Chapter 855 - 854: Alien Species Funeral Customs

Chapter 855: Chapter 854: Alien Species Funeral Customs

Although the process was pretty horrifying, at least Red finally stuffed her heart back into where it belonged. Once that lively (but non-beating) heart disappeared from the table, Yu Sheng’s gaze naturally fell onto the other "Moon Heart" that was wrapped in pale thorns.

"Next we should think about how to deal with this thing," he said, rubbing his chin. "It’s basically your kinsman’s ’remains’, so it’s not really appropriate for us to keep it... do you Vampires have any funeral customs or something?"

He asked while muttering inwardly, thinking that since this was someone’s clansman’s heart, then yeah, there was no way he could take it back and make soup with it...

He’d just finished that thought when he heard Red on the opposite side say: "We share out and eat the hearts of dead kinsmen."

The moment those words came out, the whole room went quiet. Hu Li’s two ears sprang upright with a ting, Erin, who was climbing up along Yu Sheng’s arm, slipped and smacked down onto the table, and even Baili Qing, who knew Red very well, widened her eyes a little and turned to look at her: "...You’ve never told me that before..."

"That’s normal, because I’m the only Vampire in this world," Red said calmly. "No one will ever bury me the Vampire way, and I’ll never have the chance to bury any of my kin."

Erin finally reacted at this point. She grabbed Yu Sheng’s arm, turned her head and stared wide-eyed: "Whoa, what the hell, isn’t that a bit too hardcore... you really eat it?"

"I don’t remember much about the past, but this part is very clear," Red nodded. "From our perspective, sharing out and eating a dead kinsman’s heart isn’t harm, it’s a form of continuation and blessing. The dead’s Protection and honor will be shared with others during that process, and the debts borne by their soul will also be offset in the same process. So..."

Red stopped there, then carefully picked up the "Moon Heart" from the table and looked up at the people on both sides.

"...Everyone want a piece?"

She paused after that and added, "Even though you’re not Vampires, a ritual is mainly about the process anyway..."

Erin sucked in a sharp breath, scrambling up onto Yu Sheng’s back with both hands and feet: "I’ll pass, I don’t eat things!"

Luna also uncharacteristically backed away half a step, her tone carrying a hint of resistance: "I also don’t need to eat."

Baili Qing stood up and headed straight out: "I just remembered I still have something to deal with at the logistics team..."

Baili Xue floated along behind her in midair: "I’m going too, I don’t have a mouth!"

Red closed her eyes, a serene smile still on her face, her "gaze" landing on Yu Sheng, who hadn’t spoken yet.

Yu Sheng held it in for two or three seconds, then curiously popped out a question: "...Are we eating it raw? Or cooked?"

Erin’s head almost snapped off with a crack, and she stared dumbfounded at Yu Sheng. Before she could say anything, she saw Hu Li next to him already take out the steamed buns to use as side dish...

"What kind of people am I even surrounded by," the Little Puppet muttered to herself, unconsciously looking toward the Star Sea Witch, who had been silent this whole time. "Sister Lucy, you... you actually took out a knife and fork?!"

"If you knew what the fish soup aboard the Lost Home was made of for a while," Lucrecia looked at the Little Puppet with a squinty smile, "your tolerance for food would be much higher."

Erin gaped for a long time, for the first time in her life truly grateful that everything below her throat was solid.

What happened next is not fit to describe. The Little Puppet, who witnessed the whole thing, vividly recalled the shock she felt the first time she saw Yu Sheng come back lugging a chunk of "Hunger" tentacle to stir-fry.

The good news is that in the end, Red did not choose to make soup out of that "Moon Heart". The bad news is that they grilled the damn thing...

...

An hour later, on a patch of open ground near the makeshift barracks, Yu Sheng and the others found Baili Qing watching several technicians fine-tune some equipment.

"Red says she’s heading to the Rift in a bit," Yu Sheng said casually. "We’re going with her to check out the situation."

"Mm." Baili Qing nodded. Her gaze passed over the forest canopy and toward the depths of the Forest Sea, her tone carrying a touch of gravity. "Just now, I received two more reports. Two instances of abnormal spatial structure briefly appeared in the forest—one of them was similar to what you saw before, presenting as a cluster of city buildings when observed from outside; the other was a gigantic pit that suddenly appeared in a clearing among the trees. Both abnormal spaces manifested near the Mirror Rift."

Yu Sheng immediately grew serious: "Did someone fall in again?!"

"No," Baili Qing shook her head. "After the first abnormal space appeared, the technicians adjusted the operating modes and scan bands of all the warning devices. We still haven’t fully grasped the patterns and early-warning signatures of these abnormal spaces, but at least this time the frontline Deep Dive Teams managed to avoid getting caught in the spatial lockdown."

Yu Sheng let out a slight breath of relief, then frowned: "You said they appeared briefly... those two abnormal spaces faded on their own?"

"That’s right," Baili Qing said. "The ’block’ lasted for 12 minutes, while the ’pit’ only remained in front of the Deep Diving Team Members for 32 seconds."

Yu Sheng blinked and turned to meet Hu Li’s eyes beside him.

"Savior, that ’district’ we ran into lasted for quite a long time. It only collapsed after you shot down that little moon on top of the lighthouse."

Yu Sheng frowned, thinking it over, then spoke thoughtfully after a moment: "...Could it be that the rule of these abnormal spaces is they only stay stable for a long time after trapping people inside, and if they don’t ’catch’ anyone they quickly disperse on their own?"

"That’s my guess too," Baili Qing said slowly, "it’s just that we’ve seen too few samples and don’t have enough intel, so it’s still hard to sum up the operating patterns of these abnormal spaces. But one thing does seem certain... The constant emergence of abnormal spaces means the ’Tree Angel’ that maintains this Forest Sea is being affected by the Dark Moon Royal Court, and that influence is getting stronger. If this keeps up, the Danger Level of exploration in the Forest Sea area will keep rising."

"Should we halt exploration activities for now?" Yu Sheng’s expression turned serious. "Or recall some of the Deep Dive Teams that are too close to the Rift zone?"

Baili Qing nodded slightly: "I’ve already recalled the teams that were operating near the Rift. As for whether we should continue exploration in the other areas... I’m indeed considering that.

"For now, a full pause looks like the safest option, but if we shrink straight back to the ’lobby’, we’ll lose control over all the zones where we’ve already dispersed the dense fog. Then if something unexpected happens in the far side of the forest, it’ll be very hard for us to notice and respond in time.

"Our current compromise is to have Tactical Walking Machines and low-altitude drones continue patrolling all areas. As for patrol and expansion missions along the fog boundary..."

Baili Qing paused slightly at that point, her gaze landing on Erin beside her.

She hesitated for a moment before speaking: "Without any humans accompanying them, can mass-produced Puppets handle that kind of mission alone?"

"Of course they can!" Before Yu Sheng could answer, Erin was already puffing out her chest proudly. "Without those big idiots blundering around, my mass-produced units are way more agile zipping through the forest, okay? Let me tell you, once my 18 battalions dive into the trees..."

"Ahem," Yu Sheng coughed twice beside her, speaking to Baili Qing, "Puppet squads acting independently are indeed no problem, but we have to clarify the limitations up front. They definitely can’t carry any bulky equipment, so forget about your radars and environmental monitoring stations and all that— I’ve seen what those Deep Dive Team Members have hanging off their Power Armor; a random tactical module on them could fit two Erins inside...

"Also, mass-produced Puppets don’t have high-level thinking ability. Without the mainframe directly controlling them, the range of tasks they can handle is pretty limited; they can’t process complex missions, and we have to keep that in mind. Of course, even with mainframe control they still drop the ball a lot of the time..."

While Yu Sheng was explaining this very seriously, the Little Puppet sitting on his shoulder slowly drifted into her own thoughts. Two or three seconds later she suddenly snapped back, grabbed Yu Sheng’s head and chomped down: "Yu Sheng, you bastard!"

"Let go! Let go! I’m just stating facts! When you’re doing rentals you have to explain the pros and cons of the product first..."

Erin: "Yeah and you damn well can’t just talk about the cons!"

Baili Qing watched this quietly from the side. Thankfully, they’d been working together for a long time now, so she was already used to it. Only after Erin had gnawed off a little tuft of hair from the back of Yu Sheng’s head did Baili Qing finally speak with a blank expression: "We’ve looked into all that, but it’s not a big problem. As long as they can carry basic comms and monitoring gear and operate in the forest, that’s enough. Either way, after receiving Blood Transfer, they can do more than drones ever could."

Yu Sheng bared his teeth and grunted in acknowledgment, then thought for a moment and looked at Erin, who was currently dangling from his hand: "Right, add another preset instruction for the mass-produced Puppets assigned to the forest area. If they lose contact, they immediately start recording visual data around them and transmit it straight back to command."

Erin nodded irritably: "Yeah yeah yeah, got it!"

Once they’d finished arranging things here, Yu Sheng took out his phone and checked the time.

It was already time for him and Red to head out to that Mirror Rift, just as they’d agreed.

...

Forty minutes later, above the forest region, beside that huge Mirror Rift.

The Flying Carpet controlled by Lucrecia hovered high in the air, maintaining a distance of several meters from the border of the Mirror Rift, while Red—wearing a white one-piece dress—was flying beside them. A pair of dark red, giant bat wings spread from her back, but the wings weren’t flapping; she was completely levitating in the sky through Magic Power alone.

Yu Sheng found this very fascinating and, from there, spun off a whole bunch of theories about the flight mechanics of Vampires—while also wondering, with such huge physical differences between them, how Red had actually taught Baili Qing to fly in the first place.

But after mulling it over for ages, in the end he still couldn’t bring himself to ask...

At that moment Red carefully inched closer, starting to try contacting the broken mirror surface along the edge of the Rift.

The Little Puppet sitting in the fox girl’s tail poked her head out, looked at the Rift, then at Red, like she was about to say something.

Yu Sheng noticed the little thing’s "about to speak" face, and cut in before she could open her mouth: "Don’t you dare say something unlucky like ’what if a health bar suddenly pops up over that big Rift?’!"

Erin: "I haven’t even said anything yet!"

Yu Sheng: "Like hell, if I let you say it out loud we’d be doomed! Did you forget the time the church suddenly stood up?"

Erin: "...Tch!"