sights on a particular gene, she would act without hesitation, and it was rare to hear of her failing. Once, a human succeeded in perfectly integrating dragon blood, evolving the Dragoon profession to epic rank and becoming the fourth-ranked human powerhouse.

He caught her attention. She hunted him across seven planes, ultimately wrenching his head from his shoulders and devouring his genes alive.

Of course, there were times she failed. For instance, she once tried to hunt down the Federation’s near-legendary Xivir, and was beaten into a pulp—almost losing her life there, barely escaping as a single cell, and it took her a year to recover!

Honestly, if he didn’t desperately need an outstanding tracker, Guo Lang would never have wanted to deal with her. But early-stage necromancers were simply too formidable—so much so that even with his current team, he had no absolute confidence. This time, he had to ensure success.

As he pondered this, a child’s voice suddenly rang out from the dessert shop, “Mom, I want that one!” He was pointing at the double-layered milk pudding on Cang Mingyue’s table.

“Boss, is there no more double-layered milk pudding?” asked a rather plump middle-aged woman with her hands on her hips.

“I’m sorry, we really don’t have any left. The machine broke yesterday. But may I recommend some of our other specialties? The creamy red bean soup and the iced snow frog are both delicious!”

“My son wants double-layered milk pudding!” The woman was clearly not one to listen to reason, her face full of dissatisfaction. “If your machine broke yesterday, how does she have a bowl? Who are you trying to fool?”

The owner replied with a strained smile, “I run an honest business—what would I gain by lying to you? This young lady is a regular; she comes every day for the pudding. When I saw the machine break, I made her one by hand...”

“Oh, so there’s special treatment!” The woman looked contemptuously at the disheveled Cang Mingyue, then turned to her son. “Sweetheart, let’s eat somewhere else. We’ll find another shop, and you can have all the double-layered milk pudding you want!”

“Ugh...” The child was still sulking. The other adults around frowned slightly. They’d come here in the afternoon to unwind, only to encounter such a pair—suddenly, everyone felt a wave of annoyance, as if confronted by flies.

What happened next disgusted them even more. The little boy, eyes gleaming with mischief, suddenly dashed forward and slapped Cang Mingyue’s pudding right off the table. It landed squarely on her, the solidified milk splattering across her face and tangled hair, making her look utterly wretched.

“Hahaha!” The boy clapped his hands and made a face.

The onlookers’ expressions darkened. What kind of upbringing had this brat received? Where were his manners?

The middle-aged woman rushed over, pulling out a handkerchief—but not to clean up Cang Mingyue, whom her son had just doused. Instead, she fussed over her son, wiping his hands and clothes while grumbling, “What were you thinking? So dirty! These were just bought!”

Everyone there was stunned by her reaction. What a specimen of a mother!

Surprisingly, Cang Mingyue did not respond with the expected fury. Instead, she turned her head expressionlessly and said in an even tone, “Your son knocked over my food...”

The woman ignored her, still fussing over her son, drawing more frowns from the bystanders.

“Your son knocked over my food!” Cang Mingyue’s voice grew louder.

“Tch... I heard you!” The woman turned and glared. “He’s just a child—he doesn’t know any better. Why are you, an adult, making a fuss?”

“This woman...” Jiang Liuying, dressed in ancient garb, rolled her eyes. “Raise a child like that and someday he’ll get himself killed!”

Guo Lang: “...”

Yet, even after being spoken to so rudely, Cang Mingyue showed no anger. In fact, a faint smile appeared on her lips. Noticing this, Guo Lang, observing from afar, felt a chill run down his spine.

With her abilities, how could a mere child have knocked over her food, much less splatter it on her? She must have allowed it.

That smile was the signature of the Void’s devouring faction. Under the planetary gods’ pact, believers were forbidden from wantonly slaughtering potential converts, but not entirely. If their lives were threatened, or if someone provoked them, killing was permitted.

And as for where the line lay... that depended on how much the various chief deities favored their own. Unfortunately, among the ten races, the Void were the most protective of their own. If someone merely glared at you and you killed them in return, the priests would still shield you from any consequences.

Cang Mingyue rose slowly, her pupils black as night, seeming to swallow all surrounding light. The mother and son sensed something amiss and instinctively looked over. Meeting her gaze, a wave of bone-deep chill swept through their hearts.

Central Asian eyes are black, as are the Void’s, so the change in her pupils was subtle—only deeper, more absolute. But the mother and son, upon seeing those inky eyes, felt as though they were plunging into an icy abyss.

“What... What are you doing?” The woman, still crouched beside her son, shrieked with forced bravado. “He’s just a child! Are you really going to make a scene? Have you any decency?” Her tone was defiant, but a keen eye could see she could barely muster the strength to stand.

“Oh...” Cang Mingyue cocked her head, her smile widening. It was eerie—her small mouth stretching at an impossible angle, yet not splitting, as if her face had warped. Her eyes were so black they reflected no light, and the psychic pressure radiating from her chilled the soul. Her voice rasped with a harsh metallic edge. “So all the people you’ve met before were decent? Well, today your luck’s run out—you’ve met someone who isn’t.”

“You—!” The woman collapsed to the floor, scrambling back. A pungent odor began to waft from her, and a bright yellow stain became visible—she had wet herself. Her mouth hung open, throat working as if to plead, “Don’t do anything rash,” but she found it nearly impossible to make a sound; the shrillness she relied on was gone, her voice utterly powerless.

“But you’re right about one thing—you can’t be too hard on children,” Cang Mingyue said, pressing her hand down on the woman’s face. Both mother and child were petrified with terror, frozen in place, unable to move or even think of resisting.

When the gap in biological rank is too great, the sheer force of a superior being’s presence can obliterate the most basic instincts—erasing even the urge to flee.

Bang! The onlookers held their breath as the woman’s head was crushed like a watermelon. So close, they witnessed her skull distort, her eyes bulge and burst, and her brain matter spray out—a series of gruesome scenes unfolding right before them.

Silence. Deathly silence. In that horrifying stillness, everyone could hear the breathing of those around them. Such bloodshed belonged in horror films, but seeing it in real life delivered a soul-shaking shock. Those with weaker nerves might never recover from today’s trauma.

Yet even then, no one dared break the silence. The shop remained eerily still, everyone’s nerves stretched to the limit. Instinct kept them from uttering a sound or making a move—none of that movie-style screaming or mad scrambling. Instead, a tacit agreement bound them all, suppressing every normal reaction with the most primal fear.

Cang Mingyue glanced at the blood and brain tissue on her hand, a flicker of excitement in her eyes. She scanned the room, her gaze settling on Guo Lang’s group. Under her magnetic pressure, the crowd was powerless; she could have peeled open their skulls and feasted on their brains, and not one would resist or even utter a sound. Yet, precisely for this reason, she found no justification to act further.

Fortunately, it seemed there were other special guests today. Cang Mingyue gave Guo Lang and his companions a long, penetrating look, then, in a blur, vanished from the shop.

Xie Lin frowned. “That woman is extremely dangerous. Are you sure you want to pursue her?”

Guo Lang, having felt the brunt of her oppressive aura, was equally astonished. How could a bronze-ranked, non-royal bloodline exert such overwhelming pressure on the three of them? But now that they’d come this far, how could he give up?

His violet eyes flared as he gritted his teeth. “After her!”

All three activated their bloodlines and disappeared from the shop at lightning speed. Surveillance cameras showed four people dashing through the streets at inhuman pace, vanishing from the bustling city center in just a few bounds.

Roughly fifteen minutes after their departure, the others gradually regained their senses. Chaos erupted: women screamed, men vomited, people stumbled and tripped, triggering a cacophony of chaos and panic.

As for the child at the heart of the incident, he finally reacted, bursting into tears, his face a picture of terror and grievance—his mother’s blood smeared across his face, a pitiful sight.

But this time, there would be no doting mother to wipe away his tears.