I Don't Agree to the Terms

After tidying up and ensuring nothing was left behind, he left the underground laboratory right away. Naturally, the underground lab was processed to guarantee nothing would be left behind.

What use would it be to keep that stuff? If recycled, it could become a resource; not recycling it would be a loss.

Gu Shanhai chose the tallest building in the city center as the best spot to watch. Now it was already 10 p.m., and all the workers had not yet finished their shifts. Each was diligently working overtime. Gu Shanhai estimated they wouldn't leave until at least 11 p.m.

Fortunately, it didn't matter. They wouldn't have to work so hard once Xiao Yongsheng performed the blood sacrifice. When people died, their souls were gone—there would be no need for overtime.

"It's not necessarily true, though. What if Xiao Yongsheng gains abilities like the Soul Summoning Technique and immediately brings the dead back as zombies to work for a lifetime even after death?"

When the zombies' flesh rotted off, they turned into skeleton soldiers, and if they wore down further, they could still be used in factories as bone meal—useful as feed or fertilizer.

Thinking of this, Gu Shanhai felt there was still quite a bit of residual value in these people.

If they weren't scattered to the winds, even better; not only could their bodies work a job, but after death as ghosts, they could work another job. Moreover, they'd only need to be paid the minimum wage without contributing to social security or housing fund—who needs it when you're dead?

"Hisss~I seem to have grasped some unspeakable truths."

Gu Shanhai couldn't help but take a cool breath, beginning to understand why the Endless Abyss collected skeleton soldiers. It was a marvelous exploitation of labor.

"Better not think about it too much. This kind of exploitation might lead to hanging from a streetlight... right?" Gu Shanhai felt that normally such exploitation would indeed land someone on a streetlight. But with his power and capabilities, how could he be hung from a streetlight?

Upon reconsidering, he found it wasn't very useful for him. He could exploit Heart Demon Dao Soldiers with even higher efficiency.

His mind continued to wander until late into the night, as workers gradually left their jobs.

The entire city seemed still lit, yet it was silent and quiet.

At midnight, Gu Shanhai watched as Assistant Li pushed Xiao Yongsheng in a wheelchair to the city center. It was just the two of them, neither security guards nor any other assistants in sight.

Xiao Yongsheng still held a statue in his arms, resembling the Eye Demon.

Naturally, Gu Shanhai understood it was the idol of Death's Quiet Eye.

Assistant Li, following behind, had a vacant look in his eyes, clearly under control.

Correspondingly, Xiao Yongsheng's vitality was fading, and his life force was on the brink of being extinguished. Were he not kept alive by the idol of Death's Quiet Eye, he would have already died.

Even so, barely hanging onto life, if he did not complete the ritual, he would not survive three hours.

"The soul has undergone significant abnormal changes." Gu Shanhai observed Xiao Yongsheng further and found no change in his body, which still looked human. However, within his soul were eyeballs of all sizes, swaying inside as he moved.

It looked like a transparent balloon filled with eyeballs.

Noticing Gu Shanhai's gaze, the eyeballs within Xiao Yongsheng's soul also uniformly looked back, locking eyes with Gu Shanhai.

"Eyes as a medium, huh?"

Gu Shanhai muttered softly to himself, then his facial skin began to crack, and tendrils like those of plants emerged, writhing in the air.

He had become a face of tendrils, and thus, he silently met the gaze of the eyeballs for three minutes before they looked away.

It seemed they deemed Gu Shanhai no threat, or perhaps thought him a kindred spirit due to his bizarre appearance.

Seeing this, Gu Shanhai took the opportunity to stuff the plant tendrils back into his face and smoothed his skin to sprout facial features again.

"If the avatar of Death's Quiet Eye is this strange, its main body must be incredibly powerful."

Gu Shanhai did not speculate any further.

For him, these weren't things to be considered at the moment. It was like worrying about college entrance exams right after being born—not aiming too high, but needless worrying.

There would be time to consider it when his strength increased.

Xiao Yongsheng arrived smoothly at the city center and, with trembling control over Assistant Li, placed the statue of the Silent Eye of Death in the predetermined spot.

As the statue was positioned, Gu Shanhai could feel the ritual beginning to activate.

"Indeed, Xiao Yongsheng is nothing but a tool. Whether he's here or not, the ritual can be activated. It's really all about the statue returning to its rightful place."

At that moment, Xiao Yongsheng seemed to have a resurgence of energy, his face turning an unhealthy red as he stood up and began to dance and shout loudly.

With every shout from him, Gu Shanhai could feel the entire sacrificial ritual speeding up by a notch.

Without Xiao Yongsheng, the sacrificial ritual could still have been carried out. It was designed to start automatically, albeit slowly. After all, it was a ritual, not some auto-program.

"Now, it has begun."

Gu Shanhai watched the ritual with a somber expression. To him, this sacrifice was an excellent practice of collecting, extracting, and transmitting—a special technique indeed.

For instance, after mastering it, he could unravel the knowledge related to large-scale absorption systems or high-end transmission technology, among other things.

Otherwise, there really wouldn't be any point in coming all this way just to observe a sacrifice. He could manage a river of blood on his own, no problem.

"This thing even has an operator identification system, pretty high-end indeed."

Gu Shanhai couldn't help but comment as he watched Assistant Li turn into a puddle of blood, finally merging with the soil.

Not only was Xiao Yongsheng unharmed, but through this sacrifice, his vitality had somewhat recovered. At least he wasn't trembling as before.

However, as his vitality returned, the cancer within him proliferated madly.

Twisted bones pierced through Xiao Yongsheng's skin, growing into eerie and distorted shapes.

"Bone cancer, huh? Xiao Yongsheng's willpower is truly terrifying." Gu Shanhai recognized the type of cancer as bone cancer, which meant that when receiving the boon of the Silent Eye of Death, the cancer had also manifested.

"He really got screwed over."

"But then again, why is it bone proliferation? Isn't bone cancer a tumor?"

Gu Shanhai knew that eternal torment would accompany Xiao Yongsheng until the world's end.

Normally, one would help him rid of the disease, but the Silent Eye of Death had done the opposite, enhancing the bone cancer instead.

Xiao Yongsheng's bones continued to entwine, eventually forming a giant humanoid shape on his back.

And in the sky, a massive eye approached bit by bit, plunging the entire Yunxing City into a deathly silence.

Gu Shanhai looked up at this eye, feeling it seemed familiar.

"The sun?!" Gu Shanhai realized in an instant. Of course, it looked familiar; it bore some resemblance to the Abnormal Sun he had encountered in the Adventure King world.

"I originally thought the Abnormality·Solar Shooting of the sun was the work of an information sea's specter, but it seems there's a higher existence that has contaminated it, leading to its abnormality."

"Fortunately, the Abnormality·Solar Shooting is strong enough or else it would have been a disaster."

After comparison, Gu Shanhai found that the previous Abnormal Sun was essentially a juvenile version with different attributes to the Silent Eye of Death.

"The arrival is imminent." Gu Shanhai watched as the sacrificial ritual neared its end, and the bones on Xiao Yongsheng's body transformed into another person—he recognized her as Su Ling, Xiao Yongsheng's long-deceased wife.

"Eternal Sleep Chang'an, the entanglements between the Xiao and Su families simply can't be severed. So, Su Ling was consumed by Xiao Yongsheng?"

Gu Shanhai watched the scene unfold with a calm demeanor.

At the same time, the sky descended into chaos, and the Silent Eye of Death successfully entered this world.