Chen Zhou found himself at a complete loss. The sliver of doubt lingered in his mind for a moment, but he didn't dwell on it for long.
His gaze fell upon the refugees huddled not far away.
They didn't even look like living beings. Their state was so wretched that even Chen Zhou, who was accustomed to the horrors of the apocalypse, couldn't help but feel a jolt of shock.
Every one of them was bloodless, their skin a sickly, sallow yellow. The veins in their necks protruded like withered twigs, twitching faintly with their shallow breaths.
Their hair was yellowed and dry, resembling a clump of tangled straw, and their parched, loose skin hung precariously over their bones.
Their eye sockets were so sunken that they looked more like skeletons than actual skeletons.
Even during his struggle for survival in the apocalypse of his previous life, Chen Zhou had never seen people quite like this.
Living in a state of famine, fear, and numbness for so long had caused them to nearly lose their human form.
Due to their extreme physical weakness, the flesh-and-blood energy within them was incredibly faint.
If a giant snake counted as 10 units of common flesh, all of these people combined wouldn't even total 0.1 units.
Chen Zhou’s current form was invisible to ordinary people, so he could only command his Bone Ghost Servant to walk toward the young boy.
Whether to kill them or not was a secondary concern; he planned to gather some information first. At the very least, he needed to know what kind of world this was.
Shitou’s teeth began to chatter uncontrollably, and cold sweat poured down his spine.
He watched as the terrifying skeleton, which had just crushed the snake demon’s head, slowly walked toward him.
That was... that was the legendary evil spirit that reaped souls!
The skeleton’s movements were slow, looking as if it might fall apart with every step, but not a single refugee present dared to move.
None of them even dared to breathe. They could only watch as the terrifying bony figure came to a halt in front of Shitou. Its jawbones collided up and down, emitting a series of "click-clack, click-clack" sounds.
Skeleton: "Click-clack."
Shitou: "?"
Skeleton: "Click-clack, click-clack, click-clack."
Shitou: "..."
Perhaps this is the language of evil spirits, Shitou thought.
"Th-thank you, respected lord evil spirit."
Shitou forced himself to face his fear. Ignoring Widow Li, who was desperately tugging at him from behind, he bit the bullet and took a step forward.
No matter what, the evil spirit had heard his heart's plea and fulfilled his wish.
Now, he needed to fulfill his promise and offer up his soul.
Chen Zhou watched this scene through the Bone Ghost Servant's vision, his brow furrowing deeper.
It seemed the Bone Ghost Servant was a low-tier unit and had no capacity for speech at all.
He immediately switched tactics, commanding the Bone Ghost Servant to squat down and use its finger bones to write on the mud, stroke by stroke: "Who are you? Where is this?"
Shitou stared intently at the skeleton's movements, watching the strange symbols take shape on the ground.
Meeting the skeleton’s hollow eye sockets, a sudden realization struck Shitou.
This must be the contract script the evil spirit uses to take his soul!
He swallowed hard, his voice growing even softer. "Yes, please... please accept my lowly soul."
Chen Zhou: ???
What kind of nonsensical response was that?!
Do kids these days not feel embarrassed saying such chuunibyou, cringey things with a straight face??
This was like a conversation between two people on completely different servers.
Chen Zhou felt a phantom cringe, but he quickly guessed the truth: the kid was likely illiterate.
He scanned the patched coarse clothes on the refugees, the cracked straw sandals on their feet, and then Shitou’s emaciated appearance.
Chen Zhou surmised that this was likely an ancient world. The refugees' lives were probably harder than those in the apocalypse; it made sense that literacy rates would be low.
Combined with the system's previous prompts, Chen Zhou quickly piece together his situation.
With immortals, demons, buddhas, fiends, ghosts, and monsters, this was a classic high-magic ancient plane. The danger level was off the charts.
He let out a soft sigh and commanded the Bone Ghost Servant to lift its skeletal palm, gently patting Shitou’s hair, which felt like tangled straw.
His killing intent vanished completely.
He didn't consider himself a good person, but he wasn't so wicked as to slaughter the innocent for no reason.
In the apocalypse, people who were too good or too bad didn't last long.
Besides, these people had so little flesh-and-blood energy that it was better to just let them go.
This was Chen Zhou’s first time acting as an evil spirit. He still felt a bit of psychological resistance toward raising his blade against innocent members of his own race without hesitation.
After patting the boy’s head, Chen Zhou had the Bone Ghost Servant pick up the giant snake’s corpse and walk back to the Bone Altar, then he deactivated the Ghost Domain.
To Chen Zhou, this was merely a minor interlude. He needed to return to the Ghost Domain to see what kind of lottery draw he would get from the sacrifice.
Shitou watched as the skeletal hand that had crushed the snake demon’s head descended, resting gently on his crown.
A frigid aura wrapped in a strange chill washed over him.
Behind him came Widow Li’s muffled sobs, and the other refugees closed their eyes in despair.
Yet, he felt no fear; instead, a strange sense of peace washed over him.
Am I about to die?
He had heard people in the city say that immortals also liked to take the souls of mortals and bring them to the Celestial Realm to enjoy eternal bliss.
If he left with the evil spirit, where would he go?
To the Underworld, or perhaps Hell?
Would the evil spirit spare his mother?
Shitou’s mind wandered aimlessly. Then, he saw the skeleton lower its arm, turn around to hoist the snake demon, and vanish in a flurry of shimmering light.
The moment the skeleton disappeared.
"Shitou! My Shitou!"
Widow Li rushed forward like a madwoman, clutching her son in a death grip.
She cursed the heavens for their injustice and the world for its despair like a common shrew, all while her tears flowed uncontrollably.
She hated the unfairness of this era, the hopelessness of the world, and the man-eating demons. But most of all, she hated her own weakness and inability to protect her child.
Shitou was nearly suffocated by his mother’s embrace, but his mind remained in a daze.
The lord evil spirit... saved everyone and didn't kill me?
I already offered my soul. Did the lord evil spirit accept it?
He must have.
He touched the top of his head, feeling as though he could still sense that chilling yet oddly comforting power.
From now on, do I belong to the lord evil spirit...?
Chen Zhou returned to his Ghost Domain.
He commanded the Bone Ghost Servant and the Netherflame Ghost Servant to dismantle the giant snake's corpse together.
From the blood, he extracted a total of 1 unit of essence blood and 8 units of common blood.
From the flesh, he dismantled 12 units of common flesh.
The soul triggered the enslaved ghost effect, forming a massive spiritual python. Its gaze was dull and its body stiff; it wasn't even as strong as it had been when it was alive.
"Useless. It's so weak and it takes up a servant slot."
Chen Zhou directly had the Netherflame dismantle the snake's enslaved ghost, obtaining 9 units of common soul.
The snake skeleton was only one unit. He could choose to break it down into common bone material, yielding about 11 units, or he could keep the skeleton intact.
After a moment's thought, Chen Zhou chose to keep it.
He wanted to try summoning a new servant using the snake skeleton and the essence blood.
【Bone Summoning initiated... Materials detected: Intact Snake Skeleton x 1, Snake Demon Essence Blood x 1... Summoning successful!】
A faint light glowed from the altar in the center of the Ghost Domain.
The massive snake skeleton and the crimson essence blood fused in the air. The previously crushed skull slowly mended itself, and two clusters of ghostly blue soul fire suddenly ignited in the eye sockets.
The skeletal snake body writhed gently, its bony spikes glinting coldly under the moonlight. In the blink of an eye, a Bone Snake servant was fully revived.
The Bone Snake circled the altar twice as if acclimating to its new body.
Then, it slowly lowered its massive head before Chen Zhou in a posture of total submission.
"That's actually pretty cool,"
Chen Zhou remarked in admiration.
Rate on N.U.
