Time: midnight.
The night was as dark as ink, splashed across the abandoned construction site on the outskirts of Lincheng.
Wind swept through the barren, open wasteland, lifting the black cloak draped over Lin Xincheng’s shoulders and making it rustle loudly.
Several gaunt figures closed in from all directions, trapping the two in the center.
Guttural, meaningless roars rolled from their throats. Their faces were ashen gray, as if they had just crawled out of graves. Their clothes were tattered and torn.
Identical to the things that had attacked Bai Fan earlier.
Blood slaves.
Ruan Mingxi raised her hand to tuck her wind-tousled wine-red hair behind her ear and sighed.
“Senior Brother, looks like our luck isn’t so good.”
The young man did not respond. His hand hung at his side, fingertips lightly touching the scabbard of the black longsword.
The scabbard gave off a dull luster, wrapped in several circles of black chain that were firmly fastened at the scabbard’s opening.
As if sealing something inside.
“No,” Lin Xincheng said. “On the contrary, we’re very lucky.”
“Why?”
“They came to us, saving me the trouble of searching.”
“Such a pragmatic senior brother,” Ruan Mingxi said loudly. “But with so many blood slaves, I’m scared.”
“Hm?”
“I only sublimated to the first stage a few days ago. What if they scratch my face? Would you bear to see such a blossoming young lady left with scars?”
Lin Xincheng raised an eyebrow. “On any other day, if you said something like that, I’d leave you here alone.”
Ruan Mingxi immediately smiled.
She knew this senior brother too well—there was always a “but” after such words.
Sure enough.
“But today I don’t want to waste time, so you won’t need to do anything.”
“Hehe.” Ruan Mingxi stepped back three paces, just behind him. “I knew senior brother was the most reliable.”
Her gaze fell on the black blade. Its true form had always been a mystery in the academy.
No one had ever seen Lin Xincheng truly draw his blade. Even against the most troublesome enemies, he only used the scabbard.
It was as if the sword’s purpose was to remain forever sheathed.
“Hsss—” The blood slaves closed in.
Their eyes burned with undisguised thirst—a craving for blood, a hunger for living flesh.
Lin Xincheng quietly looked at those eyes.
After a moment, he lowered his eyelids, a faint trace of pity flickering in his gaze.
‘Already at the terminal stage of Blood Thirst Syndrome. There’s no turning back.’
He raised the sheathed black blade and held it horizontally before him.
“If you still have a shred of consciousness, take a step back, and I will contact the Spirit Research Institute to treat you.”
In response, a blood-red figure lunged at him, accompanied by a stench-laden wind.
Lin Xincheng was silent for a moment. The sigh in his heart was ultimately left unvoiced.
He slowly closed his eyes as the wind whisked past his ears.
“May we meet again in a world of clarity.”
The next second, he struck.
Ruan Mingxi instantly pushed her Perception to its limit.
‘She had always been curious—what would it look like when the renowned Senior Brother Xincheng of the academy actually drew his blade?’
In the world of Perception, time seemed to be infinitely slowed, every movement dissected.
Yet even so, she still couldn’t see clearly.
‘Too fast. Too fast for perception to capture.’
She could only catch a few fragmented images: pressing the blade, bending forward, assuming stance.
Then—
The wind stopped. The cloak draped over his shoulders hovered in midair, as if briefly frozen by some force.
Then, it fell again.
Lin Xincheng had already returned to his original position. The black blade was back at his waist, the chains still there, the sword still in its scabbard, as if it had never moved.
Thud, thud, thud.
Several muffled impacts sounded almost simultaneously, and a few blood slaves crashed to the ground.
Ruan Mingxi’s pupils contracted slightly.
‘Rumors were just rumors. Only by seeing it firsthand could one know how exaggerated it actually was.’
The blood slaves lay on the ground convulsing. Their central nervous systems had been completely destroyed in an instant. They couldn’t even let out a scream.
Lin Xincheng walked forward slowly, gently tapping the scabbard on the back of each blood slave’s head.
His movements were light, as if knocking on a door.
Knock.
The final struggles ceased, and the surroundings fell silent again.
Lin Xincheng stood there, looking down at the bodies, silent for a few seconds.
“Clap, clap, clap!” Applause suddenly rang out. Ruan Mingxi clapped at his back. “As expected of Senior Brother Xincheng, you took them down effortlessly.”
Lin Xincheng did not respond. The moonlight split his profile into light and dark halves.
After a moment, he opened his eyes again. “Contact the Public Security Bureau to handle the aftermath. Notify the families to identify the bodies. Classify the cause of death as an accident. Also, cremate them all.”
“Roger, Captain Xincheng.” Ruan Mingxi rarely dropped her playful demeanor.
She sensed that the aura around her senior brother had changed.
It wasn’t killing intent—that had dissipated the moment he struck.
At this moment, he just stood there, gazing at the corpses, as if looking at something far more distant.
Ruan Mingxi couldn’t help but think, ‘Is he grieving? Because these monsters were once human.’
The thought had just surfaced when she laughed at herself.
‘In the academy, who didn’t know Lin Xincheng’s nickname?’
He seemed to regard everyone with the same temperature—not a degree more, not a degree less.
“Mingxi.” The voice suddenly came, pulling her back to reality. “The matter I asked you to investigate at the district hospitals—how is the progress? The suspected cases showing symptoms of live food cravings, sleep talking, emaciation, and nocturnal behavior.”
Ruan Mingxi immediately became serious. “Time is tight, and the investigation volume is large. Currently, only about half is done, but several dozen suspected patients have been sent to the Central Hospital.”
“Let’s go there first.”
“Huh?” Ruan Mingxi was taken aback. “Weren’t you planning to look for that truck driver, Senior Brother?”
“No need.”
“Why?”
Lin Xincheng turned around. “There’s a mole in the Public Security Bureau.”
Ruan Mingxi instantly understood.
‘No wonder they were ambushed shortly after leaving the stronghold.’
‘It wasn’t just a coincidence. Someone had been watching them in secret.’
Lin Xincheng paused for a moment, then added, “Also, compared to the hiding aberrants, potential victims deserve priority attention.”
Ruan Mingxi was slightly stunned.
“Let’s go.” Lin Xincheng had already started walking, his black cloak fluttering in the night wind.
Ruan Mingxi quickly followed.
The ruins behind them fell silent once more, only the wind passing through the empty worksite.
—
Lin City Central Hospital.
When they pushed open the door to the admitting ward, a stifling air hit them.
The ward was packed with people.
The patients on the beds were all emaciated without exception, with sunken eyes and skin clinging to bone.
It seemed something was slowly siphoning life from within their bodies.
A doctor was sweating profusely as he moved between the beds, the back of his white coat already soaked through.
The expression on his face was like someone desperately bailing water from a leaking boat, knowing it was still sinking yet unable to stop.
More than a ward, this place was like a sinking ship.
Blood Thirst Syndrome was no ordinary disease—it was a plague spread by Blood Descendant Sublimators, a blood plague.
A twisted form of Spiritual Essence took root in human blood, spreading through the blood vessels and eventually devouring a person from the inside out.
Ordinary doctors couldn’t treat this. Only Purification Spirit Doctors, physicians of the Sublimator world, could stand here.
And the expression of the Purification Spirit Doctor before them already indicated that the situation was not optimistic.
“How is it, Doctor?” Lin Xincheng asked. “Among the patients sent here, how many have Blood Thirst Syndrome?”
The doctor took off his gloves, wiped his sweat, and lowered his voice. “Not good. Currently, twenty-six have been sent in. Twenty-two are confirmed. The remaining four are still under observation, but they likely are too.”
“What’s the ratio by stage?”
“Twelve in the early stage, six in the middle stage, and the remaining four have reached the mid-to-late stage.”
The doctor paused. “If it progresses to the late stage… there’s no way. You know that. At that stage, even gods can’t save them.”
Lin Xincheng slowly furrowed his brows.
‘This number was even more severe than he had anticipated: twenty-six people, twenty-two confirmed, and already mid-to-late stage cases.’
His mind quickly visualized the timeline, spread range, infection numbers, and known case trajectories.
These scattered pieces of information were constantly reorganizing, like a chessboard that had been disrupted.
“Why are there still so many patients? Hasn’t the serum for the Blood Plague been delivered?”
“It was delivered.” The doctor was silent for a moment, then said in a low voice. “But this time, the blood poison is different from before. The serum transferred from Xiang City… is almost useless.”
The ward suddenly went quiet, as if even the air had grown heavier.
‘Different. The serum is ineffective. This means the situation has gone beyond the scope of ordinary blood plague incidents.’
‘It wasn’t an infection made on a whim by some Blood Descendant, nor an accidental leak.’
‘Someone was creating a new kind of blood poison, and had already begun experimenting on humans.’
‘What exactly had infiltrated Lin City? What did they want to do?’
Just then, the sound of urgent footsteps came from outside.
A nurse rushed into the ward, gasping for breath. The expression on her face was more complicated than mere panic—as if she had seen something completely beyond comprehension.
“Doctor, it’s bad! A girl carrying a dog has broken in!”
The doctor frowned. “Wasn’t notification already sent out tonight? We’re not accepting other patients during the lockdown. We’re focusing on the blood plague here—”
“But she’s covered in blood!” the nurse interrupted hurriedly. “And she’s carrying a dog. She forced her way in from outside the lockdown zone, shouting for us to save it.”
‘A girl, covered in blood, carrying a dog, and breaking through the lockdown zone.’
Lin Xincheng’s gaze sharpened slightly.
‘When he came in, he had seen the outer deployment. The Public Security Bureau had set up a lockdown line. An ordinary person couldn’t get in at all, let alone break through all the way to the hospital while carrying a dog.’
‘This is definitely not an ordinary person.’
‘Could this be a new lead?’
He said, “Take me to see.”
The ward door was pushed open.
Moonlight fell upon them.
The girl stood in the center of the courtyard. Her snow-white hair fell over her shoulders, and her blue eyes were calm and clear.
Like a piece of sky fallen from some clean world.
She was covered in bloodstains, some already dried into dark brown. Her clothes were badly torn, but she still held tightly to the unconscious yellow dog in her arms.
Surrounded by police, nurses, and staff who had rushed over upon hearing the news.
She didn’t speak. She just raised her head, her gaze slowly sweeping over the unfamiliar faces.
Finally, those blue eyes landed on Lin Xincheng.
They stopped.
She bit her lip slightly, as if she had finally found someone she could ask for help.
“Can you help me?”