Chapter 360 Lack of Morality?

It seemed that due to everything going too smoothly previously, Xia Xinyan had become a bit complacent.

Although she always stated the need to be cautious, she couldn’t deny that seeing Ling Mo grow stronger made her think, “As long as Ling Mo is here, everything can be solved,” a thought that bordered on dependence, though she didn’t want to admit it.

And it was this time that the problem arose.

The surrounding space once again changed, their location shifting from the village’s concrete road to the muddy fields. As the spatial distortion faded, the ground felt soft beneath their feet, creating a bizarre sensation for everyone.

Fortunately, this time they weren’t teleported apart nor replaced by branches.

Except for that one monster that turned into a heap of dead pigs.

Until the surroundings completely transformed, the group turned back to look towards the direction of the village, only to find the village, once illuminated by flashlight beams, now fell into silence. Except for the flashlights still glowing in their hands, the only remaining light came from the center of the village.

Ling Mo tried flashing his flashlight towards that light but received no response at all; even the angle of that light remained unchanged. Calling over the intercom brought no replies from others, as if their group was the only one left in the village at that moment.

Several of the more timid members instinctively huddled together, and one dude from the Chicks couldn’t help but shiver, saying, “This… this place won’t have ghosts, right?”

Everyone had agreed when entering that they would report any abnormalities immediately. Yet now, apart from this monster, there had been no reports, and everyone else was missing.

The only explanation being those people had been attacked or even killed before they could report… or rather, the last guy who realized something was off had only managed to warn them before something attacked him too.

You have to understand, whether from the Ability Bureau or the Chicks, those people selected for this mission were not exactly top-tier, but they could definitely be called experts. This even included the two heads of the Ability Bureau, Lin Nan and Morning Light, all of whom vanished without a sound. Just thinking about it was enough to tell it was definitely abnormal, right?

Judging from these eerie circumstances, if there really were ghosts here, they wouldn’t be surprised at all.

Just scared.

After all, this was reality, not the Dark Zone, nor a Dungeon—if ghosts appeared in reality, it would mean that this world had fundamentally changed, right?

If it were just demons and beasts, that could still be explained as a game invading reality… After all, up to now, only those two types had been showing up.

The fat guy was now covered in goosebumps, yet managed to argue, “Stop thinking of all this weird stuff. How could there be ghosts in reality? It’s probably just some dog crap trying to play tricks—damn it, if you have the guts, come face to face with me! You think you can scare me? Pfft, you’d need a thousand to eighteen hundred more years for that!”

Xia Xinyan pondered for a moment and looked at Bai Yu: “Did the reconnaissance bees you released find anything?”

Bai Yu paused, shaking his head, “No… In fact, most of the mechanical bees I released lost contact with me during that spatial distortion. I sent out more later, but they found nothing.”

Nodding as if in thought, Xia Xinyan turned and headed towards the village’s light source: “Let’s go check out that light… right now, it seems we’ll just have to wait for them to come to us.”

Even though she knew what might be happening in that village and what might exist, the fact that they were in the dark meant that knowing any more wouldn’t help; it was frustrating.

But since the beings in the village had already acted against everyone else, there was no reason they would spare her group. So, all they needed to do was wait for the others to show up and follow the trail.

She wasn’t worried they’d get themselves in trouble here… after all, she had mentioned her and Ling Mo’s strength previously, not to mention that they had the fat guy and the others. If even they could fail here, then no one would be able to deal with this incident.

Most importantly, they had Monica as their trump card; as long as they were in danger, Monica would definitely come to their rescue.

But… speaking of which, she probably should have brought Monica along too.

If that gal were here, she ought to be able to assess the situation in the village.

And Xiao Bai—Monica had already brought her into reality, but she still remained with her daily for research, as if digging into a treasure trove—actually, she really was digging into a treasure trove. Recently, Xia Xinyan had heard that Monica seemed to have found quite a few potential buyers interested in Xiao Bai’s species data.

Cough, getting sidetracked.

Actually, it shouldn’t be too hard to call Monica over, considering that gal’s capabilities. Contacting her shouldn’t be a problem. However, there were outsiders here, and drawing attention to Monica might cause unnecessary trouble.

Xia Xinyan suddenly felt like separating their actions.

But she also realized that splitting up now would invite opportunities for whatever lurked in the dark. While she wanted those beings to show themselves, she didn’t want to do it in such an extreme way.

Better to take things slow.

As the group cautiously reached the source of light in the village, they discovered the light came from a flashlight that had fallen in the middle of the road. There were no signs of any other people or traces of a struggle nearby, as if those people had willingly discarded their flashlight here.

Ling Mo picked up the flashlight, took a look, and then dispelled the light: “They were either controlled or suddenly lost their ability to resist—but I think the latter is unlikely; everyone who came with us is strong. There’s no reason they couldn’t put up a fight when faced with an enemy.”

“Or they were shifted to another place by the space,” Xia Xinyan interjected, “the villagers here must have been moved in the same way… We need to find out where that place is, and fast.”

“The problem is how do we find it?” The fat guy shrugged, looking around, “This is so damn eerie… so many people mysteriously vanished, and we don’t even know what attacked us.”

Bai Yu thought for two seconds and asked, “Should we turn off the stream? There are quite a few viewers worried we might run into trouble.”

However, before he could finish, they were suddenly approached by someone coming out from the darkness ahead… no, it couldn’t be called a person anymore—he wore a man’s pajamas, but his body was covered in red lumps that gave one goosebumps just looking at them.

He stared at the group for a moment and then suddenly opened his mouth, blurting out incoherently, “In the dead of night… shining that bright flashlight… lack of morality, huh?”