Chapter 1354: Collapse

Xuanyu Domain.

Sand and dust flew. A vast number of Calamities crashed into the edge of the domain like a tidal wave. Numerous figures rushed onto the battlefield one after another from the rear, their Divine Path skills smashing crazily into the Calamity wave. Looking down from the sky, a clear blood-red boundary spread between the two sides...

"Damn it, wave after wave, do they really not know what fatigue is?!" an Esoteric Sect member roared, his eyes bloodshot.

"The southeast side can't hold on much longer, send reinforcements quickly!"

"Understood!"

Several figures immediately broke away from the battlefield, preparing to move toward the southeast. But the next moment, a few Jackal Calamities dropped lightly from the air, their pairs of reddish eyes staring fixedly at the group, as if filled with hatred.

As the high-ranking jackal leading them opened its blood-stained maw, a sharp, piercing howl erupted instantly!

*Whoosh—!*

The moment the howl rang out, the pupils of the Esoteric Sect members at the front shrank violently. Before they could even react, the skin on their bodies was instantly ripped away as if it were clothing, leaving behind only shocking, raw, bloody skeletons that stumbled forward and collapsed.

Even so, they did not die immediately. The agony of having their skin stripped away crazily stimulated their senses, and the excruciating pain made them shriek hysterically!

The blood-covered figures twisted and shrieked. This hair-raising scene constantly assaulted the minds of the surrounding Esoteric Sect members...

Even though they had seen this scene many times on the battlefield, every time they witnessed it, they were still filled with terror.

"Fall back!! Fall back!!"

"Didn't we say to let the puppets go first?! The puppets don't have skin; let them take the lead!"

"After so many days of attrition, we're running out of puppets. Even though logistics is working day and night to rush production, it still can't keep up with the rate of consumption, Captain!"

"Damn it..."

"Our high-tier combat power is still not enough... Where is General Jian? When is General Jian coming back??"

"I don't know, there's still no news of him..."

"Quick, do everything in your power to find him!!"

As they were speaking, Huai Mang descended from the sky, landing straight into the pack of Jackal Calamities.

"Slash." Huai Mang’s robes fluttered in the wind. A cold glint flashed in his eyes, and a sword shadow swept out, cleaving the nearby Calamities directly in two.

"You lot continue to hold this position. I’m going to support the southeast."

After tossing out those words indifferently, Huai Mang flew off again, cutting through the surging tide of Calamities and heading straight for the other side of the defensive line.

Huai Mang's appearance undoubtedly greatly reduced the pressure on the Esoteric Sect members in the vicinity. Watching his retreating back, they all breathed a sigh of relief...

One young member stepped forward cautiously. Seeing the corpses of his comrades stripped of their skin, their bloody flesh exposed to the air, his throat bobbed, and he ran to the side to dry-heave:

"These Calamities... what on earth are they?"

……

The bright red theatrical robes moved slowly along the twisted ruins of the city.

On the building debris around him, a massive black-and-red centipede moved bit by bit, keeping pace with him. The man and the insect explored the depths of the city amidst the ash that fell like snowflakes. Aside from the rustling sound of Wu Yi’s centipede legs crawling, there was absolute, deathly silence.

Walking this whole way, Chen Ling hadn't seen a single human, not even a corpse... Everywhere he looked, there were only the material remains left behind by human civilization.

Buried high-rises, shattered roads, abandoned vehicles, tangled wires...

The only thing related to "people" might be the scattered pieces of clothing.

After a moment of hesitation, Chen Ling bent down and picked up a woman's fur coat from the roadside. Beside it was a small backpack; it looked exquisite and elegant, likely from some expensive luxury brand.

"Are the people of this world so fond of wearing fur?"

Chen Ling muttered to himself.

Along the way, seventy percent of the clothes Chen Ling saw were fur, and of quite high quality at that—deer skin, mink, and even many animal fabrics Chen Ling couldn't identify. They might even be the pelts of rare animals...

Of course, "rare" was only relative to the world Chen Ling came from. Perhaps in this parallel world, those animals were plentiful.

Chen Ling even guessed that the clothing in this world was primarily fur because the climate was extreme and textile technology wasn't advanced; synthetic fabrics might actually be more expensive here.

The deeper he explored, the more Chen Ling felt that while this place was very similar to the Earth he knew, the technological direction and cultural background were vastly different. Clothing was just one aspect of it.

"...Hm?"

Chen Ling suddenly stopped and frowned slightly. "Wu Yi, did you hear something?"

The black-and-red centipede coiled on the roof of a landmark building nearby also seemed to sense something. Its massive body instantly tensed. Almost simultaneously, the gray ground that buried most of the building beneath it began to vibrate violently!

The dust floating in the air seemed to be caught in some kind of gravitational pull, swirling toward the area beneath Wu Yi, followed by the rubble scattered on the ground...

Immediately after, the fur coat in Chen Ling's hand floated upward, as if someone were pulling the other side of the garment, trying to drag it away!

"Something's wrong!" Chen Ling felt the gravity acting upon him changing and shouted immediately,

"Run!!"

Before Chen Ling could finish, Wu Yi had already leaped from the building. The next moment, the space-time deep within the earth seemed to begin collapsing. A giant black hole shadow slowly rotated, and all the surrounding matter was swept toward it at an astonishing speed, like water draining from a pool when the plug is pulled!

Rubble, clothes, street lamps, signs, vehicles, buildings... even space-time itself was visibly distorted. A terrifying suction force coiled around Chen Ling and Wu Yi, forcibly dragging them toward the black hole!

Wu Yi's hissing sounded repeatedly. Relying on its massive body and Eighth-Order strength, it could only barely resist the collapsing space-time. Its countless centipede legs paddled rapidly in the void, like a spaceship struggling before a black hole, its power pushed to the limit.

As for Chen Ling, he was nearly pulled directly into the black hole by the collapsing space-time. Fortunately, the moment his body lifted off the ground, his theatrical robes shifted from red to black. Strands of hair danced in the air, and a terrifying aura of world-destruction broke free from the shackles of gravity, allowing him to forcibly step through the air and blink away!

"What kind of hellhole is this?!" the black-robed Chen Ling growled angrily.

The deathly silent gray-white snow was shredded by the vortex, constantly converging toward the center. All matter within a radius of several kilometers flew toward it, and even the ground was ripped up. Within a short dozen seconds, the originally cluttered city ruins were sucked into a vacuum zone where nothing remained.