Chapter 1 The Beginning

Silver Yao’s back showed mottled black patches, the size of a palm, as if splashed with ink.

This was identical to the blue-uniformed employee he'd seen in the monkey enclosure, except that the blue uniform's black patches had already spread to cover the entire back.

Silver Yao had only just started to develop them, and they hadn’t yet spread.

However, even as Zhang Yuanqing observed, the palm-sized mark silently spread, expanding to twice its size.

"What's wrong?" Silver Yao warily raised her megaphone. "You're looking at me like I'm terminally ill."

"You're not terminally ill, but you're about to be done for," the Zhisha Palace Master pointed out. "Your back is black."

Silver Yao was taken aback, then seemed to realize something. Her head "clicked" as she twisted it around to look at her back.

She snapped her head back around and grabbed Zhang Yuanqing's sleeve, the megaphone emitting urgent sounds:

"Quick, let Blood Rose replace me!"

How cowardly, Princess! Zhang Yuanqing nodded with a solemn expression:

"I will, but I think both you and Blood Rose can still be saved. Hmm, do you feel anything wrong?"

Silver Yao shook her head. "My body and soul feel perfectly normal."

"Just because you don't feel anything doesn't mean there's nothing wrong," the Zhisha Palace Master said, circling Silver Yao, her red skirt trailing on the ground.

Strangely, even though she was running around the zoo in her skirt, it didn't seem to get dirty.

The skirt seemed to have a dust-repelling effect.

After circling once, the Zhisha Palace Master said:

"There must be some kind of contamination in the zoo. People who are contaminated will turn black and become some kind of monster, like the black-clothed employees, like Wang Mingming.

"The fact that you don't feel anything unusual is the most unusual thing of all. Wang Mingming also thought he was perfectly normal. The blue-uniformed employee in the monkey enclosure didn't seem to think he was contaminated either."

Zhang Yuanqing's heart skipped a beat, recalling rule number eight of the employee handbook:

Please remember that pandas are soft, cute, and innocent animals. If they are not, please loudly recite your name while facing your employee badge.

"Silver Yao, your name, loudly recite your name!" he urged in a low voice.

The words seemed to trigger a switch. Silver Yao's scarlet eyes suddenly became dull, and she murmured:

"My name... I... I can't remember..."

In that instant, Zhang Yuanqing noticed that the black mark on her back was spreading rapidly, like ink, quickly taking over half of her spine.

The corruption is accelerating? Zhang Yuanqing's heart sank. Both palms glowed with a pure, domineering, light-golden light, pressing against Silver Yao's back.

The spread of the "ink" was visibly suppressed.

Silver Yao's red eyes remained dull as she murmured:

"My name, I don't remember my name..."

The Zhisha Palace Master's eyes shimmered with an illusory light as she walked in front of Silver Yao and looked into her eyes, causing her own red pupils to light up with the same illusory light.

Hypnosis!

"You are Silver Yao, you are Silver Yao..."

The Zhisha Palace Master repeated the words over and over, her voice gentle and filled with a reassuring power.

But it was no use.

Silver Yao continued to mutter dreamily, unable to find herself, and the ink on her back, after being briefly suppressed, began to fight back madly. "Chi chi" sounds came continuously, and wisps of black smoke billowed.

Zhang Yuanqing felt as though his hands were chicken feet plunged into a vat of hot oil. The evil, corrupt power was offsetting the power of the Sun God, attempting to corrupt him in turn.

The level of the corruption power was too high. His half-baked Sun God power couldn't suppress it. Once Silver Yao was completely "blackened," she would be done for.

"Hypnosis isn't working!" Zhang Yuanqing shouted, taking out a Po Sha Talisman (Evil-Slaying Talisman).

He didn't have many of those left.

The Zhisha Palace Master hesitated for a moment, then said, "Hypnosis doesn't seem to be effective, or perhaps I'm not saying her name correctly."

So Silver Yao is her title? She's actually a princess with a title... Zhang Yuanqing activated the Po Sha Talisman, briefly suppressing the ink's corruption.

But he was in a bind. Silver Yao had never revealed her name.

Who should he ask?

He might be able to find the princess's name in history, since she had a title. The erudite Xiahou Aotian and Li Chunfeng would definitely be able to find it out, but the zoo was blocking all information. This rule-based item could even block Star Gazing.

Even if a Beidou satellite phone worked, it wouldn't help.

"She's a Ming Dynasty princess, surnamed Zhu!" Zhang Yuanqing said to the Zhisha Palace Master.

He didn't know her full name, but he could try calling out her surname. If all else failed, he'd have to sacrifice Blood Rose.

The Zhisha Palace Master was extremely intelligent and immediately understood his intention, changing her tone: "You are Silver Yao, your surname is Zhu..."

A musician's voice possessed powerful magic. Combined with hypnosis, even a stone could be awakened.

Silver Yao's empty, dull eyes flickered with a spark of light, which vanished in an instant.

"You are Silver Yao, your surname is Zhu..."

With each repetition, the spark of light in her empty eyes continued to bloom, growing stronger and stronger.

"I... I am... Zhu Huiyao." Silver Yao's eyes suddenly burst with light, her scarlet pupils like two small light bulbs. She raised her megaphone, like a hot-blooded anime protagonist burning with cosmic energy:

"I am Zhu Huiyao!"

Zhang Yuanqing saw the black patches on her back "chi chi" as they released large amounts of black gas, dissipating into the night sky.

Your parents were truly gifted when it came to naming children. Her given name means "pig will bite," and her title is "lewd medicine." Zhang Yuanqing smiled in relief:

"Zhu Huiyao, don't shout so loudly, you'll attract the staff."

Silver Yao's body stiffened. She abruptly turned around and brought the megaphone close to Zhang Yuanqing's ear, correcting him:

"Zhu Huiyao, Zhu Huiyao, it's Zhu Huiyao!"

The Zhisha Palace Master next to them frowned deeply and said in an extremely cold tone:

"Are you two flirting?"

Silver Yao was very wary of her and immediately shut up.

The Zhisha Palace Master snorted coldly, vigilantly looking around. They were located between the Panda Enclosure and the next enclosure, surrounded by large green plants, standing on a stone-paved path, with two public benches along the side.

She retracted her gaze, her tone serious:

"Something's not right. We're encountering dangers too frequently. If this was the norm, the zoo would be in chaos. The administrators would have to constantly replenish the staff and constantly put down those blackened employees.

"But the truth is, this item has been stable in Songhai for over twenty years."

Along the way, almost no enclosure had been safe. Right from the start, they had encountered a combination of rules, and then they had faced crises and been contaminated in the monkey and panda enclosures.

Zhang Yuanqing had noticed this detail long ago. He frowned and pondered for a moment, tentatively saying:

"Is it possible that the problem lies with us?"

The Zhisha Palace Master's eyes darkened as she nodded slightly. "That's what I mean. We're being targeted, possibly by the item spirit, possibly by something else."

"The item spirit is targeting us, deliberately making the anomalies in the zoo incredibly active, keeping us on edge?" Zhang Yuanqing fell into thought.

At that moment, Silver Yao raised her megaphone:

"I have a different opinion."

Zhang Yuanqing and the Zhisha Palace Master looked at her at the same time.

Silver Yao's mature, older-sister voice suddenly lowered:

"I've experienced the power of contamination, so I have the right to speak."

"Speak," Zhang Yuanqing and the Palace Master said in unison.

Silver Yao carefully chose her words: "Do you remember the rules of the monkey enclosure?"

Zhang Yuanqing replied, "The monkeys in the enclosure don't speak."

Silver Yao nodded, holding the megaphone:

"Just now, Yuan Shi Tianzun almost turned into a monkey, such a dangerous crisis, but no solution was given. The purpose of the employee handbook is to allow employees to do their jobs and fight against the anomalies, not to provide the anomalies with partners. So why isn't a solution written down?"

Without waiting for Zhang Yuanqing and the Zhisha Palace Master to answer, she continued:

"There's only one possibility: the power of contamination is slow, affecting the body and mind imperceptibly, but not directly lethal. The blue-uniformed employees would be unknowingly contaminated during their patrols, but as long as they were discovered and dealt with in time, there wouldn't be a problem.

"Only a few employees make mistakes during their patrols, failing to follow the employee handbook, which deepens the contamination and transforms them into black-clothed employees.

"But we just entered here, and we've never been contaminated before. Why did we skip the 'accumulation' stage and directly have an outbreak of contamination?"

Whether it was Yuan Shi Tianzun's transformation or her blackening, both were lethal.

This was clearly an explosion after the contamination had reached its limit, which was very unreasonable.

Hearing this, Zhang Yuanqing finally made a judgment: "Unless we've already been unknowingly contaminated."

After speaking, the three fell silent, reviewing all the details after entering the zoo. When exactly had they been contaminated?

Zhang Yuanqing's thoughts weren't pure enough. He only thought for less than ten seconds before giving up on getting to the bottom of things. His main mission was to save the Devil's Eye, and he was under the greatest pressure, unable to think single-mindedly.

"Let's not..."

Just as he was about to say, "Let's not think about it for now, saving the Devil's Eye is more important," he saw the Zhisha Palace Master's beautiful eyes under her mask light up:

"We've overlooked a detail.

"There's a problem with Wang Mingming's notes. The door to the dorm room was locked, and Wang Mingming couldn't return to his own dorm room, so he went to knock on the windows of the other dorm rooms, causing the employees in the dorms to die one by one.

"But in the notes we saw, it was clearly recorded that people disappeared every night. Is this a contradiction?"

Zhang Yuanqing felt a chill in his heart. He couldn't enter the dorm room, so he "killed" people. Then, the notebook shouldn't have contained records of who wrote each disappearance note.

Damn it, he thought the dorm room plot was over, but he didn't expect it to be waiting for him here.

Zhang Yuanqing looked at his two female companions. They were also looking at Zhang Yuanqing.

In the silent silence, Zhang Yuanqing, as the core of the group, said:

"This might be a curse, a very high-level curse, but I should be fine now. The Palace Master hasn't encountered any misfortune yet, probably because your level is high enough to withstand the curse's erosion. As for the Princess..."

He didn't dare say that Silver Yao had eliminated all hidden dangers, even though she had just received the Po Sha Talisman's cleansing.

After all, the curse could affect him, who possessed the power of the Sun God, which meant that the Po Sha Talisman couldn't handle it unless a Night Wanderer took action.

"Why do I feel even weaker after my cultivation level has increased!" Silver Yao complained to her master.

I'll try not to get involved in battles at the Overlord level in the future, Zhang Yuanqing muttered in his heart. "Time is running out, let's continue moving forward."

The team ran along the winding scenic path. Two or three minutes later, a man-made lake appeared in front of them.

The surface of the water was dark and calm, covered in a thin layer of mist. In the center of the lake grew a thick camphor tree, its branches forming a canopy, with vines hanging down like curtains.

Among the dense vines, there was vaguely a human-shaped silhouette with its head lowered.

The Devil's Eye Heavenly King!

Zhang Yuanqing was overjoyed and was about to rush to the lakeside when he ran out of the bushes and a glance out of the corner of his eye, suddenly spotted a strong, majestic white lion lying on the shore.

He slammed on the brakes!

"Hide, hide..."

He led the Palace Master and Silver Yao back into the bushes.

The three cautiously poked their heads out to examine the magnificent white lion.

It was lying lazily on the shore, squinting its eyes as if dozing off. The occasional flick of its tail indicated that it wasn't asleep.

"What's the White Lion's level?" The Zhisha Palace Master asked Zhang Yuanqing. If it was only level 7, she would force a kill.

"I'm not sure. I've never seen it attack. At first, I thought it was an outer guardian, but after reading the employee handbook, it's likely that this white lion is the strongest in the zoo. I even suspect that the Dog Elder might not be able to beat it," Zhang Yuanqing said in a low voice.

The Zhisha Palace Master was stunned for a moment, then thought about it and said, "If that's the case, then we'll have to lure it away."

Zhang Yuanqing nodded and suddenly said:

"Musicians are good at spreading sound. Is there any way to communicate with the Devil's Eye without disturbing the white lion? Like ultrasound or infrasound. This guy has been trapped in the zoo for months, he definitely knows more than we do."

"The Devil's Eye definitely can't hear the sounds that the white lion can't hear," the Palace Master rejected his wild idea. She tilted her head and thought for a moment, then said:

"But there is a way to contact the Devil's Eye without being discovered by the white lion."

ps: I'll post it now and fix any typos later.

(End of chapter)