Chapter 396

Chapter 396: Sudden Attack

Yu Sheng wasn’t even sure this world had the term highland fox, but the girl’s “great-uncle” really did have a square head. If it hadn’t been beaten into that shape, then this six-tailed demon fox could only be some highland fox that had gained intelligence.

Of course, this wasn’t the time to worry about zoology.

With Immortal Yuan Hao treating him personally, the fox who had been more out of breath than alive finally began to stabilize.

But just as things were about to turn around, a sound like crushed glass splintering echoed from somewhere unseen—razor-sharp even through the rain.

Foxy reacted first. Her ears twitched, and she snapped her head toward the sky above a nearby building. Under the umbrella, her gold-red eyes flashed with a sharp, eerie light, and a warning growl vibrated in her throat. A heartbeat later, pale foxfire flooded the air around her.

Almost at the same time, Luna stepped forward. Rain slid off her nun’s habit as the blades on her fingertips caught the light. “Radar pinged.”

The next second, cracking noises rang out in a rapid chain. Yu Sheng saw strange rifts bloom in the sky several hundred meters away—fine lines spreading like a shattered mirror. They crawled in the same direction as the falling sheets of rain, and hazy figures appeared between the fractures, turning clearer as the openings widened.

“Holy crap, they’re here!” Irene yelped, twisting toward Immortal Yuan Hao. “Can you pause the healing for one second? What the hell!”

Yu Sheng almost choked. “Listen to yourself—does that sound like something a person says?”

Immortal Yuan Hao’s face twitched, but he didn’t even look up. “The wounded cannot move yet. Hold them off for a moment!”

Yu Sheng didn’t waste a word. He turned and yanked Zheng Zhi—still dazed—back toward cover. “Stay near Immortal Yuan Hao.”

At the center of the expanding rifts, the air suddenly bulged.

With a teeth-grinding screech, the fractures shattered all at once. Space folded backward and collapsed. The rain around them took on a strange, transparent, artificial look, as if it was falling through a sheet of glass. Buildings blurred into something unreal. Even the distant Refining Tower wavered.

And beneath that warped shimmer, it was as if a jagged, barren landscape had been laid over the city’s edge.

Yu Sheng didn’t have time to think about what it meant. Figures poured out of the collapsing rifts, charging straight at them.

In the lead were black-robed heretic cultivators wearing strange masks. Behind them surged vicious beasts—clearly driven and controlled.

“It’s them!” the girl in red shouted. “Great-Uncle was hurt by them!”

Lightning tore the sky open and lit the rain, and several grotesque beasts dove down in the flash.

Yu Sheng tossed aside the bamboo hat that was getting in his way. In his right hand was the spiked club he’d grabbed from the basement. In his left was Irene—Rebar—yanked off the living room shelf and carried like a weapon. On his shoulder sat the other Irene—darksteel turret body—primed and ready.

He walked straight into the oncoming wave.

Black spider silk exploded into motion in the rain. A winged beast brushed the threads and stiffened for a fraction of a second—long enough for Yu Sheng’s tetanus staff to smash down and drive its skull back into its body.

Then blinding beams cut through the storm. The turret Irene on his shoulder blew apart another beast that tried to slip in from the side. The body tore open under the light and fell in charred, steaming chunks.

The black-robed cultivators didn’t care. More beasts poured out of the rifts. Then the cultivators themselves descended in silence, magic treasures flaring as they unleashed killing moves.

“Damn, you’re really not saying a single word before you start swinging?” Irene shouted, perched on Yu Sheng’s shoulder and charging up another burst. “In a normal fight, aren’t you supposed to talk trash first?”

Yu Sheng hadn’t even opened his mouth when the girl in red called out, “They didn’t talk when they fought us either! The moment they showed up, they went for the kill—that’s why Great-Uncle and I got caught off guard!”

She dodged a beast’s lunge with a quick retreat. With a flick of her wrist, she produced an iron-colored long flute that glowed with a chilling sheen, and raised it to her lips.

A mournful flute song poured into the rain.

Each turning note felt like it clamped down on veins and organs. Ripples spread through the falling water—visible, rolling waves—and inside those waves, every beast’s movement seemed to slow by half a beat.

Using the opening, the jade-faced golden fox leapt back, her five tails swaying as she scattered lifelike clones into the rain-laced air.

Two beasts staggered in confusion, dazed by sound and phantoms, and Luna cut them down in a blink.

Irene stared, stunned, at the golden fox dancing through the rain with a flute in hand. Then she whipped her head toward Foxy, who was setting half the battlefield on fire. “Oh my god. So this is how the local fox fights. Silly Fox, look at her vibe. Now look at you!”

Foxy glanced at Irene, bared her teeth, and answered with action.

She roared—and launched eight fox-carrot missiles.

Bright flames blasted from behind eight silver-white tails like thrusters. The shockwave scattered the rain, and the explosions slammed into the black-robed cultivators directing the beasts.

They clearly hadn’t seen anything like it. The crowd that had been silent for so long finally broke into startled cries, scrambling to throw up protective spiritual aura and life-saving treasures.

Even so, a few with weaker cultivation had their shields blown apart and were swallowed by fireballs before they hit the ground. They burned to ash in the storm.

The flute song cut off mid-note.

Yu Sheng looked back and saw the girl in red coughing hard, eyes wide as she stared at Foxy. Her golden tails bristled like a field of swords.

She looked like she’d just watched her centuries of cultivation get shoved off a cliff.

“High Immortal!” she rasped at last, pointing at the burning clusters of foxfire falling from the sky. Her voice cracked on the edge of panic. “Your tails!”

Foxy turned. With a soft whoosh, eight tails reappeared behind her.

She gave them a little shake—like warming up.

Then, with a series of roaring blasts, she launched eight more fox-carrot missiles into the sky in blinding arcs.

The rain-filled heavens became absurd: tails streaking like rockets, foxfire explosions blooming, and, right in the middle, a doll spraying high-energy lasers like it was having the time of its life.

The girl in red hovered there, gaping. Then she glanced at her own five golden tails.

After a brief, very serious consideration, she grabbed one and yanked as hard as she could.

Pain hit instantly. She howled, baring her teeth as tears streamed down her face.

Yu Sheng didn’t see any of that. He was too busy fighting.

But as the battle dragged on, he started to feel something wrong—an elusive, thread-thin gaze hiding behind the chaos, watching from a dark corner no one could see.

A black-robed cultivator rushed him. Yu Sheng raised the tetanus staff, but before they could trade blows, Luna appeared at the cultivator’s side like a ghost. Her fingertip blades traced a clean, elegant arc and pierced the man’s neck with perfect precision.

The watching feeling returned.

Yu Sheng frowned. “Luna, did you pick up any hidden enemies?”

Luna paused. Slowly, she lifted her head. Her gaze swept the battlefield.

“Radar: no response.”

Yu Sheng didn’t relax. That sensation hadn’t been imagination. Something really was here.

And it wasn’t ordinary concealment. If it were just invisibility, it wouldn’t have slipped past Luna’s multi-frequency targeting radar—or Immortal Yuan Hao’s divine sense.

Yu Sheng remembered the moment the rifts collapsed. The way buildings had turned transparent and unreal. The way the Refining Tower had seemed to vanish for an instant.

And beneath everything, that jagged wasteland—like two spaces stacked together.

His heartbeat shifted, a thought forming—

“Brother Yu!” Zheng Zhi called from behind.

Yu Sheng spun and saw Zheng Zhi huddled near Immortal Yuan Hao, pointing toward a corner of the sky.

“There’s someone over there staring at you,” Zheng Zhi said, oddly casual. “Feels like bad intentions.”

Yu Sheng’s blood went cold.