The wind in the valley began to stir.
Yu Sheng didn't know what was happening, but he could distinctly feel that the "atmosphere" permeating the Exotic Realm was changing. It was hard to put into words; if he had to describe it, it was as though...
He felt the entire valley was gradually "coming to life."
The distant woods were awakening, the mountain ranges were awakening, the earth was awakening, and even the sky above was emanating a chilling, hunger-filled gaze that made one's scalp tingle.
He noticed that Hu Li beside him was trembling slightly, the demon fox girl clutched the food in her hands tightly, her face showing fear. She raised her head to look at the dark night sky above, then slowly moved her feet toward Yu Sheng, whispering something continuously. When she moved closer, Yu Sheng could finally hear the repeated words:
"When the Immortal dies, it's like this... When the Immortal dies, it's like this..."
"What's the situation now?" Erin asked quickly, the puppet also tensed up, hugging the kitchen knife in her arms tightly, "Do you know something?"
Yet, Hu Li did not answer her, appearing to have lapsed into a daze again, just repeating that same sentence.
Soon, both Erin and Yu Sheng were no longer able to pay attention to Hu Li's abnormal condition.
Yu Sheng felt that familiar presence nearby. In the corner of his eye, he saw a shape quickly forming in the shadow on the edge of the ruined temple. The grotesquely swollen layers of flesh seemed to be cut from various creatures, strange limbs growing out in layers from the meat, dozens of hungry eyes opening on the body of the creature, and sharp fangs and ripping orifices continually emerging between the eyes, emitting a murky growl.
The entity—Hunger, had finally appeared near its prey.
"Dammit!" Erin suddenly exclaimed, "This thing is so ugly!"
"Be careful, it might launch a sneak attack, the limbs on its body can transform, and it can suddenly grow tentacles and tails from inside," Yu Sheng immediately warned, then said to Hu Li beside him, "You just take care of yourself later, you've been deeply eroded by this creature, you can't fight it."
Hu Li's current state was very off. Even after the creature appeared, she still looked at the sky in panic, but upon hearing Yu Sheng's words, she numbly nodded, picking up the scattered food and retreating, but not daring to move too far away as if she feared something might happen to Yu Sheng.
"What's your plan for the fight?" Erin spoke in a low voice—not far away, the creature was still prowling, as if patiently waiting for something, which only made her feel more uneasy, "Don't tell me you plan to just rush up and fight it with your bare hands, you didn't even bring any weapon when you came, at least I'm still holding a kitchen knife."
Yu Sheng was well aware that he hadn't brought any weapons because he had tried before; most of the creature's body was harder than stone, even if he could chop off a small part of its softer flesh with an axe, the effect would be negligible, so he hadn't planned on bringing any "weapons" from the start— for an ordinary person who had never received any weapon combat training, even holding a kitchen knife, let alone a Dragon Slayer Sword, was more likely to hurt himself.
He had prepared another "lethal" means.
"Let's stick to the strategy we discussed at home, just control its movements with your silk threads," Yu Sheng quickly said, "I'll rush up and 'rip it open', keep an eye out, if I make a mistake, immediately take Hu Li and run, don't worry about me. Hu Li knows how to survive under that creature, and Hunger won't actively chase you…"
Erin paused: "Ah, then what?"
"After I resurrect, we'll regroup and try again, it has to die sometime."
"You damn idiot, always resorting to such brute force approaches, didn't we agree to try not to use 'resurrection' like a normal attack!"
"I am 'trying'," Yu Sheng quickly said, but soon frowned, feeling something was off with the creature not far away, "Why hasn't it attacked yet?"
Erin also had the same question: "It feels like it's deliberately stalling time, like it's waiting for something—does this thing already have a concept of 'strategy'?"
"Then we can't let it wait any longer," Yu Sheng immediately gritted his teeth, "Let's take the initiative!"
As his words ended, he proactively rushed toward the creature, and almost at the same time, Erin, who was sitting on his shoulder, swiftly flipped down from him and extended her right hand towards the creature— the moment she landed, her puppet's eyes turned pitch black, and a multitude of fine, eerie black spider silk spread out from her hands, expanding like a rapidly growing spider web, crazily spreading throughout the space!
All the "Spider Silk" avoided Yu Sheng's trajectory as he accelerated again through the expanding web of silk threads, his enhanced body nearly leaving an afterimage in the air as he lunged at the grotesque Blood Flesh Giant Beast!
The creature finally moved, facing the "prey's" proactive attack, it seemed somewhat stunned, yet quickly launched a counterattack, a fierce claw raised high from the giant beast's back, viciously smashing towards the path Yu Sheng was fiercely plunging through.
Just in that instant, Yu Sheng suddenly felt that strange... "premonition" again.
He sensed which part of the monster's muscle was contracting, felt its attacking desire and the true focus of its gaze at that moment. He seemed to foresee a tendril stretching from behind the claws, blocking every possible escape route he might have the next second...
Not sure if it was an illusion, he felt that this time his "premonition" was more accurate than before, even... he began to realize that it was not so-called "Spiritual Intuition".
Because he now truly possessed Spiritual Intuition, having experienced what it felt like, he found that what he "saw" and "felt" when predicting the monster's actions was nothing like Spiritual Intuition.
When he anticipated the monster's movements in advance, it was almost from a first-person perspective.
All thoughts flashed through in an instant, and Yu Sheng crossed the last few meters in the blink of an eye, just as the Blood Flesh Giant Beast's claw smashed down.
Yu Sheng didn't dodge; he saw from the corner of his eye the threads sprawling from behind him already intertwining in mid-air, and in the next moment, countless dark lines entangled the monster's limbs and pierced through its claws, tendrils, massive mouth like some kind of bone-piercing phantom...
Cold, numb, sluggish, as if even his thoughts were instantly penetrated leaving a thousand holes, and his soul wrapped in a chilling spider web...
A wave of negative feelings surged over him, and in an instant, Yu Sheng seemed to see a hallucination—he saw himself deeply trapped in a web, countless spider silks wrapping around him, even piercing through his limbs, and at the edge of the web, a shadow with blood-red eyes lurked in the dark, slowly crawling towards him with a bizarre and ferocious posture...
"Yu Sheng! Don't space out! I can't hold on much longer!"
The sudden shout by his ear jolted Yu Sheng awake, he looked up to see the Blood Flesh Giant Beast held in stasis at the center of the layers of black threads, with the ends of the threads taut, as if they would snap under the monster's struggle any second.
Without time to ponder the "hallucination" he just experienced, Yu Sheng charged toward a specific spot at the monster's side. Seizing the precious opportunity Erin had fought for, he grabbed the black thread hanging in mid-air with one hand, and with the other hand reached into the air, concentrating deeply before slowly pulling—
A door appeared, materializing out of thin air with a surface flowing with phantom-like light.
Opening a door from nowhere consumes more energy and time than opening a physical door. Yu Sheng had to focus in a relatively stable environment to complete the process, and seeing the monster's trembling limbs and the slowly cracking black spider silk, even just a few seconds felt as long as a lifetime to him.
—Although his "lifetime" hadn't been very long lately.
The next second, with the sound of the door opening, the door of fabrication finally swung wide open.
Larger than any door he had opened before, large enough to even throw the entire monster through.
Intense firelight burst forth from within the door, illuminating a large area around it.
On the other side of the door was a constantly churning lake of magma.
It was a "surprise" Yu Sheng had discovered during countless door-opening experiments before.
He didn't know what place it was, he only knew it was filled with endless lava and spouting flames, resembling a scene from hell.
The entity—Hunger is quite powerful, but its threat mostly comes from mental contamination and its inherent "Hunger" power almost akin to a rule; as for its physical "carrier"—compared with the rule, it isn't really that robust.
It can be roasted.
If it can't be fully roasted, then use an even greater fire.
"Throw it in!"
Yu Sheng shouted to Erin.
"Okay!"