The heavy double doors swung open in silence, revealing a thick, all-consuming pitch blackness within that swallowed anyone who gazed upon it. The exhibits inside were entirely invisible, shrouded in an ink-like density of dark.
“You’re the tour guide. Aren’t you coming in with us?”
Gu Xun jerked his chin toward the interior, signaling Ling Xiye to follow.
The darkness emanating from the exhibition hall felt remarkably unsettling, seeping a chilly draft outward.
Yu Jiu pulled his arms inward, crossing them over his exposed forearms as he instinctively shrank back by a tiny step.
Ling Xiye ignored Gu Xun’s provocation, behaving very much like an NPC at the moment.
“My only duty is to bring you to the exhibition hall. Visitors explore and tour the exhibition area freely.”
Gu Xun found himself rebuffed with no one to entertain him; arguing with an NPC naturally lacked the appeal of an unpredictable mission.
“Since that’s how it is, very well.”
The magician’s cane struck the carpeted floor with a muffled thump.
“Let’s go in.”
An arm loosely encircled Yu Jiu’s waist, maintaining a socially appropriate distance that was both polite and gentlemanly, yet brooked no argument as it guided him directly into the exhibition hall.
Ling Xiye watched it all happen, his habitually calm eyes frosting over like frozen rime.
Such intimate posture, yet Yu Jiu still wore that completely unguarded, innocent expression, they were undoubtedly well-acquainted.
Hah, he truly was a restless creature.
So there was a second financial backer.
The doors behind them slowly clicked shut, blocking the light in a seamless seal. After a few seconds of absolute darkness, lights flickered on overhead.
The stark white illumination characteristic of museum galleries lit up one display case after another.
With the aid of the lighting, Yu Jiu noticed that the exhibition hall was exceptionally spacious with very few display cases, and the overhead lamps failed to illuminate the entire area.
The darkness stretched and bled into the far reaches of the hall.
The objects inside the display cases were somewhat distant and indistinct, prompting Yu Jiu to step closer for a better look.
Inside a compact glass case rested a painting. The scroll was aged with yellowed edges, depicting a grand dragon at its center.
The dragon radiated majesty, its four claws suspended in mid-air as it stepped upon auspicious clouds, it was an exact match for the dragon carved upon the sacrificial altar they had stumbled into in the mountainside park!
Despite being a dragon imbued with divinity, Yu Jiu inexplicably sensed a chilling, bloody malevolence radiating from it.
It looked much like the aftermath of a massacre, leaving pools of fresh gore behind after human sacrifices were offered to the dragon god.
The display case’s lighting seemed to flicker for a fraction of a second. Just as Yu Jiu raised his head to check the situation, a dark shadow lunged at him with blinding speed.
Gu Xun moved with incredible agility. In a blur of motion, Yu Jiu found himself yanked behind the man’s back.
He didn’t even catch Gu Xun making a move; his field of vision captured only the silver arc left trailing by the swinging cane.
The cane was gripped in a reverse hold at an exceptionally tricky angle, striking heavily against the approaching monster.
Yu Jiu heard the monster grunt as it materialized out of the dark.
Its build was far broader and taller than a normal human’s, upper body bare with broad shoulders, a muscular chest, and large expanses of eerie tattoos covering its skin.
Long, disheveled hair hung down its back like a wild savage, and a black mask concealed its face, obscuring its features.
If one didn’t look closely, the monster differed very little from an ordinary person, until Yu Jiu spotted the tail trailing behind it.
It was an exceedingly long tail, shaped like a dragon’s tail and covered in a layer of silver scales that reflected a cold, metallic sheen under the gallery lights.
Coated in a layer of translucent slime, the entire tail gleamed wetly.
Unbidden, Yu Jiu recalled that fateful night when the monster had snatched him away, wrapping a slippery, tentacle-like appendage around his waist…
Probing beneath his clothes, lingering against the soft flesh of his waist, and leaving damp, clinging traces behind.
The sticky, uncomfortable sensation from that night still lingered in his memory, though Yu Jiu was reluctant to connect the vague, slippery tentacles with the dragon tail of the monster standing before him.
Surely it couldn’t be such a coincidence, talk about a narrow path for enemies.
“Oh.”
Gu Xun withdrew his cane, patted away a nonexistent speck of dust from his sleeve, and smiled as he addressed the monster. “Showing yourself so quickly. Could it be you couldn’t wait any longer?”
Whether the monster understood him was unclear, and Yu Jiu certainly didn’t grasp the meaning behind Gu Xun’s words, nor did he care to ponder deeply as the two instantly erupted into combat.
The speed and power of both combatants were evenly matched. Gu Xun discarded his gentlemanly, refined facade, infusing every single strike with ruthless aggression.
His cane moved so fast that only afterimages remained, while the monster primarily dodged and defended, launching no active attacks of its own.
Gu Xun’s expression gradually grew solemn. The monster’s target wasn’t him; every probing attack was merely a feint designed to break through his defenses and reach the person standing behind him.
The monster’s target was Yu Jiu.
He truly was a coveted prize, with both humans and monsters desperate to fight over a bite.
The monster proved sticky and hard to shake off, evidently intending to wear down his stamina.
Yet he wasn’t foolish enough to let himself be played by a mere beast.
Thud.
A dull, heavy impact echoed, followed by the tearing sound of flesh pierced by a cane.
When Yu Jiu raised his eyes once more, the monster had already surged right in front of him.
Its shoulder had been pierced clean through by the cane, leaving a terrifying wound deep enough to expose bone. Its blood was not red; instead, a vast pool of golden fluid welled from the injury.
At the cost of severing its own arm, the monster shattered Gu Xun’s offensive line and reached Yu Jiu.
From beginning to end, its sole objective had been Yu Jiu.
A powerful arm clamped around his waist. Reenacting the exact scene from that night, right before everyone’s eyes, Yu Jiu was carried off by the monster.
The darkness blurred his vision, leaving him no time to even call for help. Gu Xun might not even have realized he had been dragged away by the creature.
The monster was intimately familiar with the museum’s layout. All Yu Jiu heard beside his ear was the rushing whistle of fast movement and the monster’s heavy, ragged breathing.
Ah right, it was injured, the wound on its shoulder looked gruesome and was still dripping blood, yet it failed to slow the monster’s pace in the slightest. It seemed terribly anxious, eager to carry back the mate it had accidentally dropped behind in its haste.
Carrying him back to its warm nest.
That way, its little, soft mate who always curled up into a tight ball would no longer be cold.
By the time he was securely set back down on the ground, Yu Jiu’s mind was an absolute mess. For once, he found himself genuinely worrying about his derailed, shattered-to-pieces mission.
“091, staying away from the main plotline for this long, surely it won’t be judged as passive mission performance, right?”
Even he hesitated, asking with a wronged, pitiful tone: “I didn’t want the plot to collapse either, but accidents keep happening.”
Being dragged off by the monster twice now, this was already the second time.
091 fell silent for a long moment, mentally cursing the trash script assigned by the main system and its non-conformist protagonist for putting its precious baby through such grievance.
“It’s fine, baby. Missions and stuff, we haven’t strayed too far off course yet, so just let things flow naturally.”
The surface Yu Jiu was sitting on felt remarkably soft, as though a thick layer of cushions had been specially laid down, and it was quite warm as well.
He inspected the spot where the monster had put him down: a small, tidy room meticulously cleaned, with various delicate little trinkets and toys scattered across the floor in a disorganized fashion.
They looked as though they had been collected specifically to coax someone.
Multiple layers of soft mats and cotton quilts had been piled up, wrapping around him in thick folds as if fearing he might catch a chill.
Did they take him for the Princess and the Pea?
Yu Jiu couldn’t fathom what the monster was trying to accomplish. Dragging him back through all this trouble surely couldn’t be just to raise him like a princess.
While he was lost in thought, the monster, which had stood quietly in place the entire time, suddenly leaned closer, gently pressing its hand against Yu Jiu’s shoulder as he half-sank into the quilts.
Its movements were delicate and tender, as though afraid of shattering him, brimming with caution and deep reverence.
The monster spoke in a low, quiet murmur, repeatedly whispering the exact same phrase over and over again.
“Kiss, want to kiss Xiao Jiu.”