15: Chapter 15: Dolly the cloned sheep only lived for six and a half years.

Mo Tang collapsed in a courtyard deep in the northwest district.

Two of the Puppet's four legs were snapped, five of its eight arms were broken, and a gaping hole split its torso from front to back, revealing dense gears and array patterns inside.

Mo Tang herself had fallen out of the Puppet, leaning against a broken wall with blood at the corner of her mouth, still gripping a mechanical repeating crossbow in her right hand.

When Xie Feng and Tu Ziguan rushed into the courtyard, Mo Tang was pressing the bolt magazine into the repeating crossbow with trembling fingers, finally clicking it in on the third try.

Seeing the bells shaking in their hands, she finally relaxed.

"There's one."

Mo Tang's voice was no longer filled with Spiritual Qi, sounding somewhat hoarse.

"It's not a derivative. It's stronger than a derivative."

Tu Ziguan crouched down to check her injuries.

Mo Tang had a laceration on her right rib, her clothes were torn, her skin was split open, and blood was trickling down her waist.

She pulled a roll of bandage from her sleeve, bit one end, and wrapped it around her waist with one hand.

"It changed into my face."

Mo Tang said while biting the bandage, her voice muffled yet clear and logical.

"Just now in the alley, I heard footsteps behind me and glanced back. It was standing right there, wearing my face, my body, and my clothes. I made eye contact with it."

She took a deep breath and pulled the bandage tight, wincing from the pain.

"Then the Puppet blocked a hit for me. When it crashed into me, I could feel it burrowing into the Puppet. It disrupted thirty percent of the Puppet's internal array patterns and broke four drive shafts. If I hadn't reacted quickly enough to blow open the Puppet's outer shell and blast it out, this Puppet would already belong to it."

Tu Ziguan's expression darkened. He looked at the wound on Mo Tang's waist, then at the half-destroyed Puppet, remaining silent for a moment.

"What you said about eye contact," Tu Ziguan began, "what does it mean?"

"Literally."

Mo Tang tucked the end of the bandage into the knot at her waist.

"After it turned into my face, I made eye contact with it. Then I felt something trying to burrow into my body."

She looked at Tu Ziguan.

"It requires eye contact—turning into the target's face, making eye contact with the target, and then it can kill the target and replace them. I only made eye contact with it for a moment just now, and the Puppet took the hit for me. If the eye contact had lasted any longer, even the Puppet might not have been able to withstand it."

There was a moment of silence in the courtyard, and then a snicker broke out.

Tu Ziguan stood up and looked at Xie Feng.

Xie Feng was standing at the courtyard entrance, a very strange expression on his face.

It wasn't fear, nor was it tension; it was an expression Tu Ziguan had never seen on Xie Feng's face before.

Xie Feng was smiling.

It was a smile curling up from the corners of his mouth, one he couldn't suppress no matter what.

"Eye contact," Xie Feng said.

Tu Ziguan looked at him. "...Brother Feng?"

"Eye contact," Xie Feng said again, the arc of his mouth widening a fraction more. "It needs to make eye contact with the target, and then it can kill the target."

"Right." Mo Tang looked at Xie Feng somewhat strangely.

"It has to be eye contact. It looks at the target, and the target looks at it too."

"Right."

Xie Feng took a deep breath.

"Stay here and watch Mo Tang. Don't move."

Then he turned and walked out of the courtyard.

"Brother Feng!" Tu Ziguan chased after him. "Where are you going?"

Xie Feng didn't look back, his pace growing faster and faster. His voice drifted back from ahead, carrying a lightness Tu Ziguan had never heard before.

"To find it."

"Are you crazy?!"

Xie Feng stopped in his tracks and turned around.

He looked at Tu Wu, that uncontrollable smile still hanging on the corners of his mouth.

"Tu Wu," Xie Feng said, "do you know what I've been most afraid of these past six months?"

Tu Ziguan didn't answer.

"Remember this, if it comes to eye contact, no one dares to make eye contact with That Entity!"

Xie Feng laughed aloud.

He looked at Tu Ziguan.

"Tell me, an anomaly that kills through eye contact—if it makes eye contact with me, what will it see?"

Tu Ziguan froze.

Xie Feng turned around and continued walking forward.

His back passed through the narrow alley, through those empty adobe houses, and through the afternoon sunlight, carrying an unprecedented lightness.

Tu Ziguan muttered to himself.

"Yog-Sothoth?"

That wasn't crazy talk.

Humming a tune, Xie Feng ran around everywhere.

He found it in the wasteland at the edge of the village.

It was standing amidst a patch of withered yellow grass, with its back to him. Its figure and attire were identical to Xie Feng's.

A dark cyan robe, a leather belt with bronze buckles, long hair tied up with a jade crown—even its posture was exactly the same.

"I'll say it again, Dolly the cloned sheep only lived for six and a half years."

It turned around.

Xie Feng saw his own face.

A face identical to his own, a face he saw in the bronze mirror every single morning, familiar to the point of absolute recognition.

That face smiled at him.

"You still dare to smile?"

Xie Feng strode forward with big strides.

"Kid, remember this: people who want to win don't have smiles on their faces, but guaranteed winners are different!"

Xie Feng felt an unprecedented sense of lightness.

Taking pressure every day, being scared by Outer Gods, being scared by anomalies.

He had been compressed into a gas tank, and now someone actually came looking for trouble to let him vent.

Couldn't ask for anything better! Couldn't ask for anything better, baby!

It raised its eyes and looked into Xie Feng's eyes.

Xie Feng stared right back with wide eyes.

He felt something trying to burrow into his body.

"I'm counting to three! If you can't burrow in, you're going to suffer a miserable fate~"

"Heh heh heh~"

Then it encountered that eternal gaze of Yog-Sothoth.

The anomaly let out a shriek, trying to turn its head away.

"Crying? Crying counts toward the time too!"

Staring wide-eyed, Xie Feng reached out and grabbed it.

He gripped the anomaly's head tightly, refusing to let it look away.

It wasn't the silent smile of those previous derivatives melting away, but a true, heart-rending shriek.

The sound was so piercing it almost condensed into a solid entity; the surrounding withered grass was cut off at the roots by the sound wave, soil churned up, and gravel splattered everywhere.

Xie Feng's eardrums stung, but he didn't close his eyes. Instead, he pressed his face right up against it.

He watched as the face belonging to him before him changed from a smile to terror, and from terror into distortion.

Then it began to burn.

Starting from the eyes, two clusters of light lit up within the eye sockets of that face identical to Xie Feng's—not flames, but a pure, temperatureless light containing all colors.

The spot where it stood turned into a humanoid mass of light.

A scorched circular mark was left amidst the withered grass, and something there had been erased from existence itself.

Xie Feng stood at the edge of the scorch mark, looking down.

"Yog-Sothoth." He said.

There was no response.

Xie Feng remained silent for a long time, then raised his head to look at the empty sky.

"Thank you."

Footsteps came from behind.

Tu Ziguan and Mo Tang caught up.

Supported by Tu Ziguan, Mo Tang had a small patch of blood seeping through the bandage on her right rib. She saw the scorched circular mark, then looked at Xie Feng standing at the edge of the mark, and opened her mouth.

Tu Ziguan looked at Xie Feng's back, walked over, and stopped beside Xie Feng.

"Resolved?"

Xie Feng nodded.

"That anomaly?"

"If it doesn't die, consider it a bomb."

Tu Ziguan pulled an oiled paper package from his sleeve and handed it to Xie Feng.

"Sesame flatbread, stuffed with meat. Brought it this morning, it's still warm."

Xie Feng took it and took a bite.

It really was warm.