Chapter 239

Chapter 239: Something Feels Off

To be honest, that first bite was hard for Yu Sheng.

Not because he wasn’t hungry. He hadn’t eaten in a long time and he was starving. And it wasn’t that he was afraid to challenge Foxy’s cooking, either. He’d already eaten her stew once. He knew that even though it looked insane, it tasted fine. Plus, the fox young lady sat right next to him with her chin propped in her hands, those big eyes staring at him like a begging puppy. No matter what, he had to try it.

The real problem was the bowl.

This pile of “stew” was dodging the spoon.

Yes. This chaotic mix—cursed by who knew what cyber immortal arts—was dodging his spoon. It even squirmed and puffed up a bulge in the middle, like it was flipping him off.

That was way beyond Yu Sheng’s understanding of food.

After staring at the bowl and wrestling with himself for a long time, Yu Sheng finally looked up, conflicted. “Is this normal?”

“Ah, sorry, I forgot a step!” Foxy suddenly realized. She raised her hand and traced a few glowing symbols in the air, mumbling as she made a series of motions that looked nothing like cooking. Only then did she let out a long breath and smile. “Okay, Benefactor. It understands now.”

Yu Sheng froze.

It understands?

Understands what?

Who understands?

Hey. It’s cooking. Why is the last step of cooking talking to the food so it can “understand”?

The Borderland had machine spirits in its machines. Was Foxy’s pot refining a rice-soul now?

He looked down. The shifting, color-changing substance really had calmed. After thinking hard for a few seconds, he finally asked, “Let me make sure. This thing doesn’t have intelligence, right?”

“Of course not,” Foxy said quickly, waving her hands. “It’s just that heaven and earth have spirit. Stew with a soul is just temporarily stewing the spirit of heaven and earth into the food. But if there’s too much soul, the food starts moving… that’s what my mother said.”

Yu Sheng felt like, if an ordinary person heard those lines, they’d need an emergency sanity check. Language really was magical.

He took a deep breath, imagined the glowing mess as something like entity tentacles or Wolf Granny’s heart, closed his eyes, and took a bite.

Warmth flowed through him.

The taste was… actually decent. No weird flavor. Nothing sprang to life and wriggled in his mouth. He couldn’t even tell what the texture was supposed to be, but it was undeniably edible.

It even tasted better than last time.

“This… is actually pretty good,” Yu Sheng said as he opened his eyes, looking at Foxy with surprise. “It tastes better than last time.”

Foxy, who had been waiting like her life depended on praise, immediately narrowed her eyes in delight. She swayed slightly in her seat, tails swishing. “I’m glad Benefactor likes it.”

Yu Sheng took a second bite.

Within a few breaths, he felt the exhaustion drain from his body. His foggy mind cleared instantly—not the forced wakefulness of a stimulant, but the clean refresh of a full rest and a full resupply. The food he swallowed kept nourishing him, soaking into his limbs and bones.

He frowned, confused, and saw Foxy pull two chicklings out of her tails and set a small bowl of stew in front of each one.

“Bai Qie, Yan Ju, dinner time~ You’re benefiting from Benefactor again today~”

The two chicklings waddled over happily.

They looked noticeably bigger now, clearly well cared for. Bai Qie had a tuft of pale golden fluff growing on its head, and behind Yan Ju’s tail there was a faint, translucent glow.

Yu Sheng stared.

Something felt off.

He rubbed his eyes, then looked up at Foxy.

“Benefactor, what’s wrong?”

“Let me confirm,” Yu Sheng said slowly, pointing at the stew. “This is really the home cooking you ate every day back home?”

“No, it’s only for special days,” Foxy answered honestly, “like getting a hundred on a test, or holidays. It’s a lot of work, and it takes a lot of strength. Especially at spirit-nurturing peak—I’m not skilled, so I can only make it once in a while.”

Yu Sheng fell silent.

This silly fox had definitely mixed up cooking with something else entirely.

What kind of place was her hometown?

Looking at Foxy’s dopey, happy face, Yu Sheng decided not to ask. He lowered his head and finished every last bite. Then he watched the two chicklings stroll around the table to digest, feathers somehow looking even shinier than before.

Foxy went off cheerfully to wash the pot and dishes.

Yu Sheng stared at the two chicklings as they waddled in circles.

They stared back.

Bai Qie and Yan Ju stopped, tilted their heads, and met Yu Sheng’s gaze without fear. Their little eyes sparkled with something strange.

Yu Sheng even suspected the two little beasts were on the verge of awakening intelligence.

But he had no proof.

…

At the same time, outside the city.

The Borderland wasn’t infinite. Boundary City—huge as it was, so huge it could fool you into believing it was an endless metropolis—still had edges.

At the far end lay heavy factories and three-dimensional farmland, forming a ring belt. Beyond that belt were district walls set up by the councilor. Beyond the walls stretched a broad wilderness. This was already outside the Borderland’s most stable and safe prosperous urban area, so people called it the outer suburbs.

In the outer suburbs, only a few stable settlements were scattered across the boundless wilds. Observation stations and outposts established by the councilor dotted the region as well, distributed around settlements and other key control zones. Under normal circumstances, the Special Operations Bureau didn’t send people deep into this desolate land.

But today was special.

Several “meteors” had flown in over Boundary City and fallen into the outskirts. They needed to be recovered and contained as quickly as possible.

Song Cheng jumped out of the vehicle. In the cold wind sweeping across the plains, he tightened his coat and strode forward.

The terrain here was flat, weeds stretching endlessly. Far away, the city looked like a jagged silhouette on the horizon. In another direction, faint curtains of light rose from the ground, stabbing into the muddy sky—those were the boundary steles set up by the councilor at the edge of the Borderland. In theory, they marked the farthest place an ordinary person living in the Borderland could reach in their entire life.

“This landing point is really far out,” a Special Operations Bureau agent in heavy protective gear muttered. “A bit farther and it’d be outside the border. Hard to find.”

“Be thankful it drifted outward and not toward the city,” another agent said. “If it landed near the urban area, that’d be a real mess. Of course, then the ones working overtime would be the unlucky third brigade…”

Song Cheng coughed twice. “What are the readings right now?”

“Depth 0, slightly offset toward L-1, but within safe limits,” a subordinate reported immediately. “No contamination detected.”

Song Cheng nodded.

Then a shout came from ahead. “Found it! The impact point is here!”

A ten-meter-wide impact crater—like a charred black scar stamped into the weed-choked wilderness—gaped in the earth.

A small drone buzzed into position above it, monitoring environmental parameters. A walking robot stepped forward and set up basic monitoring equipment and protective devices along the rim and inner wall. Only then did the Special Operations Bureau agents in heavy protective gear approach, peering down into the crater.

A faint glow caught Song Cheng’s eye.

This commander, hardened by years of frontline experience, stared grimly at what lay at the bottom—an irregular chunk of translucent white crystal, its surface marked with traces of melting and resolidifying. The soil around it still held heat, releasing wisps of pale smoke. Tiny, star-like fragments were scattered around the larger piece, pulsing faintly as if responding to it.

He heard an agent behind him mutter, voice tight with caution. “So this is the body of dark angels…”

“Just small fragments. Its main structure already evaporated during the fall,” Song Cheng said, calm. He beckoned. “Prepare the recovery process. Send a drone for contact testing first.”

After a while, Song Cheng retreated from the crater and returned to the command vehicle.

“How are the other recovery teams doing?”

“Team Two and Team Three are still searching within the range the director provided. No debris sites found yet,” a headset-wearing agent reported. “Team Four just reported they’ve found a small fragment and are doing phase-one contact testing. One unexpected issue is that the small fragment landed near a settlement—only two or three hundred meters from the isolation wall. The settlement itself wasn’t damaged, but local residents saw the flash during the angel’s fall at close range. There may be risks. An assessment team has already departed from HQ.”

“Mm,” Song Cheng said, then looked up at the sky. “…The wind will pick up soon. The forecast says there’ll be temporal turbulence. Once we’re on the container, pull out fast. It’s finally the weekend—don’t let it fast-forward us to Monday the moment we blink.”

“Roger!”

Song Cheng grunted. He was just about to go personally check recovery progress again when the communications officer’s expression changed. They spoke quickly into a channel, then looked up, voice sharpened.

“Boss, something might have happened. Team Three just reported. They found an impact crater—but the crater is empty.”

Song Cheng went still.

“…What?!”